yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Hardware Hacking General] SouL Shadow:
The files you refer to on Team Unlimited's site http://www.unlimited.io are the RUU's for the HTC Evo 4g LTE (jewel). For non-Htc ppl, an RUU is a windows executable that contains the full firmware and software for the given phone. Each RUU corresponds to a software release. Yes, the firmware images needed to create an msimage.mbn for jewel are contained in the RUU.

As for the mprg8960.hex:

The PBL does not perform OEM signature checking on the hex file. The hex file is built by Qualcomm before distributing the sources to the OEM's. It's sole function is to program blank or corrupted flash memory (nand, emmc, etc...) with the firmware bootloaders (sbl1, sbl2, sbl3, tz, rpm).

The address 0x2a000000 is where the mprg.hex is stored in memory. After upload the 'GO' command is used to transfer execution to the flash programmer (the hex file). The phone is supposed to acknowledge the 'GO' command before jumping to the new code. It appears that the 8960 firmware in use by HTC and Samsung has a bug and is not sending that acknowledgement. QPST waits for this acknowledgement before moving on to the next step. This is one of the reasons that prompted the creation of this thread, to develop an alternative to QPST.

Using the perl script posted above by Darkspr1te, other ppl have shown that the 'GO' command DOES transfer execution to the flash programmer and have used it to write the firmware (msimage.mbn) to emmc flash, but have not yet had success booting the loaded firmware. That is why I pointed out the need for the correct firmware version to be used to create the msimage.mbn.

-SLS-
[Hardware Hacking General] saketh91:
i don't know exactly which firmware version which i was on before bricking my phone.but i definitely flashed a rooted sense rom. however i have all zips of the roms which i probably should have installed.also will this tool apply for every device(8960) even my at&t htc one x?
[Hardware Hacking General] E:V:A:
Great work!

How do you know this? (Other sources have claimed the opposite...)

a) This could be an effect of PBL signature check!

b) Even if not checked, they could easily have changed the acknowledgement string to anything else.

c) It could also be an effect of a blown Qfuse...

d) Are you saying that QPST is not connecting to your phone? (What QPST version are you using?)

What other people? Do they even have the same phone?
[Hardware Hacking General] SouL Shadow:
Qualcomm docs only mention verifying the hex, they say nothing about signature checking. For all we know it's simply verifying the uncorrupted download.

The hex is built by qualcomm and distributed with *other* files to the oem's/licensee's. It only needs to be changed when the actual hardware changes. The msimage.mbn is the oem specific component. There is no oem signature on the hex, however there may be a qualcomm signature or some kind of checksum to ensure it's a valid file.

The acknowledgment does not contain any text. It's just a simple ACK reply.

QPST hangs waiting for a response from the 8960 phones (htc evita, jewel, and sgs3), but other ppl (I don't know/remember who) using the above mentioned script have uploaded the hex and been able to communicate with the flash programmer. They were even able to upload the msimage.mbm. Although the .mbn used was probably the wrong build because after writing to emmc it did not boot in to the sbl. Either due to wrong files or older versions of firmware (causing a rollback error).

This post: http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?p=36578082

Note the code part where it mentions 'openmulti' that command is only in the streaming download protocol which is used exclusively by the flash programmer.

EDIT 2013-01-28:

After a discussion with Ralekdev on IRC and reexamination of posted test results, it seems that the mprg8960.hex is NOT being executed. Will need to check the stored error code to see excatly why. Ralekdev was able to show me evidence of possible signature checking in the PBL. Again, we'll need to check the stored error code to confirm if that is the case. While this is a set back for msm8960 devices, it doesn't diminish the need for a full featured, open source, Linux replacement for QPST/QXDM.

-SLS-
[Hardware Hacking General] E:V:A:
Well, you should never trust Qualcomm documentation! By the time they write the documentation, there have been many changes.

Probably what you say is correct, but I'm not conviced since I haven't checked the code. It was a few months ago I was looking at this. Perhaps the HEX not checked for signature, since it's just the downloader. (But this doesn't make sense, since this would break the SecureBoot3 chain of trust.) But whatever is downloaded IS signature checked.

