15
votes
How to unpack and edit boot.img for ROM porting?
Tools selection
The method I present here relies on CyanogenMod's Android source code.
While Google's AOSP only provides the tool to build the boot.img file, CyanogenMod also adds the unpackbootimg ...
- 909
12
votes
Bootloader/BIOS, flashing ROMs and related risks. Why are Android devices more brickable than PCs?
SHORT ANSWER:
Android phones are more brickable than PCs because they can hardly communicate with us if the bootloader is erased. And bootloader(s) live on Flash memory (eMMC) partitions which are ...
- 19.9k
6
votes
Accepted
A rather complex wifi issue (android tablet)
By looking at these two lines in logcat:
Could not set interface wlan0 flags (UP): Operation not permitted
WifiStateMachine: Driver start failed, retrying
I would say that the 4.4.2 ROM has a ...
- 752
6
votes
Accepted
Is it possible to extract the kernel and device tree from a rom?
If it was that easy then we'd have custom ROMs in no time for every phone on the planet.
What's on our phone are compiled, it's basically impossible to decompile them (modern decompilers are not as ...
- 9,524
6
votes
Accepted
Cannot flash Qualcomm with Stock Image (Lenovo Tab M10 TB-X605L LTE, Android 8 Oreo)
Solution (for flashing Qualcomm based Android devices)
This seems to be an easy, fast and reproducable solution for flashing Qualcomm based Android devices (tablets, mobile phones), so it should not ...
- 231
5
votes
Accepted
How to tell if phone's ROM is original or tampered?
I am assuming your device is NOT rooted by you
You can
Factory reset your device (of course after taking back up of data )
Root your device, flash a custom recovery and take a complete back up of ...
- 40.3k
5
votes
How to tell if phone's ROM is original or tampered?
TheBro21's comment applies only if it's a KNOX enabled device. For most Android devices, when you boot into downloading mode it will read a few lines in "SYSTEM STATUS: custom" or "Custom Binary ...
- 76
5
votes
Accepted
Cheating KNOX by cracking stock ROM certificate
If it was that simple it would have been broken long back. Knox is almost fool proof and prevents any such attempts
Samsung KNOX addresses security using a comprehensive, hardware-rooted trusted
...
- 40.3k
4
votes
Accepted
Enabling ADB on Nexus 6 with dead screen
I followed this guide
I went into fastboot mode by holding down the power button (force restart) and the volume down key (recovery mode)
I downloaded a twrop image from: https://dl.twrp.me/shamu/
...
- 183
4
votes
Should Factory Reset return the phone to the original version Android installed on it?
Factory reset only delete user data (userdata partition) and restore settings to the default values, meaning every settings will be restored to the factory state. This doesn't apply to the system, (...
- 3,207
4
votes
Accepted
What is the proper method to manually odex an apk?
credits to com.modaco.odexme
xda link
Theoretically you should only need your Android device to manually odex, I ended up using both smartphone (running KitKat 4.4) and PC as explained later.
I ...
- 514
4
votes
Sahara fail while trying to flash a rom into my phone
See here how I solved this problem. Somehow Windows is blocking the flashing of the device, that's why the sahara error occurs.
https://superuser.com/questions/1538067/cannot-flash-qualcomm-with-...
- 231
4
votes
Accepted
Verifying a (custom) ROM signature
In order to verify the signature of a ROM ZIP file on a PC, two things are required:
The public key from the ROM creator (can be extracted from /system/etc/security/otacerts.zip if the creator is the ...
- 19.9k
3
votes
What are the differences between a system app and user app?
I would like to add something in the above answers. System apps cannot be deleted in a full factory reset, unlike user apps. So if you want to delete all your personal files but they are too many to ...
- 31
3
votes
Accepted
The most lightweight custom ROM?
It is highly depend based on your phone model.. Yes as far as i know, SlimROM is minimal.. But im not sure whether it will be avilable for your phone.. Custom ROMs are not universal, it's device ...
- 204
3
votes
How can I verify my phone's Bootloader, OS, and ROM haven't been tampered with?
There are a few indicators of modified/unmodified devices, depending on what was modified and how.
Depending on the manufacturer and model, some of these indicators are not available.
These should ...
- 4,052
3
votes
Accepted
What do all these letters/numbers in early Samsung ROM file name mean?
These 2 firmware names are a good demonstration of (early) Samsung naming conventions.
I8160XXLL2 is the "PDA" designator, i.e. build number;
I8160QXXLL3 is the "CSC" designator, i.e. baseband ...
- 9,524
3
votes
how to check if my OS is not modified (is original)
No real way to test it unless you know what you are looking for (in terms of spyware) the best solution is to flash a new CM rom from an approved site that is known to be clean.
- 206
3
votes
Should Factory Reset return the phone to the original version Android installed on it?
Is this normal
Yes. See answers here and the linked dupe question Upgraded my phone from 1.6 to 2.2 Android version, if I restore "Factory Settings", which version it will be?
Is there a ...
- 40.3k
3
votes
Accepted
How can I see the history log of system updates?
Most OEM doesn't keep a log of that on your device, but the recovery (a place for installing OTA updates) does keep a log of what you installed, when you wiped data, etc. That log should be in /cache/...
- 173
3
votes
Accepted
Why does GrapheneOS use signify instead of PGP to sign their releases (GPG, cryptographic signatures)?
Daniel Micay (Lead developer of GrapheneOS) decided to use signify instead of gpg because of many issues associated with gpg and the OpenPGP standard, including:
PGP Certificate Flooding attacks
gpg ...
- 364
2
votes
What is the purpose of a ramdisk in Android?
Ramdisk
ramdisk.img is a small partition image that is mounted read-only by the kernel at boot time. It only contains /init and a few config files. It is used to start to init which will mount the ...
- 125
2
votes
What is the purpose of a ramdisk in Android?
The Android ramdisk is the same as the normal linux ramdisk. It's used to start init which then mounts all the normal partitions (normal linux boot procedure).
Have a look here for more details: ...
- 988
2
votes
What are the differences between a system app and user app?
Another feature of system apps is that they use native libraries (libsomething.so files) from the common system libraries directory (typically /system/lib or /system/lib64), and not from the app-...
- 156
2
votes
Accepted
Where the original stock Rom is usually stored?
This is based entirely off @Firelord's comment, with some modifications, so all credits go to him.
First things first, the stock ROM is not as such stored anywhere on device in a form which the ...
- 3,185
2
votes
If I install a ROM that doesn't exactly match my phone, will it work at all?
The answer is almost definetly no.
Although there might not be much difference between the models, there are bits that are different. These bits won't work. Other bits may depend on these bits, and ...
- 313
2
votes
SOLVED - Invalid IMEI - lenovo a7000
Solved it.
I rooted with SPTools and used Chamelephon to enter the IMEI's (if you have dual sim, enter both at the same time!).
- 121
2
votes
What is the difference between Samsung 4 files(Repairing firmware) and Single firmware file for flashing?
Some things were not explained. A 4 File is not exactly binary firmware in a sense (even though it's all binary) given that they are used to repair the device. Currently the PDA section when using ...
- 21
2
votes
What is the difference between Samsung 4 files(Repairing firmware) and Single firmware file for flashing?
The main difference is that the single file doesn't Factory Reset the phone after flashing, but the 4 file firmware does factory reset and remove absolutely everything and make it like an out of the ...
- 90
2
votes
Accepted
Given an Android phone, how can I find out what custom and stock ROMs are compatible?
This site offers a fairly comprehensive coverage to the questions asked by you:
Where can I find stock or custom ROMs for my Android device?
How do I root my Android device?
How do I update Android ...
- 40.3k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible