Ares 8 5.0 Upgrade to Ares 8 5.1, Everything working , normal sound.

[vampirefo]

This is a guide to upgrade Nextbook Ares 8, disable encryption, and flash permanent TWRP recovery to device.
Walmart is selling the Nextbook Ares 8 for $62.52

This rom works great, and sound is now back to normal, on other roms sound worked but was very low.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Nextbook-Ares-8-Tablet-16GB-Quad-Core/43267399

To use, download ares8_5.0_upgrade_5.1.zip, extract and run either Linux script or Windows batch file.

Bootloader must be unlocked

fastboot/adb must be installed system wide and working.

make sure scripts are set to executable

connect tablet to pc, leave connected until tablet reboots and is ready to set up

open terminal in folder where you extracted ares8_5.0_upgrade_5.1.zip

open cmd window where you extracted ares8_5.0_upgrade_5.1.zip

Linux

adb reboot bootloader
./fastboot.sh

Windows

adb reboot bootloader
fastboot_cmd.bat

That's it, takes a few minutes to install, leave connected to pc, when completed tablet will reboot to setup screen, setup and enjoy.

Download
https://www.androidfilehost.com/?fid=745425885120720323

Credits

@N810E
@zefie
@vampirefo

 

[martyfender]

This is a guide to upgrade Nextbook Ares 8, disable encryption, and flash permanent TWRP recovery to device.
Walmart is selling the Nextbook Ares 8 for $62.52

This rom works great, and sound is now back to normal, on other roms sound worked but was very low.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Nextbook-Ares-8-Tablet-16GB-Quad-Core/43267399

To use, download ares8_5.0_upgrade_5.1.zip, extract and run either Linux script or Windows batch file.

Bootloader must be unlocked

fastboot/adb must be installed system wide and working.

make sure scripts are set to executable

connect tablet to pc, leave connected until tablet reboots and is ready to set up

open terminal in folder where you extracted ares8_5.0_upgrade_5.1.zip

open cmd window where you extracted ares8_5.0_upgrade_5.1.zip

Linux

adb reboot bootloader
./fastboot.sh

Windows

adb reboot bootloader
fastboot_cmd.bat

That's it, takes a few minutes to install, leave connected to pc, when completed tablet will reboot to setup screen, setup and enjoy.

Download
https://www.androidfilehost.com/?fid=745425885120720323

Credits

@N810E
@zefie
@vampirefo

@vampirefo and others who contributed, this is the best rom for this 5.0 device yet. At 8 hrs. unplugged, in deep sleep, I had 98% battery left. The interactive governor deep sleep offline bug is gone. The power disconnecting, reconnecting on charge is gone also. The only issue I have noticed, so far, is that the wifi connection logo at the top is not always showing as full or 100%. That is despite being inches from my router. Furthermore, when I use mixplorer, totalcommander or quickpic to access my photos in onedrive, sometimes it is very slow, or fails to connect. When it does connect, the thumbnails are very slow to load. In the older roms this didn't happen. For me this is a minor issue, because I have other means to access onedrive from my computer. So overall this is a great improvement over the older rom. Thanks to all for your hard work and dedication to improve this device!

 

[vampirefo]

I am currently running @greatbal rom on my 5.0 it's equal to this rom, I have to remove supersu manually, I hate when a rom includes root, other than that @greatbal rom runs well on my 5.0.

By the way, did you use windows or linux to install the rom?

 

[martyfender]

I am currently running @greatbal rom on my 5.0 it's equal to this rom, I have to remove supersu manually, I hate when a rom includes root. other than that @greatbal rom runs well on my 5.0.

By the way, did you use windows or linux to install the rom?

I used windows 7. my only experience with linux, besides Android is through bootable usb drives and cds. I have tried Ubuntu this way. The other bootable drives were mostly window repair, backup, and repartitioning disks.

