PIT file method to revive your phone from a MMC_CAP_ERASE brick

Summary: in many cases this allows to revive (not really repair!) your N7000 (and some other samsung devices) after an emmc brick and should be relatively easy to follow. The method uses PIT files.

Note: This thread is rather old now (2012).

Please note that the emmc brick bug should be triggered only by a combination of a few conditions:

• an old samsung ics kernel (from Ice Cream Sandwich versions 4.0–4.0.4, see wikipedia)
  
• wiping or formatting by custom software, usually an old cwm of that time (especially an often used file called CWM.ZIP)
  
• most important: an older emmc chip (or firmware).
  All affected devices should be covered by the thread, some got patched PIT files, some could not be supported (see below).
  Some insights here (as part of this thread)

after the problem had been analyzed by the community and Samsung, all those parts got fixed to prevent the problem for the future.
In case only one of the conditions is not true, the brick should not happen.

So if you have more current hardware (somewhat newer than note1) or current software (newer than ics), the bug will not happen.

So, as an example, S3 or Note 3 should be safe because both hardware and software are fixed.

Especially, all current roms or recoveries should be safe.

If you have a brick nowadays, it's very very unlikely it's an emmc brick. Instead you probably have some other problem.

So in most cases, don't look here, unless you are using rather old devices and rather old software.




Note: this is a living post, it will change while progressing. If you want to refer to it, please make a reference to the whole thread (this link).
Don't directly link to the attached files, as they will go away, when I update the files or their names from time to time.

Note: You should generally post in the correct thread (please look in my signature)

Note: I will answer PMs which are of general interest relating to one of my topics (please look in my signature) publicly in the thread (quoting your interesting paragraphs).


It's sad the following has to be said in such big letters, but there are still people not reading anything and therefore failing seriously:
Please, please, please:

Read this multiple times and try to understand all aspects before using anything of this thread.

If you have questions, read it again!
If you have questions, read it again!
...
If you have questions, read it again!
If you have questions, read it again!

If you don't know exactly what you are doing, you may HARM your device seriously or even DAMAGE it for all times (e.g. meaning motherboard has to be changed with >150EUR).

If you are a noob, then please ask someone with more knowledge to assist you, but ignore those blowhards/bigmouths which will probably do more harm to your phone than you would.

If you have questions, read first post again and again and also read the whole thread!
Most questions are asked several in this thread and are already answered in this first post. Others are answered later in the thread. You should also use the search function before asking something a second time.
Please don't waste my time with superfluous questions already answered in the thread only because you are too lazy to search for it!
It took much much time to write this down and describe most aspects. So, please take a similar amount of YOUR time to read it carefully.
Certainly, my descriptions will not be perfect, so if you are SURE your question is NOT answered HERE, then you are welcome to ask in the thread. But don't expect a quick answer. I am usually very busy with other things and I am doing this only to help other people. I definitely don't generate any profit from this...

Please don't quote this post (in it's entirety), because it's very long and will disturbe all other readers. Instead post without a quote or extract some of the text you are referring to. I think this should be common sense...

You can find the former first post of this thread at post #9...I switched it with this continuously updated post, which I hope is more understandable for the users of this method.


-------------------- manual method and tools for using adb

I think forest1971's thread is better for the description of and questions about the manual method which I used first to revive my own phone. Looks like we developed the same thing at the same time. I started this thread before I read his (I also wasn't an active user of xda before).
Along the way our threads started to be companions to each other.

forest1971's thread has some useful tools for using in adb. Some of these will be useful for procedures described here.

But please read on, because I think the PIT file method is easier for most users with kind of standard emmc bricks.
It's less error prone, because you don't have to calculate the numbers yourself (my pit generator script did it already).
However, the manual method can do more, especially if you have special cases.


-------------------- find begin and end of bricked area

You can do this with my emmc partition scanner, which is flashed via recovery (this doesn't really flash, it only uses the scripting of the updater mechanism of the recovery, also called edify script).
You should write down two numbers:
* where emmc_find_brick_start.zip freezes -> BRICK_START
* where emmc_find_brick_end.zip freezes -> BRICK_END

I have reports, that the stock recovery doesn't show the output of the scanners, so you should probably install a custom recovery first (see forrest1971 's thread).


