After trying out one of GideonX/andrewk's unofficial 4.4.2 (KitKat) OmniROM builds (with factory reset beforehand as always), I found myself unable to boot directly into recovery mode using the same button combo as always (hold volume down), not even getting the blue text or boot loader menu. I could, however, reboot into recovery. At some point trying to get Sprint working on the generic "d2lte" builds, both TWRP and OmniROM would no longer mount my encrypted /data partition, and thus the true nightmare began. I tried all versions of TWRP dating back to around 2.4, but none of them would mount. I even tried restoring just an olderl boot.IMG, but not with the ROM it came with, and of course my phone stopped being able to boot OmniROM. Eventually I flashed stock back on without touching /data/media (most of this was using Odin of courand that couldn't mount it, either. So finally I gave up and just wiped /data, including my long-beloved /data/media, and flashed stock back on with its original /data/media. And thusly my phone worked once more...almost: I still can't enter recovery without rebooting from within a loaded ROM, which has me probably rightfully worried that encrypting the partition will leave it unable to mount again.
Notes: I'm now on latest SlimKat Stable, which is indeed pretty stable. No recovery boots directly, not even stock. I tried re-updating the Firmware+Modem using Freya's MD4 AIO, as that contains an aboot.img, but it didn't solve the problem, though my baseband is still what i tjink is the latest:SPH710LVPBMD4
My next step would probably be to either use Keis, or otherwise find the PIT files, to repartition, returning to stock once again.
Let me once again reiterate that when only stock was on here, I couldn't even get stock recovery unless I used a "Rebooter" tool.
tldr: can't boot directly into recovery, instead need to reboot from Android, help!
Notes: I'm now on latest SlimKat Stable, which is indeed pretty stable. No recovery boots directly, not even stock. I tried re-updating the Firmware+Modem using Freya's MD4 AIO, as that contains an aboot.img, but it didn't solve the problem, though my baseband is still what i tjink is the latest:SPH710LVPBMD4
My next step would probably be to either use Keis, or otherwise find the PIT files, to repartition, returning to stock once again.
Let me once again reiterate that when only stock was on here, I couldn't even get stock recovery unless I used a "Rebooter" tool.
tldr: can't boot directly into recovery, instead need to reboot from Android, help!
