[Galaxy S 4 Active General] O-T:
Phone: S4 Active GT-I9295

This is a collection of knowledge from xda-forum and own experience. Consider information found here as advise to avoid possible issues.

Please give feedback if material presented here helped or need correction. Contributors are welcome and due credit will be placed.

Remember to give credit when you copy advice from my thread.

Qcomm based phones i9295 and i9505 need same procedure when flashing. Files to flash is not interchangeable between the phones. Method to flash any item SUCCESSFULLY in Download Mode using Odin is described in this thread.

Some guides may tell you to flash firmware, baseband or modems twice using Odin in Download Mode to "make it stick" or say there is an "unknown bug somewhere". People usually loose IMEI and/or WiFi because they have entered download mode using wrong method and started flash of modem, non-hlos.bin or firmware.

The reason the flashed file won't stick on first attempt is that you have entered download mode by software reboot menu or holding Vol- while rebooting.

Don't enter download mode when phone is rebooting.

Remember that you are responsible for every action you do to your phone.

If you don't have Samsung Kies the Samsung USB drivers is reccomended to install before running Odin and connecting PC-USB-PHONE.

Never run Odin to flash phone in Download Mode on the same PC where Samsung Kies is running. Odin and Kies will fight to gain control of USB connected device. Close all running Kies processes in Task Manager or uninstall Kies.

Some Windows installations need to run a Fix It from Microsoft Support to properly detect Samsung phone even after installation of Samsung Android USB driver.

Always connect phone directly to 5V-powered PC USB port - never USB hub.

Use original USB cable or make sure it is in good condition. Cable working for charging can have broken wire making it unusable for communication and file transfer.

GSM modem (modem.bin, *.tar, *.tar.md5) or LTE modem (NON-HLOS.bin, *.tar, *.tar.md5 ) can be flashed using Odin form PHONE/CP without repeating the flash twice.

Download Mode

Why

To flash (change/update) phone recovery, firmware, kernel, bootloader or modem using computer software Odin or Heimdall with phone connected by USB to computer.

How

Completely Power Off , wait at least 5 seconds after vibration or led stop blinking. Now you can enter download mode:

Power + VolDown buttons pressed

Release Power after vibration

Release VolDown when screen turn on

VolUp to confirm

Start Odin as Administrator

Connect USB cable PC-PHONE and make sure ID:COM confirm "Added" phone in Odin

Remark: Home button is

NOT USED

Recovery Mode

Why

To flash (change/update) phone custom recovery, custom ROM, SuperSU or kernel by install zip from Custom recovery like TWRP or CWM.

How

Can be entered from the phone reboot menu OR from phone in powered off state:

Power + VolUp buttons pressed

Release Power after vibration

Release VolUp when you see blue text RECOVERY BOOTING.... in upper left corner of screen

Remark: Home button is

NOT USED

ROOT

When you have stock recovery and plan to flash a custom recovery like TWRP or CWM (ClockWorkMod) the first time, you need to enter Recovery Mode immediately on first boot after Odin flash custom recovery.

The steps are independent of the stock Android version currently installed on your phone, this is how it's done for both Kitkat 4.4x and Lolipop 5.0x

The steps are also independent of which custom recovery (CWM-based or TWRP)

you prefer.

Advice to use the latest version custom recovery built for i9295 - linked in post #3

WARNING: The CWM built by LeJay back in 2013 on CM10.2 source (=CWM-Recovery-gt-i9295_v1-2.tar.md5) do not support external SD card or Nandroid backup/restore for Samsung Kitkat 4.4x or Lolipop 5.0.x. That recovery is outdated.

Make sure you have minimum 60% battery capasity

1st step - Install custom recovery

Copy SuperSU(latest).zip to phone storage

Power off, Boot phone to Download Mode

Start Odin with AutoReboot disabled, Re-Partition disabled

Connect USB cable PC-PHONE

Odin flash (CUSTOM-RECOVERY).TAR.MD5 as PDA

Disconnect USB cable

Remove phone battery - wait - insert battery

Enter Recovery Mode

2nd step - Install SuperSU from custom recovery, TWRP or CWM

TWRP touch "install" / CWM go to "install zip" by VOLUME buttons

TWRP touch-select / CWM select by pressing POWER button

Browse to and select SuperSU(latest).zip

Reboot

Download files from links in post #3:

(USB drivers, Odin, Custom recovery, SuperSU)