Astro update to V07

[Daniel W]

Edit: @Daniel Have you had any luck with getting the firmware from Planet?

I haven't heard from them since Friday May 26, nor have I tried to reach them. If things went as they thought back then, they should have had an affected Astro to examine since Saturday May 27. I presume they'll get back to me once they have something to share. I don't want to nag them too much, so I intend to stay put for at least a few more days.

Since the same firmware apparently gives different users different results, I don't know, at this point, if a reflash would even help, and I suspect the Planet representative mostly just presumed it would. I mean, he reasonably cannot have know what was the actual issue when he, near midnight, responded to my first email about this.

If these are non-volatile settings in a display controller, that somehow has a greater than zero probability of corruption, perhaps they normally would be left as-is by a non-botched update? If so, it could take some low level specialized software or ADB hacking to restore such settings.

Since undecisive was able to able to wake the screen up (though in psychedelic mode), I'm thinking about forcing a bunch of reboots back-to-back just to see if anything happens. For most of my needs, a psychedelic phone would be more useful than one hooked up 24/7 to my livingroom TV.

[Daniel W]

Summary: Not much new to report.

I unplugged the HDMI, leaving power connected, and held the power button down to induce multiple reboots back-to-back. First I tried five, then ten and finally about twenty-five, which corresponds to holding the power button down for three minutes straight. The internal screen still didn't turn on. For certain this time, though, I saw faint, hazy flashes of white light about the time of each reboot.

I hooked up the TV again and went into the recovery menu. Lacking better ideas, I tried to "Run graphics test" and got a scare. In rapid succession, I was shown "Error", "No command", "Erasing" and "Installing system update".

A few seconds later I was back at the recovery menu again. Somewhat nervous, I rebooted without HDMI and... nothing new. The LED next to Q came on in blue for a few seconds and then nothing, as usual. I rebooted again, with HDMI and Android booted normally. As far as I can tell, all my apps, data and settings are still there.

Returning once more to the recovery menu, I ran the locale test, which showed me a few short phrases and let my cycle through various locales using the volume buttons. Finally, I looked at the recovery log. To me it looked like a boot log that didn't say me all that much. I could share it, should anyone be interested, but as I don't know any other way to get to that file, and OCR didn't give any useful results, I'd have to post a bunch of photos of the TV.

[Flauscher]

How to update the Astro? I'm still on V01. When I launch the Planet Updater app it just gives an "java.lang.NullPointerException: Attempt to invoke virtual method 'int java.lang.String.length()' on a null object reference" error.

[Zarhan]

I guess no updates have come from Planet...

But just a thought, since Astro uses partition A/B, has anyone tried to boot from the inactive partition with the old version to perhaps recover from psychedelic and/or dark screens?

In theory (with USB attached to device):

Code: [Select]

adb reboot fastboot
fastboot getvar current-slot   => probably outputs "slot b"
fastboot --set-active=a  (if it was b)
fastboot reboot


[Daniel W]

How to update the Astro? I'm still on V01. When I launch the Planet Updater app it just gives an "java.lang.NullPointerException: Attempt to invoke virtual method 'int java.lang.String.length()' on a null object reference" error.

I'm probably not the right person to answer this, as my low level Astro knowledge is flaky, at best. As far I recall (which could be wrong), I too used to get this message before the V07 update was released. I'm guessing that Planet may have withdrawn the update, while they are investigating why a few Astros ended up with dysfunctional internal screens after the update?

I guess no updates have come from Planet...

Not to me anyway. I have sent them another e-mail today, with my latest (non-)findings. I have quoted what I wrote below.

Hi again.
 
It's now been about two weeks since we were last in touch regarding the botched update that caused the screen in my Astro to stop working. I would therefore like to ask how things are going for you. Any progress or ideas?
 
Meanwhile, I have learnt from the community that a factory reset does not resolve this issue (which makes me wonder if even a reflash would reliably remedy this).
 
One user was apparently able to make their screen turn on, though with completely wrong colors, by forcing a large number of reboots, holding the power button "much longer than anyone should". I tried that, for up to three minutes straight, with no success. Near the reboots, I saw brief flashes of white light on the screen, but that was all.
 
With HDMI connected, I played a video until my Astro shut down (when not having to power its internal screen, 45% charge lasted six hours). With HDMI still attached, I then confirmed it wouldn't turn on, neither normally nor in recovery mode.
 
When I pressed the power button in that state, the vibrator still buzzed briefly, suggesting the Astro wasn't completely unpowered. Had this been a Cosmo or Gemini, I may have disassembled it enough to physically unplug the battery and fully power down the electronics, but I'm not sure how to safely do that on an Astro. Do you have any suggestions on how to do that, given basic tools and moderate tinkering skills?
 
