[T-Mobile Samsung Galaxy S 4] inuakio:
i just recently got a replacement galaxy s4 from tmobile because of a manufacturer defect. when this phone was shipped and i received it the stock firmware was the dreaded 4.4.4 firmware which breaks functionality with towelroot. i was somewhat dismayed because i really wanted to root my replacement without tripping the knox counter on my phone like before in case i have another problem (3rd galaxy s4 in about 1 year exact, first 2 both had same manufacturer defect. it was the "sim card has been removed error" which i can confirm after speaking to advanced technical support from tmobile that a defective batch of samsung galaxy s4's was sent to tmobile and they were extremely helpful and understanding.) Since rooting 4.4.4 is impossible to do without tripping knox (to my knowledge) i was looking for a way to downgrade to 4.4.2 without voiding the warranty. i can also confirm that according to samsung and tmobile downgrading to an official firmware will not void any kind of warranty as long as there is no custom recovery or anything of sort. i had read over other forums that people were having trouble with knox and the counter and a few other things and downgrading and even read some that: some people tripped the counter, was completely impossible to do, or would still be unable to root. all of this dashed my hopes of rooting and maintaining my warranty. i still wanted to try and after talking to tmobile and samsung gave it a try.

These are the steps i used and i hope they can help others who want to maintain their warranty while rooting after updating to 4.4.4 and finding out they might be in a hopeless situation.

~Things you will need: odin3, stock firmware 4.4.2 for sgh-m919 (can be downloaded from several places, good place to start is sammobile), windows computer, charging and sync/charging cable, your sgh-m919

Step 1: open odin on your computer and connect phone in odin mode (volume down+ power+ home)

Step 2: in pda option select the official stock firmware you downloaded before and click start

Step 3: it should start pretty quickly but if you notice no progress for a few minutes then check and see if you have text in the bottom left corner saying "get pit for mapping". if that is the case i had the same issue and all i had to to do was switch what usb port my phone was connected to on my computer and click start again.

Step 4: this where i had some more issues. after the phone reboots after odin is done i got stuck in a weird boot loop i believe and somehow fixed it pretty easily. so after getting stuck in the boot loop i removed my battery and then put it back and and tried booting in to recovery mode to perform a factory reset. i unfortunately was able to get to download mode. every time i tried it would it was recovery booting and then completely reboot. i tried several times with no luck. so i tried to see if odin mode would work and it did. so i held the power button and did a regular boot and removed the battery and put it back in and then tried to boot into recovery mode and it worked just fine this time.

Step 5: after reaching recovery mode again you will want to perform a factory reset. after it is done select the reboot phone option.

And that's all i had to do to downgrade. you should be on stock 4.4.2 firmware

i can confirm that after using this method i was able to root with towelroot and have not tripped knox

i have no idea if this will work on other samsung galaxy s4 models and do advise caution when flashing any kind of firmware without confirmation that it will work on your phone model

i have no idea if this has been covered but was unable to find anything myself after countless hours of searching the internet and hope that by creating this it will pop up in a search with key words pertaining to this issue in order to help people who just cant find this exactly while searching.

i would love to know if this works for any other galaxy s4 models so we can spread sneaking behind knox security to root without tripping the knox counter ( keep in mind that any form of custom recovery will trip knox)

hope this helps someone