One note to windows users, there are MANY, UAC promts to to approve the running of the fastboot.exe. So you have to stay with the install to approve each of the many prompts. one workaround would be to go into windows settings and temporarily disable UAC. Then, of course, re-enable it later, after the install finishes. There may be a better way to do this though. Under my fastboot.exe properties, on the compatibility tab, I had it set to always run as an administrator. Maybe that is what caused the constant prompts, not sure. And since I have the device re-partitioned and the rom installed, I don't want to go back and test that theory, since I have installed and updated many apps. It was very nice that you had the re-partitioning built into the script for the install. Just as you stated earlier, be patient, the routine takes some time, the device has not locked up.

I probably wouldn't have bought the Ares 8A, if I had had this rom for my old device. It is too late to return the 8A, now. I haven't figured out how to root the new device, without potentially messing it up.

 

[zerozed99]

@vampirefo I hate to ask what is probably a stupid-ass question, but I'm still running Batville. Do I need to re-partition before installing this ROM? If so, it has been a long time since I partioned it for Batville so I'm not sure what the original setup was--can you help? Thanks for continuing to work on the device--we all appreciate it.

 

[martyfender]

@vampirefo I hate to ask what is probably a stupid-ass question, but I'm still running Batville. Do I need to re-partition before installing this ROM? If so, it has been a long time since I partioned it for Batville so I'm not sure what the original setup was--can you help? Thanks for continuing to work on the device--we all appreciate it.

@vampirefo included a new partition table with the files. In addition, he put the re-partitioning in the fastboot_cmd.bat, so it is automatic.

 

[zerozed99]

@vampirefo included a new partition table with the files. In addition, he put the re-partitioning in the fastboot_cmd.bat, so it is automatic.

Is there any benefit (e.g. speed or battery life) with this rom over batville? I'm assuming that the new one is larger.

 

[martyfender]

Is there any benefit (e.g. speed or battery life) with this rom over batville? I'm assuming that the new one is larger.

See my info a few posts above. The issue I am having is with wifi, which I never had in any of the other roms.
I tested with a wifi testing app, and the link speed is good, however, the latency is fluctuating from the norm of 2 ms., all the way up to above 1000 ms. I'm not sure what would cause that, as my tablet is within inches of my wireless router. If anybody has any ideas, please let me know. Web browsing seems ok with Firefox and Chrome, but in apps where I access my photos stored on OneDrive, I have problems. I haven't tried any other internet apps to see if there are any issues. I can access videos with vlc, through my LAN, to my desktop computer with no problems.

 

[vampirefo]

Is there any benefit (e.g. speed or battery life) with this rom over batville? I'm assuming that the new one is larger.

From my personal experience, the biggest benefit is sound, I can listen to music on tablet without Bluetooth or headset.

The sound through the speaker is loud enough to enjoy.

As time permits, I plan on pulling the sound off of this and if possible apply it to my other roms, that lack good sound through speaker.

If all goes well, just applying sound patch to batville will be all that's needed for batville user's to get same sound quality, without the need to switch to this rom.

Batville is a great rom, just lacks good sound quality through speaker, I hope in time to be able to fix that, with a patch.

Sent from my Life_Max using Tapatalk

 

[martyfender]

@vampirefo, This rom has been the best yet for my 5.0 Ares 8. The only problem I have had is with wifi connectivity. So I decided to start over. I re-ran the fastboot_cmd.bat again to reflash the rom. During the install phase it failed and bricked my device, my first. What did I do wrong to cause this?

I can boot into dnx mode and type fastboot devices, and it lists my Baytrail device. Fastboot flash commands fail with errors. adb commands don't work in this mode.

