Thursday, September 28, 2017
The Snapdragon 600 series of SoCs
The Snapdragon 600 series of SoCs
Qualcomm offers its Snapdragon 600 series of SoCs to the mid range, with the series fitting between the entry level 400 series (Quad core A53s) and high end 800 series (6-8 core ARM or Quad core Kryo).
| Model | Process | Cluster 1 | Cluster 2 | GPU |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 615 | 28nm LP | 4 x 1.7Ghz A53 | 4 x 1.0Ghz A53 | Adreno 405 |
| 616 | 28nm LP | 4 x 1.7Ghz A53 | 4 x 1.2Ghz A53 | Adreno 405 |
| 617 | 28nm LP | 4 x 1.5Ghz A53 | 4 x 1.2Ghz A53 | Adreno 405 |
| 625 | 14nm | 4 x 2.0Ghz A53 | 4 x 2.0Ghz A53 | Adreno 506 |
| 650 | 28nm HPm | 2 x 1.8Ghz A72 | 4 x 1.4Ghz A53 | Adreno 510 |
| 652 | 28nm HPm | 4 x 1.8Ghz A72 | 4 x 1.4Ghz A53 | Adreno 510 |
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Tuesday, September 19, 2017
Flashing a Global ROM onto the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 Pro Snapdragon 650
Flashing a Global ROM onto the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 Pro Snapdragon 650
During yesterdays trip to Stokenchurch to meet up with some fellow phone fanatics, I purchased a Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 Pro second hand off one of the guys at the meet. No doubt I will go into more details in a future post about the differences between this phone and the Mediatek (non-Pro) version, but in this post I will provided an overview of how I transitioned from the stock Chinese ROM to the Global ROM.
A similar procedure is likely needed for other Snapdragon SoC Xiaomi devices, although I have only tried the Redmi Note 3 Pro myself.
Preparation
We will need to download the following ROM images and tools before proceeding:
Chinese Developer ROM
MIUI Flashing tool
Redmi Note 3 Latest Qualcomm Global Stable (Fastboot ROM)
Unlocking tool
15 second adb installer (if adb and fastboot are not already installed on your PC)
Stage 1 - Changing from the Stable ROM to a Developer ROM
In order to unlock the bootloader on the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 Pro you need to be on the Developer firmware. This is unlike my experience with the Mediatek version, where an unlock could be performed from either ROM channel.
If you try to unlock the ROM from Stable, the unlock process will fail at 50% with the error message "Current account is different from the account info on the device"
Ensure you are running the latest version of the Stable Chinese ROM (check in the Updater app) and then flash the Developer ROM via the built in Updater app.
To do this, copy the zip file onto the device, run the Updater app, select the button at the top right and select "Chose Update Package". Select the zip file and off you go - you should have changed from the Stable channel to the Developer channel.
Stage 2 - Unlocking the bootloader
In a previous post I have gone into details of how to request a bootloader unlock from Xiaomi. If you have requested an unlock previously, you should already have the permissions on your Mi account to unlock the bootloader directly, but if not then it is worth checking this post.
Ensure that you are logged onto your Mi account in the phone, reboot into Fastboot mode (from device off, hold down power and volume down), run up the Unlocking tool MiFlashUnlock, sign in and go through the unlock procedure.
Stage 3 - Flashing the Global ROM
Once the bootloader is unlocked you can flash the Global ROM via the MiPhone flash tool. Once again, unlike the SP Flash tool used for Mediatek SoCs, with the Snapdragon SoC the bootloader must be unlocked before we can flash using this tool.
We need to unzip the tgz completely to get the extracted files and then use the MiFlash tool to flash the device. The tool is a little picky on the location of the files, so I put them in a folder off the root of the C drive.
It should be noted that fastboot and adb must be preinstalled for the tool to work - if required, download the 15 second adb installer above.
During the installation of the MiFlash tool, all sorts of weird instructions are given, mentioning a "Settings" application. I ignored all this, as there was no settings application installed & all went well without any further configuration.
