[Sprint Samsung Galaxy S7 Guides, News, & Discussio] POWerSUrgeSW3:
My SM-G930P / PL6 Firmware Root Instructions (Updated 07/25/2017)

UPDATED 07/25/2017

It has come to my attention some of the links listed here are outdated. All of the Google Drive links are to my my account. These are the files I collected for this process. If there are any other links that are not working, please let me know by PM.

We are keeping these instructions just because there has still been interest shown for Marshmellow.

Extra THANKS to [MENTION=7683955]YMNDLZ[/MENTION] for the continued support, and allowing me to help out where I can!

Disclaimer:

This is the process I used, which I put together after a weeks’ worth of messing around and rebuilding my phone over and over. This is not the first time I have messed around doing this sort of stuff. If you are inexperienced, not sure what root/Odin/flashing is, I highly recommend keeping your phone the way it is and be happy. I take no responsibility for any damage that might come from following my process. THIS WILL VOID YOUR WARRANTY if you take your phone into Sprint and try to get it serviced. Your phone will be running an engineering version of the kernel for your phone, letting you obtain root. In addition, your battery life and performance is going to probably be different from before, and it will be up to you to tweak the kernel and other system settings to fix that.

Recommend starting over from scratch. If you already have your phone setup, I know it is not the best to start over from scratch. Nevertheless, I have tried doing this from a phone already setup, configured, and tweaked. Even though it is not rooted, something seems to screw up the process and things will not work. I had issues with MMS and hotspot not working. When I rebuilt the phone from scratch, everything seemed to work fine.

NOTE:

My instructions were done using a Windows 10 Pro 64-bit computer. If you have another OS, you are kind of on your own.

ALSO TO NOTE:

When I got my S7 (Not Edge), I switched to a new plan from Sprint. My plan now provides HotSpot with my contract. If yours does not, results may vary then. I am unable to test all different configurations of plans with this process.

What May Not Work:

I have tested everything I could think of on my phone.

Any application that checks for Root/Custom device software (because I do not know them all). Applications like Samsung/Android Pay. In addition, snapchat, though if this is installed and logged into before the Engineering Boot image is installed, Snapchat should continue working after phone is rooted. There are some work arounds depending on the app being installed, consult the Internet before rooting. You have to make the decision whether you can accept not using the app once rooted.

WiFi Calling. I think this is because I forgot to set it up before I rooted the phone. I did not even think about it until days after I had my phone setup. Because I did not use this feature on the G930U/PL2 firmware, did not think about it. But when I came back to the PL6 firmware, I did know it was working because I was messing around with it before I rebuilt the phone another 4-5 times.

First, download the firmware from one of the usual sites:

http://updato.com/firmware-archive-select-model

http://www.sammobile.com/firmwares

http://www.sammobile.com/firmwares

Then download and extract everything from this ZIP: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0Bz6QOPY0cm2lblk3TUo5ZjdlanM?usp=sharing

This gives us the modified Odin we will need later, as well as the bootloader we will need.

Grab this SuperSU ZIP:

Chainfire direct link: https://download.chainfire.eu/970/SuperSU/SuperSU-v2.76-S7QC.zip

As a backup, here's my link: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0Bz6QOPY0cm2lcWxtOFptRzVFLXM?usp=sharing

Also grab the V15 FIX ZIP:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0Bz6QOPY0cm2lUGRCSW01WHlLRHM?usp=sharing

If you don’t have the Android SDK already installed, I found this to give us the needed ADB/Fastboot options we need. You can download from this page, scroll to the bottom (linking to give them credit):

http://www.androidpolice.com/2017/0...ble-without-full-sdk-android-studio-download/

Extract the SuperSU ZIP and the ADB/Fastboot zip into the same directory for later. I recommend putting them in c:\S7files as this will make life easier in the future.

With all that done, open the Modified Odin and load the different parts of the Firmware into the associated Odin slots. Whatever the file name starts with is the slot it goes in. BL_, AP_, CP_,CSC_... now there is an extra “HOME_CSC_) file, we will not be using this and don’t worry about it. This file is if the original service settings were to be kept after flashing. As this could cause issues, I recommend not using it. If you do, you may have different results.

With all that done, your phone should be ready to start as if it was just turned on out-of-the-box. Let the phone go through its process and reboot to “install updates”. Then, it seems, Sprint is installing its software, reboots, and then loads up to the “Welcome” screen. Go through the whole process. Make sure the phone activates, which will cause a reboot and I think flashing of your SIM card (that is the image that comes up and looks like anyway). Then you can finish the activation process and log into your Google account/restore apps on your phone.

