DO NOT FLASH HYDROGEN ROMS ON HELIUM, OR YOU GONNA HAVE A HARDBRICK.
IN CASE YOU HAVE ONE, HERE IS THE SOLUTION.
This was tested with Xiaomi Mi Max 128GB helium and localized rom from xiaomi eu.
I am not responsible for bricked devices or anything else. So at your own risk:
1. Install official MiPhone drivers
2. Download and install MiFash beta.
3. Download and unpack TWRP for miflash: 32gb or 64-128gb thanks @Abdess76.
4. Download ROM for your device, I recommend to try this one. You can install RR/CM Rom as well.
5. Run MiFlash with admin rights.
6. Turn off the phone, plug the cable to PC and halfway to the phone.
7. At the same time press Volume + and Volume - and plug in the cable.
8. Refresh MiFlash phone should show up. (If it didn't then make sure you did it right and u got drivers)
9. Navigate to your unpacked TWRP and flash it.
10. Now, boot ur phone with volume up. It's a bit slow. If it's stuck on miui logo, just release button and wait.
From here start to pay more attention:
11. TWRP can ask for password, press cancel and allow modifications by moving slider.
If you just need ROOT and your current rom, skip to the step 16. Also there is a recovery from boot in system folder. If you won't remove it, recovery may be replaced with stock one after reboot. Keep it that way if you want OTAs.
12. Format data.
13. Enable MTP and put modified zip in your phone.
14. Go to mounts and unmount system **
15. Flash your rom.
16. Flash latest supersu.
17. Reboot the phone.
In case u got NO OS message, then it means that u probably ignored step 15.
Also first boot may take like 15-20 minutes, since eu rom is deodexed.
Just to be sure, after installation mount system partition and navigate to the /system folder using TWRP's file manager and make sure it's not empty.
* In my case system didn't install because script could mount system partition since it was already mounted.
P.S. In order to update, you need to install OTA for offical rom via TWRP. Then without rebooting flash SuperSU, and finally using TWRP's file manager navigate to system folder and delete file named recovery from boot. Doing so will keep root and recovery.
Thank you so much for the guide! I will try it tonite
Waiting for boot loader is just too long..
WOW!!!! Just, wow..... I can not believe it but it worked like a charm. It took me forever to figure out my issue with the drivers, but after solving that I followed you step-by-step. And, lo and behold, it WORKED! Note for other users, Twrp took about a minute or two to finally boot up and it took me personally about 15-20 minutes before MIUI 8 finally booted. Just wait it out and you should have the amazing results that Doom Slayer has so graciously provided you
THANK YOU!!!!
I just done following your guide and it works!!
For rooting, I tried 2 times before it works. I believe you missed out a step to mount back system before flashing supersu.
So in the future, how do we dirty flash? Start from step 13?
How about clean flash? Start from step 12?
Thank you once again for this great guide!!
You saved me a lot of time waiting for Bootloader approval.
flywithme said:
I just done following your guide and it works!!
For rooting, I tried 2 times before it works. I believe you missed out a step to mount back system before flashing supersu.
So in the future, how do we dirty flash? Start from step 13?
How about clean flash? Start from step 12?
Thank you once again for this great guide!!
You saved me a lot of time waiting for Bootloader approval.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, dirty flash is you keep your data and format system and caches .
Clean flash is u format data as well.
The thing is that u have root, and ur phone is also secured. It's linked to ur Mi account, while it's locked. It's better to keep that way
Theoretically If you will ignore steps from 12 to 16. (Maybe u can ignore data formatting too)
Then you can get a ROOT and TWRP on your current rom.
And also theoretically while on miui 8 rom ,u can try to unlock bootloader without waiting.
Try this manual.
I have followed these steps and bricked my phone, spent the last 24h trying to recover it no luck.
I got an error while in the process of flashing the rom at step 16, then tried again and phone went black, stopped responding.
