[MOD] [DEV] Insecure Boot Image for Nexus S on Android 4.1.1 Jelly Bean (JRO03E)

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HQRaja

HQRaja

Retired News Writer
Jan 27, 2008
491
433
Islamabad
hqraja.com
Hello everyone,

This is my first mod/hack at this level, so I am extremely excited about it. Here's some history:
I flashed the JB OTA and then started missing using adb remount. I looked around for an insecure boot image but couldn't find a JB-based one. I looked into the OTA's zip file and didn't find boot.img there so at first, I thought JB used previous ICS 4.0.4's boot.img but upon looking into updater-script from the OTA's zip file, I saw the OTA patched the existing one rather than flashing a new one.

So long story short, I extracted it from the phone, unpacked it, set ro.secure=0, repacked it and tried booting it, and it worked, so I just flashed it and have been using it for a while now.

Note that this is not for everyone, and most will not even require it but for those who do, here it is. Enjoy, and don't forget to hit the Thanks button.

Download Nexus S Insecure Boot Image for Jelly Bean (Off-site link on my blog; I have also written a guide there for those interested in learning how to flash it but if you just want to download it, skip to the end of the post to find the download link.)
 
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HQRaja

HQRaja

Retired News Writer
Jan 27, 2008
491
433
Islamabad
hqraja.com
Spidergio said:
What is the insecure boot?

Sent from my nexus s using xda app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Insecure boot image lets you use adb remount, and adb push or adb pull etc. to /system and its contents. Basically it's using ADB as root. If you don't require it, I don't recommend going for it; it's just for those who really want the convenience of these commands.
 
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medizen

medizen

Member
Jan 17, 2012
34
3
Do you happen to have a link that explains this process? I have found a couple but they never fully explained it in detail.
 
E

elamalaka

Member
Sep 18, 2008
6
0
HQRaja said:
Glad it helped =)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse


Two questions:

1) I'm running JROO3E is it still ok to use your boot.img or does my boot.img needs to be modified? (The reason why I asked is because I got two random reboots after flashed insecure).

2) File sizes of boot.img files are different. My boot.img is 8192 kb and your insecure is 3972 kb is that a problem?

Please advise.

Thanks!!
 
HQRaja

HQRaja

Retired News Writer
Jan 27, 2008
491
433
Islamabad
hqraja.com
elamalaka said:
Two questions:

1) I'm running JROO3E is it still ok to use your boot.img or does my boot.img needs to be modified? (The reason why I asked is because I got two random reboots after flashed insecure).

2) File sizes of boot.img files are different. My boot.img is 8192 kb and your insecure is 3972 kb is that a problem?

Please advise.

Thanks!!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

1. This is the version for JRO03E (I had mistakenly typed JRO03H in the post), so it should work for yours. I am myself using it on mine, with no random reboot at all. Though as we all know, when it comes to these things, your mileage may vary. Not sure what's causing them though; you are on the international variant (soju / crespo) of Nexus S, right?

2. When you extract the boot image from the phone, it dumps the entire content of the boot partition, including the empty bytes. That's why the extracted one should be 8192 kb (or 8,388,608 bytes to be precise). Once it is unpacked, edited and repacked by the script, the empty bytes are removed when repacking. Therefore, the size of the repacked one is 3972 kb (or 4,067,328 bytes to be precise).

Hope it clears things up.
 
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E

elamalaka

Member
Sep 18, 2008
6
0
HQRaja said:
1. This is the version for JRO03E (I had mistakenly typed JRO03H in the post), so it should work for yours. I am myself using it on mine, with no random reboot at all. Though as we all know, when it comes to these things, your mileage may vary. Not sure what's causing them though; you are on the international variant (soju / crespo) of Nexus S, right?

2. When you extract the boot image from the phone, it dumps the entire content of the boot partition, including the empty bytes. That's why the extracted one should be 8192 kb (or 8,388,608 bytes to be precise). Once it is unpacked, edited and repacked by the script, the empty bytes are removed when repacking. Therefore, the size of the repacked one is 3972 kb (or 4,067,328 bytes to be precise).

Hope it clears things up.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Maybe the random reboot was the result of something else I did because I was testing a few apps from the market. I'm running the stock (sojua / crespoa) variant GT-I9020A. I tried to unpack/edit/repack my original boot.img but the repacked size of the file is 3964 kb and not 3972. When I try the fastboot boot <bootname.img> it says that fastboot was ok but it just hangs at the Google initial screen.

Can I send you my boot.img so that you can give it a try?

Thanks again for all your help!.
 
HQRaja

HQRaja

Retired News Writer
Jan 27, 2008
491
433
Islamabad
hqraja.com
elamalaka said:
Maybe the random reboot was the result of something else I did because I was testing a few apps from the market. I'm running the stock (sojua / crespoa) variant GT-I9020A. I tried to unpack/edit/repack my original boot.img but the repacked size of the file is 3964 kb and not 3972. When I try the fastboot boot <bootname.img> it says that fastboot was ok but it just hangs at the Google initial screen.

Can I send you my boot.img so that you can give it a try?

Thanks again for all your help!.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

It could be because of your phone being GT-I9020A (sojua / crespoa) rather than GT-I9020T (soju / crespo) ? Not too sure; I'm quite a noob myself and this was my very first time of doing something like this. Though feel free to send me your boot image and I'll see if I can make it work. =) Just put it on minus.com or any sharing service and DM me the link or post it here.
 
HQRaja

HQRaja

Retired News Writer
Jan 27, 2008
491
433
Islamabad
hqraja.com
SamuelDebruyn said:
Don't bother explaining what insecure boot is, they should use search or Google it.

