[INDEX][GUIDE] Q-Link Scepter 8 Tablet (Gen 1 & Gen 2) / General Info & Discussion Thread

[Alkuam]

Has anyone had an issue with the tablet's touchscreen not responding?

Just tried booting it after letting it sit powered down for a month or so and it will only respond intermittently. Even tried taking off the plastic "screen protecter" it came with.

 

[SunSlide]

Has anyone had an issue with the tablet's touchscreen not responding?

Just tried booting it after letting it sit powered down for a month or so and it will only respond intermittently. Even tried taking off the plastic "screen protecter" it came with.

Do you have it rooted and what not or is it still stock?

 

[Alkuam]

Do you have it rooted and what not or is it still stock?

It's rooted.

Tried doing a factory reset in case some setting went funny when the battery went dead, but that didn't help.

It seems to be responsive on the bottom of the screen and a little bit at the top. The middle section seems pretty dead.

I'm considering reflashing to see if that helps at all.

 

[Renate]

I believe the FEL mode is Allwinner's proprietary name for utilizing the general BROM mode...

FEL - linux-sunxi.org

linux-sunxi.org

 

[Viva La Android R.I.P.]

FEL - linux-sunxi.org

linux-sunxi.org

That is also my understanding of FEL mode.

 

[Renate]

I went looking for FEL mode test points on my B&N Glow '21, didn't find any, I but didn't look too hard.
I have a hardware console and I can hit "any key" to stop u-boot, then type "efex" to go to FEL mode.
I wrote a proof-of-concept FEL mode client.

C:\>allwin
Found FEL device
AWUSBFEX 00175500 00000001 0001
Model sun8iw15

FEL is much less sophisticated than EDL Sahara.
You need to write different sections of SRAM to get the FES loader going.
The Wiki posted above is not much help on a different processor.
I somehow did something that caused my Glow to do a factory reset.
No biggie, I got everything back to as it was in 20 minutes.

 

[SunSlide]

It's rooted.

Tried doing a factory reset in case some setting went funny when the battery went dead, but that didn't help.

It seems to be responsive on the bottom of the screen and a little bit at the top. The middle section seems pretty dead.

I'm considering reflashing to see if that helps at all.

Did it get damaged ever so slightly perhaps? Sounds like a cracked digitizer but I'm no expert. If the issue persists through the factory reset then that leads me to think hardware/connection failure. Did you try the reflashing?

 

[Alkuam]

Did it get damaged ever so slightly perhaps? Sounds like a cracked digitizer but I'm no expert. If the issue persists through the factory reset then that leads me to think hardware/connection failure. Did you try the reflashing?

I don't think it got damaged, it has just been sitting in the same spot for over a month and hasn't been touched AFAIK.

Haven't tried reflashing yet.

 

[Vincent Foxx]

Just got this tablet for free, but it's running android 12. S/N: MD2207AP130*****
It's very slow, and wanted to root it or find a way to flash a new rom. But all i been finding are instructions for android 11.

 

[Viva La Android R.I.P.]

Just got this tablet for free, but it's running android 12. S/N: MD2207AP130*****
It's very slow, and wanted to root it or find a way to flash a new rom. But all i been finding are instructions for android 11.

Android 12 Go Edition? Nice. I will email my contact over at Hot Pepper Mobile and make a request for the updated factory firmware image.
In theory, the rooting procedure for Android 11 should work on your Android 12 based tablet. The kernel/ramdisk for Android 11 is fully compatible with Android 12. Google now uses a protocol known as the Android Common Kernel (ACG), which separates the vendor implementation from the boot image via dedicated partition. This new protocol will purportedly help alleviate the widespread fragmentation problem with Android-based devices, and make OTA updates simpler on manufacturers to provide. However, I would first need to know your hardware configuration to ascertain that it is the same hardware used in earlier tablet models. There is an app on Play Store called Dev Check Device & System Info by developer flar2. Install that app, open it, grant any permission requests, then tap on the Hardware heading. Post the info pertaining to your CPU/GPU if you would be so inclined. Thanks for your support. Also, if you wouldn't mind, post a photo of the manufacturer's sticker located on the rear of your tablet.
I just emailed the Support Dept over at Hot Pepper Mobile and formally requested the updated firmware image based on Android 12.

