[SOLVED - bad SIM card] Viperone 4.x, desperate to get 4G LTE to stick

ProcyonSJJ said:

I dreaded the thought of wiping my phone and starting over, but I hated losing 4G LTE so frequently that I gave in and wiped my phone in order to get LTE to stick... and it didn't work.

I'm going to give a very thorough account of everything I did so that hopefully someone can point out any particular problem and/or solution to my issues. This plan was largely based around user AznInertia's steps which he reported to have eliminated his mobile data issues.

1) Downloaded Viperone 4.1.0 full, 4.2.1 full, and 4.3.0 OTA. In addition, I downloaded Philz latest custom CWM recovery and the 3.11.605.1 firmware, primarily in order to have the latest radios.
2) Went into fastboot and flashed Philz recovery.
3) Went into recovery and did a Factory Reset wipe.
4) Back to fastboot to flash 3.11.605.1 using santod's instructions.
5) Back to recovery to wipe data again, and install Viperone 4.1.0 full (with option to wipe data again from within Aroma)
5a) proceed to reboot immediately after installation had finished, and ended up with boot loops. Realized I forgot to flash boot.img from 3.11.605.1, so I went back to fastboot and flashed it.
6) Boot loop goes away, Viperone logo appears, takes a really long time, reboots, Viperone logo reappears and finally I get the "Android is optimizing apps" screen. I let it go all the way through and start doing the first time setup. I fill in the Google account info, and Google Play syncs my contacts, and starts downloading apps. Meanwhile, I have absolutely no network service.
7) Reboot to recovery and flash 4.2.1 without wiping. Phone proceeds to Viperone logo and this time gets fully stuck (waited approx. 15 minutes). Help power down to reboot the phone, and this time it kicks over to "Android is optimizing apps," etc.
8) OS fully loads up, and this time I have Verizon Network service, but it's very apparent that 4G LTE isn't sticking, and it keeps dropping down to 3G.
9) Reboot to recovery and flash 4.3.0 OTA (no wipe). Back in the OS, I click Venom Tweaks->Misc->Phone info, drop down to "Set preferred network type:" and I switch it from "CDMA/EvDo/GSM/WCDMA/LTE auto" to "LTE, CDMA." Phone goes back to 4G for a moment, and then drops down to 1X.
9a) Back to phone info, switch from "LTE, CDMA" to "CDMA + LTE/EvDo auto," phone goes back to 4G briefly and then down to 3G.

I am DESPERATE here, I really want to stick with this ROM, but having been forced by Verizon to increase my monthly payment for 4G and not being able to use it feels like a punch in the nuts. Does ANYONE have ANY ideas on what I could do? Some different order and/or application of the steps I mentioned? I would be so grateful for any kind of help at all. Thanks very much in advance to this amazing and knowledgeable community.

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ProcyonSJJ said:

Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu...

I didn't remove the boot.img file first Now I'm stuck at verizon logo. Not sure what the correct approach to fixing this is. Do I try to reinstall a custom kernel? Do I reflash CWM and do a full wipe and try again? *banging head on desk*

Wait, you said to remove it from the firmware. But this time I didn't flash the firmware, I didn't think I had to. I left boot.img in the 3.11.605.1 ROM though, is that safe? Very confused...

Thanks so much for your support and sticking with me through this.

Update:
1) Went back to CWM 6.0.4.5
2) Flashed Full Odex (with boot.img left in)
3) Back to fastboot, flashed 3.11.605.1 recovery,
4) Entered recovery, red triangle exclamation point. Not sure why my phone doesn't like 3.11.605.1 recovery.

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ProcyonSJJ said:

Update:
1) Went back to CWM 6.0.4.5
2) Flashed Full Odex (with boot.img left in)
3) Back to fastboot, flashed 3.11.605.1 recovery,
4) Entered recovery, red triangle exclamation point. Not sure why my phone doesn't like 3.11.605.1 recovery.

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ProcyonSJJ said:

OK, here's where I'm at.
1) I successfully installed both the 3.11.605.1 ROM and recovery. Booted up the OS, requested a factory restore, the phone rebooted and did that green icon screen indicating that the recovery was doing its thing. (BTW Santos, could never get power + volume up to do anything, not that I tried too hard once I got the factory restore to work through the OS.)
2) Based on Santos's confidence, I didn't bother flashing ViperOne 4.1.0, and went straight to clean flashing 4.2.1. I let it boot up, did the setup, went back to recovery and dirty flashed 4.3.0.
The results: 4G LTE still drops. It seems to hang on better, but it definitely drops back to 3G regardless of what settings I choose. Interestingly, when I changed the preferred network from Global to CDMA/LTE, sometimes it would tell me that there's no network, would I like to switch to Global. When I went back to the preferred network setting, somehow thge setting was changed to GSM. I also noticed something similar if I went into the Misc Phone info setting under Venom Tweaks and tried to force CDMA/LTE only without EvDo.

SO... Now I'm back to square one, determined to figure out the root cause. I'm back to 3.11.605.1, and I'm going to stick with it for around 24 hours to see if it drops to 3G before I proceed to follow AznInertia's instructions and clean flash 4.1.0. At least then I'll know if it drops, it's not the ROM, but its been about an hour and no drop so far. *sigh* Thanks again for your patience and assistance.

Update: An hour and a half later, still connected to 4G. Although, I've been at my home the entire night. The true test will be when I drive to and from work tomorrow.

Update 2: I don't know when it happened exactly, but I dropped to 3G on stock! I'm actually excited because maybe it's just my sim card after all! Hopefully I can just replace it, reinstall ViperOne and put this whole issue to bed!

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