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Help Trying to factory reset but having problems..

M

matt504hrs

Newbie
Ok so i'm not that android savvy but back when I was using my desire I rooted it in order to get Froyo (I think?) which I believe partitioned the sdcard in order to work.. anyway I'm trying to get it back to it's usual state in order to sell it.

At the moment when I turn it on I get the pink swirling rings then I get the word android mirrored come up then I get the standard htc rainbow wallpaper and the notification bar but there is no ring or bar or whatever it was to slide and unlock. There is currently no SD card or sim card inside and I've tried doing the volume down / power button start up but it doesn't go to the white screen like I vaguely remember in the past but instead just boots up the same as I mentioned before.

I'm sure this will take a bit of work but I'm just not sure where to look for help, when searching 'it doesn't come up with the unlock screen' i'm just greeted by posts about unlocking phones for other networks!

Thanks for any help you can give!
 
I've still got 2 zip files saved from when I originally did the rooting but I don't know if they're of any use now.. the names are..

bravo.5.17.05.23.zip
recovery-clockwork-3.0.0.5-bravo.zip
 
To get into recovery you need to keep the volume button pressed down while the phone boots (I start pressing it either just before or immediately after I press power - wait a second or two and it's too late). Then select "recovery" from the menu on the white screen. If you can get into that you can do a factory reset.

The other question is, do you intend to sell it rooted or not? If not, then you can run an RUU (ROM Update Utility), which will reset all of the software to stock and unroot the phone. It will also erase all apps and data on the phone, i.e. will do a factory reset in the process (just doing a factory reset will not unroot the phone). You can download a suitable RUU from shipped-ROMs - either find the most recent one for your phone's original network (if branded - can advise on which RUU if you tell us what branding) or use the 2.3 upgrade, which works with any UK network branded handset. It's a windows .exe (the 2.3 upgrade has the .exe inside the zip file), so connect phone and run the RUU.

Rooting doesn't require partitioning the card, but some things that people do with rooted phones do. If you've done some of those things the phone may not work well without the card, as something important might be on it. An RUU will fix that, factory reset (which only erases data, does not return the ROM to the original state) may not, depending on what you actually did.

One vital question: have you ever made the phone S-Off and changed the internal partitioning (e.g. using a custom hboot)? If not, don't worry and you can ignore the rest of this post :). If you have, you'll probably have to do other stuff before you can run an RUU, as it won't work with a non-standard internal storage setup. So if you have done this please let us know and I'll tell you how to undo it. This is important, because a custom hboot is a booby trap for a buyer who doesn't know about it, so IMO it's not fair to sell it in that state - we've had a couple of people buy phones second hand, not knowing they had custom hboots, try to run an RUU and end up with something that doesn't work and looks very broken indeed.
 
The volume down + power option is definitely not working anymore.

I'm not sure what would be a more desirable option for a buyer to have, rooted or not rooted! I suppose they can root it if they want to so maybe I should try and get it completely back to normal.

I think the froyo rom was too large for the phones internal memory so it had to be partly saved onto the sd card which was where the partitioning came into it.

The phone is a branded T-Mobile. I have a mac, would I need to boot into windows to run the .exe or is it run straight onto the phone itself?

I'm not sure if this S-OFF thing was ever done, I don't recall it but It was a while ago when I did all this messing about so I suppose it might have happened.

Thanks!
 
Standard HTC ROMs will fit in the stock partitions, but ones based on later versions of Sense do not. TBH if it's one of those I'm surprised it boots as far as it does.

Have you tried to get into hboot after removing the battery? Just in case it's that "fast boot" feature later HTC ROMs have rather than a real reboot.

Gotta go now. Will try to think of way into recovery. Will need windows to run an RUU .exe
 
Do you mean while it's connected to mains? I've tried going into hboot with the battery in and out and plugged in and out of the mains, nothing has worked. It's been stored in the box it came in with the battery out for about a year.

I've got windows so that's not a problem, however plugging it into a computer it's not picked up at all! i've tried putting different sd cards in but I have a feeling where I went wrong might have been from doing a hboot and wiping the sd card forgetting that part of the os was saved to it in order for it to run!
 
Sorry, I meant connect to a PC.

Re. detecting, do you have the HTC drivers installed on the PC? For an RUU try installing the HBOOT drivers, as described at the start of this thread. It might be worth installing HTC sync drivers too - installing the HTC Sync package (download from HTC) should do this.

If you could get it into hboot you could easily tell whether the S-Off thing had been done as it says at the top of the screen. But you need the volume key thing to work for that. That is very odd actually - can you tell whether the volume keys work at all?

