Root lte2 touch recovery issue

[andriodamit]

Hello All,

I have a rooted metro lg f6 phone with CWM ( Lte2 touch recovery) recovery installed. I have rooted and installed recovery long back.
Recently I was planning to upgrade to 12b ( or custom rom may be) , so I tested how can I get into recovery mode.

I realized that only way to get into recovery is to use the lte2 touch recovery app reboot option
I tried different button combination/ adb reboot recovery ( with SU as well) and also within the phone using the terminal , nothing works .. ( a green andriod comes and then whole system reboots)
In fact within the CWM recovery if I choose reboot recovery it shows green android and then reboots the whole system
my worry is that tomorrow if phone get soft brick or something then how to restore it using the nandriod cwm backups I have ( when I cannot get into recovery mode)

Please advise

 

[WarrantyVoider]

I have no experience with lte2 recovery, but looking inside the apk, I don't think it's a true recovery. It doesn't seem to be installed to the recovery partition (so you're still seeing the stock recovery with green android) and it probably can't (or at least shouldn't) be used to install a new rom.

You should probably install hroark13's TWRP instead. That's likely what most people use.
http://androidforums.com/threads/metropcs-recovery-twrp-lokied-new-apk-version-08-27-14.861281/

Just remember that if you use the button combo (from the off state) to enter recovery, F6's bootloader will wipe your data (factory reset). And when you get into custom recovery that way, it won't be able to mount your data partition because the partition has been wiped. If that happens, you need to format the partition to set up a valid file system.

Another note. I don't remember for sure, but I think CWM backups aren't compatible with TWRP backups (unless you know how to convert them). If you prefer to stay with CWM, there's also a CWM recovery made by pressy4pie (inside F6Utilities2, I think).

 

[andriodamit]

I have no experience with lte2 recovery, but looking inside the apk, I don't think it's a true recovery. It doesn't seem to be installed to the recovery partition (so you're still seeing the stock recovery with green android) and it probably can't (or at least shouldn't) be used to install a new rom.

You should probably install hroark13's TWRP instead. That's likely what most people use.
http://androidforums.com/threads/metropcs-recovery-twrp-lokied-new-apk-version-08-27-14.861281/

Just remember that if you use the button combo (from the off state) to enter recovery, F6's bootloader will wipe your data (factory reset). And when you get into custom recovery that way, it won't be able to mount your data partition because the partition has been wiped. If that happens, you need to format the partition to set up a valid file system.

Another note. I don't remember for sure, but I think CWM backups aren't compatible with TWRP backups (unless you know how to convert them). If you prefer to stay with CWM, there's also a CWM recovery made by pressy4pie (inside F6Utilities2, I think).

Hi,

thanks for your reply, I did realize that lte2revocery is not a true recovery and still I was having the stock recovery installed ( all the time)
So I installed the CWM recovery using f6 utlities and took the system backup then
1. I reset the system, booted , checked everything was working, used for some time and took the back up again ( using recovery)
2.Install and run Voodoo OTA Rootkeeper, took the ROOT backup, and did the temp unroot
3. fired the OTA update
4, go some error and was shown the CWM recovery screen ( pressy4pie CWM) screen
5. tried to reboot system but system rebooted to CWM recovery again
6. tried to restore all the different backup ( latest/old/oldest) , nothing works, system reboot is actually rebooting recovery
7. tried to format system,boot , cache and tried advance restore as well . didnt work
8. adb devices recognizes the recovery only
List of devices attached
db9dfc recovery

can you please tell me what is wrong here, can you please help me what is best way to get out of this situation ( I am still hoping to get out of this situation using the CWM recovery )

 

[WarrantyVoider]

I am not sure about this phone. My F6 came with 12b and I've never had to do an OTA update for this phone.

