Android newb... will I lose anything flashing my unlocked international phone on AT&T
Hi everyone, and thanks for all the great info here. Let's assume I have my "how to root" links bookmarked and ready to go, but like a good boyscout I want to understand the gotchas/subtleties before I cliff jump. I'm also within my 15 days to exchange my s6edge AT&T for an unlocked one at Best Buy, which I plan to do today... :highfive:
(I'm technically savy, but a real newb in the world of android versions, manufacturer changes, and carrier versions and conflicts...) :crying:
1) How do I do a full ROM-level backup before beginning my adventures in rooting? Titanium Backup is no good since I need root to use it. I'd like an iPhone-style backup that I can just restore should I brick my phone.
2) After I exchange my phone I'm going to immediately airplane-mode it to prevent autoupdates (my current phone already autoupdated to unrootable OF4)... once I root how do I effectively get-latest? I'd obviously like the latest security updates, and 5.1 if I can manage it, and to maintain root.
3) AT&T doesn't have 5.1.... but if I go unlocked then can I run 5.1 on AT&T? (I've been iPhone forever -- carriers messing with you is really foreign to me). On a related note, can AT&T send some update/profile-change OTA to my phone that will conflict with updates I'm doing locally? If so any tips to avoid this?
4) An unlocked phone will perform just as well on AT&T as an AT&t phone, right? (looks like the 925F has all the AT&T bands and more, whereas the 925I is missing 1 AT&T LTE band)
Thanks for any info, help, and/or pointing me to resources where I can find the info, in advance. I'm technically savy, but a real newb when it comes to the gotcha-ridden ground of android and carriers.
Thanks again.
- Jason
So can I upgrade a 925F to 5.1 and use it on AT&T? I'm trying to work out if AT&T has _all_ edges locked down or just the official AT&T versions.
JasonS6Edge said:
So can I upgrade a 925F to 5.1 and use it on AT&T? I'm trying to work out if AT&T has _all_ edges locked down or just the official AT&T versions.
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At&t does not have the power to lock down all variants; only the variant with its branding. Just make sure 925F is compatible with the network of you want to use that variant.
Snowby123 said:
At&t does not have the power to lock down all variants; only the variant with its branding. Just make sure 925F is compatible with the network of you want to use that variant.
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Thanks so much. Is there a reason I can't to seem to find any people running 5.1 or rooted phones on AT&T? Just that not many people are buying unlocked phones?
JasonS6Edge said:
Thanks so much. Is there a reason I can't to seem to find any people running 5.1 or rooted phones on AT&T? Just that not many people are buying unlocked phones?
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The at&t variant is the only variant not to receive 5.1 yet. It has nothing to do with root and everything to do with at&t's corporate policies. Most people who use a smartphone in the USA buy it through their carrier. So those users on at&t likely bought there phone from them. This is why no 5.1 for them.
Related
Hello I recieved this phone from a friend which had told me the phone was carrier unlocked.
I am currently a AT&T customer.
I went to the AT&T Store locally and had the woman get me a new SIM card and activate it.
My internet did not work so I told the woman I can figure it out and left the store.
I then edited my APN settings to "phone" and all the proper settings that are posted for the Galaxy S6 Edge AT&T
I now have horrible service. Just like T-Mobile does in my entire area that is why no one bothers to use it unless you live in town even then it wont work inside your own house.
I feel like all the information is somewhere in this forum but I have spent quite a bit of time searching around to only find small pieces of answers.
Questions:
What Bands does the tmobile version run on?
Is this phone fully compatible with AT&T LTE? If not what speeds am I limited to?
Should I be running a different bootloader?
I'm currently on 6.0.1 Android stock tmobile. Can I flash to a debloated firmware without tripping knox? Which ones? Are there features I may loose?
Should I downgrade to stock 5.11 tmobile first then root then flash to debloat?
What is the safest and best way to root the phone?
Should I care about Knox if I have no warranty and dont plan on sending it in ever because of this?
Thank you in advance everyone I appreciate the help.
Please help
cruid said:
Hello I recieved this phone from a friend which had told me the phone was carrier unlocked.
I am currently a AT&T customer.
I went to the AT&T Store locally and had the woman get me a new SIM card and activate it.
My internet did not work so I told the woman I can figure it out and left the store.
I then edited my APN settings to "phone" and all the proper settings that are posted for the Galaxy S6 Edge AT&T
I now have horrible service. Just like T-Mobile does in my entire area that is why no one bothers to use it unless you live in town even then it wont work inside your own house.
I feel like all the information is somewhere in this forum but I have spent quite a bit of time searching around to only find small pieces of answers.
