yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Segnaro:
I tried it but didn't even get to the vbmeta step. My bootloader somehow ended up perm unlocked, not sure what happened.

Here's what I did:

fastboot Hisense unlock
fastboot flash avb_custom_key ./output.img

reboot

Phone is bricked.

fastboot Hisense unlock
fastboot erase avb_custom_key

reboot

Phone is still bricked.

Flash LUN4 from EDL.

Phone boots into Data Wipe screen

Bootloader now remains unlocked on reboot.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] user0u:
Does this device have a/b slots? Maybe it is booting to the wrong one?
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Rukairi:
Yes, I did. I used this image (https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1EZliZlJ9Ss6gb3me4aENkBH1ATPBlymA) that was provided in this thread for LineageOS 20 GSI.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bigwigs:
Did u do run fastboot -w after flashing img?
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] meh.:
@dferreira is there anything extra to do to get SMS working with your LOS 20 build? I installed the IMS APK (and rebooted) but I'm still unable to receive SMS.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Rukairi:
Yes, I did. Here is the output when I ran the command:

D:\Users\Rukairi\Desktop\scrpy\A9_Fastboot\windows-x86\bin>fastboot flash system rom.img

Invalid sparse file format at header magic

Sending sparse 'system' 1/5 (786176 KB) OKAY [ 18.658s]

Writing 'system' FAILED (remote: 'Partition not found')

fastboot: error: Command failed

D:\Users\Rukairi\Desktop\scrpy\A9_Fastboot\windows-x86\bin>fastboot -w

Erasing 'userdata' OKAY [ 2.054s]

mke2fs 1.45.4 (23-Sep-2019)

Creating filesystem with 58460333 4k blocks and 14622720 inodes

Filesystem UUID: cd180f7c-07c8-11ef-aef3-f3ee708fbd9a

Superblock backups stored on blocks:

32768, 98304, 163840, 229376, 294912, 819200, 884736, 1605632, 2654208,

4096000, 7962624, 11239424, 20480000, 23887872

Allocating group tables: done

Writing inode tables: done

Creating journal (262144 blocks): done

Writing superblocks and filesystem accounting information: done

Sending 'userdata' (6363 KB) OKAY [ 0.154s]

Writing 'userdata' OKAY [ 0.003s]

Erasing 'cache' OKAY [ 0.067s]

mke2fs 1.45.4 (23-Sep-2019)

Creating filesystem with 65536 4k blocks and 65536 inodes

Filesystem UUID: cdadebf0-07c8-11ef-802d-2d40938f69e7

Superblock backups stored on blocks:

32768

Allocating group tables: done

Writing inode tables: done

Creating journal (4096 blocks): done

Writing superblocks and filesystem accounting information: done

Sending 'cache' (184 KB) OKAY [ 0.010s]

Writing 'cache' OKAY [ 0.005s]

Erasing 'metadata' OKAY [ 0.018s]

Erase successful, but not automatically formatting.

File system type raw not supported.

Finished. Total time: 3.147s

D:\Users\Rukairi\Desktop\scrpy\A9_Fastboot\windows-x86\bin>fastboot reboot

Rebooting OKAY [ 0.000s]

Finished. Total time: 0.002s
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] damianmqr:
This is your problem, you are probably in fastboot and not fastbootd

Try running

fastboot reboot fastboot

first before proceeding with the other commands.

Alternatively if you for whatever reason can't reboot to fastbootd (you will know, because the screen will be black unlike white in normal fastboot) you can try addin "_b" (or "_a" if your active slot is a) to system, so

fastboot flash system_b rom.img
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
You also have to pick Prefer LTE on Mobile settings and override VoLTE on Treble settings. What SMS app you are using? I'm with Google Messages and RCS works after certifying the device!
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
Yep. A faster way to get there is to use:

adb reboot fastboot
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bigwigs:
If you are using fastboot and not fastbootd then you need find your active slot and then flash rom.img to that slot as mentioned above.

