Samsung Galaxy Note II

BenEadir

wotzgoingon wrote: »

KitKat released for Note II today, so far only France.

http://www.sammobile.com/2014/04/25/samsung-rolling-out-android-4-4-kitkat-update-for-galaxy-note-ii/

Is there any reason for us not to flash this manually via Odin or should we wait for our respective carriers (Vodafone in my case) to roll out KitKat for the N2?

Ben

Bluefrog

Well if you flash this one it won't be branded with the Vodafone look and apps.

Upgraded and re-rooted mine this evening from 4.3 via Odin without issue but since I had nightmares upgrading to 4.3 I did have both Nandroid and Titanium backups in case things went south.

Might be some small performance improvement but the main reason I wanted it was to get to use the new Google Camera app with the lens blur effect - seems pretty nice.

Won't know about battery life for a couple of days.

BenEadir

Bluefrog wrote: »

Well if you flash this one it won't be branded with the Vodafone look and apps.

Upgraded and re-rooted mine this evening from 4.3 via Odin without issue but since I had nightmares upgrading to 4.3 I did have both Nandroid and Titanium backups in case things went south.

Might be some small performance improvement but the main reason I wanted it was to get to use the new Google Camera app with the lens blur effect - seems pretty nice.

Won't know about battery life for a couple of days.

Did the same myself and all seems well so far. It's N7100XXUFND3 from http://samfirmware.com.

How did you re-root it after the upgrade?

Ben

irishpancake

BenThere wrote: »

Did the same myself and all seems well so far. It's N7100XXUFND3 from http://samfirmware.com.

How did you re-root it after the upgrade?

Ben

Hi Ben

You started a thread earlier saying your Note II was bricked??

http://touch.boards.ie/thread/2057198630/1/#post90136702

You should really update that thread giving details of how you recovered the device.....

this could well help others.

I see another poster has replied there, giving detailed advice, I was about to do the same, so you should clarify what the situation is.

BenEadir

irishpancake wrote: »

Hi Ben

You started a thread earlier saying your Note II was bricked??

http://touch.boards.ie/thread/2057198630/1/#post90136702

You should really update that thread giving details of how you recovered the device.....

this could well help others.

I see another poster has replied there, giving detailed advice, I was about to do the same, so you should clarify what the situation is.

Thanks IP, you're right.

Through pure trial and error late into the night I ended up flashing the 4.4.2 Samsung Note 2 ROM released in France (downloaded from Samfirmware) via Odin and it seems to be working fine. No issues with the phone app yet anyway.

I guess the moral of the story is that if for whatever reason you end up messing up your Samsung phone such that it won't boot and you can't install/update a ROM via CWM/TWRP the thing to do is download Odin http://odindownload.com, make sure your phones USB drivers are installed on your PC (I used http://samsung-usb-driver-for-mobile-phones.en.lo4d.com) and then download the relevant ROM from www.samfirmware.com.

Once you are ready you need to put your phone in download mode (for me that was vol down + power + home and release the col down + power once the first graphic appears on the screen), connect the to your PC via USB cable and install the downloaded ROM tar file PDA.

That process installed a working stock ROM on the phone and allowed me to get it back up and running again.

Hope that helps someone who finds themselves in a similar situation.

Ben

Bluefrog

Ben

To root I just followed the first process here - http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2730764&__utma=248941774.337331472.1398579400.1398579400.1398587651.2&__utmb=248941774.1.10.1398587651&__utmc=248941774&__utmx=-&__utmz=248941774.1398587651.2.2.utmcsr=google|utmccn=(organic)|utmcmd=organic|utmctr=(not%20provided)&__utmv=-&__utmk=122734344

_Whimsical_

If I root am I waving goodbye to OTA updates and certain apps working ? I know some streaming apps won't work with root but are there generally reliable work arounds for these problems?

Bluefrog

Rooting in itself won't prevent OTA updates but rather some of the methods used such as doing it via a custom recovery can as it is the recovery software that runs the updates.

The other issue is that OTA updates can break your root so if you are rooted you don't necessarily want them to run anyway.

As for certain streaming apps not working, I have not seen any that doe't work yet. Actually one of the primary reasons some might root is to be able to run privacy software to circumvent location restrictions in certain streaming apps.

_Whimsical_

Thank you Bluefrog.