If I type: fastboot boot boot.img, it boots to uefi / bios access menu. I suspect I need a hub, a usb otg adapter, a keyboard and mouse to get the buttons to respond, though. Are there settings in this bio menu which will help me? Is there any way to recover from this that you know of?
In addition I can boot to an efi shell by holding down the home button and the power button. Unfortunately, your info on the wifi came after I did this blunder. I have a twrp backup, I can't get into it to reload the backup.
Any help recovering from this disaster will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
Edit: I found this post:
https://forum.xda-developers.com/member.php?u=4821597
Not sure where to get this file: efilinux.efi. Is it the one in your esp folder or the one in the esp.zip?
Thanks
I solved this my self by following @social-design-concepts directions, then running the fastboot_cmd.bat to re-flash the system. Anybody have any ideas what may have caused this data corruption in the first place?

 

[vampirefo]

You want me to guess what you did wrong? No ideal, seeing it worked the first time and third time for you, and everytime for me, I would guess user error.

Sent from my Life Max using Tapatalk

 

[martyfender]

You want me to guess what you did wrong? No ideal, seeing it worked the first time and third time for you, and everytime for me, I would guess user error.

Sent from my Life Max using Tapatalk

No, sorry, this is all I did:
I rebooted to bootloader. Then I ran your fastboot_cmd.bat. It never had errors in the command window until it was running the flash commands. Then it rebooted to the dnx window. So it didn't appear to be a user error. I am using minimal adb and fastboot. I have all of the files in that folder. I shift, right click, then choose open a command prompt here.

Instead of typing the command in windows, I dragged and dropped it in the command prompt window. I guess it will be a mystery. However, I did do a TWRP backup this time, even before flashing SuperSu and busybox.

I did use your fix for the captive portal and my internet seems to have improved, So thanks again.
Just curious, what is the: -S 200M, in the flashing system command?

 

[vampirefo]

No, sorry, this is all I did:
I rebooted to bootloader. Then I ran your fastboot_cmd.bat. It never had errors in the command window until it was running the flash commands. Then it rebooted to the dnx window. So it didn't appear to be a user error. I am using minimal adb and fastboot. I have all of the files in that folder. I shift, right click, then choose open a command prompt here.

Instead of typing the command in windows, I dragged and dropped it in the command prompt window. I guess it will be a mystery. However, I did do a TWRP backup this time, even before flashing SuperSu and busybox. I did use your fix for the captive portal and my internet seems to have improved, So thanks again.

I don't use minimal adb, that is a problem, you need to be system-wide.

Use system-wide method, it's a better way to use adb and fastboot. The script was designed to be ran based on system-wide access.


https://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=48915118

-S 200M is sparse, the 200M is the size or chunk I tell it to split, this can be raised or lowered​ depending on speed of computer, I am using a Windows tablet to run the windows batch file.

My Linux could push it much faster, 500 or more, but 200 is safe, slow, and steady.

Sent from my NXA8QC116 using Tapatalk

 

[martyfender]

I don't use minimal adb, that is a problem, you need to be system-wide.

Use system-wide method, it's a better way to use adb and fastboot. The script was designed to be ran based on system-wide access.


https://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=48915118

-S 200M is sparse, the 200M is the size or chunk I tell it to split, this can be raised or lowered​ depending on speed of computer, I am using a Windows tablet to run the windows batch file.

My Linux could push it much faster, 500 or more, but 200 is safe, slow, and steady.

Sent from my NXA8QC116 using Tapatalk

I had it set at one time in the system environmental variables, but when I redid my system I forgot to re-add it. Thanks for the link. I had seen that in the past, but it had older versions of adb and fastboot. I see now that it has been updated, so thank again.

Edit: I checked and apparently I did have Minimal ADB and Fastboot entered in the system environmental variables, which would make it system wide. I downloaded and installed your recommendation. it added an additional variable after: C:\adb.

Here may be the issue: I updated Minimal ADB and Fastboot with an installer and it appears it added an additional entry for it. I notice to that windows live has two entries also:
C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox;C:\Windows\System32;C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Windows Live;C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Windows Live;C:\Program Files (x86)\Minimal ADB and Fastboot;C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Live\Shared; C:\Program Files (x86)\Minimal ADB and Fastboot;C:\adb.
I think I should remove the double entries?

