Ok here I was, totally innocent thinking about upgrading my Samsung Galaxy S2. I did that before some time ago and had no problems whatsoever. However when trying to install Codename Lungo Mod (CyanogenMod) as described in things-to-do-before-and-after-installing-a-rom-troubleshooter some problems occured.
Things to do when installing a new rom:
- “wipe data/factory reset”
- “wipe cache partition”
- Go to advanced and “wipe dalvik cache” and “wipe battery stats”
- Go to mounts and storage and ”format system”
- The go to “install zip from sdcard> choose zip from sdcard” and select the ROM file you want to install.
- In case, the developer has recommended to install GApps too, you should install it just after flashing the ROM (use Step 5).
- When it is installed, reboot the device
After wipping everything and trying to “install zip from sdcard> choose zip from sdcard” some weird “Status 7” assertion errors appeared. Which basically denied the installation because clockworkmod thought the rom was not compatable with my device which was caused by my rather super outdated clockworkmod . Upgrading clockworkmod didn’t work for some weird reason. Please let me know why it didn’t ate the update.zip if you happend to know.
Anyways, so I had to delete the assertions in the rom zip file as described in how-to-fix-android-custom-rom-status-7-installation-abort-assert-failed-error-in-recovery-easily. Well changing the updater-script was no big deal. However how to get the zip on the device which has no rom installed anymore? I could have rolled back the backup, copied the rom.zip on the device, wiped and attempt another install or push the rom via adb onto the device.
But that approach probably took just as long in the end. At first my laptop didn’t find the android device anymore although I’m developing on it on a daily basis so the USB driver were installed. After some research I’ve found a website describing that very problem how-to-solve-adb-device-not-found-error. Which basically let me install PdaNet. My Samsung mobile phone could be found via “adb devices” after I went into clockworkmod start screen, then plugged in the USB cable and then went into the mounting screen. The article stated to use adbfastboot but I have android platform tools installed and just used the officially shipped by google adb tool. Now I could simply “adb push rom.zip /sdcard/rom.zip” and “install zip from sdcard> choose zip from sdcard” , select the lungo and install the rom.
To my surprise the “Enable USB Debugging” menu item was missing which had to be enabled by tapping 7 times on the about information for some weird reason. Is Google hidding stuff like Mac now? Also to note that if you want to get your device “online” when developing look into how-to-fix-adb-device-is-listed-as-offline-on-android-4-2-2.
TL;DR: upgrading to a new rom can be quiet more troublesome than advertised. ^^’
Bonus: on this tiny journey I stumbled on a collection of android rom installation errors and also collection of useful Tools, Drivers, utilities, downloaders and various fixes for Androids and PC. .
April 23, 2014 at 10:00 pm
I wanted to update my S2 to Lungo, but after reading your article, I prefer the old rom. Thanks for sharing your experience.
July 1, 2014 at 5:28 pm
Well to be fair, the mod itself is quite nice and did a good job for a long time. It’s just the updating process that is quite a hand full ^^’. But yea there might be easier ways to update your android device now.