-------------------- patched pit files

I finally hacked a perl script, which generates a set of PIT files for me.

But because I cannot test the PITs on my phone (because I need it):
==> NO GUARANTY <==

Say you have a situation like this:


The repartitioning should leave a hole in the partition table around the bricked area.
Therefore the bricked area will lie fallow (i.e. not accessed) after the repartitioning.


The calculation is done like the following (Example: N7000_16GB) with X being the size of the HOLE:



The PITs are named like that:

N7000_16GB_Q1_20110914--patched--brick-between-281-and-2428-MB--FACTORYFS-moved-by-2048-MiB

This PIT is for the N7000 with 16GB and derived from the file Q1_20110914.pit.

Here, the HOLE is from 281 MB up to 2428 MB (MB = 1000000 bytes) which is 2147 MB or 2048 MiB (MiB = 1024*1024 bytes) in size.

So the following relations have to match: BRICK_START >= 281 MB and BRICK_END <= 2428 MB

Note that these numbers are rounded, so if your brick lies exactly on this border, it is possible that your aprtitions are not brick free after the repartitioning.
So to be sure this would be safer: BRICK_START > 281 MB and BRICK_END < 2428 MB

In the example all partitions from FACTORYFS up to the "big" partition (here UMS) have their beginning moved by 2048 MiB.
The "big" partition is shrinked by the same amount, so it ends at the same block as before the repartitioning.
Therefore the following partitions (only HIDDEN in this case) remain unchanged.
All partitions before the first moved partition (FACTORYFS) remain also unchanged.

I recently added more starting partitions for the brick (XXX-moved-by-...).
As a rule, all partitions from this starting partition up to the "big" partition are moved by the size of the HOLE.
All partitions in front of the starting partition and all partitions after the "big" partitions remain unchanged.



The PIT file will repartition the phone automatically when flashed using Odin, but the moved partitions will not be formatted after that.
If you flash a partition in Odin, you will also put a valid file system on this partition(because the partition image also contains the file system).
For all other partitions, you have to format those partitions, before you can use them.
At least the data partition should be formatted

The revived phone does in nearly no user noticeable way differ from a stock phone afterwards.
You just have a smaller internal sd (called "big" partition above) and you cannot flash a stock pit file again (this would revert the phone to the bricked state).


ATTENTION: different recoveries and ROMs mount external and internal sdcard on varying directories.

I also had the following problem:
I couldn't format my internal sdcard with the cm9 recovery. I think it's too big for the mkfs.vfat tool of current cm9. So I installed another recovery, formatted the internal sd (I thought).
This erased all my current backups and downloads, because in reality it was my external sd. Fortunately I had a backup of the external sdcard from before rescuing my phone.
So, you may want to create a backup of your external sdcard first.
Then double check which is your internal sdcard (the UMS partition) and which is your external sdcard.
Or you could remove the external sd completely. But think about when to remove it, because you might need it for some files (e.g. to use the emmc partition scanner).



-------------------- backup

before messing with the partition table, everyone should make backups of all partitions that can be accessed.


-------------------- efs backup

The most important backup is the efs partition, which very crucial, it includes your IMEI number, bluetooth MAC etc., and without this individual information, your phone cannot be used as a phone again.

For most supported phones, you can do this via adb:
please look at forrest1971's thread for details about using adb.

If your phone uses another partition number for efs, then use this instead of the "1" in mmcblk0p1.
Perhaps you have to mount your sdcard first, to be able to save it there.
Then you should copy the backup to your PC (the recovery should have the option to mount usb).


-------------------- backup files from internal sd before repartitioning

the repartitioning will clear all data in the affected partitions, so all data in your big partition (internal sd etc.) will be lost.
You can try to backup your data, if the partition is accessible. The different methods below may have different success, depending which parts of your phone are usable.

* you can use aroma file manager, which is a full fledged gui file manager which starts standalone by being flashed in CWM. So it should be completely independent (sorry, I could not test it for this kind of backup myself).

For the following possibilities you should first ensure, you have a working recovery with working adb support.
Mount your external sd in recovery (which might be /emmc or /sdcard, please check), to be able to copy files.

* you can use QtAdb to copy files to your PC:

* you can use adb pull to copy any files or directory tree to your PC, e.g.:
adb pull /emmc/. emmc

* you can use tar from adb to archive files to a file on sdcard:
adb shell tar cvjf /sdcard/emmc.tar.bz2 /emmc/.

