yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[HTC One S] AKToronto:
Helpful tips from a recent downgrader

So I finally took the plunge and downgraded my hboot!

A few things I did that I thought was helpful.

#1. Fully charged my phone. This was one less thing to worry about

#2. I used Ubuntu 12.04 like in the instructions and ran it off a usb stick. I copied the ville folder right onto the usb stick, and then transfered it from the cdrom subfolder (where it shows up) straight to the desktop to make it easier and let me follow the instructions step by step. Also, there is no need to "root" or go su under Ubuntu for these purposes. Dont worry about it.

#3. I played around with the linux setup first to get used to it before i bricked my phone. I had to figure out basic things like how to open terminal windows (these basic things can be googled easily)

#4. I made sure I had everything all set up through linux before i bricked my phone. Especially I made sure I had my own bakp4

#5 After spaming the commands in step #3 I actually got "sde" values, so it seems these can be sda, sdb, sdc, etc. Dont worry, just make sure to remember it for steps 9 AND step 12!!! This is important too. I almost caught myself typing in the wrong values. I suggest doing every step slowly.

#6 I had to reset my phone a few times to get it to flash, but this wasnt a problem, I just followed instructions and waited for the "QDL Mode" thingy to disappear

#7 I experienced no wireless or other issues after hboot downgrade. My suggestion for folks is to flash a good RUU for their phone ahead of time, that you know works with the ROM you want. Downgrade after, and then you can play around with baseband radios, etc. Downgrading alone, it seems to me doesnt cause any other issues. It seems like if you downgrade and flash other RUUs then you may end up with issues related to those RUUs. Anyways, I find that people are confused in general about RUUs and how they interact with ROMs, and so forth.It may be helpful to put up a dev post explaining RUUs and what partitions they flash, their power, etc, etc.

#8 I was running Viper1.2.1 before my downgrade. I had much earlier (ie many custom ROMs ago) flashed a Bell Mobility 2.4 RUU, which had upgraded my radio and hboot to a 1.14xxxx something version. But off of this RUU, I never had Wifi issues. And I still dont now that I am downgraded.

Hope this helps others willing to take the journey!
[HTC One S] npiper05:
I'm confused with the Hex Edit. If we have the bakp4 we don't have to do that correct? We just put ours in the ville folder you download in the OP?
[HTC One S] AKToronto:
Thats correct. It appears the hex edit steps are there just in case you completely forget about this step before bricking your phone... It also means you would need your IMEI number written down somewhere besides your phone.

I wouldnt worry about that step, again, unless your in the middle of the downgrade and forgot to pull the file off of your phone and into the ville folder for use in linux
[HTC One S] Qs5:
Okay after I downgrade my hboot will I loose my current data? Almost ready to start.

EDIT! Well I finished and messed up, it booted and everything, just no IMEI number now, its "000000000000000" what should I do? I flashed the one provided in the the Ville.zip

EDIT! post #252 saved me
[HTC One S] theguitarman94:
I've bricked my phone. Any help would be much appreciated. I'ts my own stupid fault sorry. Every time I go to list devices I only get the 6 dev/sda results back instead of the paragraph with lots of them I keep turning my phone off for qdl to disappear and nothign is happening. I have restarted my comptuer. changed usb ports etc and it's not working. I want to cry. Don't know how I can rescue my phone but if anyone can do it. it will be one of you guys :)
[HTC One S] theguitarman94:
Tried the jet evita tool and it says cannot find emmc partitions so that doesn't work. For the main commands I've tried Sdb12 sdc12 and sdd12 and ALL I get is waiting device. I've also done the next step where you try and manually reset it and instead of sdb4 I've put in sb12 agan and sdc12 etc. I don't know what's going on!
[HTC One S] jac10000:
Ok restart from step 2

2 in terminal : $ watch -n 1 lsusb

you have to see your phone : Qualcom, Inc.Gobi Wireless modem (QDL mode)

3 then , another terminal : ls /dev/sd*

you have a list without your partition phone

hold power down on your phone for about 10 seconds*,OR until you see (QDL mode) disappear and let go

then you spam ls /dev/sd* in the second terminal until you have a answer wth your partition phone
[HTC One S] npiper05:
Thanks for all your tips. I am a little nervous but probably going to try today.

