HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfree!

[DirkBelig]

Ack, this sucks! I downloaded AdFree Android from the Market, er, Play store (really, Google?) and after downloading the hosts file and rebooting, it started restarting every minute or two. It flashes the Sprint logo and makes the Sprint boot music and then as the lock screen come up. After all the media scanners run, it seems to be OK for a minute and then poof. I uninstalled AdFree, but that didn't help. Looking around I saw something that indicated the hosts files may be bad, so I got it reloaded, reverted the hosts and then uninstalled, but it still reboots. I can't get it to boot into recovery to wipe the cache - it won't respond to power button presses.

While I was trying to run down the AdFree problem, I saw another reference to a bad SD card and tried pulling the 16GB Class 6 SanDisk card I'd put in a week or two ago and with it out, it ran without rebooting. So, just leave the card out, right? Wrong. I'd moved about 100(!) apps with Apps2SD Pro to the card and I kinda want them back on the phone.

When I try to move them with Apps2SD lining up what's in the card, it takes me to the app's management screen, I select it to move to phone, and then it just hangs before rebooting. I've got the phone in airplane mode, all autorunning things shut off, turned off the clock widget, anything that could delay getting control of the system, but it's not seeming to work.

What are my options, short of a hard reset?

 

[sherri]

May be a file got corrupted and damaged card. Try putting card into card reader and see if you can see Apps on pc. If so, I suggest copying them all to a folder there.

I had a similar issue a few weeks ago. Card reader had no problems seeing apps, but if I put card in phone, phone couldn't/wouldn't read it. I put apps in a folder on pc. Wiped and reformatted card. Phone now read card (card was empty, but phone showed the correct available space....) Hooked phone to pc, and put apps back on card.....some data was lost, but not much...

Sent from my DROID using Tapatalk

 

[DirkBelig]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

Well, that's a problem. The SD card adapter is at home (at my g/f's now) and unless I go get it, I'm SOL until I get home in a couple of days unless I can get the phone to mount to my MacBook Pro via USB. That's why I'm wondering why I can't mount the phone and card by USB. Bother.

I was wondering if an update of another app got boned and the the AdFree was just a coincidental thing, not the actual cause. I'm surprised it's killing the phone so hard.

 

[dtm_stretch]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

What about using one the odin packages that Sfhub made and using one that doesn't wipe data. I don't think the issue is an app I think that it is possible that the adblocker modified some of android's libraries causing the reboots. It sounds like you have taken every step possible in regards to apps and data, short of wiping data. Try the odin package that doesn't wipe, if that doesn't work then the only option is to wipe data.

Edit: You could use mobile odin to flash the package.

 

[DirkBelig]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

OK, this is weird: I hooked it up to my MBP and it's not rebooting. I mounted it as a USB drive and I'm seeing two drives in Finder, both labeled NO NAME. I copied the contents of what appears to be the SD card to my desktop (see attachment) and the hidden .android_secure folder is filled with .asec files. Are those the apps moved to the SD card? Do I format the card and then copy everything back to it from the Mac or what? TIA.

EDIT: I can't seem to format the card via Finder. Mac is my 2nd language and perhaps they've got this hidden so the iPhone peeps don't hurt themselves, but as a manly Android l337, I don't have time for this.

 

[DirkBelig]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

What about using one the odin packages that Sfhub made and using one that doesn't wipe data. I don't think the issue is an app I think that it is possible that the adblocker modified some of android's libraries causing the reboots. It sounds like you have taken every step possible in regards to apps and data, short of wiping data. Try the odin package that doesn't wipe, if that doesn't work then the only option is to wipe data.

Edit: You could use mobile odin to flash the package.

I forgot to mention that I'm running the rooted stock EL29 loaded via ODIN3 and I used the retain data version. What is the mobile ODIN and can I load it via my MBP? It's not rebooting as long as it's chained to the laptop, but will probably go back to crazy when I cut it loose.