Based on what I've learned on another LG device, OTA updates can fail quite spectacularly on some modded devices. One potential problem is that lte2 recovery has changed some of your system files. I don't know if the update patches those files. If it does, those files probably won't pass the check. The other potential problem is that an LG OTA update isn't compatible with custom recovery. I haven't studied the F6's stock recovery much (never had the need to), but with another LG device, the bootloader would continue to attempt to boot recovery in order to complete the process (perhaps to clean up in case of failure). Since a custom recovery isn't built to handle LG-specific commands, the process can never complete. That's my guess anyway.

Maybe someone who has experience with this can answer you better. If you're asking me, three ways to consider. One, put stock recovery back and see whether whatever the update wants recovery to do can be done to break out of the loop. However, if this doesn't work, you lose access to CWM and you may need to unbrick. Two, continue using custom recovery to manually fix whatever is causing the bootloop. More about this later. Three, try to unbrick to see whether you can start from a fresh state. On the plus side, using the 12b KDZ would put you at 12b which you wanted in the first place. You should be able to find another KDZ version like 10e or 10i if you want that instead. There are probably D500 KDZ files if that's your model. GameTheory's unbricking guide is here: http://androidcreations.weebly.com/unbrick-unroot-factory-restore-ms500.html

About option two. Some people with other LG devices say when you're in a bootloop caused by applying an OTA update, you can get out of it by zeroing out the "fota" and "misc" partitions. The "fota" partition is normally all zeros, so it's safe to wipe. The "misc" partition, according to Google, is supposed to be used to store certain info for OTA updates. On my F6, which has never been through an OTA update, the partition contains my IMEI as well as wifi and bluetooth MAC addresses. So, if you want to try wiping these two partitions via ADB shell commands ("adb shell" to give you the prompt), you can try the following.
To save an image of "misc" to your SD card (mount your /external_sd first in "mounts and storage"):

dd if=/dev/block/platform/msm_sdcc.1/by-name/misc of=/external_sd/misc.img

Then, to wipe the partitions:

dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/block/platform/msm_sdcc.1/by-name/fota
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/block/platform/msm_sdcc.1/by-name/misc

Obviously, the first line would wipe "fota". If that's all that's needed. just do that. The second line would wipe "misc" if wiping "fota" isn't enough.

Whatever you decide to do, good luck.

 

[andriodamit]

Thanks for quick response, much appreciated !

I was able get my LG back to life using your suggested option 3 with 10i kdz
However after reboot I found that some of my apps already installed, Google account already setup etc ( basically I got the phone with the last recovery I tried with nadriod backup -> backup I took just before I fired the OTA), Later I checked , this option removed the custom recovery

Isn't third option should give me vanilla fresh stock phone ( when it is updating the recovery and may be few other things ) ?

However from all this drama and excitement , here are my observation

1. If you fire the OTA update on the rooted phone, it tries to update but its not able to update actually ( phone remains on 10i) and after some time you get annoying OTA update notification again
2. If you install the custom recovery ( e.g. - like pressy4pie CWM) then I believe OTA update checks for stock recovery and it fails and causes phone to get into boot loop ( it brings you back to custom recovery again)

take away - never fire the OTA update with custom recovery ( at least on this phone)

thanks again for the quick and detailed reply, still there is lot for me to learn it seems

Also can you please advise what is the actual benefit or difference between 10i and 12b ( other than Knock feature)

 

[WarrantyVoider]

Isn't third option should give me vanilla fresh stock phone ( when it is updating the recovery and may be few other things ) ?

take away - never fire the OTA update with custom recovery ( at least on this phone)

Also can you please advise what is the actual benefit or difference between 10i and 12b ( other than Knock feature)

As far as I know, the KDZ unbricking procedure doesn't wipe the userdata partition. So if you were using the stock rom, you data should mostly be intact. If you were using a custom rom, restoring back to stock would make the data incompatible. So in that case, you'd need a factory reset to start fresh. Yeah, sorry, didn't mean to cause confusion. When I said "fresh state," I meant the rom/system files.