Questions:
What Bands does the tmobile version run on?
Is this phone fully compatible with AT&T LTE? If not what speeds am I limited to?
Should I be running a different bootloader?
I'm currently on 6.0.1 Android stock tmobile. Can I flash to a debloated firmware without tripping knox? Which ones? Are there features I may loose?
Should I downgrade to stock 5.11 tmobile first then root then flash to debloat?
What is the safest and best way to root the phone?
Should I care about Knox if I have no warranty and dont plan on sending it in ever because of this?
Thank you in advance everyone I appreciate the help.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Please anyone that could point me in the direction of the correct threads?
I believe I need to flash a EFS and security which I did not back mine up of course.
Hey everyone, i've been out out the rooting/customization game for a few years now since I had a company phone, but i'm changing jobs and will be buying a galaxy S9+ soon and I plan on activating it on Verizon. I have a couple questions though.
If I buy the unlocked version (SM-G965UZKAXAA) through Samsung is there any way to activate the HD calling features, most importantly Wifi calling as service near my house is bad? I've heard of apps like shortcut master and the like being able to do it but I have no confirmation.
I've also heard about people flashing the official VZW fw through Odin to get these features back, but won't that lock the bootloader and make full root with a custom recovery impossible or can we flash everything but the bootloader?
I don't understand how a carrier can lock these features if they are specific to the phone and not the carrier??
My end goal is to have a a phone that I can still root/use custom ROMs if I want but still have WiFi calling working. Is this a pipe dream? Should I just suck it up and get the locked down VZW version? The Wifi calling trumps unlocked bootloader for me right now but I am hopeful for both.
TIA
So after doing a little more research it seems that the unlocked version we can buy from Samsung/BestBuy have the Snapdragon processors and does not have an unlocked bootloader?
Is this true?
If so I guess there is no reason for me to not get the Verizon variant. Just have to disable all the bloatware.
Tallica21 said:
Hey everyone, i've been out out the rooting/customization game for a few years now since I had a company phone, but i'm changing jobs and will be buying a galaxy S9+ soon and I plan on activating it on Verizon. I have a couple questions though.
If I buy the unlocked version (SM-G965UZKAXAA) through Samsung is there any way to activate the HD calling features, most importantly Wifi calling as service near my house is bad? I've heard of apps like shortcut master and the like being able to do it but I have no confirmation.
I've also heard about people flashing the official VZW fw through Odin to get these features back, but won't that lock the bootloader and make full root with a custom recovery impossible or can we flash everything but the bootloader?
I don't understand how a carrier can lock these features if they are specific to the phone and not the carrier??
My end goal is to have a a phone that I can still root/use custom ROMs if I want but still have WiFi calling working. Is this a pipe dream? Should I just suck it up and get the locked down VZW version? The Wifi calling trumps unlocked bootloader for me right now but I am hopeful for both.
TIA
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Click to collapse
Tallica21 said:
So after doing a little more research it seems that the unlocked version we can buy from Samsung/BestBuy have the Snapdragon processors and does not have an unlocked bootloader?
Is this true?
If so I guess there is no reason for me to not get the Verizon variant. Just have to disable all the bloatware.
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Click to collapse
Currently, all Snapdragon variants come with locked bootloader.
If you want development right now, you should get the Exynos version or you can wait a couple of months until someone finds a way to unlock the bootloader for Snapdragon variant.
Thanks for the response. So it looks like i'll get the verizon variant and hope someone eventually figures out how to unlock the bootloader. Although i'm not hopeful as the Note 5, S7, and S8 have yet to be unlocked
Galaxo60 said:
Currently, all Snapdragon variants come with locked bootloader.
If you want development right now, you should get the Exynos version or you can wait a couple of months until someone finds a way to unlock the bootloader for Snapdragon variant.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not so, SM-G9600 and SM-G9650 have unlocked bootloaders with Snapdragon chipset.
Hey everybody,
So recently i bought this international unlocked Galaxy S9+ (SM-965F/DS Exynos processor) off Amazon and it's great, everything is fine with the one major exception being that at home my signal is pretty poor and i get extremely delayed text messages coming in and calls taking forever to dial out or failing to connect. Not a problem, i'll turn on Wi-Fi calling, right? Wrong, option isn't available, some detail: I'm in the US on T-Mobile, updated to the latest Pie OS update, i'm very tech-capable and used to do tier 2 tech support for Verizon. Long story short, I've tried everything in the book including FDR and fresh setup as well as clearing system cache etc. and it's looking like the ONLY solution to get Wi-Fi calling (and subsequently VoLTE that i didn't realize wasn't enabled until researching and checking myself) enabled is to flash the ROM with a T-Mobile OS. Unfortunately i'm coming up negative trying to find the firmware for this phone. Plenty of resources out there for the SM-965U(Snapdragon), but none for the SM-965F(Exynos) as of yet as far as i can tell (and before any ignorance jumps in here as i've seen on other threads, NO the SM-965U software will NOT work on this model phone as it runs a different processor, non-Snapdragon Exynos chipset)
So, that all being said, is anyone out there working on a fix for this, is it likely i'll ever get a fix for this, and/or is the fix already available and I've just completely missed it? Any information or help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for your time and consideration.