I then unplugged the HDMI and connected a charger. The LED close to the front camera came on in red, the one next to Q came on in blue shortly after and both stayed lit, which I take to mean the device was off and charging, but the screen remained off, never showing the charging animation.
 
When I then tried to turn it on, it booted normally, as far as I can tell from the vibrator and the LEDs, but still with its internal screen off, So I plugged in the HDMI again, forced another reboot and was back to where I were.
 
While the Astro kind-of-works on external HDMI and I have marshalled my Cosmo into basic service, via a spare SIM and call forwarding, this is getting increasingly impractical. I could move my main SIM to the Cosmo and make it my main phone again, but I'd have to get a new e-id, move stuff over and then reverse that once my Astro is back to normal. It's doable, but I'd rather not, if I don't have to.
 
Kind regards
Daniel Wikholm, Sweden

In theory (with USB attached to device):

Code: [Select]

adb reboot fastboot
fastboot getvar current-slot   => probably outputs "slot b"
fastboot --set-active=a  (if it was b)
fastboot reboot


Since I don't have the necessary tools on my PC, and normally wouldn't have any use for them, I would appreciate it, if that person didn't have to be me. I would still try this before sending my Astro away though.

[Zarhan]

Planet updater just offered V07b. It says it's fixing "esim visibility", but maybe those who only have psychedelic/dark screens can try updating to that?

I'm myself not daring to

[cam1965]

Ok... Planet updater is now saying that the promised FW update is there.

Has anyone dared to try it yet? Any hassles? Did they get rid of the other two updaters?

My esim card was not recognized after update.

update v07b corrected  the esim visibility. Mine was invisible before the update. Unfortunately I changed in the past the esim for  a second sim card and it was working. But after the update the second sim card doesn´t work anymore. And my previous profile of the esim is visible now after the update. But as I said I changed this esim network for a sim card and now it is not working. Planet fix one thing and causes other problem.

[Zarhan]

update v07b corrected  the esim visibility. Mine was invisible before the update. Unfortunately I changed in the past the esim for  a second sim card and it was working. But after the update the second sim card doesn´t work anymore. And my previous profile of the esim is visible now after the update. But as I said I changed this esim network for a sim card and now it is not working. Planet fix one thing and causes other problem.

Can't you set in Astro settings whether you use physical SIM Slot 2 or eSIM? I did think that on Astro you could use both at same time (unlike Cosmo), but apparently there's a toggle.

[cam1965]

update v07b corrected  the esim visibility. Mine was invisible before the update. Unfortunately I changed in the past the esim for  a second sim card and it was working. But after the update the second sim card doesn´t work anymore. And my previous profile of the esim is visible now after the update. But as I said I changed this esim network for a sim card and now it is not working. Planet fix one thing and causes other problem.

Can't you set in Astro settings whether you use physical SIM Slot 2 or eSIM? I did think that on Astro you could use both at same time (unlike Cosmo), but apparently there's a toggle.

Hi.
There is no option to select esim or phyical sim in settings. Even after removing my previous profile of esim in esim wallet , the physical sim 2 are not recognized. When I reboot I saw that is reconized for a moment and after some time it disappears. So , I removed my sim 2 card and I in the future I will change  again my sim card 2 phone number  here in Brazil to esim again. Thank you.

[Zarhan]

There is no option to select esim or phyical sim in settings. Even after removing my previous profile of esim in esim wallet , the physical sim 2 are not recognized. When I reboot I saw that is reconized for a moment and after some time it disappears. So , I removed my sim 2 card and I in the future I will change  again my sim card 2 phone number  here in Brazil to esim again. Thank you.

Interesting, in my Astro (running V07, not V07b), I see option "Use eSIM for SIM slot 2" in Astro settings. Maybe they removed that option then...?

[cam1965]

There is no option to select esim or phyical sim in settings. Even after removing my previous profile of esim in esim wallet , the physical sim 2 are not recognized. When I reboot I saw that is reconized for a moment and after some time it disappears. So , I removed my sim 2 card and I in the future I will change  again my sim card 2 phone number  here in Brazil to esim again. Thank you.

Interesting, in my Astro (running V07, not V07b), I see option "Use eSIM for SIM slot 2" in Astro settings. Maybe they removed that option then...?

You are right. Thank you so much again. Problem solved.

[Daniel W]

Well, it's ten days since my last email to Planet. No reply this time. Perhaps worse, I have discovered another issue with my Astro, which seems to make fixing my dead screen even harder.

Using the developer options, I set the default USB configuration to file transfer, so the Astro would immediately show up as a portable device in Windows as soon as I plug the USB cable in. I then rebooted without HDMI, logged in blindly and connected a USB cable from the left side port to a Windows computer. The Astro begun charging, but there was no USB connection sound and the Astro did neither show up in the file manager, nor in the device manager.

