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Root Help:How to unbrick from Stock Recovery?

S

speedwheels

Lurker
Kind Folks,
I have a T-Mobile Zte Zmax phone that hangs on the ZTE logo. I don't know how it got into this situation. I bought it like this thinking I can get it back to stock easily enough but now I realize that things may not be that simple.
Holding the volume key up/power and restarting the phone took me to the recovery menu. So I do have a working stock recovery. My question is this. Using the stock recovery, how does one go back to stock. i.e format all partitions install a clean copy of the stock rom? I have already tried a format cache/wipe/reset to stock from the stock, all to no avail. So, I download the stock rom.zip files some other folks had posted. Specifically the TMO_Z970V1.0.0B22_Stock-4.4.2.zip
So I copied this zip file to my sd-card and tried to install it from the stock-recovery(flash update from sdcard) but that process fails with an error "Signature Verification Failed".
I tried the same thing with adb sideload. The file would transfer correctly but the file would again fail signature verification. So I guess I have two questions really.
1. Does someone have a valid Zip file that I can flash from stock recovery to restore the phone image to stock?
2. If I cannot do this from stock recovery, how do I install a custom recovery using adb sideload (the only option I have available). I cannot boot into the OS since it hangs so all I have is ADB sideload to install a custom recovery. Does someone have a recovery.zip file that i can flash from stock recovery?
If not, what are my choices at this point? Any way out of this mess?
 

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Masterchief87 said:
Your only hope is root access through adb shell. If you can't get that then you are screwed
Click to expand...
Is there a how-to on that? :(
Actually, is there not a zip file I can flash from stock recovery? or ADB Sideload? No stock or custom rom zips that can be flashed with stock recovery?
Also, is there a way to switch the phone to fastboot mode so I can install a custom recovery and perhaps save the phone from there?
 
Last edited:
We dont have fastboot or any zips that can be flashed through the stock recovery. To see if you can get root in adb shell boot the phone into ftm mode by holding power and volume down until you see a black screen that says ftm then connect your phone to a PC with adb installed and type
adb shell
Click to expand...
then type
su
Click to expand...
and if you get a prompt with a # sign we can use adb to flash twrp recovery and fix your phone. If you are unable to complete any of those steps then there is nothing we can do to fix your phone.
 
i went back to stock flashed the stock rom n the stock recpvery i am stcuk at setup wizard keeps crashing please help :( if there is any help . i can get to ftm
 
So I managed to get into a weird ADB mode on the phone so now I have an ADB composite device available but I cannot do an ADB sh because the system partition does not exist or is not mounted. I get this error
- exec '/system/bin/sh' failed: No such file or directory (2) -

Now, I saw on another thread that one could flash a twrp recovery in ADB mode to the recovery using the following procedure..

>>push command
>>adb push twrp /sdcard/recovery.img
>>dd if=/sdcard/recovery.img of=/dev/block/platform/msm_sdcc.1/by-name/recovery

All the TWRP files I can find on this forum are in the .APK file format. How do I find one with .IMG format?
Thanks in advance..
EDIT: I realize that I need to get into adb shell to do the above and also need root access. Sigh. Guess I am boned.

Masterchief87 said:
We dont have fastboot or any zips that can be flashed through the stock recovery. To see if you can get root in adb shell boot the phone into ftm mode by holding power and volume down until you see a black screen that says ftm then connect your phone to a PC with adb installed and typethen type and if you get a prompt with a # sign we can use adb to flash twrp recovery and fix your phone. If you are unable to complete any of those steps then there is nothing we can do to fix your phone.
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
speedwheels said:
So I managed to get into a weird ADB mode on the phone so now I have an ADB composite device available but I cannot do an ADB sh because the system partition does not exist or is not mounted. I get this error
- exec '/system/bin/sh' failed: No such file or directory (2) -

Now, I saw on another thread that one could flash a twrp recovery in ADB mode to the recovery using the following procedure..

>>push command
>>adb push twrp /sdcard/recovery.img
>>dd if=/sdcard/recovery.img of=/dev/block/platform/msm_sdcc.1/by-name/recovery

All the TWRP files I can find on this forum are in the .APK file format. How do I find one with .IMG format?
Thanks in advance..
EDIT: I realize that I need to get into adb shell to do the above and also need root access. Sigh. Guess I am boned.
Click to expand...
The recovery.IMG is inside the apk. Change the file extension from .apk to .zip then extract it and you will find the recovery.img for twrp inside the assets folder. Assuming you were running the commands from the same directory where you put the recovery.img the command sequence would be as follows.

>>adb push recovery.img /sdcard/recovery.IMG

>>adb shell

>>su

>>dd if=/sdcard/recovery.img of=/dev/block/platform/msm_sdcc.1/by-name/recovery

>>reboot recovery

Just a little tip for informational purposes... You can also link multiple commands together by putting && between them.
Example:
>>su && dd if=/sdcard/recovery.img of=/dev/block/platform/msm_sdcc.1/by-name/recovery && reboot recovery
 
Last edited:
Oh good to know. Hope it helps others on this forum. As I mentioned, I cannot execute adb shell successfully so I am at a dead end. Thank you very much for your replies.

Masterchief87 said:
The recovery.IMG is inside the apk. Change the file extension from .apk to .zip then extract it and you will find the recovery.img for twrp inside the assets folder. Assuming you were running the commands from the same directory where you put the recovery.img the command sequence would be as follows.

>>adb push recovery.img /sdcard/recovery.IMG

>>adb shell

>>su

>>dd if=/sdcard/recovery.img of=/dev/block/platform/msm_sdcc.1/by-name/recovery

>>reboot recovery
Click to expand...
 
ghet2 said:
if i can get to ftm would this help me out also ? as i cant get pass the setup wizard keeps crashing
Click to expand...
Ftm won't help since your phone is not rooted. What you need to do is just skip past the setup wizard. Anywhere you see the skip button or next button just quickly press it without trying to put in your google account or name or changing the time or date. Just skip all of it you can do it later. If the setup wizard crashes then reboot and try again. Eventually you will get past it.
 
i tried that i press it n it crashed n it starts all over agaiin
maybe if i take oout the sim card it wont read to update ?
 
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