To flash the Global ROM, the phone must be in Fastboot mode (Power and Vol down) and attached via USB to the PC. We must locate the unzipped global images folder using the Browse button (where the batch files are located) and then select refresh, which should pick up the device. Select "Flash all" as the flash option and then hit the Flash button.
Hopefully once everything has completed, the phone will boot up with the Global image, with all the Google services and a distinct lack of Chinese apps!
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Monday, September 18, 2017
Flashing a Global ROM on a Snapdragon based Xiaomi phone without a Bootloader Unlock
Flashing a Global ROM on a Snapdragon based Xiaomi phone without a Bootloader Unlock
One of the limitations with Xiaomis new bootloader locking policy is that a user can only unlock the bootloader of one device every 30 days, and then only after you have successfully applied for your Mi account to have this right.
When importing a Xiaomi phone from China, you will find that the installed ROM will either be a genuine Chinese Xiaomi ROM, without pre-installed Google Services and with some settings not tailored for the western market, or a shop ROM, which has Google Services and western-centric settings, but will never get any updates.
Some of Xiaomis devices (usually those available in other markets, such as India) have Global ROMs, which are official Xiaomi ROMs with western-centric settings that will get updates for the supported life of the device. It is these that are the most suitable for the western market - if they are available!
In a previous post, I outlined the method by which you could change from the stock Chinese ROM to a Global ROM, but this involved requesting a bootloader unlock. It also assumes you have a stock Chinese ROM and not a modified shop ROM.
In this post I will describe how to flash the Global ROM without requiring an unlocked bootloader from any firmware.
This should also work to get back to a stock Chinese image if your device is shipped with a shop ROM.
Suitability
We will need to download the following ROM images and tools before proceeding:
Mi Flash tool
Global Fastboot ROM (for the relevant device)
15 second adb installer (if adb and fastboot are not already installed on your PC)
Stage 1 - Installing the Mi Flash tool
Install the Mi Flash tool. This will copy the relevant Qualcomm drivers onto the hard drive in addition to installing the tool. Dont worry about any instructions that pop up during and after installation. Just go ahead and install.
Stage 2 - Enabling USB Debugging
In order to bypass the locked bootloader, we need to enter EDL mode. This is accomplished via adb.
adb devices (to make sure the phone is connected)
adb reboot edl
Stage 4 - Change the QHUSB_BULK driver to the Qualcomm HS-USB driver
In EDL mode, we need to change the default QHUSB_BULK driver that Windows installs with the proper Qualcomm HS-USB driver that is present in the Mi Flash tool installation folder.
1. Open Device Manager on the PC and locate the QHUSB_BULK driver.
2. Right click & Update Driver Software
3. Select Browse my computer for driver software
4. Locate C:Program Files (x86)XiaomiMiPhoneQualcomm
5. Select "Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer"
6. Select Qualcomm HS-USB QDLoader 9008
At this stage, I got an error message saying that the USB device could not be recognised. I powered the device off and back on by holding down the Power button and went back to Stage 3 to return to EDL mode.
Once complete, the new Qualcomm driver should be present in Device Manager in the following location:
Ports (COM & LPT) / Qualcomm HS-USB QDLoader 9008
Stage 5 - Unpacking the Fastboot driver
Locate the downloaded Fastboot .tgz file and unpack it completely. I used 7-Zip to accomplish this.
Unpack the .tgz file to a .tar
Unpack the tar file to a folder containing the image
Stage 6 - Flashing via Mi Flash
Run the Mi Flash tool, that is now installed on the PC.
1. Locate the unzipped global images folder using the Browse button (where the batch files are located)
2. Select Refresh, which should pick up the device.
3. Select "Flash all" as the flash option
4. Hit the Flash button.
Once complete, remove the cable, power down and reboot.
If flash fails
While the procedure worked perfectly for me, if for any reason the flash failed and you need to re-enter EDL mode without being able to boot, you can do the following:
1. Enter Fastboot mode through Power & Volume Down
2. Type the following fastboot commands
fastboot devices (to ensure the phone is connected)
fastboot oem edl
The above should return you to EDL mode.
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