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Re: MX4 preloader

 

You can search the mailing list for the thread : [Ubuntu-phone] Flash MX4 
Ubuntu Edition. Did it work to flash flyme?

Here's a method Sebastian Hiller posted : 

Hello there,

i was semi-successful. I did manage to get Flyme working however there 
are major drawbacks which i haven't found a fix for yet (will test over the 
weekend when i have more spare time)
First things first i've tested the I and A versions of Flyme (which should 
definitely work since it is the MX4 M461 Model = international model, 
please check the model on your battery. If it is M460 it is the chinese 
version with locked bootloader and it wont work at all), so versions 4.0.4I, 
4.2.8.2I and 4.5.3.1A


Now the way this works is:
You need adb and fastboot on your machine (tested on OS X, Win 10 and 
15.04) As far as i can tell OS doesn't matter, there might be a driver 
problem and your MX4 wont be recognized. If that happens check google 
for the MX4 Windows drivers. Also use USB 2.0 Ports, on all of my USB 3.0 
Ports the Meizu wasn't recognized at all. You'll also need a recovery.img for 
flyme. Any version of that works it is just used to get in the default flyme 
recovery menu (can even be chinese. find it through google or create your 
own if you have a spare Meizuphone lying around)
Now to the fun part: Boot your MX4 into fastboot (Vol down + power)
Connect to PC
Fire up Terminal, CMD or whatever command line you are using.
fastboot -w (this clears the cache and user partitions on your MX4)
fastboot flash recovery recovery.img
shut down your mx4 and boot it in recovery mode (Vol up + power)
Your device should now mount as "recovery" (size around 1GB)
Move update.zip (the flyme update) to the recovery partition
On your phone make sure the first box is checked ("firmware update", 
might also be in chinese so you won't be able to read it, but it is always 
the first one) and hit the blue continue button
Your device will update (even replace the correct recovery partition, that is 
why the first one doesn't matter) and boot into flyme
But then things get strange:

4.0.4I will fully work and boot normally (it may take some minutes the first 
time). However graphics are bugged. Colors are missing saturation and it 
appears that the graphics driver or chip is not working with this version 
(laggy like hell, colors seem rendered by cpu) This will also carry on to 
ubuntu if you flash it back. You first have to update to one of the following 
versions and then got to ubuntu if you want correct color replication
4.2.8.2I will be stuck at boot / flyme logo. The device turns hot after a few 
minutes so there must be something wrong with the version (oddly enough 
colors appear fixed) This happens for OTA update as well as native update 
through recovery. Clearing cache and user data doesn't fix that one either
4.5.3.1A i've managed to get this to work. It might need a few reboots (it is 
stuck at flyme logo too) But there are bugs with the native browser, 
therefore signing in to google play services with 2factor auth. is not 
working as the browser crashes every time. You can chose chrome as a 
default, but for critical tasks it will always use the one that is bundled with 
flyme so you cannot use it as your main phone (at least i can't, might be 
ok for you)

As you can see it isn't fully working but better than nothing. I think there 
are just some minor corrections needed or maybe i'm missing something.

Good thing is, the device partitions wont be screwed up (at least if you do 
it this way, if you use flash tools be VERY careful what you do or you screw 
up you whole device) Therefore you can flash ubuntu back at any time. Just 
get the ubuntu recovery.img flash it through fastboot and then plug it in to 
flash ubuntu in the usual manner through terminal (i'm back on rc-
proposed but the rc one should be ok too)



Regards,
Sebastian



Le mercredi 29 juillet 2015, 10:09:14 Ionut Negru a écrit :
> Hi,
> 
> My MX4 Ubuntu edition device died while plugged on USB and I am trying 
to
> resurrect it. Till the event I used the phone without any dev related
> activities on it ... it broke before having time to really get into it. It
> is so dead that plugging it to USB will not raise any log events at all.
> 
> One hint I got was that for some reason emmc got corrupted. Is there 
anyone
> that knows the procedure and managed to successfully rewrite the 
preloader
> for the phone?
> 
> PS: I voided the warranty so ANY option is valid.
> 
> Thanks!


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