[Galaxy Tab S General] 3DSammy:
This How-To is best viewed in a web browser as many of the forum readers strip out the formatting.

The obligatory warning:

"I take no responsibility for what happens to your device if you follow this guide. Flashing with Odin carries risk no matter the platform/OS used. This procedure has worked multiple times with 100% success in the test environment detailed below. It should work for any device, but I can't confirm, so feedback please if it works for your device."

- 3DSammy

Test Environment:

This method has been successfully used to flash stock Samsung firmware to a Samsung Tab S 10.5 (SM-T800) tablet. The SM-T800 Knox counter was "0 0x0000" before the Odin flash and remained as "0 0x0000" after the Virtualbox Odin flash of the Samsung stock 4.4.2 firmware and subsequently a Samsung stock 5.0.2 bootloader.

Distro: Ubuntu 14.04

Virtualbox: v4.3.10_Ubuntu r93012 along with extension pack (scroll down)

Windows Virtual machines: XP with all updates applied and Win7 with all updates applied except IE 11 cumulative update

Odin: v3.10

ADB, Fastboot and drivers: 15 second ABD Driver install (maybe the best solution for MS-XP)

KIES3: Samsung KIES3 and download link

Samsung stock 4.4.2 firmware *(XAC - Canadian): T800XXU1ANF8_T800XAC1ANF5_HOME.tar.md5

Samsung stock 5.0.2 bootloader

Tablet model: SM-T800NTSAXAC (Tab S 10.5)

*Samsung device firmware

Configuring a MS-Windows Virtualbox VM to use with KIES3 and ODIN:

1) Install/Upgrade to the latest Virtualbox for your Linux Distro and make sure you have a matching extension pack

2) Install a Microsoft XP or higher OS from an ISO image or your DVD player via Virtualbox. ISO's can be downloaded but unless you have a valid license key it can only be used for 30 days, which may be all you need.

Note: make sure to configure the memory and disk space to match the minimum requirements for the Windows version, KIES3 and Odin

3) Install the extension pack in the new Windows VM

4) Apply all available Windows Updates in the new VM. This can take a very long time depending on the Windows DVD/ISO you started with.

5) Take a VM snapshot as you do not want to waste the set up time again..

6) For the VM to have access to the PC's USB devices your user account must join the "vboxusers" user group. You need root access

for this step. In a terminal session:

> echo $USER # This will display your user id if you are unsure

> FOOUSER # For example

> sudo usermod -G vboxusers -a FOOUSER # "FOOUSER" should be your user ID as this is only an example

7) Reboot Linux (that is what I did but a log out may work as well)

8) Connect your POWERED ON Samsung Device to the PC

9) Start Virtualbox access the new Window VM's settings and click on USB to get the USB filter list

Check both "Enable USB Controller" and "Enable USB 2.0 (EHCI) Controller"

Press ALT+INS and a pop-up list of all connected USB devices should display.

Select the one starting with "SAMSUNG_Android".

Click OK

Disconnect your Samsung device and power it off

Reboot your Samsung device into Download mode (button combination is specific to your model)

Connect the device to your PC

Open the Virtualbox USB pop-up again

Press ALT+INS and a pop-up list of all connected USB devices should display.

Select the one starting with "SAMSUNG Gadget Serial".

Click OK

Disconnect your Samsung device from the PC and reboot the device (button combination is specific to your model)

NOTES:

I never modified any of the internal USB filter values leaving them exactly like Virtualbox added them to the filter list

The USB filter list should look like the screen shot attached to the bottom of this post

You can ignore any scary warnings on your device when invoking "Download mode" as no device connection or downloads are occurring.

Both USB filters are required as the "SAMSUG_Android" works with KIES3 while "SAMSUNG Gadget Serial" works with Odin.

10) Start the Windows VM and log in

11) ADB, Fastboot and drivers:

At this point you can attempt to let Windows recognize and install the necessary drivers or you can download and install them yourself. See 15 second ADB installer.

NOTES:

Despite installing the drivers manually on Windows 7 the VM recognized and downloaded and installed the drivers a second time when I attached my SM-T800. The driver discovery, download and install took way longer than I expected but eventually completed.

With the XP VM I manually installed the necessary drivers with the 15 second ADB installer script

12) Download and install KIES3 and Odin per their web page instructions. The downloads can be done within the VM. XP may need Internet Explorer upgraded as some web sites no longer support old versions of IE. Upgrading in XP can be a major hassle. Alternately (recommended) download the KIES3 and Odin software outside of the VM and set up a Virtualbox share or use a network share that is attached to the VM. I found that you could not install the executable directly from the share but could after you copied the install file into a Window's directory such as "Downloads".

13) KIES3 validation:

Start the Windows VM and log on

Start KIES3

Connect your booted Samsung device to your computer

After a while (up to a couple minutes) the KIES3 should connect to the device

Check that the device information is accurate (e.g. Internal storage used value)

Attempt a backup but the first time un-check the item for backup up your apps as that can take a very long while for a validation test.

NOTE:

App backups will skip some of the apps, I have no idea why. This is not a fail condition. KIES3 highlights that condition.

Check if the backed up data is accurate, I like to check wallpaper, pictures, music ... etc.

14) Odin validation:

Start the Windows VM and log on

Start Odin (run as administrator)

Power off your device and disconnect from the PC

Reboot your Samsung device into the bootloader and start Download mode (button combination is specific to your model)

Connect your download ready Samsung device to your computer

After a while (up to a couple minutes) the Odin log should show that your device is connected

NOTE: At this point you can use Odin normally.

WARNING: Odin is powerful and can brick your device so read the Odin instructions carefully

As I do not own any Apple products, I could not test this Odin solution on a Mac but maybe someone can see if these instructions can be tailored to Virtualbox on a Mac. Steps 6 and 9 are the only steps unique to KIES3 and Odin use of a VM and are likely similar across both Linux and MAC in regards to Virtualbox's VMs.

Here is an article describing how to use cross-platform JODIN3 as an alternate to Windows and Odin. You may find it a viable alternative to the solution described above..

I hope this helps someone and if you have issues/successes please post in this thread.

Screen shots:

USB filter pop-up settings and required Samsung device (SM-T800) USB filters

Odin after successfully flashing the Samsung 4.4.2 stock firmware to a Tab S 10.5 SM-T800 tablet

Odin after successfully flashing the Samsung 5.0.2 stock bootloader to a Tab S 10.5 SM-T800 tablet