[T-Mobile Samsung Galaxy Note II] Darkshado:
Hello TEKHD,

I have a T889V, but my carrier up here is Virgin Mobile Canada, whose network is technically closer to AT&T's band-wise. DC-HSPA 42 on 850 and 1900 MHz with LTE on Band 4 (AWS).

Reason I got a T889V is because I also keep a T-Mobile SIM for stateside trips, it was a bit cheaper and it leaves the door open to switching to Videotron in addition to the "Big Three".

I first unlocked the phone using the ServiceMode menu method.

I backed up /efs, and this is where I made my first mistake. I know I've been ranting about this for a few days now, you need a proper Qualcomm NV backup.

I usually stick to the Canadian ROMs as they tend to remain closer to their international brethren than the US ones, and also because they don't require tethering fixes. In this case, the T889V ROM also allows switching network modes between GSM, WCDMA and GSM/WCDMA/LTE easily.

I did modify the CSC files to remove the <CscFeature_Setting_DisableNetworkMode>lte</CscFeature_Setting_DisableNetworkMode> line in /system/csc/others.xml and even went so far as making a customized VMC CSC and reapplied that to get all the other little carrier tweaks like FastDormancy. The line is cosmetic only, as I've had it show 4G in the network icon and still get LTE, otherwise it shows 3G, H, H+ and LTE on the T889V. The other place I've seen it have an effect is in the network settings where it'll show GSM/WCDMA/LTE instead of GSM/WCDMA.

I've used Odin before, I have a download jig (two paralleled leftover 620kOhm resistors and a Sparkfun breakout board) and I've tarred my own images before with Cygwin.

To get the necessary files, I downloaded the stock T889V, I317M (Canadian LTE Note II variant, the one that'd actually be sold by VMC if they ever do.) and T889 ROMs from Sammobile.

My initial attempt to flash the I317M modem through Odin (as a standalone image) gave a fail before the phone began the actual writing process, i. e. it transferred the radio image without any issues. Later experiments show that only the T889V modem tar flashes with Odin, the T889 one doesn't either. Same goes for the whole, original Sammobile images, the modem partitions fail if you're cross-flashing.

I then used CWM with an update zip sourced here on XDA that included a "flash_image" binary to flash the 317M LJ2 modem. I used it to prep T889 and 889V zips as well. Rebooted the phone, it connected and gave me LTE, network icon and all. The before and after speedtests went from 3.5 to 35 Mbps. I did check and my IMEI showed 0 instead of, well, my IMEI.

No big deal, or so I thought, I'll just restore /efs in CWM, reflash the T889V modem and carry on. NOT.

The phone immediately started bootlooping, and the only way I initially got it to stop was to flash an N7100 boot.img. The S-Pen didn't work, nor did any networking apart from wifi. Getting QPST to talk to the phone was a bust as well; the hen and the egg.

I tried different combinations and couldn't fix the problem. (My flash counter sits well over 20 now.)

I got another poster (deeznutz1977) to send me his T889 NV backup (sans IMEI) the other day. I later had the idea of reflashing the I317M modem again, which did not boot loop after all (there may have been a matter of wiping /cache and Dalvik cache at the right time).

This time dialcode *#7284#, selecting "Qualcomm USB Settings" then selecting "RNDIS + DM + MODEM" worked. I could get the programs talking with the phone. I inserted my IMEI in deeznutz1977's backup, wrote that to the phone and rebooted.

The phone doesn't bootloop anymore, my IMEI is back, as is service on my current carrier. Plus, this configuration still works with AWS HSPA. The one catch is that bootloops resume if I reflash the T889V modem through either CWM or Odin.

I made a few more speed tests before writing this and managed to get an average 45 Mbps down and 12 up along with a 40 ms ping.

Hope that answered a few of your questions.

Regards,

Darkshado