You can find active slot using fastboot getvar all or fastboot getvar current-slot
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] meh.:
Override VoLTE is what did the trick, thanks a bunch :)
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] kriegervondi:
I ended up flashing it back to stock and will make do without Google services (using F-Droid and Aurora Store). It works fine for my use case and the InkOS UI seems to be the best performing one for the screen.

Thanks for all the help, I really appreciate it.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Rukairi:
Thanks for the all the help! I was able to boot into LineageOS! I can't wait to see further updates.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] Tharks2:
Hello there,

I use Lineage 20 GSI from @dferreira with no root from several weeks.

I now want to root the phone , but all tutorials seems to be for the stock chinese rom of the phone.

Does something changes in particular if I do it from Lineage ? Do I need to wipe all data from the phone ?
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bigwigs:
You need to use boot.img from lineageos and rest of instructions are same , you need to copy boot.img from lineage os to phone and use magisk etc.

hisense-a9/rootphone.md at main · aimindseye/hisense-a9

Contribute to aimindseye/hisense-a9 development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
Just a clarification here: this is not LineageOS boot.img, but the stock OS boot.img from the last official update that has been patched with Magisk that is linked on the repository!

Flashing this boot.img will show Magisk on your launcher and that will then allow you to finally root and fully install Magisk on your device.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
After spending a few nights - unsuccessfully - trying to get my repo to build with the latest changes on LOS20, I decided I'll just pull the latest from LOS21 and get an updated build with LOS21. You will be able to update from my previous LOS20 to the latest LOS21. It's building.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] treff89:
Exciting to hear that, I've been F5-ing this thread like it's concert tickets, but held off asking for updates since I imagine that'd be pretty annoying when this is an unpaid passion project!!

Looking forward to helping test!
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
Me too! :p I'm building both Googless and Googled versions of the ROM. Update tonight!

So what's coming:

- latest Treble app and configs - auto brightness etc working

- native Always On Display

- configurable Vibration

- Android 14

- latest Eink Center v1.6 - night light should work now as I've added a SE rule for read and write to sysfs for system apps

Will test if upgrading LOS20 -> LOS21 is as simple as flashing system partition with the new image. It should work, but if it doesn't, will let you know. I do have a bunch of apps installed, which I'm hoping I don't need to reinstall again 🙈

@damianmqr if you want, we could extend Eink Center to include your lockscreen and we combine efforts on LOS21?
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] meh.:
Yesss, I was really looking forward to the degoogled version :D
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
Took a while. Moment of truth. Just flashed LOS21 gN (google included)
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
Bad news.... i'm on a boot loop with the latest LOS21. Complaining about missing properties:

Investigating...
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] ferlanero:
Fingers crossed
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] damianmqr:
Sure, I will work on making the AOD a standalone apk so it can be included in any OS and just remove that functionality from my current service (unless you specifically prefer having it as part of EInk Service?), but probably won't release it any earlier than the 16th because I'm too busy with finals

I'd probably still continue my work on the patching script for a while but I'm happy to join efforts in any aspects that can benefit the ROMs ;)
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] treff89:
Denzil, is it something to do with build.prop missing ro.board.platform line?
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
I think this is because of the SELinux rule I put. I’ll remove it and see if it works. Multiple things are complaining of not having permissions so I think that’s what is causing this. Will keep everyone posted!
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
It's rebuilding now. Hopefully won't take long as most of it is already built. The other mistake I made was I was building the light version of GSI, when we want the TD build.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
Can be standalone and I can integrate it on the build so it has system/priv-app access!
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] damianmqr:
It doesn't need any special access other than being an accessibility and notification service so probably no need for priv-app privileges, my current service apk is just in system/app but could be a regular non-system app as well

