[Q] updating to a rootable kitkat rom on a N900W8

kamikaze2112 · May 16, 2014

I have a Rogers Note 3, N900W8.

Right now it's running 4.3 MJ4, rooted and knox at 0x0.

I'd like to know what the best process is to upgrade to KitKat, and be able to root keeping knox intact. I want to stick with the Touchwiz rom for now, as I do use my S-Pen quite frequently.

I've been looking around the forums for quite some time to try and figure this out on my own, but it's like information overload and I find threads tend to get derailed and then you end up reading page after page of stuff that doesn't apply. If someone would be kind enough to point me in the right direction, and I'm successful I'll update this first post with the procedure so hopefully the next guy doesn't have to make this thread LOL

Thanks

**UPDATE**

as promised, i'd update with the method I used here. followed this thread, except for the installing the custom recovery, kernel, and wifi/nfc fix (do I need the wifi/nfc fix if I'm not bothering with a custom kernel?).

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=2614772

DrawnToLife · May 16, 2014

You have two approaches.
1) Unroot. Flash up to the Mexican "leak" NA2 version of Kitkat. Root/Recovery. Flash custom TW roms to get up to the latest builds.
2) Unroot. Update to the latest NB7 firmware via standard means and then root.

Either way, you'll keep Knox 0x0. If you're interested, I'll link you to the many threads with procedures available.

Edit: Option 1 lets you downgrade to 4.3, but option 2 doesn't.

kamikaze2112 · May 16, 2014

Lemme see what I can find on those topics. At least with a starting point I have something to look for. I'd think that the 2nd approach seems simpler so that's prob what I'll go for. Less steps ftw.

Really appreciate you pointing me in the right direction

DrawnToLife · May 16, 2014

kamikaze2112 said:
Lemme see what I can find on those topics. At least with a starting point I have something to look for. I'd think that the 2nd approach seems simpler so that's prob what I'll go for. Less steps ftw.

Really appreciate you pointing me in the right direction

There's like.. two threads in this section, and one in the T-Mobile general section about doing this stuff.

JohnnyRebel · May 16, 2014

I'd go with the Mexican (Telcel) NA2. This leaves you with way more options. If you decide your not happy with NA2 you can go back to MJ4, the latest stock from rogers does not have this option. I used MJ4 for half a year and then finally took the plunge to NA2. Battery life is way better, delay is gone when waking phone, call reception improved, internet stability increased, I'm rooted, and have CWM recovery installed and Knox is 0x0.

Sent from my SM-N900W8 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app

DrawnToLife · May 16, 2014

JohnnyRebel said:
I'd go with the Mexican (Telcel) NA2. This leaves you with way more options. If you decide your not happy with NA2 you can go back to MJ4, the latest stock from rogers does not have this option. I used MJ4 for half a year and then finally took the plunge to NA2. Battery life is way better, delay is gone when waking phone, call reception improved, internet stability increased, I'm rooted, and have CWM recovery installed and Knox is 0x0.

Sent from my SM-N900W8 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app

If you feel that way from updating to NA2, flash an ND5-based rom. Everything is even more snappy than the first round of Kitkat roms.

kamikaze2112 · May 17, 2014

ok, Mexican rom it is then.

Going to be doing this tonight, so hopefully i don't bugger it up

kamikaze2112 · May 17, 2014

Got it done. going to play with it like this for a couple days before i go any further.

What's the advantage to installing a custom recovery? would it allow me to install something like CM11 without tripping knox? That's about the only rom i've had any interest in trying, aside from the stock touchwiz stuff.

kamikaze2112 · May 17, 2014

So far so good, getting everything reinstalled is a pain, but whatev. Using the GPE launcher and some modules for xposed to tweak it to my liking. My only gripe, and it seems like there's no way to get rid of it, is the full screen album art lock screen thing when playing music. That's a massive annoyance, one that I'm hoping someone will come up with a solution for.

nicholaschum · May 17, 2014

kamikaze2112 said:
Got it done. going to play with it like this for a couple days before i go any further.

What's the advantage to installing a custom recovery? would it allow me to install something like CM11 without tripping knox? That's about the only rom i've had any interest in trying, aside from the stock touchwiz stuff.

If you're on NA2 bootloader, whatever you do on the device you can't trip KNOX.

You can backup your EFS and make nandroid backups in case you mess up your phone.

Yes you can flash CM11 without tripping KNOX.

---------- Post added at 06:31 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:29 PM ----------

kamikaze2112 said:
So far so good, getting everything reinstalled is a pain, but whatev. Using the GPE launcher and some modules for xposed to tweak it to my liking. My only gripe, and it seems like there's no way to get rid of it, is the full screen album art lock screen thing when playing music. That's a massive annoyance, one that I'm hoping someone will come up with a solution for.

That's a 4.4 specific feature by Google. If TouchWiz detects your music player to be using Google Music Player as a base engine, it will use full screen music player as your lockscreen.

kamikaze2112 · May 17, 2014

Wow thanks for the info. I'll keep playing with it like this for now but keep that in mind.

Sent from my SM-N900W8 using Tapatalk

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[Q] updating to a rootable kitkat rom on a N900W8

kamikaze2112

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DrawnToLife

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nicholaschum

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