It's not detected using adb or fast boot, it appears in device manager as "Qualcomm HS-USB QDLoader 9008" or "Qualcomm HS-USB Diagnostics 900E", I have tried to flash again TWRP or the official ROM, it says success every time but the phone is still dead.
Could it be due to locked boot loader ?
agreusar said:
I have followed these steps and bricked my phone, spent the last 24h trying to recover it no luck.
I got an error while in the process of flashing the rom at step 16, then tried again and phone went black, stopped responding.
It's not detected using adb or fast boot, it appears in device manager as "Qualcomm HS-USB QDLoader 9008" or "Qualcomm HS-USB Diagnostics 900E", I have tried to flash again TWRP or the official ROM, it says success every time but the phone is still dead.
Could it be due to locked boot loader ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Open it up and remove battery for a few minutes, then try again from step 6...
agreusar said:
I have followed these steps and bricked my phone, spent the last 24h trying to recover it no luck.
I got an error while in the process of flashing the rom at step 16, then tried again and phone went black, stopped responding.
It's not detected using adb or fast boot, it appears in device manager as "Qualcomm HS-USB QDLoader 9008" or "Qualcomm HS-USB Diagnostics 900E", I have tried to flash again TWRP or the official ROM, it says success every time but the phone is still dead.
Could it be due to locked boot loader ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Which rom did u flash, give the link please.
Are u sure it's for your version? It can be a broken file as well.
Does the device connects when u hold both volume buttons?
It's called emergency download mode, u can istall rom with miflasher.
There is a testpoint method also.
All u need is a pic from this post on http://4pda.ru/forum/index.php?showtopic=749580&st=700#entry51154086
U need to disconect battery, connect testpoint to battery and flash ur device with miflash.
After that let it charge, since this in your state phone consumes battery.
thanks for you answer, I flashed the MiMAXPRO EU ROM xiaomi.eu_multi_MIMAXPro_6.8.4_v8-6.0.zip (sorry as a new user not allowed to post a link yet)
When I hold both volume buttons the screen is still black but MI Flasher works with COM10, after flashing a ROM or TWRP again MIFlash says "success" but the phone is still dead and won't start up even after holding power button for a long time.
I'm happy to open the phone and try the method on the russian forum, I will try tomorrow hope it will start up
agreusar said:
thanks for you answer, I flashed the MiMAXPRO EU ROM xiaomi.eu_multi_MIMAXPro_6.8.4_v8-6.0.zip (sorry as a new user not allowed to post a link yet)
When I hold both volume buttons the screen is still black but MI Flasher works with COM10, after flashing a ROM or TWRP again MIFlash says "success" but the phone is still dead and won't start up even after holding power button for a long time.
I'm happy to open the phone and try the method on the russian forum, I will try tomorrow hope it will start up
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Don't worry about your phone, the testpoint method will work for sure.
But in order to prevent this kind of situations ,we need to determine the reason how did it happen and you need to help me with that one by answering following questions:
1) You have mentioned that you had an error 1st time.
I also had error which was cache related, and it's OK because that partition was just formatted. You tried to flash again... but did you unmount your system partition for second time?
2) What's the capacity of your internal storage?
3) Did you use internal or external storage? If external then I need the model and the file system that have been used on that storage.
Doom Slayer said:
Don't worry about your phone, the testpoint method will work for sure.
But in order to prevent this kind of situations ,we need to determine the reason how did it happen and you need to help me with that one by answering following questions:
1) You have mentioned that you had an error 1st time.
I also had error which was cache related, and it's OK because that partition was just formatted. You tried to flash again... but did you unmount your system partition for second time?
2) What's the capacity of your internal storage?
3) Did you use internal or external storage? If external then I need the model and the file system that have been used on that storage.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hello,
I managed to recover the phone, I installed a fresh windows 7 on another PC with only MI Flash Beta installed, device appeared as "Qualcomm HS-USB QDLoader 9008" as usual and I flashed the china ROM. Not sure why it wouldn't start previously after flashing, maybe issue with drivers.
1) unfortunately I don;t remember the syntax of the error, it was after a few seconds of flashing but the process seemed interrupted, I even googled it but my browser history has been purged.
