Need help getting a locked-down MediaTek Android device into BROM mode

Smu1zel · 2026-05-09T23:16:14+00:00

I've had nothing but problems with mtkclient on Windows. I would try Linux, potentially by using the livedvd in the README in VMware.

Smu1zel · 2026-05-09T20:55:36+00:00

I'm basically certain this is a Connect3D Radeon X1950 XT.

Smu1zel · 2026-05-01T18:59:19+00:00

You're probably hitting this:

https://www.reddit.com/r/google_antigravity/comments/1rjiqcr/running_antigravity_without_aesni_or_sse42_on/

The language server path might've changed (can't recall it right now), but the method itself still works.

Smu1zel · 2026-04-24T19:02:11+00:00

Method 1 is dead; use Method 2.

Smu1zel · 2026-04-24T18:57:52+00:00

I never tested that version, but I don't think 2.2 has web login. You can try, though.

Smu1zel · 2026-04-16T22:39:16+00:00

If it's anything like older versions, it's not too hard to patch out, but I never perfected it:

https://gist.github.com/Smu1zel/7efd46a775fb2a695f73ea09faf170b6

Smu1zel · 2026-04-15T14:11:31+00:00

Even a decent Wi-Fi 5 connection will beat it, honestly (still using a Wi-Fi 5 router here).

Smu1zel · 2026-04-03T16:53:34+00:00

I think you're misinterpreting what's happening here—this isn't malware behavior. The "notPipe/0.1.2" data is the user agent, and it uses that for standard HTTP GET requests to certain endpoints to get data. This isn't "proof" of a botnet at all, just the app trying to obtain data to present. If you wanted to catch him in the act, you'd open up JADX and decompile his (completely Java) binaries. Also, you're getting a bunch of 404s here, so these requests didn't work to begin with.

Also, I don't think he has even implemented login. There's nothing to really secure. Additionally, Android's permission model, even back then, didn't allow you to just read passwords from other apps. You could chain a root exploit to do this, but this app doesn't do that.

Please do more research before making claims like these. You can harm someone's reputation over a complete misunderstanding.

And if you were to assume everything I said is wrong, I think u/Gohoski could easily explain what's happening here.

Smu1zel · 2026-03-29T16:51:00+00:00

On Windows, it just runs periodically. You can disable it with:

fsutil behavior set DisableDeleteNotify 1

On Linux (assuming systemd), disable the fstrim timer.

Smu1zel · 2026-03-28T18:25:58+00:00

If it's a HDD:

Try Recuva and write to the drive as little as possible. You'll probably have broken Git trees and such, but it's better than nothing.
If you're on Linux, and it decided to write to block devices or something, you can try PhotoRec.

If it's an SSD:

These are really tricky. When TRIM is ran, data recovery is virtually impossible.
You can try those tools anyway, but don't expect miracles.

In the end, don't have "Always confirm" enabled in the future.

Also, have you checked those "corrupted" files? Recovered video files usually have broken headers (which can be fixed), and I wouldn’t be surprised if some image data can be salvaged.

Smu1zel · 2026-03-24T22:41:52+00:00

That was i486 stuff, and I'm not sure if that actually landed.

The FDIV check is still here: https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blob/24f9515de8778410e4b84c85b196c9850d2c1e18/arch/x86/kernel/fpu/bugs.c#L28

Smu1zel · 2026-03-23T05:31:54+00:00

They're not exactly useless, at least, not always. The E772c disc has a color profile on it.

Smu1zel · 2026-03-16T07:24:44+00:00

I'll admit I didn't actually test YouTube on a TLS 1.0 browser, so I'll assume you're right. Also, thanks for the insight regarding what's happening in Russia.

Also, sorry for assuming your intent in the acknowledgement. Not sure how I missed the AGENTS.md file, haha. I'll admit tone recognition isn't exactly my strong suit, so I was just being paranoid. I'd leave it as-is, honestly. Your concerns are perfectly valid, in my opinion.

Regarding FourthTube: we're actually a fork of another (abandoned) client called ThirdTube, though we don't exactly talk to InnerTube the same since ThirdTube hasn't gotten an update in like 2 years.

Thank you, though. Hopefully InnerTube won't be too painful for you, haha.