 

[Mikest]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

OK, this is weird: I hooked it up to my MBP and it's not rebooting. I mounted it as a USB drive and I'm seeing two drives in Finder, both labeled NO NAME. I copied the contents of what appears to be the SD card to my desktop (see attachment) and the hidden .android_secure folder is filled with .asec files. Are those the apps moved to the SD card? Do I format the card and then copy everything back to it from the Mac or what? TIA.

EDIT: I can't seem to format the card via Finder. Mac is my 2nd language and perhaps they've got this hidden so the iPhone peeps don't hurt themselves, but as a manly Android l337, I don't have time for this.

to format on a mac you have to use the disk utility (its in the applications folder for mac). Someone else will have to guide you from here (someone tell me if I'm wrong) but the file format should be FAT 32. If you've already tried this then I'm out of my depth. Heck I may already be out of my depth here, I just know the mac operating system. I've never flashed anything to a phone.

and for the love of god make sure you format the card and not the macbooks hdd, just a warning.

 

[DirkBelig]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

Heh, I'm not a total n00b. I won't type format c:\ and wonder what happened. (Build my own PCs and work IT.) I was about to post that things seemed to have worked out, but something's still wrong.

I went into Disk Utility and spotted a Repair Disk option so I ran that on the SD card. It completed and lo and behold, the phone was behaving normally. I was able to move a few apps back to the phone and it looked fine, but the test was how it'd behave after a reboot. Unfortunately, it reverted back to reboot and giving errors like:

Sorry! Process system is not responding - [Force close] [Wait]

This. Sucks. Plugging it back into the laptop, I ran the disk verify again and ejected the phone, but unlike last time, I wasn't able to do anything much with the phone before it rebooted itself. It's late and I'm going to try leaving the card out and limping along tomorrow at work.

OK, that's not an option now because I tried running Fix Permissions in ROM Manager and then booting to recovery and now it won't get past that. [banging head against wall]:'(

 

[DirkBelig]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

After my last post, I stayed up another hour-and-a-half downloading* the Mac version of the ODIN One-Click only to learn that there's nothing you can really do with the damn thing once you unzip it! [/facepalm] I decided to get up super-early, go home and see if re-running the installer on my PC would restore things to operational, then drag off to work.

It worked.

After 10 minutes of restorative loving from OOC, things appear to be working fine. I lost my bookmarks in Boat and GReader needed to start from scratch in DLing topics, but both I think are due to trying to clear cache/data while attempting to move apps back to the phone. I ran Apps2SD to push my frontline apps back to the phone and it didn't hitch. I've rebooted to reload the card, re-enable startup apps and widgets and it hasn't gacked yet. [/Knocks head]

Now it's time to try and work and recognize that next time something like this happens, it would be faster to drive home and reflash the phone than try and sort it on the wrong type of computer and a slow Internet pipe.

Thanks to all who replied and provided guidance. Learn from my mistakes!


* I have 25 mbps cable at home. My g/f has 1.5 mbsp DSL. It. Is. Sloooooooow.

 

[dtm_stretch]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

Rom manager?!?!? Why?! That application does not work with our phone. So many people have bricked/soft bricked their phones because of it.

This is mobile odin https://forums.androidcentral.com/e...id=eu.chainfire.mobileodin.pro&token=4HdI6R0g
It is 5 dollars but well worth the purchase because it can save you when you don't have a computer. There is a light version on xda [14.03.2012] Mobile ODIN v2.30 [ROOT] - xda-developers but you need to download the flash kernel for the epic 4g touch found in post 6. I haven't done the steps for the lite.

Also here is a how-to format an SDcard on a mac How to Format an SD Card for a Mac | eHow.com


**Edit** Glad to see you got it all worked out, I still recommend mobile odin and getting rid of rom manager though. Did you determine what the cause of the problem was?