2) 64GB (Helium)
3)I used internal storage, copied the zip on the phone using MTP.
Might try to go through the process again this weekend.
agreusar said:
Hello,
I managed to recover the phone, I installed a fresh windows 7 on another PC with only MI Flash Beta installed, device appeared as "Qualcomm HS-USB QDLoader 9008" as usual and I flashed the china ROM. Not sure why it wouldn't start previously after flashing, maybe issue with drivers.
1) unfortunately I don;t remember the syntax of the error, it was after a few seconds of flashing but the process seemed interrupted, I even googled it but my browser history has been purged.
2) 64GB (Helium)
3)I used internal storage, copied the zip on the phone using MTP.
Might try to go through the process again this weekend.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, I guess system was mounted and it gived u the error,but formatted it.
hi to all of you. I am very interested by this thread. Here is the story. I received my brand new mi max helium this week but it was the chinese rom. I am in France and my country did not appear in the settings. So I wanted to flash a global rom. I plugged it to my pc in recovery mode and a window appeared said that there is an update. I clicked ok and after a while I got stuck in the mi logo bootloop.
Then from then I tried everything possible from several solutions here, but nothing worked. What I got is the mi logo without bootloop, but nothing more.
I get the message that the bootloader is locked, but I can't get it unlock if it is in this state.
What I can reach is the recovery mode and the fastboot mode. But nothing else worked, flash or anything.
That is why I am interested to flash a recovery, in order to flash a clean rom, etc..
I did what you, Doom Slayer, explains, but I could not get a twrp flash. It ends with "receiving hello packet" in mi flash, and every thing stopped.
If I cannnot install any recovery, I cannot flash a rom.
So please if you have any suggestion, it would be helpful. Thanks a lot.
alain belay said:
hi to all of you. I am very interested by this thread. Here is the story. I received my brand new mi max helium this week but it was the chinese rom. I am in France and my country did not appear in the settings. So I wanted to flash a global rom. I plugged it to my pc in recovery mode and a window appeared said that there is an update. I clicked ok and after a while I got stuck in the mi logo bootloop.
Then from then I tried everything possible from several solutions here, but nothing worked. What I got is the mi logo without bootloop, but nothing more.
I get the message that the bootloader is locked, but I can't get it unlock if it is in this state.
What I can reach is the recovery mode and the fastboot mode. But nothing else worked, flash or anything.
That is why I am interested to flash a recovery, in order to flash a clean rom, etc..
I did what you, Doom Slayer, explains, but I could not get a twrp flash. It ends with "receiving hello packet" in mi flash, and every thing stopped.
If I cannnot install any recovery, I cannot flash a rom.
So please if you have any suggestion, it would be helpful. Thanks a lot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you disable drivers signature?
Also some people have a better luck on windows 7, u can try a virtual machine.
If you can enter EDL mode, then you should be fine.
Unless Chinese already disabled it in a new update.
I would blame drivers. Make sure u got them correctly.
Updated tutorial.
Uploaded TWRP for helium, so you don't need to edit updater script anymore, since script will get correct model.
Now you can try to get root on your current rom and unlock bootloader without Xiaomi's confirmation.
People having helium with unlocked bootloader may also have problems installing roms from xiaomi eu, if they have TWRP from hydrogen.
You may update using my recovery.img from archive using fastboot, or TWRP(will also work for locked bootloader).
Doom Slayer said:
Did you disable drivers signature?
Also some people have a better luck on windows 7, u can try a virtual machine.
If you can enter EDL mode, then you should be fine.
Unless Chinese already disabled it in a new update.
I would blame drivers. Make sure u got them correctly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
hi Doom. Thank you for reply. But what do you mean by " disable drivers signature". I did not do anything but install the drivers and when I am on what I think is EDL mode(screen isi black) the driver is recognized as Qualcomm HS-USB QDLoader 9008(COM20).
Anyway, I will give another try and let you know. Thank you again.