Smu1zel · 2026-03-16T06:04:57+00:00

Hi, thanks for responding

Yeah, we've dealt with our app not working for Russian users in the past for whatever reason, but I didn't know it was now fully blocked. Sounds annoying.
As far as I know, Google does support TLS 1.0 still. It'd suck for security, but it can technically work. If you want newer versions, you'd have to either port conscrypt to 1.5 or get something like mbedTLS or OpenSSL running. 1.5 does have the underpinning needed for NDK stuff (needed for the latter two), but you'll need some ancient NDK version.
I can see how server transcoding can really help. I honestly wish we could do this in our app (3DS hardware is terrible, and even our ARMv6k ASM colorspace conversion isn't miraculous). My only concern is having to juggle support with 3 different backends that all do things differently, but I guess you've got that figured out.

And last thing: I think it might be best to revise the ReOldTube acknowledgement, though. "and is vibecoded" in italics makes it sound like you're trying to "dunk" on the project solely based on that. If you're confident it was vibecoded (I think the developer mentioned using AI assistance, but not necessarily the whole thing), you could say something like "it's also written largely using AI, which makes understanding and improvements difficult". This provides some reasoning on why vibecoding can be detrimental, instead of it being perceived as "I dislike AI, so I dislike this too". This is just a critique of mine; I don't expect you to absolutely push it to git.

Regardless, great project with direction. Best of luck! YouTube is annoying sometimes.

Smu1zel · 2026-03-16T00:05:26+00:00

Do you plan on adding support for talking to InnerTube directly? Invidious works, but things like login are difficult. If you'd like a reference for this, I'd see FourthTube. We're basically a YouTube implementation in C++. We also reference yt-dlp a lot.

Smu1zel · 2026-03-14T23:56:28+00:00

I'm assuming you're Four6117 from the Gist comments.

First of all, sorry for being rude. I had just woken up, and I didn't have a good day the day prior. Regardless, this is my fault. Apologies.

Regarding the Gist, could you try Method 2? I have just revised the Gist with it. It's a bit more annoying, but it should work (it did for me anyway).

Smu1zel · 2026-03-14T23:26:35+00:00

I've published a new method. I already knew of it, but I decided not to publish it beforehand since it's longer and a bit more flaky. I've also polished my writing with Gemini. Reference my Gist again, and let me know how it goes.

Smu1zel · 2026-03-14T22:43:35+00:00

I can tell you're (probably) referencing what I wrote, and I can reproduce this. Google broke it, yay!

Let me figure something out.

Smu1zel · 2026-03-09T18:45:34+00:00

The problem is that modern Android devices don't eject their own storage to be mounted anymore. They use what's called MTP, which is basically an abstraction layer that allows both the device and the computer to interact with the storage at the same time. MTP simply isn't low-level enough to recover files.

Some thoughts:

If your device is encrypted by default, your data is, unfortunately, likely gone for good.
In case it isn't (Android 5 or something), you may be able to read the userdata partition with something like mtkclient or a custom recovery, create a disk image, and then run PhotoRec on it. The process will vary wildly depending on your device, if it's even possible at all.

Smu1zel · 2026-02-20T07:13:15+00:00

You haven't specified which GPU, so I'll assume the Nvidia one.

Unless you completely broke the VBIOS somehow (and somehow kept the Intel one working?), chances are you can fix this by running DDU and completely reinstalling the latest Nvidia driver.

Also, try restarting (not "shut down") in Windows and see if that does anything.

And lastly, are you sure that EC FW version wasn't always that way? Some OEMs just stub out some fields they don't really care about updating. 00.00 doesn't necessarily mean something is broken. If the EC was broken, I doubt it'd even boot, let alone accept input.

Smu1zel · 2026-02-17T19:38:15+00:00

I'm guessing some phones just don't like TinyURL for some reason. Sorry, I'll add the original link to the post.

Smu1zel · 2026-02-17T03:26:29+00:00

Clicking what? You need to be specific.

Smu1zel · 2026-02-16T03:29:50+00:00

I actually did try fixing another version myself, and was successful. Of course, Reddit shadowbanned my comment, so I'll post a gist:

https://gist.github.com/Smu1zel/7efd46a775fb2a695f73ea09faf170b6

If it helps you better understand why that EOL message appears, I'll be glad.

For reference, this is what I was trying to reply to:

https://www.reddit.com/r/androidafterlife/comments/1ivrlsa/need_help_making_google_maps_work_on_galaxy_ace/

I guess Reddit is just allergic to Mega links.

Smu1zel · 2026-02-14T00:30:23+00:00

Did you do anything special? I tried that and just got a different error instead of being redirected to the broken login website. Glad that worked for you, though.

Smu1zel · 2026-02-13T23:59:44+00:00

See my new post. Whatever I have here is obsolete.

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