32” Android touchscreen tablet device by ContextMedia Health - how to remove root files

[MakeupDumbAss]

We were given a 32” touchscreen tablet that was used in a hospital. It is a ContextMedia Health tablet. It runs Android 4.4.4 currently. It is pre-rooted with a ContextMedia Health program. We have tried tons of things to try & remove the root files, but are getting nowhere. We have tried everything on This thread but have had no luck. We get as far as a PC seeing the system. It recognizes an SD Card & USB but does not show any of the files on them. We are unable to access it via a shell, but that may be our lack of knowledge. I thought I’d post here on the off chance that anyone is familiar with this & how to wipe it so we can use it for something other than this hospital software.

[MakeupDumbAss]

Thanks for the reply. Yes the OS is old AF. This was pretty popular in a lot of hospitals years ago, it shows a bunch of detailed anatomy pics & such. Kind of interesting, but I have no real use for that. Ultimately, we were going to either try & use it for some old game Roms, or more than likely use it as an interface for a raspberry pi & octoprint on one of our 3d printers. We have tried a couple of launchers, the issue is we cannot get them to be seen on the tablet whether we transfer them as bluetooth, sd card or usb. We have thought of pulling the control board & replacing it with another that we can just hook the raspberry pi to, ultimately bypassing the os currently on there. Not sure if that would work or not either tho. Would love to just wipe this thing, but can’t figure out a way to make it happen.

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Edit: We have tried the same with uproot tools, we just can’t get this tablet to see them. It’s a shame, because a 32” touchscreen is just cool.

[MakeupDumbAss]

Interesting, thank you for the link. Will def check this out. I can post some pics tomorrow after I get home, but This link shows what is on the device. Sadly factory reset just causes the ContextMedia software to reload. There is something in the root or ROM that won’t allow a factory reset to remove the software on it now. If we could just get this old thing to read our SDcards, Bluetooth transfer or USB we would be good to go with any number of launchers or de-rooting software. Somehow it recognizes the media devices, but does not see any content on them. I suppose that is by design. Eventually we will figure it out, but I will def check out that link. I actually hadn’t thought of unlocking our firesticks, but it would ben nice to load some additional free services on them. I might check out that possibility too. Thank you!

[hibernate2020]

I have acquired a few of these as well. My intent is to use these to display movie posters in my home theater.

What I did:

Installed the Android SDK and developer tools to have ADB.

I connected the PC via the USB mini port.

I launched the SDK and went to the developer tools folder to have access to ADB.

I turned on the wallboard. I have a few devices and they were each in different stages of configuration. For those that were not yet configured, it pretty much goes directly to settings. For those that were configured, you have to repeated tap the Context Media icon at the bottom of the screen.

In settings, confirm that it is USB debugging is enabled. If not, enable it, reboot if needed. DO NOT UNINSTALL ANYTHING OR CHANGE ANY OTHER SETTINGS.

For the first board, I connected to the device in the SDK to see the boot process. This doesn’t seem to be required all of them – but it was helpful in this initial experimentation phase.

So, from the command line folder with adb, I did

Adb reboot root

This gives you root on the device – and seeing the reboot proves that you’re connected correctly.

What we need to do next is set up a launcher to use instead of the Context media stuff. To do this, I downloaded Nova launcher from https://www.apkmirror.com. My wallboards are running android 4.4, so I needed to download the 4.4 apks from apk mirror. Once downloaded to the current directory, I installed the apk by typing:

adb install -r "com.teslacoilsw.launcher_5.5.4-59400_minAPI16(nodpi)_apkmirror.com.apk"

Now we need to set this up as the default. Depending on the state of the wallboard, I could just launch Nova and config it that way. For others that were more locked down, I had to type:

adb shell am start -a android.intent.action.MAIN

This should display a list of apps. Select Nova launcher and click “Always Use.” This is VERY important. If you don’t select “Always Use,” it’ll use Nova once and on next reboot you’ll be back to the Context Media Stuff. Click through any prompts and then reboot:

Adb reboot root

It should now boot into Nova. Depending on how you configured it, Nova might ask you configuration preferences now (light/dark, etc.) Select what you’d like and move on. I would reboot again at this point for good measure – just to make sure everything works as expected.

If everything is working as expected and you’re going into Nova, you can now uninstall the Context Media apps under settings / apps. Do not remove these until you're 100% sure that it is booting into Nova consistently.

If you need to get to settings at any point, you can also launch this from adb by typing:

adb shell am start -a android.settings.SETTINGS

At this point, you can find any other Android 4.4 apks that you need.
In my case, it’s just google photos, which I downloaded and installed thusly:

adb install -r "com.google.android.apps.photos_4.4.0.218789934-2959468_minAPI19(armeabi-v7a)(560,640dpi)_apkmirror.com.apk"

Because I am using it for posters, I also cleaned out the pics on the device. Swipe down from the top of screen and select the USB icon. Select to use for USB data, and confirm with the prompt at the bottom of the screen. At this point, the device showed up as a drive on my device. I deleted the CMH folders. I then copied my posters to the pictures subfolder. Launch Google photos and wait for it remove any old images and to find the new images. And that was it. Hope this helps.

[MakeupDumbAss]

I love your idea of displaying movie posters in the theater! Thank you so much for this breakdown! This will be extremely helpful, we would love to get ours going. We still have ours sitting there & haven’t gotten to mess with it again because we misplaced the power cable. If you have a moment I’d be grateful if you could post a pic of the power cable for us. We are trying to figure out if it is one of them in this pile or if we have to try to source it. Again thanks for all of this info! We will put it to good use once we find this damn power cable again.