When I extract the AOD it can just be a vendor app on your ROM, I will see if I can even remove the need for it to be an accessibility service (might not be possible because I don't want the OS to kill it when saving resources but I will try anyway because turning it back on after each install gets annoying)
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
Was able to spend some time this morning doing a clean build. I think I messed up the previous source by applying light patches and then td patches without clearing the repo. Left the PC building and will check if all ok when I get home. Hope I can release both builds today 👀
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
It’s build but I need to reset my phone to test them since my previous build won’t even boot… can’t get my phone into fastboot :-/ EDL to flash system should work so I’ll try that.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] ferlanero:
Fingers crossed again, then :LOL:
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
ugh, tried flashing the img to the super partition on edl - since we can't see it on printgpt and now my phone just goes on a loop. I have access over EDL, so I'm restoring stock first so that I can flash system partition on fastbootd. I would share the images already but I want to make sure they work before sharing.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] jixbo:
Sounds like I will be flashing this weekend...🤓
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] scarletya:
Hi

I'm really pleased to have your great rom, it is really easy to use and has a nice performance.

I have a small issue here, can I use OTG usb storage?

With stock rom it was worked, but with lineage, otg storage doesnt recognize at all.

When I put it in other hisense with stock rom, it works.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] scarletya:
I am really happy with your rom, AOD works well, all things are really good.

There is, however, very minor issue if it could be fixed or not...

1. I set 24h time option, but on AOD it fixed with 12hr time option

2. When I rotate the screen, AOD also rotates, and AOD image get stretched and broken.

Is there any way to get it fixed?
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] damianmqr:
Yes, there will be a patch to the AOD soon-ish with a bunch of fixes, probably after the 16th

I didn't have much time to work on it recently
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] biodbl:
The USB otg doesn't work on Los 20, but I guess on Los 21 by @damianmqr works and on Los 21 by @dferreira it will work
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] scarletya:
I'm actually on LOS 21 by damianmqr but it doesn't work
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] damianmqr:
I will have a look at OTG after I'm done with AOD, I don't really use it so I haven't noticed but thanks for bringing it up
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] scarletya:
Thank you!

Your patch works fantastic, much better than stock rom.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
No progress to report… Mother Day duties with the kids and mother in law this weekend 😅
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
Thanks for this. I'm restoring atm my phone. If you ever get this error on Fedora, do `sudo su` before running this otherwise it won't work.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
I’m back on the latest official ROM. I’ll do a quick backup of it, just in case. Will then test my last builds. If all ok, I’ll share the official ROM for us to have a way to go back to the latest stock, and the LOS21 builds! Hopefully today/tomorrow morning!
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
Something is really broken with the latest sources of LOS21. Because it really fails to boot with this error:

01-01 05:41:08.676 5169 5169 F DEBUG : Abort message: 'couldn't find an OpenGL ES implementation, make sure one of persist.graphics.egl, ro.hardware.egl and ro.board.platform is set'

and goes into a bootloop. Luckily, this time I flashed LOS20 while my adb key is valid and my phone booted up. I'll see if I can put those props on LOS21. Weird that this is required for LOS21. What are the props that Andy Yan is using on his LOS21?
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bigwigs:
Not sure if this will help or not:

******************

Android expects the GPUs available to the system to be known when the system image is built. The preferred paths for 32-bit and 64-bit OpenGL ES drivers are /vendor/lib/egl and /vendor/lib64/egl respectively. The loader uses two system properties, ro.hardware.egl and ro.board.platform, or the exact name to discover and load the system drivers. The OpenGL ES driver must be shipped in either one binary or split into three binaries. If the OpenGL ES driver is shipped in one binary, use one of the following names:

libGLES_${ro.hardware.egl}.so

libGLES_${ro.board.platform}.so

libGLES.so

*************

Implement OpenGL ES and EGL | Android Open Source Project

source.android.com
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
OK, I've added to device.mk these two properties which should match what the OS expects. It's rebuilding.

PRODUCT_PROPERTY_OVERRIDES += \
ro.opengles.version=196610 \
ro.hardware.egl=adreno
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] OtherJonny:
Hi, I'm in need of a lot of help with my Hisense A9. Ultimately I want to enable all the cellular bands to be able to get hspda/4g in my area on the lineage gsi rom. Signal worked on stock rom. Unfortunately before installing the GSI I forgot to root with magisk. I believe I need root to be able to accomplish what I want. Can someone help me out? I literally can only use this phone now because of eye sensitivity.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bigwigs:
It is not possible to enable additional bands apart default bands that come with phone.

check out - https://xdaforums.com/t/hisense-a9-root-reward-offered-snapdragon-662.4495809/post-89411268
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] OtherJonny:
Hmmm any particular reason I would get signal on stock and not lineage?
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bigwigs:
LineageOS with phh treble need additional settings.

