I337M Downgrade and Custom ROM Questions

lg777 said:

Haven't played with custom rom for awhile as well as rooting/recovery.

Now that Samsung implemented Knox, I'm reading this is changing how to implement roms and upgrading/downgrading stock roms.

I am currently on MDJ from MG1 and did not want to go to 4.3 because of the full blown Knox implementation.

So my questions are:

1. Can I still downgrade from 4.3 to 4.2.2 (MDJ)? I read some in one thread you can but others you can't. Have to make sure which thread I read for I337 vs I337M which seem quite different. Reason is that I can still easily repair/modify stuff on MDJ firmware.

2. I am also considering installing Google Edition 4.4.2 ROM as I believe it does not have Knox. Can I easily revert back to 4.2.2 MDJ from a custom rom?

I've been reading for awhile and I can't seem to figure this out. Must be old age. TIA.

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The safest thing to do is stay on a version without the knox bootloader. I know for sure I337 can't downgrade, and i think the bootloader isn't downgradeable but the system is or something for the I337M. I'm not sure, but either way the safest bet is to stay without the 4.3 bootloader. That way you can root and use recovery and flash without worrying about knox and you'll easily be able to revert from any custom ROM back to stock as long as you either keep a nandroid backup or the ODIN files for the firmware.

its completely fine flashing custom roms with the 4.3 bootloader for us canadians. the only downside is, you will trip a knox flash counter, it cannot yet be reset. you only see this flash counter in download mode. AND if you have a non-official kernel, or recovery, you get a little yellow message in upper left corner during the first bootscreen.

BUT. if you do not upgrade to 4.3 modem, you will experience data drops (loss of signal randomly) with any custom 4.3 or 4.4 rom.

so you dont have to upgrade to 4.3 bootloaders, but you will need to get the modem, its around, if you are already on 4.3... just flash the phone as normal, you cant go back, but its not stopping you from going forward.

I have the bell smartphone protection plan, if i break the phone, they replace it, and dont care about custom software or booloader flash counters ect. So i dont care either.

For the modem, find a copy of MK6 modem assuming your in Canada, flash it through odin from your pc. If you get a fail, chances are you have a bad download (happened to me) download from a different source then. Before you flash any rom... root.... install custom recovery.... nand backup your current "stock but rooted rom" If you flash a 4.4 rom (not sure if this applies to 4.3) do a full wipe... System/cache/dalvic.... then factory reset... then flash.... I flashed 4.4 the first 2 times without wiping system and though the phone worked fine, data was inconsistant at times.....

lg777 said:

Yeah, I think I'll do that. I also understand the issue with Knox is tripping the counter voiding the warranty but I don't care about my warranty. Going to try Goldeneye when I get the chance or look at some 4.4 roms.

I don't know why Samsung or any other manufacturer just let corporate users enforce Knox or whatever and let the rest of the users alone.

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I have a Bell S4 with Google Play Edition 4.4.2 running perfectly so far. I had an MDJ modem, and tried flashing many custom ROMs on it. All 4.3 ROMs worked fine, and only AOSP 4.4 ROMs also worked fine. The only problem was the GPE 4.4 ROMs that gave me constant signal drops. So I tried to upgrade my modem to MK6 to fix the issue. Even when I upgraded to Samsung's stock 4.3 through Odin, it still didn't upgrade my modem. I had to manually flash the modem in Odin to get it to upgrade successfully. Then I just flashed a GPE ROM and everything went well.