* you can use a copy command in adb shell to copy files to a folder in sdcard:
adb shell cp -ra /emmc/. /sdcard/emmc.backup
Note: you will loose file attributes and owner information if emmc is formatted with ext2/ext3/ext4, because vfat cannot handle these.
This may matter for system and some app related files.


-------------------- recommended procedures for "standard" cases

"standard" in this sense are pits that only affect FACTORYFS, DATA, CACHE or internal SD (UMS/USERDATA etc.).
All other partitions need special considerations and are not handled in this section!

Note these are from theory only. My phone is running now and I don't want to brick it again, only for testing the procedure.
Therefore the procedure is *NOT* tested (by me) and may contain problems which I didn't expect!
So be "careful with that axe, Eugene!"

Note, there are always multiple ways to reinstall the phone.


phase "find brick"
* reboot into recovery (hold Vol-Up + Home + Power until you arrive there [20-30 seconds])
* flash emmc_find_brick_start.zip, note where it freezes -> BRICK_START
* flash emmc_find_brick_end.zip, note where it freezes -> BRICK_END

phase "flash pit and ROM"
* (re)boot to download mode (hold Vol-Down + Home + Power until you arrive there [20-30 seconds], then Vol-Up)
* flash a patched PIT in Odin
* flash a known good ROM via Odin (especially not a faulty stock ICS ROMs)

phase "check partitions"
* reboot into recovery (hold Vol-Up + Home + Power until you arrive there [20-30 seconds])
* check the partitions (see section "checking all partitions" below)

phase "restore partitions"
* switch off the phone (something like "power off" in recovery)
* remove external sdcard (to be sure not to format it afterwards)
* boot recovery (hold Vol-Up + Home + Power until you arrive there [20-30 seconds])
* format cache
* format data
* format internal SD (if it fails read below)

phase "start ROM"
...


After formatting or wiping data you can probably also boot into the ROM and format the internal sd from there (again: keep the external sd removed, to not format the external sd instead of the internal sd unintentionally).

You should be able to flash any stock ROM from samfirmware (click on n7000 under "models"), I would recommend the one you had before the brick and and before any stock ICS, else you risk a brick again!.
I would recommend a cyanogen ROM though, if you can live with some features missing from stock ROM.
Note: I think the standard recovery doesn't give you enough format options (a guess, I am running cm9).

It may be easier to take a custom ROM with a better custom recovery, but it has to be flashable via Odin (tar file).

A second method is via recovery using a custom kernel:

phase "find brick" like above

phase "flash pit and kernel"
* (re)boot to download mode (hold Vol-Down + Home + Power until you arrive there [20-30 seconds], then Vol-Up)
* flash a patched PIT in Odin
* flash a custom kernel with a good recovery (e.g. cm9 safe kernel) via Odin (which will increment the flash counter! -> yellow triangle -> warranty lost until you reset the counter)

phase "check partitions" like above

phase "restore partitions"
* switch off the phone (something like "power off" in recovery)
* remove external sdcard (to be sure not to format it afterwards)
* boot into recovery (hold Vol-Up + Home + Power until you arrive there [20-30 seconds])
* format system
* format cache
* format data
* format internal SD

phase "install ROM"
* install the zip of the ROM

phase "start ROM"
...


So you generally install the ROM like usual, the only difference is to restore all the partitions moved by the repartitioning with the patched PIT.
This is neccessary because all changed/moved partitions don't have a valid file system or content after the repartitioning.
For some partitions this can be done by a simple format (cache, data, internal sd).
Others need true contents (e.g. system, kernel, recovery can be restored by installing a rom/kernel/recovery).

In other cases (non-standard situations) you need to restore a backup (efs, if you have one) or some generic contents (param, sbl1/2).
EFS is the most critical one, because it contains information unique to your own phone. Also see the efs section in this post.
I assume SBL1/2 are needed by the boot process (secondary boot loader), but I never tested this. I don't even know where to get these boot loaders (which probably have to be installed with the PIT via odin, because they are involved in the boot process).

You may find other important information in the thread, please read it completely before asking the same things over and over again.