---------- Post added at 09:14 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:22 AM ----------
I followed your guide and I could get the twrp installed. So I tried to install rom(following your link). It said rebooting in 5 seconds, and then nothing. The screen is black, no power anymore, no logo, no vibes, and no life at all.
I cannot get any more reaction from it. I plugged it to my pc, but nothing is connected. I was so happy with twrp working... Any idea?...
one more information I don't know if it can help, when I flashed first, I tried the "xiaomi.eu_multi_MIMAXPro_6.8.4_v8-6.0" and a message said "failed. This rom is for helium and this is hydrogen phone". Which is strange because mine is helium(4GB/128GB).
Then I tried with the "xiaomi.eu_multi_MIMAX_V7.5.6.0.MBCCNDE_v7-6.0" rom, and everything got ok, last message "success. The phone will reboot in 5 seconds", and from then, dead all over...
alain belay said:
one more information I don't know if it can help, when I flashed first, I tried the "xiaomi.eu_multi_MIMAXPro_6.8.4_v8-6.0" and a message said "failed. This rom is for helium and this is hydrogen phone". Which is strange because mine is helium(4GB/128GB).
Then I tried with the "xiaomi.eu_multi_MIMAX_V7.5.6.0.MBCCNDE_v7-6.0" rom, and everything got ok, last message "success. The phone will reboot in 5 seconds", and from then, dead all over...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Looks like you installed hydrogen TWRP and that caused all your problems.
I've been very careful to install the helium twrp from this thread...
Hello XDA
As title say, I 'm going share my experience in this thread.
History
I purchased this device almost 8 month back.Purchased from a local store.Was very smooth and i was satisfied with the performance.Battery was good.Got regular update and these updates are from google,so why not install it,right?Then this Android N came,and i was so happy.7.0.0 was good.Then the nightmare 7.1.2 came.Phone started to lag continuously,Battery drained too much.But I was like Okay.May be this will fixed in new update.Then suddenly one day my phone was stuck.Not booting.Stucked at Google.I understood that phone already booted and fingerprint was too working but it showed nothing on display just black light.I was afraid as i didn't purchase it from Google Play or any authorized seller.So no warranty or chance of having replacement.So I started searching about this issue and found not only me many people are facing this.But there are no proper guideline or solving this issue.Tried everything and ended up with Locked Bootloader Irony!
Journey
As i never try to mess with my phone because it was Nexus 5x! So i never touch OEM or try to unlock the bootloader.So i tried to access stock recovery,But Alas! in recovery Volume up and down wasn't working.So I couldn't wipe or factory reset.So Now ended up with :
1.Locked Bootloader
2.Locked OEM
3.Recovery Stuck
Googled and found many solutions but none of them came to solve my issue.So i thought why not flash stock rom.But HOW! Cause fastboot only work with unlocked bootloader.And you can't unlock bootloader when your OEM is locked and you can't unlock it with fastboot.It can be only unlocked from developer option only.GOD!
Now I have only 2 options left:
1.Fastboot mod where no functions working
2.Download Mod (This will save you)
Now fastboot option is out and only download mod option is available.So what can i do with Download Mod?
LGUP TOOL helped me.Downloaded a tot file for Global version (LGH791) and flashed it and stucked at google logo and in recovery too.But next time i flashed the same file in a different way.Ok here it is:
1.Drivers are important here.I'm using windows 10.I have adb and fastboot and Lg drivers.Workplace okay.
2.Opened device manager and change the com port of Android phone 3 to 41. Port Changed!
3.Connected my phone to pc using 3rd party cable (Careful here,try to use original cable.) and entered into download mod and.
4.Opened LGUP Tool ,checked REFURBISHED mod,checked BIN file and select the tot file downloaded before.And quicky close it.(No need to click start)
5.Then again opened lg tool and click start.(BIN Checked and it showed the previously selected tot file).No need add anything new this time,just open and click START.
6.Rebooted and again stucked at Google screen.But wait! recovery is working.Pressing and holding volume up button for a while then a android logo with red cross inside will come up.Now holding power button and volume down button at the same time,Recovery will show and menu is working.Great!
