[Sony Xperia XZ Guides, News, & Discussion] alex.do:
Hi all,

Not even sure I'm in the right place, still I'd like to share my own experience after upgrading to Oreo last few days. So moderators, if you guys find this irrelevant, or it is in the wrong place, please help me move it accordingly.

I am using XZ F8332. Last few days I decided to say hello to Oreo after some time being patient with the pretty annoying "Upgrade your system" notification. I finally managed to have a fully working Oreo + DRMfix + Magisk + SafetyNet passed and root. Unfortunately good things usually come with bad things too...

At first, I was trying to patch my boot image using ta_poc method. Believe me ta_poc seems to be working on Oreo too, I got all the DRM functionalities working thanks to munjeni & serajr. However, it doesn't seem to be working with both Magisk and SuperSU. I tried all recent versions of those two e.g. Magisk v14, Magisk v14.5 beta, SuperSU v2.79 SR3, SuperSU v2.82 SR5, etc... ALL cause bootloops! I had to come to a conclusion that any methods that patch your modified (with ta_poc) boot image will cause bootloops. There's one thing I didn't try: SuperSU system mode which installs to /system. What's the point of system-less then? But it's up to you to try this.

The above means you are most likely gonna lose root if you go with ta_poc on Oreo. So I had to give ta_poc up and go with DRMfix instead. I got into a few troubles then.

I was initially trying to keep my userdata intact, so I didn't do a full wipe, I actually wiped everything except only my userdata (including data in sdcard). DRMfix didn't fix at all. All I got was only "FIDO_KEYS: Provisioned", the rest was "general error!" and of course DRM functionalities didn't work. I did some search, followed some guides saying about removing these directories: /data/credmgr, /data/drm and /data/mediadrm. There's even a script named "SafetyNet-Cleaning-Tools" also does exactly the same. Perhaps I wasn't that lucky enough. It just didn't work. Until I had to pull all of my data out, do a FULL WIPE including userdata, DRMfix worked then.

Next thing is to get Magisk (or SuperSU) working to have root. I knew recent update of SuperSU causes Xperia devices into bootloops. I also used Magisk on Nougat too. Why not now? So I flashed Magisk v14. Uh oh... I met my old dear friend again, Mr. Bootloops. So Magisk v14 doesn't work on Oreo. But v14.5 beta does. That's how I got it fully working.

Then I pushed my data back to sdcard (including a nandroid of course), did a restore DATA ONLY in TWRP and manually delete the folders mentioned above. After phone started, everything went back. I smiled.

Some existing Magisk modules started to work without any problems. But some other they need busybox. Without any thoughts, I immediately installed osm0sis' busybox installer, the one on Magisk repo. Weirdly it said "Magisk is not activated". I tried other modules, same issue. So only existing modules work, I couldn't install any new modules using Magisk Manager. "Use TWRP then" I thought. I went to TWRP and flashed the busybox installer. My old dear friend came and said "Hi! Bootloops!!" to me again. This time I used Magisk uninstaller to clear magisk files and re-flashed it again. I was able to get back in. I tried YashdSaraf's busybox universal installer. Same issue. Maybe I haven't tested well enough or maybe I went completely wrong way, but looks like busybox isn't working on Oreo? Also, I'm not sure this is the right way to do it, or we have to "clean install" Magisk too? Like uninstall everything first and re-install module by module all over again?

Also, after some Magisk uninstalls and reflashs, suddenly my DRMfix was no longer working. It displayed "general error!" in Service tests -> Security. I tried to fastboot the modified boot image again. Not working. There's no way to get it back except a FULL WIPE. I didn't get it. System-less approach is supposed to have nothing to do with our files. Somehow it does leave some traces, which we need a FULL WIPE to get rid of it? Maybe it isn't just the 3 folders mentioned above, there's maybe more?

Additionally, on Oreo I got some other bad stuffs:

- Adaptive brightness keeps adjusting, going darker and brighter very very quickly. It's no doubt an Oreo's bug.

- Cannot open Titanium Backup. It crashes right after you open it. I tried v8.0 and v8.1. Same issue. Maybe it's because busybox isn't installed?

- I have a feeling battery drains issue comes back. Looks like its consuming more battery than latest Nougat I'm not sure. Haven't got time to do some stats yet.

Last but not least. When I was pulling / pushing data to / from, I noticed that the storage space somehow changed! My phone is 64gb but the second time I got it fully working, it said "storage is 80% full..." and when I opened Settings -> Storage it showed only 21gb! What I did to get it fixed was to run fastboot format userdata. Then I let the phone start normally (without old data), after finishing setup, I turned off and went to TWRP to restore DATA ONLY. Problem solved. I got my storage back. But I have never figured out why. Maybe something wrong with adb pull / push in recovery?

If you've read down this far, I hope my experience could somehow help you avoid encountering the problems that I did.

Me personally I think I will go back to Nougat and stay low for a while. You understand why. Another reason is I also wanna try the "official" xposed for nougat for a little more. rovo89 is freaking awesome. man, he's a legend.

References:

I used this tool to patch my boot image (kernel). This tool origins by tobias.waldvogel but I used the "unofficial" one here and here modified by serajr for the ta_poc method. Thank you guys for this amazing tool.

Magisk latest versions here

SuperSU v2.82 SR5, v2.79 SR3

SuperSU System Mode v2.82 SR5 here

osm0sis' Busybox installer here

YashdSaraf's Busybox universal installer here

Special thanks to serajr, juanpirulo, munjeni, rovo89 and tobias.waldvogel for your amazing works & supports. I dont tag you guys here coz I dont wanna bother you guys :)