There may also be useful information and experiences from users.
I try to incorporate useful information in the thread starter, but my time is often very limited.
Also, some information may not look valuable enough for me to integrate it, but it may be valuable for you.

...suggestions or corrections welcome!...


-------------------- checking all partitions for bricked blocks

After repartitioning some partitions may still have bricked blocks inside (because of moving brick or choosing a wrong pit etc.).

Bricked blocks in any partition will lead to random freezes when these blocks are accessed in any way.

So you should check all your partitions after repartitioning to be sure.

With both methods below, you can check the partitions even before formatting any of them.

You can do this with my emmc partition scanner, which is flashed via recovery (this doesn't really flash, it only uses the scripting of the updater mechanism of the recovery, also called edify script).

You can also do it manual via dd commands in adb, but this is much slower.
Use commands like this, using the partition block device in the if=... argument:

adb shell dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p1 of=/dev/null
adb shell dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p2 of=/dev/null
adb shell dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p3 of=/dev/null
...
adb shell dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p9 of=/dev/null
adb shell dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p10 of=/dev/null
adb shell dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p11 of=/dev/null
etc.

If any of these freeze the phone (or reboots the phone or doesn't come to an end even after an hour), you probably (still) have bricked blocks inside the according partition.


-------------------- pit.str for DataWorkshop

For those who want to edit their own patched pit file, I made a structure definition file (pit.str) for an open source multi-platform tool (java) called DataWorkshop, which allows looking at binary data in structured form.
The tool is not very comfortable when it comes to copy/paste etc. but you can edit the values (just put the cursor at the correct digit before typing the number).
Please ask (PM), if you are interested in this.


-------------------- PITs for other devices

Because Samsung doesn't fix their kernels (thinking their software doesn't have the problem) there is a growing number of affected devices.
Look at the attached files, which devices are currently available.
If pits for your device aren't available yet, please send me a stock PIT and tell me which partitions are bricked (or BRICK_START and BRICK_END, and if you know, which partitions are usually bricked for your device).
I'll look what I can do...

I will add comments for special cases below.


-------------------- device i9250 - experimental PITs

I added i9250 PITs which are very experimental, because I don't know how some details of it's stock PIT affect the result. May be it breaks everything, so beware.
I added this especially for Shanava, who said to be able to recover even from a hard brick.
His brick is in userdata.
So this will probably revive the internal sd (is it userdata?) and reinstalling a ROM shouldn't be necessary, only formatting userdata.
But I also added system and cache as possible starting partition for the brick, then you have to install a ROM and format cache accordingly.


-------------------- devices not supported/supportable

i9000, i9300 (and similar):
These devices have a different PIT structure.
The structure for each partition entry doesn't include an offset, so I don't know a way to define a gap for skipping the bricked blocks.
Inserting an unused partition changes the partition numbers after it, which shouldn't work.


-------------------- FOR-EXPERTS-ONLY packages

DO NOT USE one of the packages with "FOR-EXPERTS-ONLY" in it's name unless you are REALLY REALLY sure how to handle/restore/initialize all the affected partitions, often meaning you were involved in the discussion leading to these files or you read this VERY carefully.
These packages contain files to be used by those who have special problems and want to take the risk to try them.
They are only documented by the corresponding discussion (somewhere in this thread).





note: this is a living post, it changes while progressing. If you want to refer to it, please make a reference to the whole thread, beginning at the first post.
Don't directly link to the attached files, as they will go away, when I update the files and their names from time to time.

Repartitioning around the bad blocks

This is the former first post of this thread...I switched it with a continuously updated version, which is more understandable for ths users of my pit method.

-----------------------snip -------------------------------------
Hi everyone, especially those with an ICS brick,

last week I jumped straight into a MMC_CAP_ERASE brick.
Sadly, I knew very well what not to do with a LPY kernel on my phone (wiping etc.).
But one weak moment (touching "wipe data/factory reset" in CWM), and then a moment later a flash (pun!) going through my brain, telling me "wow, now the phone will be bricked, right?".

Well I rebooted the phone and thought to be a lucky man, because the system booted correctly.

But after about a minute the SGN started to get FCs in android.*.acore and Google Play etc. I looked with a root file manager and found that the /data partition wasn't mounted.

So I got the BRICK!