bahruuk said:
Hey everybody,
So recently i bought this international unlocked Galaxy S9+ (SM-965F/DS Exynos processor) off Amazon and it's great, everything is fine with the one major exception being that at home my signal is pretty poor and i get extremely delayed text messages coming in and calls taking forever to dial out or failing to connect. Not a problem, i'll turn on Wi-Fi calling, right? Wrong, option isn't available, some detail: I'm in the US on T-Mobile, updated to the latest Pie OS update, i'm very tech-capable and used to do tier 2 tech support for Verizon. Long story short, I've tried everything in the book including FDR and fresh setup as well as clearing system cache etc. and it's looking like the ONLY solution to get Wi-Fi calling (and subsequently VoLTE that i didn't realize wasn't enabled until researching and checking myself) enabled is to flash the ROM with a T-Mobile OS. Unfortunately i'm coming up negative trying to find the firmware for this phone. Plenty of resources out there for the SM-965U(Snapdragon), but none for the SM-965F(Exynos) as of yet as far as i can tell (and before any ignorance jumps in here as i've seen on other threads, NO the SM-965U software will NOT work on this model phone as it runs a different processor, non-Snapdragon Exynos chipset)
So, that all being said, is anyone out there working on a fix for this, is it likely i'll ever get a fix for this, and/or is the fix already available and I've just completely missed it? Any information or help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for your time and consideration.
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I'm currently researching the very same issue... So far i hypothesize , with no knowledge, that if it is rooted, you can then change the csc settings and configure it for TMO, thus enabling WiFi calling. If someone can confirm, that'd be great, otherwise i'm trudging slowly to verify.
Root and use tekhd detonator.
CynicalHeight00 said:
Root and use tekhd detonator.
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Click to collapse
Well i looked at this and it looks like a non-stock rom i'm sure wrought with problems that unfortunately is not helpful. My goal here is to have my phone work and continue to get standard updates with original and licensed (more or less) software and have it actually work. I'm not interested in a full OS replacement pre-loaded with a bunch of adblockers and other crap the designer thought would be useful, just want my standard features enabled and nothing else to change if at all possible. Also, if you believe my statement here is in error please explain, your one line really isn't very helpful, and nowhere on their website is there any description as to what tekhd detonator does / is supposed to do / what it will break. I'm certainly not risking bricking my phone when their own website says under all of its S9+ related material that it's for Snapdragon which the variant i have again doesn't use Snapdragon.
bahruuk said:
Well i looked at this and it looks like a non-stock rom i'm sure wrought with problems that unfortunately is not helpful. My goal here is to have my phone work and continue to get standard updates with original and licensed (more or less) software and have it actually work. I'm not interested in a full OS replacement pre-loaded with a bunch of adblockers and other crap the designer thought would be useful, just want my standard features enabled and nothing else to change if at all possible. Also, if you believe my statement here is in error please explain, your one line really isn't very helpful, and nowhere on their website is there any description as to what tekhd detonator does / is supposed to do / what it will break. I'm certainly not risking bricking my phone when their own website says under all of its S9+ related material that it's for Snapdragon which the variant i have again doesn't use Snapdragon.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is going to be a hassle trust me. even with the Snapdragon models from different CSCs VoLTE and Wifi Calling do not carry over. An ATT 965U would have to be reflashed with the TMobile CSC and USERDATA files to get access to TMobile features. U are trying to do this with an Exynos model. I think you would have to root and install a custom firmware that has the TMobile USERDATA embedded.
Good luck.
can the U1 be flashed to the verizon u firmware? i thought i read someone tried this, but suspected it didn't work because he had previously used the phone with verizon with the unlocked firmware...
methcat said:
can the U1 be flashed to the verizon u firmware? i thought i read someone tried this, but suspected it didn't work because he had previously used the phone with verizon with the unlocked firmware...
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Click to collapse
You can flash the G965U onto the G965U1 and vice versa. It's been well documented that this will let us go from one carrier firmware to another as well as let us have the unbranded carrier firmware. The only catch to this is the bootloader version of the firmware your wanting to flash. The firmware one wishes to flash must have a bootloader version equal too (or greater then) what is currently on the phone.