7.Now Wiped cache and factory reset.And after that selected Apply update from Adb sideload
8.My device was connected to pc from the beginning,right? Now i downloaded a file previously called bullhead-ota-opp2.170420.019-c449d2bb.zip from Google Nexus 5x OTA update page.
9.In Adb folder,copied the file and named it ota.zip.Opened a command prompt using shift+right click in the folder.Phone was on Adb sideload mode.Typing this command adb sideload ota.zip
10.This took more than 8-9 minutes to finish.After flashing and phone rebooted.WOW
11.Couldn't believe my eyes.The OTA update was about Android O.I quickly enabled the developer menu and made oem unlcocked and usb debugging on.Boot into bootloader and unlock bootloader with this command fastboot flashing unlock
12.Now bootloader is unlocked and i flashed TWRP recovery for future need.
13.Rebooted the phone and after using for 1 minute the phone freezed again
14.This is the end of the story for today.
Planning
I'm thinking the OTA update was the problem.Now I'm downloading 6.0.1 version.And will do a clean install.Let's see what happens next.
Any kind of help is appreciated.If you think there is something i'm missing here then please suggest.
And Thanks to XDA.I got all these helps from here.Will update the post tomorrow.
You downloaded Android O Developer Preview. Final OTAs are here:
https://developers.google.com/android/ota
Just try flashing newest Factory Image via fastboot, but don't forget to flash TWRP back:
https://developers.google.com/android/images
TBH I NEVER thought this phone will be dead by hardware failure all of a sudden, I dont mind another few hundreds bucks but the problem now is the fking data within it.
Cant even pass google logo if you choose Recovery Mode
GG LG, well played
I have a 16gb variant dead....same issue like urs .....can i use the same lgh791 tot file?... in fastboot it says lgh791 16gb
usefully
usefully
I STRONGLY recommend that the original post is corrected to change "Download mod" to "Download mode" in all of its four occurences.
Same for one ocurrence of "Fastboot mod".
It is horribly confusing as it is, as calling them "mod" implies some modification you have to apply to the phone (be it software or hardware).
same of my expirience, flash 4CoreOreo..
my nexus 5x now is fully working
the_uker said:
I STRONGLY recommend that the original post is corrected to change "Download mod" to "Download mode" in all of its four occurences.
Same for one ocurrence of "Fastboot mod".
It is horribly confusing as it is, as calling them "mod" implies some modification you have to apply to the phone (be it software or hardware).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I suppose that makes sense. Then again, when an instruction is telling you to boot into download mod.....using common sense I'm gonna understand that's a typo and they meant download mode. But you're right, for some folks that may be a bit of a challenge. Common sense isn't as common as it was when I was young.
And the links?
I'm brazilian and i'm having a hard time to find the links to download stuff. Mine is dead and bootloader blocked. The tutorial seems to work but i can't understand well
Interesting. Thanks
So, basically I will make this short as possible
Due to some problems I had to sell my G6 Plus (Brazilian -8 model) but it was on a custom rom, and did the most dumb thing that I could do: Reflashing pure stock and locking it, I've used the LMSA tool then relocked in Fastboot, the thing is some files were corrupt and when locked, it doesn't boot up anymore, as i still had hope for it, I tried to LSMA again, but it doesnt recognize anymore, as the lock flag is now "Flashing_Locked", flashing manually via Fastboot gives a error related to the lock flag (also LSMA resets the device, so using my unlock key asks to enable OEM Unlock at settings, a impossible thing when OS is broken) , then searched for some solutions, first it was booting a Boot.img file from the last stock, which was the flashed one, it bootloops, then tried something on the recovery that works, but is the stock one and pretty limited, so the logical thing to do is flashing a OTA file, but only works for old versions that requires one version before the target one, so its a no go. The last thing i tried to do is booting TWRP, but it gets stuck on a red warning that indicates that system is corrupt. Then the last hope was EDL Mode, and thats the point where i want to go, i've bought a EDL Cable that's basically a green and black wire thing used on most Qualcomm based Redmi/Xiaomi devices, but it automatically boots to fastboot, so I need help to get EDL Test Points for this device, im with access to the board, i just need the right Pads to short-circuit it and blankflash it, so i can finally get it to work like normal again.