Here is a link for a microsoft script the remove duplicate path variables:
https://gallery.technet.microsoft.com/scriptcenter/How-to-check-for-duplicate-5d9dd711
I ran that script, but my entries remain the same. i'm not sure why.
I guess the simplest solution is to remove Minimal ADB and Fastboot, its variables and keep the other ADB.

 

[martyfender]

This Ares 8 which originally came with 5.0 is running great since I redid it and applied your wifi fixes to it.

I find myself using it most of the time, over the new Ares 8A, because I have root on it and don't possess enough knowledge to feel safe in trying to root the Ares 8A, or building a working TWRP for it.
By the way, I had 98% battery left after leaving it overnight. That is a far cry from what I had with the 701Q and Batville roms. That is great.
With Batville I could never get contacts to work, despite trying playstore and other fixes. In addition, the sound is good with this new rom.
I don't do much gaming anymore, but i do have GT Racing 2 installed on the External microSD card, Using @vickybonick Apps2SD, and this graphic intensive game runs very well on it.
Thanks again for your great work.

By the way, in the past with the original 5.0 rom, I tried using three different SanDisk high speed UHS-1, Class 10 cards with Apps2SD, and all of them had good write speeds, but poor read speeds. I finally returned those cards and went with the Samsung EVO series. The read and write speeds are great on this card. I used several test apps, both on Windows and Android, to test them. Has anybody else had similar experiences with different brands of high speed cards?

 

[martyfender]

If you have more than one adb install listed in the environmental variables, the first listed takes precedence in system wide access. I tested this by changing the order with Rapid Environment Editor. I viewed which one was running in Process Explorer.

Rapid Environment Editor will also show any invalid paths. This is of academic interest, as the simplest solution, is of course, to only have one adb installed system wide. If you run a command prompt from the folder where each adb is installed, that one will run, instead of the one installed system wide, unless you are already in the folder where the system wide is installed. (shift right click, choose open command prompt here).

That is what I did and should have worked fine, it always has before. So I am "beating a dead horse to death", in the pursuit of knowledge. i hope this helps someone else as well, that is learning, like me. By the way, is this considered OT?

 

[martyfender]

I hate to be a thorn in your side, but:
Apparently I spoke too soon about the wifi connection working better. And please keep in mind I am comparing it to what I had on all three previous roms: the original 5.0, i708q and the Batville roms, and my newer Ares 8A. Also please keep in mind that the device is less than 2ft. from my wireless router in my tests.Using WiFi Network Analyzer, I see a continual fluctuation in the dBm signal strength, all the way from the normal -34, all the way up to the -70 to -92 range. In addition, the latency goes from normal 3-4 ms., all the way into the hundreds and even thousands ms. The older roms did not do this in the analyzer. My new Ares 8A remains in the -32-42 dBm signal strenth, and the latency stays in the 3-4ms range.
I seem to have improved things slightly by changing the following things in my router:
Allow n devices only
bandwidth set from auto 40mhz/20mhz, to 20mhz only
protected mode (not to be confused with WPS):
rotected Mode
NOTE: In most situations, best performance (throughput) is achieved with Protected Mode OFF. If you are operating in an environment with HEAVY 802.11b traffic or interference, best performance may be achieved with Protected Mode ON.
(I'm not certain if protected mode helped, or not.)