Once the launcher loads, any apps you wanted to restore is done, time to start the actual rooting process. Enable ‘USB debugging’ under ‘Developer Options’ and turn off verify apps via ADB. If you do not know how to get Developer Options to show under Settings… Google It (and might be a first sign this is not for you if you’re new to the process)

Next, while in Settings, go into ‘Lock screen and security’, scroll to the bottom to ‘Other Security Settings’, click ‘Security policy updates’ and turn auto updates off.

This next part requires purchasing Package Disabler Pro. If there is another way that you know, please try to report back. However, I bought he app and it does the job. This app will be used to disable services on a non-rooted device. The following services will need to be disabled:

(Knox needs to be activated in order for Package Disabler Pro to verify it's license)

Chameleon

Security policy updates

SecurityLogAgents

(The next ones I did from a lot of late night reading, sorry I forget where I found these)

Samsung DM Phone Interface

Samsung DM Service

CMHProvider

com.samsung.dcmservice

Now we are going to flash the Engineering Boot Image file. Again, if you are not sure how to use, or what Odin does… stop here! Run Odin, and flash the Engineering Boot image, I used the AP slot. Then under ‘options’ disable ‘F. Reset Time’.

Once rebooted, the phone is running the engineering kernel now. This is what is going to allow us to root. However, until we are rooted and do some tweaking, battery is going to drain a lot faster than expected. This is due to the kernel not being efficient with the processor/system resources. Your phone will get warm, because of the above reasons. Don’t worry, once rooted everything can be tweaked to fix this.

At this point, LTE will not be working. Also after every reboot your phone will not remember any WiFi networks it was connected to do not worry it will get those fixed down the road.

Now we are going to go through the actual root process on the phone. Connect phone to a computer via USB cable. If the phone asks to allow/deny access, ALLOW. Open up Command Prompt as an administrator on attached computer. Move to the directory c:\S7Files that we created earlier. This should be where the root.bat, SuperSU, and ADB/Fastboot files are located. Once inside this directory simply run the root.bat file.

This will execute a bunch of commands to be run on the phone; phone should reboot at least once (or twice – cannot remember). Once the phone boots up and loads “normal”, SuperSU will be loaded. I kept the phone awake while the files were being transferred over to the phone. On a few times doing this, when the phone went to sleep the process seemed to “hang” until the phone was “woken up”.

Of course we have, an older version of SuperSU is installed, but do not worry about it now. We are going to finish the process, and then update SuperSU last. That just seemed to have the best/smooth/stable results for me.

Please note, you have SuperSU access to the phone. Now you can screw it up, even possibly hardware brick the thing if you do not know what you are doing. Again, I caution if you are not comfortable with knowing what root really does or how it can affect your phone, reflash your phone back to factory using Odin NOW.

Copy the S7_or_S7Edge_Fixes_V15.zip file to your phone storage. Download ‘[root] FlashFire’ by Chainfire (In Google Play) and flash the fixes zip. This will reboot the phone a couple of times; you will see the FlashFire logo at the top and then a bunch of scripts being executed.

Download BuildProp Editor, and change the following values (use the search function at the top is easiest method):

ro.securestorage.support to false. (This fixes the phone forgetting WiFi networks on reboot)

Set ro.cdma.default_numeric to 310120

Ro.cdma.default_alpha to Sprint

Ro.build.characteristics to Sprint

Reboot the phone to apply changed.

Now another app that costs money, but this seemed to work for me over the other method mentioned by [MENTION=7683955]YMNDLZ[/MENTION] in his rooting tutorial to get HotSpot working. (found here https://xdaforums.com/showpost.php?p=71118378&postcount=1021 )

Install SQLite Editor. Click on “files” tab, and navigate to:

/data/data/com.android.providers.telephony/database/telephony.db

Select ‘carriers’ and scroll down to the bottom. On my phone, it was lines 30 and 31, ‘APN2 LTE internet’ and ‘APN2 EHRPD internet’ respectively. Select each one, click the edit button at the top (looks like a pencil) and scroll down to the ‘type’ line. It should read: default,mms

click the line and add ‘dun’ to the end. The line should now read: default,mms,dun

No spaces between the words and the commas.