Well, this is not how the Odin handshake looks like! There there is a short string, like "LOKE" / "ODIN" or something like that. (I don't remember it on top of my head.) So AFAIK, Odin is not working with these device, which would be an indication that they have changed the handshake. (What other kind of tools would the mobile operators use?)

Exactly.
[Hardware Hacking General] withRandomPrecision:
Is it possible to access the bootloader output via USB UART for htc 8960 devices? Seems like this might be useful to get PBL/SBL output for a bricked device.
[Hardware Hacking General] SouL Shadow:
Take a look at the creation date on the hex files in the source archive. They were created in November 2011. But that build is from a later date (I don't have it in front of me, but I think it's from april 2012). That source archive is directly from qualcomm. Why is that important? Because it shows that even with most changes to the source, the hex files don't need to be rebuilt. Besides, the flash programmer is fairly limited in what it can do. It's purpose is to rewrite the bootloaders to blank or corrupted nand/nor/emmc flash. Once written the phone will shut down and attempt to boot normally. Secure Boot only covers the boot process from power on to hardware initialization, security environment setup and finally loading appsbl. Everything after that is up to the oem to do whatever they choose. Although, interestingly enough, team unlimited was able to create a custom hboot (htc's appsbl) which will load normally even with signature checking...

I don't think we're in odin anymore toto!

PBL, the good bootloader of the east suddenly appears to tell us that someone dropped a brick on secure boot. Now all these little pdf's are singing, telling us to follow the HDLC road. Along the way we'll meet some interesting new people. There's QDL who lacks a brain. The Hex-man with no heart. And Streaming Download, a protocol in need of a little courage. Together we can follow the HDLC road to reach the great wizard of qualcomm and use the ruby .mbn file to return us to odin. That's when we'll awake to find Auntie ( a || h )boot and uncle recovery. Adb is there and fastboot and android too!

(don't ask, I don't know either ...)

And back in reality:

I've never used odin (in fact the first time I even heard of it was reading the Verizon SGS3 unlocking thread, which is how I discovered your thread, which lead me to here), but it's my understanding that it is a Samsung only feature that is integrated on the appsbl level, providing similar functionality to HTC's RUU mechanism. Although odin appears to be much more advanced. I've seen numerous samsung users with qualcomm hardware mention how they were stuck in qdl mode and no longer able to access odin to recover.

Now if you'll excuse me, I suddenly have the urge to listen to Dark Side of the Moon...

-SLS-
[Hardware Hacking General] SouL Shadow:
Sort of. Only JTAG can access full output. Error and other diagnostic info can be read from memory using the DMSS Download Protocol or through the DIAG interface.

Under Linux all communication is done via usb serial converter kernel module qcserial and device node /dev/ttyUSBn where n = your device number reported by the kernel dmesg. This goes for any modern qualcomm device using a usb port. Older products used a proprietary serial wiring (outlined in the DMSS Serial Data ICD document 80-V1294-1) to access these same protocols.

The pbl/sbl's all share the same qdl code base. They will transmit a "magic" string over usb, waiting only a programmed amount of time for a connection.

If you mount debugfs

mount -t debugfs none_debugfs /sys/kernel/debug

and load a kernel module usbmon

modprobe usbmon

then you can access raw usb streams, either per bus or for the entire computer. There's a raw text interface at /sys/kernel/debug/usb/usbmon

There's also raw binary interface through /dev/usbmon[N]

Also, see the kernel source docs:

<kernel source>/Documentation/usb/usbmon.txt

On a bricked phone qcserial will recognise the device and a ttyUSB will become available OR if sbl3 was successfully loaded usb mass storage will provide the enumerated emmc partitions (although using them is still a work in progress, I have an idea how to properly do it. Will post details once I can test it).

To utilize the qdl usb serial interface you need to use the DMMS Download Protocol outlined in document 80-39912-1 Revision E.

On a working phone there is a usb serial interface available as well. However the qcserial kernel module is not programmed with the oem's vid/pid, so it doesn't load. I've been able to connect to it via generic serial converter:

modprobe usbserial vender=0x<vid> product=<pid>

Then disconnect and reconnect the usb cable to the phone. dmesg will show the new ttyUSB device.