Question: after you finish you can just flash any Rom, correct? I don't need an RUU?

Thanks
[HTC One S] Darknites:
Ya don't do RUU, you can flash everything that's need for JB roms and whatever rom you on now will load fine after if you was worried about that.
[HTC One S] npiper05:
Awesome. Support seems great on this thread so I'm going to try later today. I'll post if I have any problems.
[HTC One S] Darknites:
Agreed the support is great in this thread.
[HTC One S] Sneakyghost:
Correct. If you pull your p4 of the phone you don't need to edit the blank one.

[EDIT]

Just realized from browsing on my pC that this reply came way too late. Tapatalk sometimes makes me miss the last page. Keeps happen more often lately. It never brings me to the current page from notification bar unless i hit the notification right when it pops up. 15 minute polling set. Older notes lead to older pages.... hmmm... i understand i have to reply more carefully and check for newer pages first lol.
[HTC One S] theguitarman94:
I do see my phone in QDL mode. Everything seems to work but I don't get the outcomes
[HTC One S] cat2115:
Hi, I'd already downgrade per OP guide and was wonder what RUU belong to radio 1.06 US T-Mobile just in case phone need to go back for whatever reason.

Is it RUU_Ville_U_TMOUS_1.53.531.16?

Thanks
[HTC One S] fmedrano1977:
As soon as the QDL Mode disappears, in my case paste what it asks you to type and press enter, do this repeatedly, on my third time it showed up.

Tmobile HTC One™ S
[HTC One S] theguitarman94:
I've done that. I seem to be doing the process right but it's not having any of it. It's a real pain in the ass so I might have to send it in for repair. Going to cost a lot of money though.
[HTC One S] theguitarman94:
So my device isn't showing my partition tables so maybe you can no longer write to them or they have been corrupted? Running out of ideas. So did you guys all put SDC12 OR SDB 12 and then if it didn;t work did you put SDB 4 OR SDC 4? Or could my device be SDC8 or a multitude of different combinations?
[HTC One S] jac10000:
What is the asnwer when you do ls /dev/sd* ?

If you don't see your phone and if the last device is sda*, your phone partitions are certainly sdb*

---------------------------------------------------------------------------sdb* ----------------------------------------------- sdc*

---------------------------------------------------------------------------sdc* ----------------------------------------------- sdd*

and it 's always sd*4 and sd*12

But logicaly you must see the partitions of the one s when you type ls /dev/sd*. Have you try 5 or 10 times ? Have you try to unplug and replug the USB cable then try another ls /dev/sd*
[HTC One S] traicer:
Finally went ahead and did this after reading it over like 20 times. Everything worked out flawlessly. thanks!
[HTC One S] npiper05:
Stuck

Using 12.04 and on the last step I get this:

sudo ./emmc_recover -f ./bakp4 -d /dev/sda4 -c 24576

sudo: ./emmc_recover: command not found

Any help?

thanks
[HTC One S] Qs5:
Only issue I had was the freezing at QDL mode, I skipped steps 9-11 and did step 12 and modified. Because I kept getting errors with step 9 part b I guess.

$ sudo ./emmc_recover -f ./bakp4 -d /dev/sdc4 -c 24576

To (New Terminal)

cd Desktop/ville

$ sudo ./emmc_recover -f ./bakp4 -d /dev/sdc4 -c 24576

Then forgetting to replace the bakp4, (Which I should have done before doing the command) I had to hex edit the IMEI number as shown in post 252.

Just a heads up if anyone else is having these issues.
[HTC One S] npiper05:
Closer

Hi

I'm a little further - now I get

Ready to write 1024 bytes

Resetting device

Cannot reset device

Reset command sent

Device already exists!!