At this point everything should be working. If you go into the Mobile Networks and check out the Access Point Names, there should be a bunch of names listed. I have 8. LTE should be working, HotSpot, and WiFi should remember all of the names. The phone should be fully functional now, with root access, just runs hot and kills the battery. We will deal with that next. Here is the apps I used, L Speed, and Kernel Auditor. Now [MENTION=7683955]YMNDLZ[/MENTION] has his own setting recommendations for L Speed, check out the post referred to earlier for screen shots. [MENTION=3260779]swick1981[/MENTION] also has a thread with recommendations, found here https://xdaforums.com/verizon-galaxy-s7/how-to/guide-to-fix-s7-lag-root-s7-variants-t3441715 . I started with both of their recommendations, one at a time, and tweaked things, as I wanted. Personally, I found that my phone still felt warm, like it the processor was still working harder than it needed to. Therefore, I hanged my settings. I suggest reading, research, testing. Figure out what works best for you. This for me seems still fast, battery lasts all day, and phone does not get hot at all. I do think I still have a bit of a nasty battery drain on LTE networks compared to when my phone was not rooted, but I am surviving with it.

L Speed: I left everything default. When the app loads and you are at the profile screen, I changed the Profile, IO Tweaks, and LNET options all to the Balance profile for each. After I changed each one, I exited the program and loaded it again. I did this because sometimes I noticed the app would not acknowledge changes to profiles. I have screen shots of my settings at the bottom of this thread. To experiment, I recommend using the BACKUP feature, and saving different options. That way you can go back to an exact configuration to try different settings without having to manually reprogram them each time.

Kernel Auditor: All I am currently using this app for is to change the CPU Governor to INTERACTIVE for all the cores. I like it because it has thermal options, if that is a concern down the road. As well as has options for the GPU. Among a bunch of other options, I doubt I will touch. However, I have a feeling maybe the GPU needs to be adjusted to help save some battery life as well… sometime I will tackle later.

Note:

that on reboot or booting phone from powered off state, the stock options for the kernel are used. Therefore, my phone usually sucks about 4% battery and gets warm everytime. Then when the scripts run for L Speed and Kernel Auditor, things “regulate” themselves and the phone settles down. For the rest of the time until I reboot my phone again, it stays cool for the most part. Even with the screen on a lot and/or using LTE/WiFi/Voice.

I have heard that the stock launcher seems to cause lag. I did not notice that really myself, but in the event, it was causing the phone to work harder… I switched. I have been a huge Nova Launcher fan; use to use it a lot on my S3 and S5. I also have the PRIME version. I installed that and tweaked it, and am actually a lot happier with that personally. Again, it is another app that can require root access for some features, why I stopped using it when I first moved to my S7.

I would also recommend debloating via an App Remover program. Personally, I like Titanium Backup, you can freeze apps you’re not sure about… or even back them up to restore later if needed. Remember removing some apps may cause error messages to pop up, rebooting should fix that. IF not, undo whatever you did (IE unfreeze or restore the app. [MENTION=7683955]YMNDLZ[/MENTION] has a screen shot of the apps that can be removed, found here https://xdaforums.com/showpost.php?p=71119004&postcount=1024. Know what you use and do not use. I have a Samsung Galaxy S2 watch, so I kept a lot of the Samsung apps (except the Pay stuff), I use Gmail, etc. Nevertheless, it’s a good reference.

Or if you want you can try running this debloat script: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0Bz6QOPY0cm2lTXBWWHVNN1o0SXc?usp=sharing

Personally I think it removes more than I want, but if new to this rooting process it's woth a try to see if it works out for you.

EmergencyManagerSerivce seemed to come up as not responding on a few of the times I experimented rebuilding my phone for this process. If that happens, just go to the service and wipe the cache for it. Reboot, and that should take care of the issue.

Last thing I did, trying to figure out why the EmergencyManagerService was not working, I re-enabled the following in Package Disable Pro:

Samsung DM Phone Interface

Samsung DM Service

CMHProvider

My phone seems to still be working fine with them enabled.

How to Update SuperSU:

If anyone has tried updating SuperSU from the PLAY store, it updates fine. But then the binaries need updated, and that's where we run into the problem. The update process always fail, and because of the locked bootloader we can't restart in TWRP or a custom recovery to install the update. My process is pretty easy, and so far seems to work every time (I should know I've done it about 11 times over the past couple of weeks). The current newest version is v2.79 (December 14, 2016) as of writing this post.

NOTE: This will remove root access from your phone temporarily, and then all apps that require root will have to be granted access again. So yes until this is done we're back to the stock kernel settings and your phone may get a little warm again/battery will die a bit faster than normal again.