Is there anything I can do on the tablet to improve this or troublshoot it?
Furthermore are the system wifi files in the newer rom different to what was in the working i708q and Batville roms? Sometimes, turning off wifi and turning it back on helps for a while. Also I forgot to point out that the fan shaped wifi connection symbol fluctuates from full to partial, also. All other devices I have turned on to test, show no problems, that I can tell.
I haven't ruled out interference as I live in an apartment complex where I can see several neighbors on all non-overlapping channels 1, 6 and 11. However the older roms, the new 8A and other tested devices have no detectable problems with my wireless router. Does anybody have any suggestions?
Like I've said in the past this is a great rom for this device, if I can get this problem resolved.
Thanks

 

[martyfender]

For my wireless configuation and router, I was able to improve my speed and connection by reading linux documentation on the hostapd.
I edited the hostapd.conf located in system/etc/wifi, changing the following entries:
preamble=0
dissoc_low_ack=0

I'm not sure, but maybe my wireless router doesn't handle the default settings as well?
If that was the case, though, why did the same defaults work well with the previous roms?

preamble=0 "Set optional use of short preamble."
0 sets a long preamble instead of a short one
dissoc_low=0 "Disassociate stations based on excessive transmission failures or other indications of connection loss. This depends on the driver capabilities and may not be available with all drivers."
0 turns this off.

My congested wireless environment may be partially to blame for this. there are at least 4 clients on each of the three non-overlapping channels of 1,6 and 11, respectively.
If anybody has any additional thoughts on this, let us all know.
Thanks
UPDATE: apparently, the above changes didn't help. In the terminal when I type: busybox ifconfig, I see dropped packets under p2p and wlan0 for rx, but not for tx. This has happened on other wireless networks as well. Maybe not as bad though. I'm not 100% sure though as I haven't run ifconfig on those other networks.
I am considering ordering an ASUS 3-In-1 Wireless Router (RT-N12), or an Asus RT-N12 D1 Wireless Router - IEEE 802.11n RT-N12/D1, to see if this improves things. I have no AC devices, so an AC router seems like a pricey overkill for me. However an AC might be more future proof. I don't have a new flat screen tv to stream to. I have an old Sony 36" CRT, which I haven't turned on for over a year, as I watch streamed TV shows on the internet, from my computer. So finally, the bandwidth that AC affords, doesn't seem necessary.

 

[N810E]

Well, I managed to (sort of) kill my Ares 8. I already had 5.1 installed and working an thought, "I'll run this and start fresh." Everything looked like it went normally but when the tablet rebooted, I have:
Entering DnX mode.
Waiting for fastboot command...
Tethered recovery gets this:
***********************************************************************
FASTBOOT TETHERED RECOVERY LAUNCHER 07-24-2015
***********************************************************************

=======================================================================

DEVICE STATUS: FASTBOOT-ONLINE

DEVICE INFORMATION: BaytrailBA302518 fastboot

=======================================================================

copy needed files to our device
sending '/tmp/recovery.zip' (7151 KB)...
OKAY [ 0.285s]
writing '/tmp/recovery.zip'...
FAILED (remote: unknown command)
finished. total time: 0.294s
sending '/tmp/recovery.launcher' (704 KB)...
OKAY [ 0.036s]
writing '/tmp/recovery.launcher'...
FAILED (remote: unknown command)
finished. total time: 0.049s
we need to stop logcat before replacing it
...
FAILED (remote: unknown command)
finished. total time: 0.005s
sending '/system/bin/logcat' (349 KB)...
OKAY [ 0.021s]
writing '/system/bin/logcat'...
FAILED (remote: unknown command)
finished. total time: 0.026s

issue fastboot oem "stop_partitioning" command to start cwm recovery:
...
FAILED (remote: unknown command)
finished. total time: 0.005s

Everything tethered or not comes up (remote: unknown command)

martyfender what exactly did you do to get tethered recovery to work?