Which version of the boot img is this?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Heh it's OK I guess; not all of us are good at Googling or reading what's already written out there (or here, for that matter. :D)

About the image, it's the latest Android 4.1.1 Jelly Bean JRO03E boot image for the International Nexus S GT-I9020T (soju / crespo).
 
Last edited:
E

elamalaka

Member
Sep 18, 2008
6
0
HQRaja said:
1. This is the version for JRO03E (I had mistakenly typed JRO03H in the post), so it should work for yours. I am myself using it on mine, with no random reboot at all. Though as we all know, when it comes to these things, your mileage may vary. Not sure what's causing them though; you are on the international variant (soju / crespo) of Nexus S, right?

2. When you extract the boot image from the phone, it dumps the entire content of the boot partition, including the empty bytes. That's why the extracted one should be 8192 kb (or 8,388,608 bytes to be precise). Once it is unpacked, edited and repacked by the script, the empty bytes are removed when repacking. Therefore, the size of the repacked one is 3972 kb (or 4,067,328 bytes to be precise).

Hope it clears things up.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

HQRaja said:
It could be because of your phone being GT-I9020A (sojua / crespoa) rather than GT-I9020T (soju / crespo) ? Not too sure; I'm quite a noob myself and this was my very first time of doing something like this. Though feel free to send me your boot image and I'll see if I can make it work. =) Just put it on minus.com or any sharing service and DM me the link or post it here.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
HQRaja:

Can't post external links just add the http stuff in fron of it.

min.us/mRk5DoUxD


Thanks!!
 
chronophase1

chronophase1

Senior Member
Mar 12, 2011
919
163
Thanks for this. I'm gonna run stock with a custom kernel and I needed to get rid of that nasty gradient as well. haha
 
HQRaja

HQRaja

Retired News Writer
Jan 27, 2008
491
433
Islamabad
hqraja.com
chronophase1 said:
Thanks for this. I'm gonna run stock with a custom kernel and I needed to get rid of that nasty gradient as well. haha
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Glad it helped. BTW if you are flashing a custom kernel anyway, it probably comes as a boot.img (in the flashable zip file of the kernel) and is most likely already insecure. Also, if you flash that kernel, it will likely overwrite this boot image (unless you somehow flash only the kernel and not the ramdisk. I don't really know if that works). =)
 
Beatsleigher

Beatsleigher

Senior Member
Oct 30, 2011
1,112
586
27
County of Osnabrück, Lower Saxony, Germany
This might seem like a stupid question; is this compatible with all versions of the Samsung Nexus S?
I don't mean the 4G version, but I do mean:
the 850MHz version, the international version and the korea version :)

Thanks for quick answers!

EDIT: Question already answered!
 
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  • 6
    HQRaja
    HQRaja
    Hello everyone,

    This is my first mod/hack at this level, so I am extremely excited about it. Here's some history:
    I flashed the JB OTA and then started missing using adb remount. I looked around for an insecure boot image but couldn't find a JB-based one. I looked into the OTA's zip file and didn't find boot.img there so at first, I thought JB used previous ICS 4.0.4's boot.img but upon looking into updater-script from the OTA's zip file, I saw the OTA patched the existing one rather than flashing a new one.

    So long story short, I extracted it from the phone, unpacked it, set ro.secure=0, repacked it and tried booting it, and it worked, so I just flashed it and have been using it for a while now.

    Note that this is not for everyone, and most will not even require it but for those who do, here it is. Enjoy, and don't forget to hit the Thanks button.

    Download Nexus S Insecure Boot Image for Jelly Bean (Off-site link on my blog; I have also written a guide there for those interested in learning how to flash it but if you just want to download it, skip to the end of the post to find the download link.)
    View
    4
    HQRaja
    HQRaja
    Spidergio said:
    What is the insecure boot?

    Sent from my nexus s using xda app
    Click to expand...
    Click to collapse

    Insecure boot image lets you use adb remount, and adb push or adb pull etc. to /system and its contents. Basically it's using ADB as root. If you don't require it, I don't recommend going for it; it's just for those who really want the convenience of these commands.
    View
    1
    HQRaja
    HQRaja
    medizen said:
    Do you happen to have a link that explains this process? I have found a couple but they never fully explained it in detail.
    Click to expand...
    Click to collapse

    The link provided in the OP aims to do that. =) If you need further information after reading through that, feel free to ask me here.
    View
    1
    HQRaja
    HQRaja
    elamalaka said:
    Thanks just what I was looking for....works great!!
    Click to expand...
    Click to collapse

    Glad it helped =)
    View
    1
    HQRaja
    HQRaja
    elamalaka said:
    Two questions:

    1) I'm running JROO3E is it still ok to use your boot.img or does my boot.img needs to be modified? (The reason why I asked is because I got two random reboots after flashed insecure).

    2) File sizes of boot.img files are different. My boot.img is 8192 kb and your insecure is 3972 kb is that a problem?

    Please advise.

    Thanks!!
    Click to expand...
    Click to collapse

    1. This is the version for JRO03E (I had mistakenly typed JRO03H in the post), so it should work for yours. I am myself using it on mine, with no random reboot at all. Though as we all know, when it comes to these things, your mileage may vary. Not sure what's causing them though; you are on the international variant (soju / crespo) of Nexus S, right?

    2. When you extract the boot image from the phone, it dumps the entire content of the boot partition, including the empty bytes. That's why the extracted one should be 8192 kb (or 8,388,608 bytes to be precise). Once it is unpacked, edited and repacked by the script, the empty bytes are removed when repacking. Therefore, the size of the repacked one is 3972 kb (or 4,067,328 bytes to be precise).

    Hope it clears things up.
    View

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