Unfortunately I haven't been able to actually do anything with it yet. On a working phone it should connect you to the modem which you can use AT commands to interact with. There is also an AT command to switch to DIAG mode. From DIAG more you would use the DMSS Serial Data protocol (doc 80-V1294-1 Revision YP), another HDLC based protocol, to interact.

I have a large number of doc's covering all the above mentioned items and much more (just over 100 pdf's). Unfortunately they are all watermarked with the actual username who had access. If someone has or can point me to a program that can remove said watermarks then I would happily share all of them.

-SLS-
[Hardware Hacking General] E:V:A:
Did you actually try to google that?

http://www.slideshare.net/linsu39/5-solutions-to-remove-pdf-watermark

http://download.cnet.com/We-PDF-Watermark-Remover/3000-18497_4-75593137.html

http://online2pdf.com/

http://www.freepdfconvert.com/#

http://foxyutils.com/splitpdf/
[Hardware Hacking General] SouL Shadow:
Hah, yes I did. These pdf's are encrypted so most tools want a password to edit them. Looking for a Linux command line utility so I can strip about 100 pdf's. Found pdftk but it requires a password to work on encrypted pdf's. I was able to convert an encrypted pdf to a non-encrypted pdf using the pdftocairo tool... but that changes the raw pdf data so finding the watermark data is more difficult. Now I'm searching for a pdf editor since my linux distro didn't come with one. Unfortunately I've spent half my day off working on this when I could have been programming.

EDIT:

found qpdf on sourceforge!

qpdf + grep + sed = fully automated bash script to clean all the pdf's :)

EDIT2:

I now have a working script to remove the watermarks. Found a few bugs while cleaning my document archive. I will post it as soon as I can work them out.

-SLS-
[Hardware Hacking General] viperbjk:
Absolutely correct. The download code itself has a mechanism to verify if it is valid. Some vendors check the download code before being executed if they are signed correctly, others leave the downloader as it is, but check the md5 signature within the downloader. However we managed to exploit the md5 verification to rewrite the msm7x bootloader to let us read full flash connected to radio. Not sure if they changed a lot regarding the msm89xx chipsets, but I'm going to have a look at that again, if needed. Regarding the flashing process, the flashed files are signed and checked for validity after uploading, rsa keys are in both amss and oemsbl.

Odin Protocol mainly belongs to samsung's own cpu/bootloader and has nothing to do with the qualcomm msm's/qsd's/qsc's.

What we speak of is the such called "QC Download Mode". Using the tty interface being in QC DM Mode you can just send the "3A" command to enter the "QC Download mode". For some mobiles, even if you have access to the radio download mode (qc) you cannot flash and repair the flash that belongs to the PDA part (most seen for those OMAP / MSM combinations). It's just because both cpu's use their own flash module for their firmware parts (means the flash isn't routed to both cpus, thus technically impossible).

WBR
[Galaxy Note II Accessories] tbvnz:
I was getting ready to order a bluetooth keyboard until...

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=2086118

May be a good alternative to some.
[AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note I717] Sdnote:
I'm planning to sell my Unrooted, unlocked GN i1717. It fell from a 4 foot drop, and the LCD is cracked and the screen isn't working. Everything else functions.

I was wondering, how do I factory reset the phone, erasing everything, with a screen that doesn't work? I downloaded odin, but need the factory reset file, if there is one.

can anyone one help?

Thanks in advance.
[AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note I717] gregsarg:
Unless you can see the download mode screen, there is a slim chance you can return to stock successfully.

You simply need sight to navigate properly.

It's not a good situation....g
[AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note I717] rangercaptain:
Couldn't he flash a stock ICS rom like the one-click file? That reformats your phone and is done through Odin. You have that file in the super everything thread, right Sarge?
[AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note I717] gregsarg:
Yes ...but there is no way to confirm a successful flash.

It's a crap shoot, but really the only option at this point ....g
[AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note I717] Sdnote:
At this point, it's just worth a shot. I'll download the file and try it out. How can I confirm that the process was successful?
[AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note I717] rangercaptain:
The odin program will replace a yellow box with a green box, and will say success. The pbone will reboot and you should feel it vibrate at the boot.