 

[martyfender]

Well, I managed to (sort of) kill my Ares 8. I already had 5.1 installed and working an thought, "I'll run this and start fresh." Everything looked like it went normally but when the tablet rebooted, I have:
Entering DnX mode.
Waiting for fastboot command...
Tethered recovery gets this:
***********************************************************************
FASTBOOT TETHERED RECOVERY LAUNCHER 07-24-2015
***********************************************************************

=======================================================================

DEVICE STATUS: FASTBOOT-ONLINE

DEVICE INFORMATION: BaytrailBA302518 fastboot

=======================================================================

copy needed files to our device
sending '/tmp/recovery.zip' (7151 KB)...
OKAY [ 0.285s]
writing '/tmp/recovery.zip'...
FAILED (remote: unknown command)
finished. total time: 0.294s
sending '/tmp/recovery.launcher' (704 KB)...
OKAY [ 0.036s]
writing '/tmp/recovery.launcher'...
FAILED (remote: unknown command)
finished. total time: 0.049s
we need to stop logcat before replacing it
...
FAILED (remote: unknown command)
finished. total time: 0.005s
sending '/system/bin/logcat' (349 KB)...
OKAY [ 0.021s]
writing '/system/bin/logcat'...
FAILED (remote: unknown command)
finished. total time: 0.026s

issue fastboot oem "stop_partitioning" command to start cwm recovery:
...
FAILED (remote: unknown command)
finished. total time: 0.005s

Everything tethered or not comes up (remote: unknown command)

martyfender what exactly did you do to get tethered recovery to work?

I didn't use a tethered recovery, I used the twrp recovery posted at the start of this thread. It is in the ares8_5.0_upgrade_5.1.zip.
When I had similar problems, I found a post by [MENTION=5368024 [user=4821597]@social-design-concepts[/user] https://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=65435780&postcount=409 in the original ares 8 thread to fix the problem:
"
Member
94 posts
Thanks: 30

Quote:
Originally Posted by social-design-concepts

"thats the uefi / bios access menu you'll need an usb otg adapter and most devices ( not all ) require use of a powered usb hub ( which i personally recommend regardless as devices that use more power can short out the port ) and keyboard and mouse to navigate it. but it looks as if you esp is corrupt if you have the efiloader and droidboot.img you can try.

Code:

fastboot flash osloader efilinux.efi
fastboot boot droidboot.img

this should get you back into droidboot / fastboot where you can then partition your device and reflash the esp and the reset of android.

@social-design-concepts, thanks for this post. When I tried to reinstall vampirefo's latest 5.1.1 rom, ported to work on the 5.0 device, it failed and Could only get into dnx mode. I used your instruction to fix the ESP partition, then reinstalled the rom, with no problems. It is running great now.
Thanks, again."
I used the above commands and files within the rom posted above, so I didn't even need a usb otg adapter to do it. I believe I used the droidboot.img and efilinux.efi. The efilinux.efi is in the esp.zip. unzip to the root of your folder where you have adb and fastboot installed. The rom files must also be unzipped to that location.

The above commands are run through an adb and fastboot command prompt, from your computer. Those are the windows commands. they would be slightly different if you are on linux. Then I rebooted the tablet back into fastboot mode: fastboot reboot bootloader, which worked again, ran the fastboot_cmd.bat to reflash the rom again. This was all done from the computer with an adb and command prompt, using fastboot commands, of course. Type fastboot devices, to make sure your device is showing up, before proceeding

I never figured out the cause of the problem when I reflashed this rom the second time, but I suspect I should have done a factory reset before doing it. It was flashing the above files that gave me the ability to get into fastboot bootloader again, then I reflashed the whole rom the third time and it worked as it did the first time I did it.
Currently I am using the newer, twrp 3.1 recovery he posted in the ares 8 5.1 problems thread.

UPDATE: if you don't have a permanent recovery installed, this may or may not work in the tethered, temp, twrp recovery. I don't know as I have never used the tethered, temp, recovery.

Actually, I think I used the fastboot commands in dnx mode to flash the droidboot.img and efilinux.efi, rebooted into the bootloader: fastboot reboot bootloader and then ran the fastboot_cmd.bat to reflash the rom.
And of course, you have to make sure adb and fastboot drivers are setup correctly and recognizing your device, for all of the above to work. I tried to retrace my steps. I hope I didn't forget any of them!
Good Luck!