 

[DirkBelig]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

ROM Manager is incompatible with the E4GT? Whoa! News to me. I used it with my OG EVO and never new it was bad news until I borked me with the file permissions coup de grace. I shall uninstall pronto. Other than Mobile ODIN, what are the recommended recovery/nandroid apps for this phone? I'm not really into flashing every nightly that comes along because I need a working phone more than the bleeding edge of ROMs. When the official ICS load comes along, I'll get the pre-rooted version so I can use Titanium Backup Pro and perhaps the handful of apps that require root, but I'm not going to get too crazy.

I have no idea what caused all the damage other than it all went south after installing AdFree. The first question in troubleshooting is, "What was the last thing you did before it broke?" Somehow editing the HOSTS file in the manner it does gave my poor phone a stroke. Regardless, I was able to fix it, albeit with a loss of sleep and wasted gas.

 

[dtm_stretch]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

ROM Manager is incompatible with the E4GT? Whoa! News to me. I used it with my OG EVO and never new it was bad news until I borked me with the file permissions coup de grace. I shall uninstall pronto. Other than Mobile ODIN, what are the recommended recovery/nandroid apps for this phone? I'm not really into flashing every nightly that comes along because I need a working phone more than the bleeding edge of ROMs. When the official ICS load comes along, I'll get the pre-rooted version so I can use Titanium Backup Pro and perhaps the handful of apps that require root, but I'm not going to get too crazy.

I have no idea what caused all the damage other than it all went south after installing AdFree. The first question in troubleshooting is, "What was the last thing you did before it broke?" Somehow editing the HOSTS file in the manner it does gave my poor phone a stroke. Regardless, I was able to fix it, albeit with a loss of sleep and wasted gas.

The only 3 essential apps I recommend for rooted users are mobile odin (for cases when I'm away from a comp and I have an emergency), a root file explorer (es file explorer or root explorer), and an app backup program (Titanium or mybackup). I tried adfree a couple of weeks ago on rooted EL29 and it didn't mess up my phone but it didn't block any adds so I uninstalled it.

 

[DirkBelig]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

Before it proceed to strangle my phone, it didn't block my ads either, so it failed at its purpose and then wreaked havoc. Stupid Adfree. Bah!

I already have ES and Yaff's Explorers and Titanium, but I don't see that Mobile Odin offers nandroid backups. When I toyed with CM7 on my EVO, the ability to flash back to a mirrored image of what I originally had was a must-have. I used Amon_Ra for my EVO; what's a good backup/recovery tool for the GS2?

 

[JayWill]

Mobile Odin is not a replacement for CWM, rather another tool that allows you to flash TAR files right from your phone, rather than having to connect to a PC and use desktop Odin. This can sometimes be a lifesaver in instances where you can't get Odin to recognize your phone. It's more useful to the chronic flashaholics though. For people who root just to get wifi tethering or other simple reasons, its benefit is limited.


Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk

 

[dtm_stretch]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

Before it proceed to strangle my phone, it didn't block my ads either, so it failed at its purpose and then wreaked havoc. Stupid Adfree. Bah!

I already have ES and Yaff's Explorers and Titanium, but I don't see that Mobile Odin offers nandroid backups. When I toyed with CM7 on my EVO, the ability to flash back to a mirrored image of what I originally had was a must-have. I used Amon_Ra for my EVO; what's a good backup/recovery tool for the GS2?

Yeah that is the one downside of odin in general, no ability to make a backup first. We have the clockworkmod recovery which is similar to Amon_Ra. The big difference between the Evo and the E4GT is the epic's kernel and recovery are packaged together. So if you want a different recovery or to update your kernel they come together. Not a big deal though. I recommend team rogue's EL29 kernel/recovery [KERNEL/RECOVERY][ICS] Rogue *Stock FC07* (New 3/10/12) - xda-developers just scroll to post 2 and it is at the bottom. Team Rogue's recovery is just a modified version of clockworkmod, also I know a lot of evo guys hate clockworkmod because it was unreliable, which is why someone created Amon_Ra, but clockworkmod is very reliable....except on ICS, which is a whole other story.