 

[Vincent Foxx]

Android 12 Go Edition? Nice. I will email my contact over at Hot Pepper Mobile and make a request for the updated factory firmware image.
In theory, the rooting procedure for Android 11 should work on your Android 12 based tablet. The kernel/ramdisk for Android 11 is fully compatible with Android 12. Google now uses a protocol known as the Android Common Kernel (ACG), which separates the vendor implementation from the boot image via dedicated partition. This new protocol will purportedly help alleviate the widespread fragmentation problem with Android-based devices, and make OTA updates simpler on manufacturers to provide. However, I would first need to know your hardware configuration to ascertain that it is the same hardware used in earlier tablet models. There is an app on Play Store called Dev Check Device & System Info by developer flar2. Install that app, open it, grant any permission requests, then tap on the Hardware heading. Post the info pertaining to your CPU/GPU if you would be so inclined. Thanks for your support. Also, if you wouldn't mind, post a photo of the manufacturer's sticker located on the rear of your tablet.
I just emailed the Support Dept over at Hot Pepper Mobile and formally requested the updated firmware image based on Android 12.

If i'm reading this right, it says it has about 2gb of ram?

 

[Viva La Android R.I.P.]

@Vincent Foxx, you do have upgraded hardware in your model. Yours is running the Allwinner-A133 chipset. The Android 11 models run the Allwinner-A100. And, yes, you have double the RAM of the earlier models as well. The good news is, the A100 and A133 can both run the same kernel. Speaking of kernel, can you give me your kernel version? I want to double check something first, but I believe you're in luck as far as rooting goes.

 

[Vincent Foxx]

@Vincent Foxx, you do have upgraded hardware in your model. Yours is running the Allwinner-A133 chipset. The Android 11 models run the Allwinner-A100. And, yes, you have double the RAM of the earlier models as well. The good news is, the A100 and A133 can both run the same kernel. Speaking of kernel, can you give me your kernel version? I want to double check something first, but I believe you're in luck as far as rooting goes.

Thats good. If I can root this I can extract the img an post it

 

[Viva La Android R.I.P.]

Thanks for the info @Vincent Foxx. I have already heard back from my support contact, Joshua G. at Hot Pepper Mobile. He is working on getting me the firmware so I should know something very soon.

 

[SamuEDL]

By the way, I don't know if you've tried it. On my tablet (Also with Allwinner A100 and 1GB of ram) I use GSI roms and I have better performance than stock roms. Maybe it's the same on the Q-link. At least it can be an alternative until you have a good custom rom.

 

[Viva La Android R.I.P.]

By the way, I don't know if you've tried it. On my tablet (Also with Allwinner A100 and 1GB of ram) I use GSI roms and I have better performance than stock roms. Maybe it's the same on the Q-link. At least it can be an alternative until you have a good custom rom.

Yes, I've had a much better experience using the LineageOS based GSI ROMs. Definitely more responsive than stock.

 

[Viva La Android R.I.P.]

@Vincent Foxx, great news. I have been given the Android 12 Go Edition firmware for the latest QLink tablets. I am uploading the package now and will post a download link as soon as it's finished.
In case you aren't familiar with Allwinner firmware, it comes archived in .img format. In order to extract the boot.img and other partition images, you must use a special extraction tool such as CRB Android Kitchen (available for free here on XDA). If you need, I can take the liberty of extracting the firmware. Let me know.

 

[Viva La Android R.I.P.]

Android 12 Go Edition/Scepter 8

Build Date: June 7, 2022
Variant: Allwinner-A133 QLink Scepter 8

 

[Viva La Android R.I.P.]

@Vincent Foxx, I went ahead and extracted the Android 12 Go Edition firmware image. I patched the boot.img with Magisk v25.2 and uploaded it to my cloud storage. Here is a link:
Patched Boot Image (Android 12 Go Ed. Firmware,)
I noticed in the device info you posted that your active partition slot is _b. Whenever you flash the patched Boot Image to achieve root, be sure to flash both the _a & _b slots as such:

fastboot flash boot_a patched_boot.img
fastboot flash boot_b patched_boot.img

 

[Vincent Foxx]

@Vincent Foxx, I went ahead and extracted the Android 12 Go Edition firmware image. I patched the boot.img with Magisk v25.2 and uploaded it to my cloud storage. Here is a link:
Patched Boot Image (Android 12 Go Ed. Firmware,)
I noticed in the device info you posted that your active partition slot is _b. Whenever you flash the patched Boot Image to achieve root, be sure to flash both the _a & _b slots as such:

fastboot flash boot_a patched_boot.img
fastboot flash boot_b patched_boot.img

Everthing works great, now i can see if i can make this a bit lag free. If there's any roms i can download let me know, something that's android 10 since android 11 and 12 are buggy imo.
and thanks a lot for your service helped a lot