Schematics (for people who understands): https://androidfilehost.com/?fid=4349826312261726244
Any help is important, I'm sorry for some typos, english isnt my main language considering i didnt use translate
and please don't come with instructions like "have you tried LSMA?, try booting up the device and select oem unlock" because its clear that it doesnt work.
Hello everyone,
I have a very peculiar problem with getting my Essential Phone to work again. It was lying around for roughly two years as I switched to another phone. Seeing as one of my relatives needs a new phone and has really low requirements I thought I could try to set it up again. I downloaded the official drivers again (Version 1.0.0 I think) as well as the last official release of fastboot images (February 2020).
Before I switched to a new Phone I had the Essential running with Lineage OS and remember wiping it with fastboot -w after I got the new device.
Now when I try to flash anything the device won't respond. It shows up when fastboot devices is used in the bootloader, but all fastboot commands get no answer whatsoever. I then switched from the official fastboot drivers to the latest android drivers which then gave me the sending x to y message when I try to flash anything, but nothing actually happens.
Interestingly enough, I can reboot to bootloader just fine and the Lineage Recovery is still accessible eventhough it shows an:
E: Failed to bind mount /mnt/staging/emulated/media/0 on storage/emulated: No such file or directory
on the bottom which leads me to believe that my device partitions may be corrupted outside of the recovery partition and the phone is bricked. In recovery adb commands can be used and I can reboot to bootloader for example.
When trying to sideload via the "Appy Update" function of the Lineage Recovery, I get an:
Error applying update: 26 (ErrorCode::kDownloadMetadataSignatureMismatch))
everytime. I tried different methods and Roms but nothing worked so far.
Can anyone help me with regards to bypassing signature verification entirely or point me in the direction of another solution?
Thanks for reading, I hope you have a nice day!
McMeth said:
Hello everyone,
I have a very peculiar problem with getting my Essential Phone to work again. It was lying around for roughly two years as I switched to another phone. Seeing as one of my relatives needs a new phone and has really low requirements I thought I could try to set it up again. I downloaded the official drivers again (Version 1.0.0 I think) as well as the last official release of fastboot images (February 2020).
Before I switched to a new Phone I had the Essential running with Lineage OS and remember wiping it with fastboot -w after I got the new device.
Now when I try to flash anything the device won't respond. It shows up when fastboot devices is used in the bootloader, but all fastboot commands get no answer whatsoever. I then switched from the official fastboot drivers to the latest android drivers which then gave me the sending x to y message when I try to flash anything, but nothing actually happens.
Interestingly enough, I can reboot to bootloader just fine and the Lineage Recovery is still accessible eventhough it shows an:
E: Failed to bind mount /mnt/staging/emulated/media/0 on storage/emulated: No such file or directory
on the bottom which leads me to believe that my device partitions may be corrupted outside of the recovery partition and the phone is bricked. In recovery adb commands can be used and I can reboot to bootloader for example.
When trying to sideload via the "Appy Update" function of the Lineage Recovery, I get an:
Error applying update: 26 (ErrorCode::kDownloadMetadataSignatureMismatch))
everytime. I tried different methods and Roms but nothing worked so far.
Can anyone help me with regards to bypassing signature verification entirely or point me in the direction of another solution?
Thanks for reading, I hope you have a nice day!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've been reading around a little, it seems like it could be a recovery issue? try the official lineage recovery if you're not already. If you can get fastboot working at all try to reflash the stock rom and go from there.
I had a similar problem. Use a windows computer with the essential drivers (you can download from reddit) and use the official cable
DO NOT use the cable supplied with the Essential phone for data transfer, it is likely to brick your phone. Use a high quality one from a reputable manufacturer!