Open up SuperSU app on your phone, go to the SETTINGS tab scroll all the way down. On my phone "Reinstall" will now be the first thing listed when scrolled all the way down to the bottom of SETTINGS, it's the first item inside of the "CLEANUP" section. If it's not for you, scroll back up until you see it.

DO NOT CLICK FULL UNROOT!!!!

This will unroot your phone. I have not done this, but potentially you would have to rebuild the phone from scratch.

When "Reinstall" is clicked, SuperSU will give a little informational box. Read it, it pretty much gives you the instructions you need. Click "Continue" and the process is started. For me I usually have to restart my phone manually. When the phone restarts, simply go to the Google PLAY story and download the newest version of SuperSU. Once downloaded, open up SuperSU. There should be no notification to update (as you're on the newest binaries). Go back and tweak your settings if needed, install Pro if you bought it, and go through all your apps that need root to grant it.

Other SuperSU method/Other apps that try to do certain mods on reboot: I know that there is a version on [MENTION=631273]Chainfire[/MENTION] website to download and install the SuperSU updates through FlashFire. This isn't the only situation that that will cause issues, but be aware that this will probably soft brick the phone and it will not boot. If you see the picture below, keep reading for a fix.

[IMG="Error Message On Reboot"]http://i.imgur.com/1ORpysym.jpg[/IMG]

'custom binary blocked by SECURE BOOT (boot.img)'

Scary message huh? No matter if you reboot your phone, try clearing the cache in Recovery, nothing will get it to go away. First time I saw it, I ended up rebuilding my phone last time because I figured all was lost... praying something didn't "lock" in the firmware to cause me to have to actually call Sprint! This time I was messing around with 'Magisk Manager', because I ran into more apps that wouldn't install on a rooted device). Was trying to figure out a work around and flashed something and BOOM on reboot.

Fix

When I read the message again this time, and saw the 'boot.img'... it stuck out in my head. I figured I would try using our modified Odin and re-upload the engineering boot.img file again. That was the fix for me! After that, phone rebooted and loaded back into the launcher like normal. So far everything seems to be working fine, my L Speed and Kernel Auditor scripts ran at bootup just like I had normally rebooted my phone.

I can't promise this is the overall fix for everything. But if you happen to be messing with your phone, like I do, and get this... hopefully this will be a quick fix and get the phone back up and running.

I have not reinstalled XPOSED yet, maybe down the road I’ll mess with it. Trying not to add too many variables while figuring out a few of the other things. However, I did test the process and it works.

Framework ZIP to be installed using Flashfire: https://www.androidfilehost.com/?fid=529152257862685343

XPOSED APK installer: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0Bz6QOPY0cm2lLUVuVnBlalRHbWM?usp=sharing

[MENTION=5840143]colormedroid[/MENTION] also posted up an FQA post in this thread that may be helpful to anyone having issues, found here https://xdaforums.com/showpost.php?p=67595435&postcount=2

:confused:The End:eek:​

That is my notes on everything I did to get the Sprint PL6 firmware rooted and functional with Voice, LTE, MMS, and Hotspot. I enjoy the phone, and I am SOOOOO happy to have root again. Just for stupid stuff like access NTFS partitions on thumb drives, I connect to my phone, Adaway, Titanium Backup, and just general apps to let me use MY phone MY way.

Again, these are the instructions I followed for what I did. I think I wrote down all the steps, if I missed anything or something is not clear, PM me! I am always here to help when and where I can. If there is an edit to be made, I will make it. There is a bunch of people to thank here, if I forget anyone let me know! If this process helps you, think about giving everyone involved a THANKS for their contribution/hardwork! Samsung is really making life hard for us now after they made it so easy with the S5.

[MENTION=5840143]colormedroid[/MENTION] and everyone in the OP of the thread here! This is where I met [MENTION=7683955]YMNDLZ[/MENTION] and got really into figuring out the rooting process for The SM-G930P phone.

[MENTION=7683955]YMNDLZ[/MENTION] who has put up with my insane posts throughout this thread trying to figure this out. Plus responding to a few PMs with questions

[MENTION=71281618]@bodyshop[/MENTION] who suggested the SQLite Editor part for the Hotspot.

[MENTION=3260779]swick1981[/MENTION] for the thread on S7 lag.

The other random threads I read through and picked up bits here and there, and forgot to bookmark.

My wife, for putting up with this crap and my sleepless nights messing with my phone.