Below are the settings needed to get 4g and volte enabled:

Phh Treble Settings: (For Volte & Wifi Settings)

IMS features

- Install IMS APK and reboot

- Request IMS Network

- Force the presence of 4G Calling Setting

Change preferred network type to LTE(Network & Internet- SIMs) if it is not.

Enable VOLTE(Network & Internet- SIMs) if it is not
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] OtherJonny:
I’m not sure how to do the “request IMS network” or “force the presence of 4g calling”. I installed the ims apk and checked the settings.

This person lives a few hours away from me and fixed their signal by forcing band 41, which I’m not sure how to do.

https://www.reddit.com/r/eink/s/QRT9NiK7te
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
See their last post on that Reddit thread: network signal guru, disable all bands other than 41? You can flash boot.img that has been rooted with Magisk. It doesn’t affect Lineage GSI and you will see Magisk in your launcher.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] jixbo:
You might

You might not have 4g enabled at all. Go to network and internet, internet, and in the settings of your provider, there should be "Preferred network type". Mine was set to 3g, changing it fixed it for me
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] OtherJonny:
thanks for the rooting tip! Got root working. Unfortunately forcing the bands still didn’t work. I’m outta luck I guess. Awesome work though btw.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] OtherJonny:
It’s set to LTE. I spent over 12 hours trying every setting and configuration I could think of.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
It could be that the operator has discontinued the band that was supported? Being a GSI image, we only touch the system partition and it doesn’t touch the vendor or modem partitions. However, it may well be we are missing some props for the device. On this last time I reset my phone, I actually copied the /system files and folders from the stock latest ROM to my computer. I plan to take a look and see if there is anything there useful - face unlock is missing and I think we can get the missing .so from there to inject in LineageOS, missing build.prop and system.prop for better audio etc
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bigwigs:
Did you open IMS app after it was installed and reboot? There should be an option there.

4g calling I don’t remember where the setting is. Could be under network settings and sims or under treble settings.

Anyways, with LineageOS , I also faced connectivity issues that I didn’t face with stock rom. I had Tello SIM card which is another Tmobile MVNO.

LineageOS needs to have better support for mobile network switching and access. Maybe better IMS and other network code in phh treble module.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] dferreira:
In Developer Options, there is a setting "Mobile data always active" - try turning it off. I use it off because I have fast wifi at home and in general only need mobile data when outside. Seems to work fine for me.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bigwigs:
I was talking about connectivity issues outside not inside. I had posted the same earlier. Couple of months ago, the phone went into 2G mode and then would not go back to 4G even after multiple restarts . Eventually , when i reverted back to Stock rom, 4G LTE was restored. Since then, phone is on backburner until some stability is achieved.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] StridAst:
It's possible your carrier dropped band 41 as LTE in your area. I'm in Utah, just north of SLC. In this area T-Mobile refarmed band 41 entirely to 5G back at the beginning of March. Other parts of the SLC area got refarmed since then. Once T-Mobile cuts the band from LTE, all the T-Mobile MVNOs loose it as well. (Mint mobile, simple mobile, etc). Eventually all of band 41 will be moved go 5g in the USA, at least with T-Mobile.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bigwigs:
If band 41 goes 5g then Hisense a9 will be useless in US
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] StridAst:
Pretty much. I still get 2G on mine in the SLC area. Poor reception in many places, and data speeds slower than molasses in winter. I had to play around with it to even get the 2G data to work and not stop working the moment it connected to wifi. But I can still make calls and receive texts. In rural areas it doesn't even get 2G. Just no signal.