Please disconnect device!!

Cannot reset device

Still stuck

Edit-----------

Success! Now going to try to flash all those roms I never could because of the wifi issue with 1.14!

Thanks
[HTC One S] Darknites:
Forget roms lol flash this here.
[HTC One S] DylanTheVillian:
Great Thread!!

I once had a crap One S phone from T-Mobile,

They sent it to me and it was already unusable,

I couldn't flash a kernel or a radio it was horrible,

I followed this easy guide and it made me feel capable,

Now I have a phone that I can do what I please,

I'm out of rhymes thanks to you all!!!!!

:silly::silly::silly::silly:
[HTC One S] fmedrano1977:
What rhymed?

Tmobile HTC One™ S
[HTC One S] DylanTheVillian:
maybe nothing, i've been drinking and had just finished on my first try... quite excited ::laugh:
[HTC One S] :
Yea. Its EXTREMELY easy if you just read it slowly. People ask "its stuck and won't write" and it says in the op if it gets stuck "hold power for 10 seconds"
[HTC One S] LibertyMonger:
Yeah I can't see how anyone could have an issue if they simply follow the tutorial. I think people are making it harder than what it is.
[HTC One S] Sneakyghost:
An issue that has nothing to do with the tutorial could be, that the reset command on the chip doesn't work most of the time and hence from rebooting the phone too often the port address range gets exhausted and at some point the os can't send data anymore. That is what happened on my phone. I needed to reboot it for virtually every 23k chunk and when I went on to restoring my p4 partition it simply errored out on me.

That can be quite scary and one needs to find out how to reset the ports in order to get it working again.

I believe that this inability to reboot by itself and thus re-establishing the connection too often is dependent on the chip quality. I might be mistaken though.

I also did two hboot writes on the same port. That might have contributed to it as well.

sent from a phone
[HTC One S] theguitarman94:
This must be my problem then! Please tell me how you overcome this problem by resetting the ports!
[HTC One S] jac10000:
Have you try to use ubuntu livecd ? it's clean installation of the OS and it's maybe more appropriate whith your computer
[HTC One S] theguitarman94:
I've tried live cd and installation
[HTC One S] jac10000:
And on other computer ?
[HTC One S] _-..zKiLLA..-_:
There really needs to be a how to video for this cause i dont quite understand what happens after finishing step 13 and post #2
[HTC One S] theguitarman94:
Ok so I tried this all again today and now instead of my phone is now just showing up as qualcomm, inc instead of qualcomm, inc gobi wireless modem (QDL mode) I wonder why this is. It means there must be a change in the device. Really want to unbrick this thing! Has the OP got any ideas (Please pretty please!)
[HTC One S] AKToronto:
Could you use an RUU to load 1.06?

Hi folks.

Im curious, if you had a compatable RUU for your phone, could you not load the RUU, then find its temp folder before flashing, go into the rom.zip in the temp folder, replace the .nb0 file with the hboot of your choice, and then let the RUU run?

Im not sure if the RUU would still run with the modified hboot there, but I was just curious.
[HTC One S] fmedrano1977:
Did did you reboot ubuntu?

Tmobile HTC One™ S
[HTC One S] theguitarman94:
yes i did and i used a different computer too. I wonder why its changed.
[HTC One S] AKToronto:
Not sure but one way to check is to run the RUU, let it extract all its files. Then press ctr alt delete and in your task manager highlight the application. Right click and navigate to the temp folder the files are located in. There should be a rom.zip in the temp folder. Make sure you have WinRAR or another compressed file extractor handy (stock windows wont open it). Then open the rom.zip. You should see an hboot image with a version number as part of the file name. If the version number is higher then the one you want, dont flash it!

---------- Post added at 12:17 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:07 AM ----------

Sneaky, I ran the Bell Mobility RUU you describe and found the hboot file in it. Its version 1.13 so don't worry about not being able to open or check.