I suspect you'd remember if you'd changed hboot. One way to tell: did you root with Revolutionary or Unrevoked? Unrevoked does not give you S-Off, so you have had to do a separate operation in that case, which you'd definitely remember doing.
 
I'll download the files and try it in the morning thanks!

I am fairly sure it was the unrevoked I used, I think I just downloaded a .dmg file someone had created on xda and when I ran it the whole rooting process was done. I've remembered the rom that I put on was called Insert A Coin, don't know if that's any help?
 
OK I've tried hbooting with no battery and plugged into pc, nothing happens but the notification lights flash back and forth between orange and green.

I've still got the drivers and htc sync installed on the pc, htc sync says disconnected at the bottom. In My Computer I get another drive appear but when I click on it the message 'Please Insert a Disc into Drive' pops up.

This doesn't sound promising!
 
Ah, sorry, I wasn't clear. It won't work without the battery in: the phone draws its power from the battery, and all the power lead does is charge the battery. I was very concerned by the orange/green blinking until I realised that there was no battery in the phone! I'd just meant remove the battery long enough to force it to really shut down, rather than using this "fast boot" feature of some later HTC software (which would indeed bypass the HBOOT as it's not a true shutdown).

It sounds like the phone is trying to enter disk drive mode (i.e. mount the SD card over usb) automatically, which won't work as there's no card in it. When it's in that mode I don't think the other stuff will work.

Insertcoin was IIRC based on the Desire HD software, so I expect it will require a partitioned SD card for part of the ROM. I don't know much more about it (not a Sense ROM user), but I'm not surprised if it doesn't work.

The real problem is to get into recovery - if you can do that you can factory reset or change ROM. Or into hboot, from where you can enter fastboot mode and run an RUU.

If you have USB debugging on you might be able to use ADB to force it into the bootloader. There's a guide to ADB (Android Debug Bridge) in the Desire All Things Root Gude sticky post in the All Things Root forum (red link in my signature). If you can get ADB installed on your computer and the phone has USB debugging enabled (to let ADB talk to the phone) you can use the command "adb reboot bootloader" and it should boot straight into hboot (the white screen with little androids at the bottom, which the power+vol down combination should take us to). That will tell you whether you are S-On or S-Off, let you get into recovery, or let you run an RUU. The question is, is USB debugging on?

When the phone is booted can you do anything at all with it?
 
I used to be able to mount it this way, and I've put a card into the phone but I think it is currently blank. It won't allow to format the card either stating there isn't a drive to format.

It says that debugging is on when I plug it in, I've tried following your guide but I don't think it worked for me.. first time I tried it said adb server was out of date then it said killing something..

second time trying had this outcome (see attachment)

when the phone is booted no buttons have any control except for the power button for turning the screen on and off, long hold doesn't bring up the shutdown message - the only way to reboot is ejecting the battery.
 

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If you are in adb shell try exit. Then try adb reboot bootloader.

When you type "adb shell" then return you are in a linux shell on the phone. So whatever commands you then type go straight to that shell (login session). You need to exit it before you can use other adb commands - that's why you typed "mount" rather than "adb mount" then.
 
Ok, so you are S-On, so no need to worry about memory partitions. :)

Can you use the volume key to select "fastboot"? If you can then you can run an RUU when it's in fastboot mode, and it should be fully working. Unrooted, but you can root again if you want. If you do this the 2.3 update would be my RUU of choice.

Or if you select recovery you can do a factory reset, and install a rooted stock ROM if you prefer (which won't need a partitioned card to work). Can dig out links later (there is a section for rooted stock ROMs in the list of ROMs linked in the ATR sticky post).
 
I'm going to go for the unrooted option, does the RUU file need to be on the sd card? because I still don't have access to that on the computer
 
The RUU is a windows .exe. You run it on a PC while the phone is connected by usb and in fastboot mode (as shown in your picture).

Being in fastboot mode means whatever funny state the ROM is in won't matter, because the ROM isn't running.
 
OK, I think I get it! So the correct RU I would need should be on the shipped roms link you posted earlier? I can't find a t-mobile 2.3 one, or at least I don't think I can! haha
 
Yeah, 2.3 was never released as an over the air update. You can find it at shipped-ROMS.com (the Desire is know by its codename "bravo" - do not try RUUs labelled "Desire" as that's a different handset!). Would provide a link but am on Tapatalk.

As Nicka says, it works with any uk network and has no branding.

Edit: there's a link to the right index at shipped-ROMS in one of my earlier posts in this thread.
 
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