OTA updates are meant for unrooted stock firmware. Sometimes there's no ill effect when they are applied over modded software, but it'd be a mess when they're incompatible (which is likely the case with LG updates). So in general it's a good idea to check forums to make sure it's safe to apply an update. This phone is probably not getting any more updates (unless LG is feeling generous enough to fix the stagefright bugs for us), so once you've updated, you should be good.

I think knock-on was the notable one. This is an old device. When I got this phone over a year ago, like I said, it came with 12b. So honestly, I have no experience with any version other than 12b.

Anyway, I'm glad you've resolved your problem.

 

[andriodamit]

alright very good !, thanks for coming forward and providing the expert advice

 

[andriodamit]

Hi,

I am not sure what is happeing ( never happened with any other device , these strange things)
here is another story.. believe I know waht I was doing and I have done this earlier as well

after resotring my device I installed freedom kernel ( before installing any recovery, kept the phone on stock)

1. everything was going great until I decided to intall the recvoey again using f6 utiliites,
   for some reason f6 utilities didnt install the CWM and when I tried to reboot to recovery phone rebooted as normal ( green android came in which meant no custom recovery)
2. so I tried using the lte2 touch recovery, phone rebooted normally ( no green android) and now phone is not connecting to WIFI ( tell avoided due to poor connection ) , doesnt detect any phone network , tried rebooting many times
   
3. when I tried to open my TB it is telling me that there is no root on this phone,
   who removed that ? link2sd is not working
   
4. I tried doing ADB but same computor is not detectig the device as media device
5. I tried connecting as lg software/camera and adb devices showed the device but root is failing ( same root method which worked earlier like a charm

here is the log

[*] Sending files to your device...

[*] Starting rooting program.
ro.build.product=f6
ro.build.id=JZO54K
setsockopt() failed: Bad address.
this device is not supported.
kallsyms_addresses search failed.

[*] Checking if rooting succeeded
[*] Unfortunately, rooting failed. Cleaning up.
Press any key to continue . . .


Experts please help me to get out of this situaton ( I dont want to use KDZ method now since adb shell command is working and I can do su as well)

 

[andriodamit]

tried root again wiht updated saferoot from xda, got the errror that kernel is patched, root wont work

 

[WarrantyVoider]

I don't have experience with the methods you're using, so I can only base my comment on what I know and maybe provide some educated guesses.

I imagine freedom kernel requires root to install. If that was a log from the rooting attempt, then according to that, rooting has failed. So I don't know if freedom kernel was installed. The recommended way to root this phone is with towelroot. Older methods might not be compatible with newer firmwares (not sure if you're on 10i or 12b at this point).

I think freedom kernel is supposed to allow root access. If it's strictly a kernel or boot image, then it likely doesn't install su to /system. I don't know how F6Utilities installs its recovery, but if it relies on su being in /system, you probably still need SuperSU or something. Anyway, custom recovery can be installed manually if for whatever reason the app (or another flashing app) doesn't work. You can pull out the loki'fied image file (.lok) from the archive and flash that to the recovery partition. With adb shell, use "su" to become root. Use "id" to check that you're root. If you have the image file at the root of your SD, use

ls -l /storage/external_SD/

to see the contents of the SD and use

dd if=/storage/external_SD/recovery.lok of=/dev/block/platform/msm_sdcc.1/by-name/recovery

to install the image to the recovery partition. Of course, replace "recovery.lok" with the name of your recovery file.

Check some of the other posts; there are probably newer, simpler, and/or better ways to achieve your goal. Anyway, good luck.

 

[andriodamit]

thanks again for the detailed reply !
well I did root the phone using saferoot, did the root check , restored essentials apps using TB and later I installed freedom kernel and rest of the story you know ...

so basically what I learnt from all this that
if you have freedom Kernel and then install the custom recovery , some stargne things can happen, still not able to figure who is the culprit here ? ( or it is me )

anyway I am able to restore things back to stable life using Unbrick guide