Im curious though if anyone has tried running 1.04. I wonder if it gives you access to other partitions too (would it help with s-off?)... Anyways 1.06 seems to do the trick as a daily driver, but my curiosity may get the better of me one day.

Also it seems that if the 1.09 is an .img file, I wonder if you could just fastboot it to upgrade? Seems like it wouldnt work cuz you would be in the bootloader to begin with... But I cant say I have tried it.. something like fastboot flash hboot <bootimgfile>

Also, there is no RUU out there with a 1.09 nb0?

---------- Post added at 12:27 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:17 AM ----------

Im also curious about p23... My p23 seems mostly empty except for the following phrase at offset 0x840: recovery.--wipe_all

Im actually a bit confused as to what is gained by hex editing this p23... Partitions between HTC One S and One X dont seem to align..

AbsolutelyGrimm seemed to suggest this would allow you to flash any RUU. I wonder if by doing such a hex edit, you could then downgrade your hboot by flashing an older RUU (something previously thought impossible)? My other idea was to try to downgrade by running an RUU then switching the nb0 file while the rom.zip is still in the temp folder... Havent followed up on either idea yet... I may have to try this, because it may help all those having RUU issues, trying to flash the correct one, wanting to downgrade hboots, but arent comfortable with linux, etc.

---------- Post added at 12:55 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:27 AM ----------

Nipper, if your having Wifi issues you may need to flash the wifi partitions that you want. Try the lates wifi partitions from Zarboz's dev thread at http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=2064868 These partitions seem to work just fine on Viper 1.2.1.

Now that your on a lower hboot flashing these partitions shouldnt be a problem. Just flash the zip from the thread in your recovery. But having a lower hboot alone may not solve your wifi issues. I think you would need to flash the updated partitions.
[HTC One S] RockR172:
what should i replace sdc12 with, inorder to restore hboot?

sdb12 right?

EDIT: sdb12 yea..

AND I SUCCESSFULLY DOWNGRADED MY HBOOT! :)

No tough issues..!! :)
[HTC One S] Paradoxxx:
Successfully downgraded on Xubuntu , Ubuntu, Linux Mint. Even the new hboot. Everything works perfectly. But the hboot writing phase is a bit long. Wouldn't it be possible to write more than 23kbits/reset ?

Envoyé depuis mon HTC One S avec Tapatalk
[HTC One S] :
Not in Ubuntu.

Only in tiny core, which doesn't have lsusb and other commands. Never tried it there
[HTC One S] stollerolle123:
now on version 1.06 - no problem at all

Thanks
[HTC One S] Sneakyghost:
So that limitation is not imposed by emmc_recover but rather by the host system? i really need to understand that, i so hope i to find a way to make this more slick and fast...
[HTC One S] cat2115:
I'm extracting rom.zip from RUU_Ville_U_TMOUS_1.84.531.2_R2_Radio_0.16.31501S.16_2_10.22.31501S.10L_release_263233_signed.exe and had the hboot1.09.img. Then I rename it to hboot.nb0 and place inside your ville folder. If everything successful and my hboot is now t-mobile 1.09, later on in the future and want to run stock (oem lock), can I run RUU_Ville_U_TMOUS_1.84.531.2_R2_Radio_0.16.31501S.16_2_10.22.31501S.10L_release_263233_signed.exe without hex editing mmcblk0p23?

I personally feel 1.06 take forever to go BL, power+Vol down seem to be buggy..

