bionicmike
New Member
Hey there folks, this may be a long post...
Had my Bionic flashed to Cricket while on ICS back in January. Rooted, running ProxyDroid for 3G data, call, text, voicemail, all working except MMS but I didn't care because I don't use it (especially with snapchat being a thing now)
About 2-3 weeks ago, I got the notification for the OTA update to JB for the Bionic. I kept putting it off because I liked ICS, and I was worried about it messing up my flash, losing root, blah blah blah I just didn't want JB
After doing some research, I figured what the heck. Installed Voodoo's Rootkeeper, protected su, all that jazz, and then updated to JB using the manual file and stock recovery instead of the OTA download. Then, went into Rootkeeper, restored root (or so I thought) and figured my phone was all good. showing service like it did before, everything looked normal.
UNTIL... I tried texting my friend, and the message wouldn't send. Tried calling, and got Verizon's notification "welcome to Verizon wireless." Thought that was wierd, because usually I get Cricket's notification, so I went into my phone information- everything was gone: Phone number unknown, network unknown, MIN unknown. My flash to Cricket was gone.
Thought- no biggie, I'll just redo it. Fast forward a week or 2, tons of reflashes and 3-4 fxz's later, I'm stuck. At one point, I soft-bricked my phone to the point where the home screen was black, and all that would open was the settings menu. No app drawer, no contacts. nothing. I recovered it from that point via fxz, even bypassed the activation screen a few times, and thought I had it all ready to go about a week ago. I had trouble activating it using Cricket's service online, and the automated service over the phone couldn't activate it back onto my number, either, so I took it to 3 different stores, and nobody could activate it back to my line of service (no biggie, though, I'm on another phone for now)
But after yesterday, the people at the local wireless store did something while trying to activate it, and asked if they could do a factory reset on it. I told them "sure thing," because I have done it more than a few times already and nothing of value is on the phone. After they did that, it went back to the activation screen: Please wait until your phone has been activated. AGAIN I thought, no big deal, I've bypassed this before. Did the Safe Mode 4 corner trick, and... nothing. rebooted, tried again, nothing. I've been stuck on the activation screen for 2 days now, and I can't get past it like I have before. I've tried everything- sim card in, sim card out, SD card in and out, normal mode, safe mode, BP tools mode, tried reflashing to Cricket while stuck on activation screen, everything I can think of to try and get me back to at least the homescreen and able to use apps again.
But, here I am, at my wit's end, hoping that someone here has any solutions. I'm going to keep trying, I've brought the phone back from worse situations than this, but after 3 weeks and still not having my good phone to work from, it's getting old. One of the guys at the Cricket store even told me, after he was unable to activate, said "oh, it's the root. you had root on there once and it messed everything up, and now it will never be able to activate to Cricket again. Just sell it to a Verizon customer and buy a new one." Is he full of it? Or should I just do that? I don't want to have problems with another Bionic, but I love this phone. I'm out of answers, here, and looking for insight. Any help is really appreciated.
Should'a stuck with my gut and stayed on ICS... my phone was awesome...
Had my Bionic flashed to Cricket while on ICS back in January. Rooted, running ProxyDroid for 3G data, call, text, voicemail, all working except MMS but I didn't care because I don't use it (especially with snapchat being a thing now)
About 2-3 weeks ago, I got the notification for the OTA update to JB for the Bionic. I kept putting it off because I liked ICS, and I was worried about it messing up my flash, losing root, blah blah blah I just didn't want JB
After doing some research, I figured what the heck. Installed Voodoo's Rootkeeper, protected su, all that jazz, and then updated to JB using the manual file and stock recovery instead of the OTA download. Then, went into Rootkeeper, restored root (or so I thought) and figured my phone was all good. showing service like it did before, everything looked normal.
UNTIL... I tried texting my friend, and the message wouldn't send. Tried calling, and got Verizon's notification "welcome to Verizon wireless." Thought that was wierd, because usually I get Cricket's notification, so I went into my phone information- everything was gone: Phone number unknown, network unknown, MIN unknown. My flash to Cricket was gone.
Thought- no biggie, I'll just redo it. Fast forward a week or 2, tons of reflashes and 3-4 fxz's later, I'm stuck. At one point, I soft-bricked my phone to the point where the home screen was black, and all that would open was the settings menu. No app drawer, no contacts. nothing. I recovered it from that point via fxz, even bypassed the activation screen a few times, and thought I had it all ready to go about a week ago. I had trouble activating it using Cricket's service online, and the automated service over the phone couldn't activate it back onto my number, either, so I took it to 3 different stores, and nobody could activate it back to my line of service (no biggie, though, I'm on another phone for now)
But after yesterday, the people at the local wireless store did something while trying to activate it, and asked if they could do a factory reset on it. I told them "sure thing," because I have done it more than a few times already and nothing of value is on the phone. After they did that, it went back to the activation screen: Please wait until your phone has been activated. AGAIN I thought, no big deal, I've bypassed this before. Did the Safe Mode 4 corner trick, and... nothing. rebooted, tried again, nothing. I've been stuck on the activation screen for 2 days now, and I can't get past it like I have before. I've tried everything- sim card in, sim card out, SD card in and out, normal mode, safe mode, BP tools mode, tried reflashing to Cricket while stuck on activation screen, everything I can think of to try and get me back to at least the homescreen and able to use apps again.
But, here I am, at my wit's end, hoping that someone here has any solutions. I'm going to keep trying, I've brought the phone back from worse situations than this, but after 3 weeks and still not having my good phone to work from, it's getting old. One of the guys at the Cricket store even told me, after he was unable to activate, said "oh, it's the root. you had root on there once and it messed everything up, and now it will never be able to activate to Cricket again. Just sell it to a Verizon customer and buy a new one." Is he full of it? Or should I just do that? I don't want to have problems with another Bionic, but I love this phone. I'm out of answers, here, and looking for insight. Any help is really appreciated.
Should'a stuck with my gut and stayed on ICS... my phone was awesome...