If your trying to ask about flashing the U1 onto an exynos variant then the answer is definitely no. You can't flash firmware from a different model onto a different model.
Hi,
I would like to buy a V60 and use it in Europe.
But reading about it makes me wonder if it is such a good idea to buy this phone.
Could you help me out, I'm a bit of a newbie to Roms, rooting and fixing phones so they work.
I was reading something general about importing a unlocked carrier phone and it stated that I can buy an unlocked T-mobile or other carrier and use an european sim. There it stated that it will come a time when you need the us carrier sim card to perform things and I will be unable to do those things without the correct sim card. I do not remember what those things where. Perhaps it was If I need to update it. Is it true that you have to have the carriers sim card even if it is unlocked?
Is there any other problems one might face. e.g.
This was the latest LG phone so perhaps they will not care about customer service so much:
perhaps LG will stop posting security updates:
From what I understand there are two parts of the software of a phone: the firmware and android. The firmware is LG specific and I will not be able to get updates on that. But for android which is on top of the firmware there should be a way to get updates even if LG stops posting them, or?
If not, can I switch to an other rom to have them?
Can I update to a later android version even if LG does not post one for the phone?
Can I root the phone and be rid of all the us carrier stuff, get a phone that is not associated with any carrier?
yes you can root the phone and flash EA firmware. instructions available here and works perfect for ATT unlocked phones. also you can buy a Verizon version, use it 60 days in the Verizon network, after it will work anywhere and get updates. the problem is that no new LG V60 devices left in the stores.
Since the Galaxy S6 Edge days I've been getting AT&T branded Samsung phones. This time around due to initial perks of a trade in were better for the unlocked version of S23U, I went ahead and pre-ordered the unlocked version. Are there any drawbacks anyone has experienced with the unlocked version that would warrant me to cancel the order? Are there any AT&T features such as visual voicemail, personal hotspot or HD voice that isn't compatible with the unlocked, non carrier version? Any help would be appreciated as i believe I can still cancel the order.
Thank you.
With an unlocked phone, you cant call. But if you add a sim card into it you can do anything such as mobile data, call, hotspot, etc. An unlocked phone can work on any carrier. But it is still the same thing as an at&t version unless you add the sim card in it.
So I assumed if i insert my AT&T simcard it'll work just like an AT&T phone?
AeroSatan said:
So I assumed if i insert my AT&T simcard it'll work just like an AT&T phone?
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Click to collapse
That's what I have done for every phone I have had since the S7 Edge on T-Mobile. Still using the same simcard since I started out with the (S7 Edge), then Note 8, S20U, S22U and now S23U and has worked fine with T-Mobile but without the carrier bloat. The only downside is Unlocked versions always get the updates last.
You can always flash U (carrier firmware) that is bit different from from U1 (factory unlocked) firmware. This way you'll get exactly the same experience as for the phone of any carrier directly. You can always switch back and forth with data wipe.
AeroSatan said:
So I assumed if i insert my AT&T simcard it'll work just like an AT&T phone?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yes. and sorry for the late reply.
irshansk said:
You can always flash U (carrier firmware) that is bit different from from U1 (factory unlocked) firmware. This way you'll get exactly the same experience as for the phone of any carrier directly. You can always switch back and forth with data wipe.
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Click to collapse
First time Sammy user here, so possibly a stupid question but... from my search it appears that other than carrier bloatware you don't loose anything by going to U1 firmware and possibly gain faster updates. Is that a correct? Seems to be the case for WiFi calling but what about ATT wifi hotspots for example?
Unlocked phones were useful for sticking local SIMs in them for international travel but with the new international plans pricing is actually reasonable so it is not worth the hassle.
AeroSatan said:
Since the Galaxy S6 Edge days I've been getting AT&T branded Samsung phones. This time around due to initial perks of a trade in were better for the unlocked version of S23U, I went ahead and pre-ordered the unlocked version. Are there any drawbacks anyone has experienced with the unlocked version that would warrant me to cancel the order? Are there any AT&T features such as visual voicemail, personal hotspot or HD voice that isn't compatible with the unlocked, non carrier version? Any help would be appreciated as i believe I can still cancel the order.
Thank you.
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Click to collapse
I was in the same situation as you, and ordered the Unlocked version this time instead of the AT&T version. I am happy to report that everything is working. Visual Voicemail (Samsungs App), Personal Hotspot (aka Mobile Hotspot), HD Voice (VoLTE), and WiFi Calling.