Edit:

i'm on hboot 1.06 (downgrade from 1.14), can I run RUU (RUU_Ville_U_TMOUS_1.84.531.2_R2_Radio_0.16.31501S. 16_2_10.22.31501S.10L_release_263233_signed.exe) w/out hex edit mmcblk0p23 since Hboot is higher?
[HTC One S] theguitarman94:
does anyone know a solution to the phone only showing up as qualcomm and not as the gobi modem? Still want to see if I have any hope of unbricking before I send it in
[HTC One S] 2rz_taco_sr5:
hey guys sorry I'm sure the answer is here but by page 22 I either missed or I can't go any further lol can someone tell me if this changes my Cid. in the end or will it stay the same? I have a stock T-Mobile replacement with hboot 1.14 and I just want to root and get back to 1.06 for now. want to do this before I send my old phone back but wanna run stock for a while so will I need to flash any ruu or anything or will I be able to do the process and just boot into stock rooted with no other changes? seen people talk about trouble flashing T-Mobile ruu and issues getting HTC Dec unlocked after so I'm just wondering if I will even bother downgrading
[HTC One S] ernestnwanu:
Will this work on Zorin OS? It's based on Ubuntu.

Kind of hesitant to do this as it's still a new phone, but I want this over with lol.
[HTC One S] Zer0r:
Just downgraded from 1.14.00004 version. One step left me sweat - during HBoot writing (step no. 9) my Ubuntu went to sleep mode. I woke it right up, but my screen went crazy - I got horizontal lines instead of normal image. Something still happening there, so I waited until finish and rebooted computer. Then I continued from step 10 and on - and everything finished normally! Thank you for this manual!
[HTC One S] theguitarman94:
Keep the help coming guys! I've got all the packages and libs etc. I've tried doing the tutorial again and everytime I have to reset my phone it comes out of qdl mode and goes back into just qualcomm mode. I'm not able to view my partitions at all so like I keep thinking maybe the chip is screwed
[HTC One S] cat2115:
Maybe one can lighten up. This is how it happened and I risk in downgrading to hboot 1.09. Somehow my phone become "soft brick" (fail to mount sdcard, etc). So I follow this guide. This case it's not working since somehow cmd did not see my devices (adb devices). Then I try this guide and it works but I had to reformat sdcard first. Anyhow, I oem lock,. Then I ran T-Mobile RUU 2.35. This upgrade my hboot to 1.14. Finally, I extract T-mobile RUU for hboot1.09.img and rename to hboot.nb0 and place in "Ville" folder along w/bakp4 from my phone. Flashing the hboot109 all successfully per OP guide.

Here's the question:

1) After step 12 successfully flashed, the charging light suppose to come back on, but it didn't in my case. I power on, it's not on. So I re-do from step 2 to step 9 (reflash hboot.nbo) again. This time, it flash for a few minute (half way, i guess). Then suddenly the charging light went back on and the terminal just said "waiting for device." so I pull out the usb cable and power on. Go into BL and it's 1.09.

2) Since something odd in question 1, should I oem lock again and then run RUU for that 1.09 hboot to ensure it's not a "half process ???? " hboot 1.09?

3)in BL, fastboot, it show as "Fastboot USB" instead of "Fastboot User". In CMD, doing adb devices. it just show something like "list devices". It should have show my device number but it's not.

Edit:

Just watch Wolf-Flow youtube and it's fastboot usb... so i'm good. I guess i must have mix up with Samsung Infuse 4G.
[HTC One S] fmedrano1977:
Why did you want 1.09? The ville.zip already had 1.06 in it. Your the first that mentions changing the hboot file before doing the process, not sure if that had any effects on it. You should now be able to run the hboot 1.09 RUU, I would do so.

Tmobile HTC One™ S
[HTC One S] cat2115:
1.06 had some bug on my phone and since my phone got soft brick (not sure how, it just happened when i reboot my phone at work). I didn't run RUU 1.09 cuz i thought RUU 2.35 had all the updated files, assuming downgrading Hboot will only affect the hboot not the rest of the files in the phone that was from RUU. (hope you understand what i meant).
[HTC One S] fmedrano1977:
Yeah HBOOT doesn't affect it, I downgraded to 1.06 from the 2.35 RUU, wifi still refuses to stay on after screen turns of, that tells me all 2.35 firmware remains in place.