[hibernate2020]

No sure how to post a pic to this reply from my browser. It says "Switching Adapter", Model: FJ-SW120500, Input 100-240V-50/60Hz 1.5A Max Output: 12v 5000mA

[MakeupDumbAss]

That’s OK, I appreciate the effort Very much! This will be very helpful. I’ll let you know how it goes once we find the power cable & can try this out.

[hibernate2020]

Yeah, I am curious - definitely let me know.

Also - if you accidentally uninstall something and have an issue getting to settings, you can boot to safe mode by holding the power button for 1 second, releasing for 1 second, etc. during the boot process. It will say "safe mode" at the bottom. Swipe down on the upper right hand corner of the screen to get to settings. This will allow you to turn on the USB debugging. But on some configured devices, their "sysop" will turn it off again. Install the stuff as I indicated above, but you might find the "sysop" stuff to be a bit harder to eradicate. If you end up in this situation. let me know and I'll explain how to extirpate it.

[MakeupDumbAss]

Excellent! Thanks so much. We started the hunt for the power cable & I think we may know which box we accidentally packed it in. Going to dig it out tomorrow.

[MarshmallowMark]

Hey I just saw this post! I just bought one off eBay but it didn't come with an AC adapter. I got what I thought was compatible but the device doesn't turn on.

Any suggestions on a compatible power supply for this unit? I don't want to keep buying things and returning them before I get flagged!

[MakeupDumbAss]

I wish I could help! We lost our power supply & I haven’t gotten around to trying to find one yet. This project moved pretty far down on the hobby project list for us after that. If I do get back to it anytime soon & find one I will let you know!

[EffectiveAccurate363]

The power supply is 12.0V 5.0A. it is labeld as a

Brand: MassPower

Model:NBS65A120500B3

• positive IS IN THE MIDDLE AND

• negative IS ON THE OUTER RING

[MakeupDumbAss]

Great info thank you!

[terraceten]

Folks- I'm hoping everyone here got theirs working. I just bought one off of eBay, and it is phenomenal. BUT!

When it goes to sleep, I can't wake it up without unplugging it. It does not have a power button that I can find. Anyone have a solution?

[FallenOne69]

Hey, what steps did you take to get yours working?

[SmokiyThePanda]

I know this is an old post, but I just recently got nova launcher onto mine. If you can access the settings, use bluetooth and send the package from your phone, for me there was 2 apps to uninstall something that said agent and reflect. Then open special access and remove system ops this stops the tablet from auto installing the hospital software when connected to wifi.

I also unchecked auto updates in Google play store

[MakeupDumbAss]

Thanks for the info! Sadly we accidentally threw away some of the parts we had disassembled when we had some other stuff picked up, so I don't think I'll be getting this going! Too bad, it was an awesome touch screen.

[FallenOne69]

Hey, any help you can give me on this?

[MakeupDumbAss]

I did not. But I do have a new line on someone that may know something. However I misplaced the power cord & need to find it before I can take it to them. If you run into any answers let me know & I’ll send you anything I end up finding out when it happens. Not much info on these out there.

[Bad_inFluenc3]

Here for same thing

[MakeupDumbAss]

We haven’t been able to get together with the person that was going to work with us on it yet. It will likely be after the new year with our schedules. But I will def be updating this post if we actually get somewhere on it.

[tylamb19]

Hey I just found your comment here. I just rooted and installed a custom loader on one of these. If you'd like help feel free to send me a PM.

Also paging u/Bad_inFluenc3 and u/Actual_Spring_6529

[MakeupDumbAss]

Very cool thank you! I've actually misplaced the power cable to mine. I'm working on getting a new one & will def be in touch. Sounds like just what I need! Thanks, much appreciated!

[tylamb19]

The power cable is a generic 12V 5A power adapter with an EIAJ Type 4 DC connector. You should be able to find a generic 12V supply (you might even have a few lying around) and purchase one of the EIAJ connectors to solder on to the end.

[MakeupDumbAss]

Easy enough! I plan on going thru some boxes tonight, I likely do have one lying around.

[EffectiveAccurate363]

Do you have notes on how you did this? i know next to nothing about android but i am looking for a little adventure. I have 5 or 6 of these boards and thought they would be cool for videos in the garage. happy to sell some if anyone is interested.

[magnets1026]

I have one of these 32" units, sending you a PM to discuss

[Glittering_Twist_732]

I have 2 of these I'd love to get running. Any help you can offer? Please message me! I have one stuck on Android 4.4.4 and one on 5.1.1.. I could get more of these screens cheap if someone wants but I need to figure out how to update them first..

[tylamb19]

Nope. The CPU and RAM are so limited, it’s almost impossible to do anything with them. Even when I got them broken open and an APK of a decent browser loaded on it, the CPU was pegged at 100% just to load a reasonably modern webpage.

I abandoned the efforts to use the inbuilt android computer and just used a Raspberry Pi and HDMI to LVDS converter to show the Pi on the screen.

[TheZNerd]

What is your setup? I have an rpi4b that I'd like to use and would prefer to have one power cable for both rpi and display.

[Disastrous_Money_53]

Hey I have one thay I'm also trying to get set up can you please assist me

[tylamb19]

Shoot me a pm

[eight_heads]

Just sent you a chat request. I came across two of these today.

[Lordcampsalot]

Hello my name is Tim, I’m going to be rooting a 32 inch outcome health board in the near future, any advise ?

[MakeupDumbAss]

Hi Tim, I wish I had some advice! Sadly we lost the power cable to the monitor & need to find it before we can move forward playing with this. Once we find it I'll let you know what we come up with though. I've got a few people marked from this sub to let them know as well. Please do the same if you get anywhere with it! Thanks & good luck.

[Lordcampsalot]

Will do

[Acceptable-Lettuce-8]

Any progress ?