You could attach it to a pc and use Windows Explorer to view the file system and see there is no personal folders, pictures, etc.
[Galaxy Note 10.1 General] hectorz321:
Hi guys! i am just wondering if it is at all possible to duel boot currently with android and native linux? i would love to be able to do this, but being rather bad have no idea how to do it myself :( are their any tuts out their if its possible? many thanks :)
[Galaxy Note 10.1 General] JSale:
http://androlinux.com/android-ubuntu-development/how-to-build-chroot-arm-ubuntu-images-for-android/

If you are familiar with linux use this, although it may not help with dualbooting, its best to ask a developer for some help.

Regards

Jack
[Galaxy Note 10.1 General] rnpasinos:
you can also try this... http://linuxonandroid.org/ it's not dual boot, it's more like a virtual machine... but i can run ubuntu, debian, and backtrack... other flavors are in development as well...
[Galaxy S II Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] inc188:
Has anyone here tried the MIUI jelly bean rom for the S2?

My main question is about this all of 3rd party roms -

How safe are they? I mean there is a lot of info in these phones and being a noob i have no idea what is been accessed by these roms? ie - passwords, emails etc etc. = Should I just stick with originals from Samsung?
[Galaxy S II Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] wess786:
MIUI based on Jelly Bean? Where?!

Verstuurd van mijn GT-I9100 met Tapatalk
[Windows Phone 8 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Oberoth:
Hey, i would know if it is possible on WP8 to change the OEM market to nokias as there were wp7 apps for that.

would be great if there will be something to do this, as i think that nokia will wait a long time to release the normal Nokia Drive for all Windows Phones :)
[LG Optimus 2x] LoneWolf0695:
For the past 5 hours I have been trying to install P.A.C. MAN 19.0.0 and MIUI V4 for the ICS Bootloader to no avail. I have tried flashing/wiping multiple times to get these ROMS to work, each time with the same outcome. The issue I'm having is my phone keeps getting stuck at the boot logo (the Unlocked LG padlock logo.) I have repeatedly tried wiping Data/Cache/Dalvik Cache like the instructions said. If anyone could tell me what I'm doing wrong it would be a great help, I decided to switch to these ROMS after using the TG V30A ICS ROM. I am using an LG P990 and I am on the ICS Bootloader (not the old GB one.)

Thanks.
[LG Optimus 2x] grimmyrippy:
Use aio tools and nvflash the ics new partition, it is in number 4 in selection, the padlock logo is the old ics bootloader, the new ics bootloader is have a pink logo
[LG Optimus 2x] therightperson_630:
if you've flashed the new ICS bootloader correctly, you'll have to follow this thread (which allows you to flash CM10 based roms on new bootloader - like PACman and new MIUI):

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=2058231

the only part that applies to you is "coming from ICS unlocked bootloader"

1. you'll have to flash the special recovery (it enables CM10/new bootloader compatibility)

2. then, instead of flashing CM10, just flash PACman rom

*Make sure you flash rugglez' ICS kernel which adds the wifi drain fix, and BSOD fix, unless it's already integrated into the new PACman version!*:

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=2066816
[LG Optimus 2x] LoneWolf0695:
Thanks

Hi guys, thanks for the replies but after about 7 hours of trial and error I finally managed to fix this.

If, there are any "noobs" out there like me that have these issues, just do what I did below and this should help.

So after several hours of scouring the internet and XDA forums with the hopes of reviving my phone, flashing several ROMS and CWM versions which caused compatibility issues with the ROM I had previously used, and nearly losing my sanity, I had stumbled upon this. So I logged on to my old Win7 laptop (thanks Microsoft, for making Win8 users reboot to install unsigned drivers) with APX drivers and loaded up the program. I flashed a newer version of the ICS bootloader (even though I was already on the ICS Partition layout) and the latest version of CWM. These fixed my compatibility issues and allowed me to flash ROMS again, hurray!