Tmobile HTC One™ S
[HTC One S] Zer0r:
hellforgedheart,

Looking at your log it seems everything to be ok. Do you have charging light back on? If so - just turn you phone on by pressing Power button for 1-2 seconds.
[HTC One S] hellforgedheart:
Thanks for the reply. The charging light didn't come back on, and I can't figure out for the life of me why not. If I try to restart from scratch everything just hangs because the phone won't leave QDL mode. I must have tried resetting it 20 times; also rebooted my Ubuntu server, then tried it on another debian box I have, no luck.
[HTC One S] cat2115:
Oh it happened to me too. after step 12 completed, the charger light does not come back on.. see my few post above.
[HTC One S] romansvillage:
Same thing happens to me. I'm holding the power button until QDL mode dissapears from lsusb. I see the sdb* drives. Just some 5 seconds later my phone goes back into QDL mode and i can't write to sdb12...

Anyone knows how to continue?

EDIT:

So I did run dmesg command after the device went back to QDL mode. This is the output:
[HTC One S] hellforgedheart:
I can't even get that far; here's mine:

[ 431.844274] generic ttyUSB0: generic converter now disconnected from ttyUSB0
[ 431.844290] usbserial_generic 1-2:1.0: device disconnected
[ 432.664032] usb 1-2: new high-speed USB device number 18 using ehci_hcd
[ 432.797604] usbserial_generic 1-2:1.0: generic converter detected
[ 432.797743] usb 1-2: generic converter now attached to ttyUSB0
[ 434.030321] usb 1-2: USB disconnect, device number 18
[ 434.030496] generic ttyUSB0: generic converter now disconnected from ttyUSB0
[ 434.030512] usbserial_generic 1-2:1.0: device disconnected
[ 434.852058] usb 1-2: new high-speed USB device number 19 using ehci_hcd
[ 434.985696] usbserial_generic 1-2:1.0: generic converter detected
[ 434.985837] usb 1-2: generic converter now attached to ttyUSB0
[ 468.421513] usb 1-2: USB disconnect, device number 19
[ 468.421711] generic ttyUSB0: generic converter now disconnected from ttyUSB0
[ 468.421727] usbserial_generic 1-2:1.0: device disconnected
[ 469.244049] usb 1-2: new high-speed USB device number 20 using ehci_hcd
[ 469.378524] usbserial_generic 1-2:1.0: generic converter detected
[ 469.379527] usb 1-2: generic converter now attached to ttyUSB0
[ 470.607849] usb 1-2: USB disconnect, device number 20
[ 470.608046] generic ttyUSB0: generic converter now disconnected from ttyUSB0
[ 470.608061] usbserial_generic 1-2:1.0: device disconnected
[ 471.428050] usb 1-2: new high-speed USB device number 21 using ehci_hcd
[ 471.561988] usbserial_generic 1-2:1.0: generic converter detected
[ 471.562128] usb 1-2: generic converter now attached to ttyUSB0
[HTC One S] romansvillage:
I could restore the bakp4 on sdb4 in that 7 seconds that non-QDL mode was active, so I can use my phone again now.

Still I would want to downgrade hboot.

Anyone has an idea?
[HTC One S] ernestnwanu:
Guys, I'm doing this right now. Ran into a small problem. I'm at the part where I need to navigate to the ville folder on my Desktop. But it's saying "no such file or directory". I'm sure I'm getting the command right that's stated in OP. Please help.
[HTC One S] romansvillage:
Well, if it says that there is no such directory you might not have extracted the ZIP archive to your Desktop, or something failed there, or the directories name is different than in OP or not on Desktop but in another folder.
[HTC One S] ernestnwanu:
No, everything is how it should be. I tried navigating to Desktop, home etc. All failed.
[HTC One S] romansvillage:
You get an error if you enter this into Terminal?
[HTC One S] ernestnwanu:
OK... that was dumb of me. I installed a dutch version Ubuntu. It does say "Desktop" but I have to use the Dutch word for it. Thanks though.
[HTC One S] Raptylos:
Perhaps you didn't wrote the "V" in Ville in capital letter. Linux is case sensitive, even in directories.