I tried another cable, another port, another computer. My Cosmo gladly shows up using any cable in any port on either computer. The Astro does not. I took a screenshot, just in case the Astro was showing an error on its disabled screen, but after rebooting with HDMI, the screenshot just showed my Android home screen. Being able to take a screenshot at least proved that the Astro was indeed fully booted and logged in, so it should really have showed up in Windows.

I installed ADB on my computer, rebooted the Astro blindly, and plugged in the USB cable again. Windows didn't detect it this time either and, as I suspected, ADB could not see any devices. After some tinkering I got ADB to work over WiFi, which is nice, since I can then use it while the HDMI is attached. I am able to start a shell via ADB over WiFi, but I'm not sure what I could use it for in this context. I am also able to reboot the Astro to fastboot mode. With HDMI attached I can see fastbootd start, but since fastbootd can't use WiFi, I have no way to see or set the active boot slot.

I could try the 07B update anyway and just hope for the best, but that would reasonably overwrite the boot slot with the factory image, meaning I would no longer have even a theoretical ability to return to a known good firmware image. That might be undesirable.

Ideas anyone? Having a non-mobile mobile is starting to get tedious.

Edit: Btw. I was also able to get screencasting from my Astro to computer working, but to see what I was doing on the Astro, I naturally had to also have HDMI attached, so I didn't gain much. Would I be able to somehow start the screencasting after a blind login, it might be useful, but there seems to be too many steps involved to be able to do that blindly, and as long as basic USB cable connectivity doesn't work, I'm kind of stuck anyway.

[cam1965]

Well, it's ten days since my last email to Planet. No reply this time. Perhaps worse, I have discovered another issue with my Astro, which seems to make fixing my dead screen even harder.

Using the developer options, I set the default USB configuration to file transfer, so the Astro would immediately show up as a portable device in Windows as soon as I plug the USB cable in. I then rebooted without HDMI, logged in blindly and connected a USB cable from the left side port to a Windows computer. The Astro begun charging, but there was no USB connection sound and the Astro did neither show up in the file manager, nor in the device manager.

I tried another cable, another port, another computer. My Cosmo gladly shows up using any cable in any port on either computer. The Astro does not. I took a screenshot, just in case the Astro was showing an error on its disabled screen, but after rebooting with HDMI, the screenshot just showed my Android home screen. Being able to take a screenshot at least proved that the Astro was indeed fully booted and logged in, so it should really have showed up in Windows.

I installed ADB on my computer, rebooted the Astro blindly, and plugged in the USB cable again. Windows didn't detect it this time either and, as I suspected, ADB could not see any devices. After some tinkering I got ADB to work over WiFi, which is nice, since I can then use it while the HDMI is attached. I am able to start a shell via ADB over WiFi, but I'm not sure what I could use it for in this context. I am also able to reboot the Astro to fastboot mode. With HDMI attached I can see fastbootd start, but since fastbootd can't use WiFi, I have no way to see or set the active boot slot.

I could try the 07B update anyway and just hope for the best, but that would reasonably overwrite the boot slot with the factory image, meaning I would no longer have even a theoretical ability to return to a known good firmware image. That might be undesirable.

Ideas anyone? Having a non-mobile mobile is starting to get tedious.

Edit: Btw. I was also able to get screencasting from my Astro to computer working, but to see what I was doing on the Astro, I naturally had to also have HDMI attached, so I didn't gain much. Would I be able to somehow start the screencasting after a blind login, it might be useful, but there seems to be too many steps involved to be able to do that blindly, and as long as basic USB cable connectivity doesn't work, I'm kind of stuck anyway.

Try mtkclient. I had installed it in my linux in the past when my phone was bricked. I don't know if this will help. I had used the graphical interface in linux.

[polarwinkel]

I am having a little different display issues since I updated: The display is sometimes turnig off or is flickering going black and on again.
If turning black sometimes one press on the power button brings it back, often turning black soon after.
Sometimes I can reproduce the "screen-crash" like when opening an eMail in k9-mail.

I am thinking about it being a combination of a software- and hardware-issue: When there is a certain load (opening eMail) the voltage drops somewhere and the screen turns off. Or something similar like the pictures show, which reminds me of my N900 running out of battery, leaving the display-controller with under-voltage.

I also have all the time since I have my Astro problems with the network dropping which I first thought was randomly, but I also could reproduce it fetching mails with k9-mail. As soon as I fetch them the network is dropping on both inserted sim-cards, even on the one not being configured for data. After some seconds the network reconnects again.

All this makes my Astro being a paperweight I turn on just once in a while to play around with, putting it back soon frustrated over all these bugs 

[ArchiMark]

Guess I was lucky with updating my Astro....

Both updates went smooth and no hiccups.

 

Mark