If it isn't too much trouble, could a moderator close this thread since leaving it open is no longer necessary?
[LG Optimus 2x] Jishnu Sur™:
And People Please read the instructions before installing (If Provided) .
[General Questions and Answers] TekGadgt:
Hey XDA,

I have been around for a while, gone through two phones and have had no problems rooting, flashing ROMs, etc. thanks to all of the amazing people on the site. I have come to a point though, that I am interested in learning to port ROMs (and maybe even build a ROM from AOSP, but I am taking this one step at a time). I have looked all over the Chef Central -> Android section and the Q & A section and have been unable to find a solid guide on porting ROMs from a device with different hardware than the device you want to port to. I am sorry if this has been answered elsewhere and I try to contribute as much as I can. I hope I am not inconveniencing anyone too much. If a thread already exists that can help me out, I would greatly appreciate a link, then you can close this thread.

I am only trying to port between the ATT and internation GS3s, so it shouldn't be too hard, right?

The ROM I am trying to port is PA 2.99 beta8.

Thanks,

#TekGadgt
[General Questions and Answers] -star-:
Have you read this guide?

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1908008
[General Questions and Answers] TekGadgt:
I will give it a go! Thanks. I had noticed this one, but was unsure if it would work between devices with different hardware. I see now that it does. I will work on that ASAP. One more question though, what do you do about devices with different resolutions? I noticed the guide is for devices with the same resolution.
[Galaxy S I9000 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] alcaprone:
Hello everybody, since a few months i noticed that almost any of my photos (apart for the ones made very close to the subject) are blurry. I wanted to know if there is an app to check whether AF still work or if someone else experienced this.thanks a lot!
[Nexus 10 Themes and Apps] Bataga:
Lots of customization options. Used this on my Note and felt the butter...

Not my work BTW, just thought I'd share.

Play dl https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.androguide.pimp.my.rom

XDA forum http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1908269

Hit thanks if it worked for you
[Nexus 10 Themes and Apps] brGabriel:
I was going to make a post about this awhile back but never got around to it. I currently use this app and it does work well.

If you like this you should actually thank the original creator/developer...credit where credit is due.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Rauch:
Hey guys,

I've been hopping around several ROMs lately just trying to see what is out there for the most part.

I have definitely been preferring AOSP to TW/JB. Of course there are some issues with AOSP though. Most notably, MMS and Group Messaging. Group messaging is less of an issue because I rarely do it. However, MMS is my biggest concern. Is there any way to increase the photo quality within the AOSP MMS client? I definitely prefer it to any third party client. It's simple & clean. It just makes images look like absolute crap though.

I'm sure this has been asked before, but is anyone able to just quickly chime in with suggestions?

Thanks!
[AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note II] tangmu:
It used to be when I made a call using google voice, the call log would show the google relay phone number instead of the number I dialed.

I got the OTA update to 4.1.2, and now I see that it's correctly showing the contact number in the log instead of the google number. Yay!
[AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note II] dnanj:
Awesome! That was driving me nuts for the longest of time! Good to know that it's been fixed.
[AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note II] EVO'D_OUT:
That was driving me crazy on 4.1.1 as well. The 4.1.2 multi-window update fixed my GV call log too. Now if we can only get Google Voice to catch up to the times and get pic messaging...
[AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note II] tangmu:
Yeah, that's the other big annoyance, Not only doesn't it handle pictures, if someone sends a txt with a pict, it doesn't get delivered, and the sender doesn't get any indication it didn't go.
[Galaxy Ace S5830 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] likishi84:
hi i want to flash this rom http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1453165 but im not sure if i can put over my old rom which is a sgs2 v9 rom that i got from here but cant find thread any more i would like to know could i use cwm v5.0.2.6 to flash over my sgs2 v9 rom thanks in advance
[Galaxy Ace S5830 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] aflefel:
yes,you can flash it via ClockworkMod
[Nexus 7 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Vafler:
hey, i downloaded football manager game on pc and sideloaded it to my nexus device. the game works but the game window is not maximised. its just half of the screen and i cant change it to fullscreen. i was wondering if you guys know thhe solution. its my first android device.

im soriry if this has been posted before but all the search results were from 2010, so idecided to make a new thread.
[Nexus 7 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] manasgirdhar:
You are not allowed to Discuss pirated stuff here.And i think the game you downloaded was a paid app.
[Nexus 7 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Vafler:
the first thing i did was to search in app store. it didnt come up. i googled it on pc and i found it, i didnt know it was pirated. i thought it was one of those games that are free with ads or some other cach.