Volla Installation guide

I did just that, Rephone with ubports 0.10 and oem unlocked. Booted into fast mode, unknown device, then it did the bootloader unlock. I didn’t reboot because it could be flashed directly afterwards with manual selection of Volla 22. After flashing finished I got only a white Led and reboot doesn’t work and it’s just bricked.

So, you did boot the rephone android and enable developer, and usb debugging, etc? As with all instruction guides, the one above is probably to brief.

Yes, I did that. Maybe we can make the documentation better if we find out what went wrong.
Kenada from UBPorts forum mentioned, that the partition layout on GS5 and Rephone are different from Rephone, but I understand the instructions as that the Rephone, the GS5 and the Volla 22 are basically to be installed in the same way, right?

You mean different from Volla22, I assume? I don’t believe the partition layout could be the issue since I would have experienced it!

I did rephone and GS5 in exactly the same way. Both I first did a full install of Volla OS to check that all features worked. Then, I erased the user partition with recovery, then I flashed SFOS.

My second rephone I recently went through the whole procedure again to rule out errors. So, flashing VollaOS is definitely possible as I laid out. In total, five devices with the same procedure (1 Volla22, 2 GS5 and 2 Rephones). The phones I’ve bricked where either the wrong phone (GS5 lite once, my son’s backup phone!) or accidents (pulled cord).

At what time do you unlock the bootlader? In Android I tapped 7 times on System, then enabled Devmode and OEM as well as USB Debugging. But still, after booting into fastboot mode it reported the bootloader as locked. But it offered to unlock it, wich I chose before I started to flash it in UBPorts installer.

Second question, in UBPorts installer it did not recognize the Rephone right away, I had to select the Volla 22 option to get flashing started. During the flashing I also saw many different messages on the phone screen, but once it finished only the white led and a black screen. If I connect to MTKclient it reports it sits there in BROM Mode.

Ok, that sounds the same as my last processes. I usuall do a check with fastboot get_unlock_ability and do fastboot oem unlock and co. But I know that with the last two flashing episodes, I just used the ubports installer and the SFOS flash script.

Second point is the same for me, the different messages are the different partitions being written. This was on the VollaOS install, correct?

Could you post the contents of

~/.cache/ubports

please?

Funky. Inside ~/.cache/ubports I found all the Volla Files inclund the scutterfile for the M6768 under mimameid/firmware. I started up spflashtool5 with root privileges and connected the phone with a USB Hub. Using mtk payload script I was able to send the payload to the phone and then set Option/Connection in Spflash to UART and a proper port. I was able to start flashing it with these files but I got

BROM Exception! ( ERROR : STATUS_TOO_LARGE (-1073479676)

Still, this is moving forward. :slight_smile:

[HINT]:
)((exec,../../../flashtool/Cmd/DADownloadAll.cpp,84))
Connecting to BROM...
BROM connected
Downloading & Connecting to DA...
connect DA end stage: 2, enable DRAM in 1st DA: 0
DA SLA enabled status: Disabled.
Warning: DA SLA Disabled, skip it!
DA Connected
Check Storage Life Cycle: S_DONE(0)
executing DADownloadAll...
Stage:
[0] WRITE TO PARTITION [ preloader ]

Stage:
[7] WRITE TO PARTITION [ vbmeta_a ]

Stage:
[8] WRITE TO PARTITION [ vbmeta_system_a ]

Stage:
[9] WRITE TO PARTITION [ vbmeta_vendor_a ]

Stage:
[21] WRITE TO PARTITION [ md1img_a ]

Stage:
[22] WRITE TO PARTITION [ spmfw_a ]

Stage:
[23] WRITE TO PARTITION [ scp_a ]

Stage:
[24] WRITE TO PARTITION [ sspm_a ]

Stage:
[25] WRITE TO PARTITION [ gz_a ]

Stage:
[26] WRITE TO PARTITION [ lk_a ]

Stage:
[27] WRITE TO PARTITION [ boot_a ]

Stage:
[29] WRITE TO PARTITION [ dtbo_a ]

Stage:
[30] WRITE TO PARTITION [ tee_a ]

Stage:
[34] WRITE TO PARTITION [ logo ]

Stage:
[45] WRITE TO PARTITION [ super ]

Stage:
[46] WRITE TO PARTITION [ userdata ]

Download failed.
Disconnect!
BROM Exception! ( ERROR : STATUS_TOO_LARGE (-1073479676) , MSP ERROE CODE : 0x00.

I was able to finish flashing successfully when I unticked “userdata” from the spflash. Now I have a brief Volla Bootscreen when I press power. But nothing more happens…

Ok, good to know. That’s the correct Volla22 image data. The same data that I flashed with successfully.

The question is can you get to a fastboot prompt?

I know and the answer is no as of now. ;-/

Holy cow…I flashed again with spflash5 and selected Firmware Upgrade instead of Download with all boxes checked and now I have a regular Volla OS that can go into fastboot mode. Because I rock!

@ flinkevend You might find this interesting!

5 Likes

Hah! You rock!

So, to make it clear for everyone:

  1. have bricked rephone (probably also GS5)
  2. have firmware you tried to install in ~/.cache/ubports/mimameid/firmware/unpacked/
  3. have ~/bin/SP_Flash_Tool_v6.2228_Linux/ (or other os version?)
  4. choose scatter file from above firmware folder
  5. Check all,
  6. Firmware Upgrade

that about right?

1 Like

Minor edit:

  • before flashing use mtkclient with “mtk payload” command and connected Rephone with USB by pressing Vol/Up+Vol/Down+Power. mtkclient then delivers a payload to set the phone into BROM mode without authentication for flashing.
  • I used spflash version 5
4 Likes

Ah, cool to know the all buttons method works. And you used the older version of Spflash. Interesting.

@lispy @poetaster YEEHAA!!! My Rephone is working again. I followed your steps @lispy. SP-Flash tool grumbeld at super.img (to large). But recovery-mode worked. I tried to install volla.zip by adb sideload. And here we are again. Thank you so much!!!

5 Likes

Great news! I hate it, if stuff gets wasted…

4 Likes

Good news! Congrats!!

1 Like

Hi

i have bricked my rephone too. But i am on windows, so i don´t have the (there is no) firmware in ubports folder.
Were else can i download the firmware?
And which is the scatter file?

regards

Could someone please post the needed files to make the rephone… Restore :slight_smile:
on my linux mint laptop i dont find the files from ub port installer:-(