 

[DirkBelig]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

CWM was super-flaky on my EVO, so, yes, I used Amon_Ra. What confuses me in the Team Rogue page is that you're supposed to make a backup before you load the ROM with the backup in it. Huh? Should I use ROM Manager to get CWM loaded and just that, moving to other options afterward? If CWM is bad with ICS, then how do we get ICS ROMs loaded. I'm too sleepy to comprehend this!

EDIT: ROM Manager's Market page says, "Samsung users: You must flash a Clockwork compatible kernel first (see XDA forums)"

Headache....building.....

 

[dtm_stretch]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

LOL, I understand why you would be tired. You aren't going to be able to make a full system image via nandroid until you have clockworkmod installed and that means flashing a kernel through odin. Do not use Rom Manager, didn't you uninstall that? I wouldn't even think about flashing ICS until you are very comfortable with the process on Gingerbread.

 

[DirkBelig]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

I've uninstalled ROM Manager. To get CWM loaded, am I going to be using the ODIN3 thing (v.1.8.1?) to flash the Team Rogue ROM you referenced - Goo-inside.me Downloads - Downloading rogue_ET-recoveryonly-1.1.4-rc0-odin.tar.md5 - and then do this:

Install Instructions-

ODIN-

-Make a nandroid in your current recovery then proceed
-Download tar from link below
-Place phone in download mode
-Open Odin and make sure only auto reboot is selected in the option list
-Click PDA and select the Rogue tar, then select start
-Let the phone boot back up fully, then reboot for best results
-Sit back and bask in the Rogue glory!

However, in the first post is this: "**This kernel and recovery does not install superuser or busybox, please have both installed prior to flashing.**"

Great. I have Superuser loaded, but now I need to load Busybox? It's a weird chicken-egg situation because I can't backup w/o a recovery and the instructions to load a recovery are to backup. Kind of a leap of faith there, no? Does this recovery wipe my data? The whole appeal of the ODIN One-Click-NoData thing was that it wouldn't burn my apps and data to the ground. The instructions are just vague enough to make me a little gunshy.

As for ICS, as I noted above, I'm holding off for the real final OTA version to be rooted and packaged before moving up. I was one of the impatient folks who jumped the gun on the EVO Froyo load and had to wait a couple of weeks for Sprint to push the patch to us whom couldn't wait a few days more.

I appreciate whatever enlightenment you're providing to a tired bloke.

 

[JayWill]

Re: HELP!!! Phone rebooting every 1-2 mins after installing Adfre

Great. I have Superuser loaded, but now I need to load Busybox? It's a weird chicken-egg situation because I can't backup w/o a recovery and the instructions to load a recovery are to backup. Kind of a leap of faith there, no? Does this recovery wipe my data? The whole appeal of the ODIN One-Click-NoData thing was that it wouldn't burn my apps and data to the ground. The instructions are just vague enough to make me a little gunshy.

Well, you don't exactly "need" busybox, but some root Applications require it so it can be useful to have. You can download a free Busybox installer from the Android Market here: https://forums.androidcentral.com/e...jrummy.busybox.installer&hl=en&token=fiiUgl7g

For the kernel + CWM, using Odin to flash it will not wipe anything. However, using desktop Odin will increase your binary flash count and cause a yellow triangle with an exclamation to show up on your boot screen. This happens anytime you use desktop Odin to flash a kernel that has not been signed by Samsung (such as one repackaged with Team Rogue recovery).

This is where Mobile Odin can also come in handy. With Mobile Odin, you can flash a kernel+CWM in TAR form right from your phone and it does not increase the flash count to trigger the triangle.

However, another option, which I've use many times lately, is to use sfhub's autoroot tool to flash the kernel.

sfhub's autoroot tool: [ROOT][NCIQ][EG30/EG31/EK02] Auto root your existing stock ROM (w/o ODIN/ROM Flash) - xda-developers

You will see on the image in the post, that Option C will allow you to install a zImage, which is the kernel. So follow his instructions to download, unpack and load the tool, plug in your phone, choose Option C then choose the EL29+CWM kernel. It will flash and re-boot your phone and you'll have CWM. Then you can boot into recovery and make your Nandroid backup.