Onyx Boox Poke 3 (Soft) Brick by deleting Email App

[Renate]

Originally Posted by toryr

How did you manage to find the recovery file?

From me. But the case was about a Poke3, which I have. I don't have a Note Air or a Note Air 2.

Do you have an update for your device? My internet sucks, so I'll not be loading gigabytes for other people. Here is a link for the last Note Air update:
http://firmware-us.boox.com/de228201...42d/update.upx
The fingerprint is ONYX/NoteAir/NoteAir:10/2021-11-30_18-30_3.2_5bccd60/4165:user/dev-keys

Then you have to get familiar with DeBooxUpd.py, Google it. Then you can tell me whether there is recovery image in there. Nope that's not the end of it. The stock recovery might not get you back in business. You may need to use a custom recovery. No knowledge required but you may need to make a bit of effort yourself.

[toryr]

Thanks for your reply

Seemingly is no recovery image in the update: https://ibb.co/NpxDqKg

A buddy of mine has a Nova Air, is there a way to extract the recovery image from his device ya think?

[Renate]

EDL mode is the way we scarf stuff off an un-rooted device. If it's rooted already, we only need dd. I'm not even sure what the Note Air has for a processor. That's important to know what EDL loader we have to use. OTOH, Onyx appears pretty easy to do stuff.

You can ask your friend to ADB shell and "cat proc/cpuinfo". The only important line is the last line with MSM or SDM or numbers or something.

Edit: Hmm, I was afraid for a second that you pasted a >1GB on that link. You have a boot image, that usually can solve most problems. What's the exact state of your device?

(In the future, just try pasting the text in a [code][/code] block.)

[toryr]

Sorry, didnt see your reply.

Its pretty much exactly the same as what is described by DogilD. I rooted it, removed some apps, now it wont boot. I am able to enter recovery mode and interact with it, but it wont boot regularly.

[Renate]

Arrgggh!

Sorry, I screwed up, but you didn't catch it either.
You have a Nova Air! (Not Note Air)

http://firmware-us.boox.com/83536cf3...477/update.upx
Fingerprint: ONYX/NovaAir/NovaAir:10/2021-11-30_19-51_3.2_5bccd60/4165:user/dev-keys

[toryr]

Oh no worries. I used the upx file i downloaded when rooting, it should be the one for Nova Air, no bandwidth wasted today my friend.

[Renate]

It's a bit harder to modify a boot image because there is so much going on and to run stuff without any libs you have to static link everything.
Why don't you post the boot image somewhere and I'll see if I can do anything with it?

[toryr]

Here it is: https://we.tl/t-3xX9SHS8VO

Thank you so much for taking the time by the way

[Renate]

Looks good. I downloaded it and it tears apart nicely, like dinner rolls. DTB, payload, kallsyms...

Let's try this from both ends. Can you get this into EDL mode? If you can get ADB working at all, "adb reboot edl". It should show up as USB 05c6/9008 in USB.
There is already a loader bin here (two different ones) https://github.com/bkerler/Loaders/t...factory/sdm835. Do you have a Windows (non-virtual) PC?

You have a MSM8998, Snapdragon SD835, 64 bit.

WT...heck? I was wrong, this is using an SDM636, same as the Poke3. The payload on the images are identical. So, good news, we have an EDL loader.bin that works fine for this.

[Renate]

Ok, let's give it a try. Are you all clear with fastboot and ADB? Here's the recovery:
http://www.temblast.com/download/oYbsCeSB-narec (you can rename it to simplify things)
You want to "fastboot boot narec".
It should give you a "bong" for ADB connecting, but wait until the screen goes from "Onyx" to all white. Then "adb shell". You should be root. You should be permissive.

[toryr]

Fantastic work, Renate

I managed to get adb working! I also attempted to follow the same instructions you gave DogilD by placing the update.zip file on an SD card, running start autoupdate and plugging it in. I assumed this was the next step, correct me if I'm to trigger-happy.

Unfortunately, my display doesn't give any valuable information during the flashing phase, my screen just looks like this:
https://we.tl/t-vT7pHa8P0v

It does this for a few seconds before rebooting to the Onyx logo, the same as before.

[toryr]

I did a couple of tests to verify that the device is able to read the update.zip file properly during autoupdate:
- When only the dongle is connected, nothing happens.
- When the SD card is empty, the screen blinks for a shorter period of time than with update.zip on it.

So i think the reading is good, just to exclude that.

[Renate]

Well, that worked out better than I thought.
I was just trying to get recovery and ADB working.
The display driver was just something that I threw together for the Poke3.
Still, at least the diagonal zits tells me it's all good except the dimensions.

You can also "start recovery" to get to the stock recovery menu. I disabled that.

Gimme a second (err, hour or so) and I'll get you the display working.

[Renate]

Ok, same link, different file.
I can't guarantee that this will work and you may need a mirror to read it!

[toryr]

It worked

Here is the output from flashing update.zip:
https://we.tl/t-TeBoQ5uF9L