I've lost hope for more bands, so I'm waiting for the bigme hibreak release at the end of the month. Crossing my fingers that it will have US bands enabled. Still going to use my Hisense a9 as a pocket reader until i have a replacement but I'm no longer using it as my primary phone.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bigwigs:
If the phone doesnt have 5g bands then not worth buying anymore. All mobile networks will slowly make 4g also obsolete as selling phones is the new revenue model in US. Verizon n ATT already have strict device whitelist policy. metro by T-Mobile is now offering phones with new prepaid plans.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] scarletya:
Very glad to hear this.

I also get random signal losts after get LOS 21(this is patched by myself with damianmqr's).

With stock, I didnt experienced this at all for about 1 year. Also worked well 1month ago, with stock.

LTE, VOLTE worked well.

But after LOS21, VOLTE call randomly get dropped during VOLTE call, and LTE signal is also gone without any reason.

I set all the Phh treble setting, IMS, force 4g option, reset APN, reboot, and finally, change to another A9.

But all didnt work.

And this is not US, actually I'm in ROK Koera.

I have two hisense A9, both are on LOS 21. One is for a backup as I love this so much.

First I thought old A9 got problem, like its sim slot got damaged or something, as sim worked perfectly with other smartphones.

So I took new A9 form my desk, set LOS 21, and put sim to it.

It seemed work well first, but after 2days random LTE signal lost and VOLTE call drop reoccurred.

And I saw this thread there are many ones getting similar problems.

I hope it can be solved, as GSI on hisense makes it perfect.

It is also glad that you get stock img, so we dont need EDL mode for flash stock anymore.

Waiting for your works.

And thank you always.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bartelbertse:
Hi there!

I am using a Hisense A9 since February as my main phone. I still have my old phone on the side because I can't get everything to work still.

I was happy with my set-up for the time being. Today I made it through these instructions and rooted my Hisense A9. I thought this would give me full functionality of the Google Play Store and any Google Play Services needed for many apps. That's the main thing I was missing and Gbox or 2accounts didn't really give me the functionalities I am missing. Location services also work only on a few apps.

Now that I fully made it through the rooting instructions, my phone seems back in factory set-up without any new functionalities. It might be that I simply don't know what to do after these rooting instructions. Everything seemed to have gone well. Google Play Store and Google Play Services are still not working and the phone is back to Chinese. One of the first apps I reinstalled is APKpure and this app now also crashes after opening, which didn't happen before I rooted the phone.

Simply re-installing the backup I made before I started rooting unfortunately doesn't bring me back to the moment before I started rooting.

I have no idea what I did wrong. Anyhow I hope to be helped through this process and I happily pay someone who can do the set-up for me.

Another thing, when I have VOLTE turned on, each incoming call is an unknown caller. Did anyone find a way to solve that? I assume this can be connected to location. I am located in western Europe.

I also like the lite-interface I have seen somewhere in this chat. I'd be curious to try that!

Very interesting stuff you have worked on here! May it be a good step to more and more accessible and user-friendly e-ink phones!

So where I am now:

- I installed the version of Magisk that is recommended in the rooting instructions I linked to in this message, but the modules section colors gray and I can't open it.

- I downloaded the apk for trichrome from the link in the same rooting instructions, but my Hisense A9 doesn't manage to finish the installing process when I try to install the apk.

- I downloaded the Google Play Store and it still crashes right after opening as it did before I rooted the phone.

Anyone familiar with my situation and knows how to proceed?
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bigwigs:
Did you get any error messages?

It seems your phone might not be rooted.

Provide screenshot of magisk app if possible.
[Android Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] bartelbertse:
I did get some error messages along the way in the terminal (linux). Then I changed my prompt after checking what I did wrong. Is the full sequence of actions in the terminal supposed to be flawless or can it handle some errors between the commands? I used the latest-boot.img from this drive folder.

I wasn't sure how different it should look after rooting so I was unsure what happened. It looks exactly like how I received the phone when I first unpacked it. So I think you are right and that the phone is not rooted. I will trouble shoot and redo the process after hearing your thoughts on my screen shot :)