After some days of analysing and thinking about the situation, I found a way out of the dilemma. I think, I will not bother you with all the details of these days, but go straight ahead to the final solution...

(this was planned as the second post in the thread, but the dynamic community inserted many post in between, so I added it here sorry, my fault)
---- cut ----

This is a rewrite in english of my report at a german forum:
ICS Brick, Samsung Galaxy Note N7000, Erfahrungsbericht
www.handy-faq.de/.../249283-ics_brick_samsung_galaxy_note_n7000_erfahrungsbericht.html

My brick created bad blocks in the phone's flash memory.
I got I/O-Errors when attempting to read or write those blocks.

My SGN was still able to boot into recovery and all kinds of kernels/recovery.
Odin was able to flash boot loaders, kernels, modems and CSCs.
But flashing a factory_fs stopped at the very beginning.

I found, that any access to some blocks inside /system and also ANY access to /data left an inaccessible phone and I had to restart it.

For all of the following I needed access to some tools (mainly e2fsck and parted).
As I had completely deleted my system partition before (formatting it), I had no single useful tool around, so the recovery had to provide any of those.
The stock recovery e.g. of KL8 engineering kernel doesn't provide such tools, so I had to find a better one first.
I found all this packed in the Thor kernel, but would not recommend it, because it's closed source.
You may use the tools from forrest1971, see below under "manual method".

One of my attempts to get around those bad blocks, was to create a bad blocks list which can be used by the ext4 file system, I tried this command:

e2fsck -c /dev/block/mmcblk0p9 (which is the /system partition)

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

This failed, because to find out which blocks are bad, e2fsck tries to read them and gets stuck by doing so.
I could have created a list manually, but because the data partition was corrupted starting at it's first block, this bad blocks list wouldn't work here anyway.

At the end, my solution was to recreate the partition scheme, leaving a big hole at the space where /system (893MB) and /data (2147MB) resided before:


In order to not access those bad blocks, I could not move these partitions, but instead I had to delete them first and recreate them at another place afterwards.
So I needed a backup of them first (fortunately I always have 7 Titanium backup levels around).


Here is a log of my steps (but see below in the blue sections for other probably easier procedures):

-- naturally, it's much faster to insert those short messages than rewriting a long german post in english.

Next time I should write the main text prior to posting anything, I think...

sorry...

Interesting...

Most notes are bricked in the factoryfs and the datafs.
Looking for a reason I noticed, that our factoryfs start in a range where you have datafs. My brick starts in the range 950MB-1GB.

So there is a chance, the brick is always at certain addresses.

But not all have the same ranges. For the note, there seem to be bricks in the ums, too. I guess a brick address could be calculated from an access address by some kind of alignment operation?

Anyway, your pit is very similar to ours, so it should be easy to generate a patched one. I just have to think about how to generalize this. I think there will be more requests like this.

crys18 said:

Flashed your pit.
Flashed SGN_XX_OXA_KJ1_FACTORYFS.tar worked no stuck on NAND Write.
Flashed CF-Root-SGN_XX_OXA_LA4-v5.0-CWM5.tar
Installed XXLC1_CheckROM_NoteHD_V6.zip using CWM.

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

now, at least, you should have wiped the data partition...which you catched up afterwards...

Stucked at Wizard, retried a couple of times and passed wizard.
Now everything Force Closed, after some minutes manages to go to Settings > Privacy > Factory Data Reset
Check Format USB Storage

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

Ok, thanks, so the wizard problem comes from having an unformatted data partition.

But why formatting USB-storage?
I heard there are ROMs which call the external sd "USB storage"?
I think, probably Factory Reset (which should be more or less equal to "wipe /data" or "format /data") should be enough here.

And now is working fine no more FC.

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

nice

i only have 8 Gb internal space.
Is there a way i can revert my phone to original state, fix the bad blocks and have 12 gb internal space like before???

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

Note: this is a work around, it's not a real fix.
Your internal flash memory has bad blocks, and from what I know no one managed to repair them. So most people probably should ask Samsung for repair service (on guaranty).
The fix works by moving the old /system and /data into the start of the UMS partition (internal sd) and therefore shrinking the internal sd by about 3GB.

don't update youtube from play store, bcoz the update will FC
a lil laggy.

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

this should be unrelated to my workaround.

May be your internal sd is still unformatted?
Can you see files on it?