How to recover from an unbootable N900 without reflashing (maybe this should be stickied)
 

Folks,

Had the 2nd star "brick" happen today. (Merry Christmas by the way!) Last time it happened someone posted a link to this:

http://wiki.maemo.org/User:Jebba/Flash

Was very useful this time. This allows you to un-"brick" (recover from an unbootable state) without having to reinstall everything due to flashing. Although it postulates that you need to be running linux. I did this through the wife's apple with the flasher-3.5 program. I speculate that the same program for windows will work the same way from the command prompt.

2d

Edit: to correct my "mis-use" of the term brick. Also updated link.

Re: How to unbrick without reflashing (maybe this should be stickied)
 

you lie!!!!

Re: How to unbrick without reflashing (maybe this should be stickied)
 

Errr....

perhaps...

this isn't a guaranteed fix for all situations, it should just be tried before reflashing the entire thing.

2d

Re: How to unbrick without reflashing (maybe this should be stickied)
 

i doubt this will work for every "brick"?!

but its worth a try before completely reflashing, i guess.

/edit:
damn, 2disbetter was faster :>

Re: How to unbrick without reflashing (maybe this should be stickied)
 

It's too bad that the meaning of brick has evolved so much. Originally (at least when I got here in early 2007) it meant like a brick, i.e., totally dead, even when plugged in. Now what bricked means is pretty unclear, I guess it lights up but does nothing, is frozen, but maybe can be reflashed.

Re: How to unbrick without reflashing (maybe this should be stickied)
 

Brick is for beyond repair. If your device gets bricked you can use it for spare parts.

Re: How to unbrick without reflashing (maybe this should be stickied)
 

I have recovered two devices using this method. Bought were stucked in second dot when started.

Re: How to unbrick without reflashing (maybe this should be stickied)
 

Yeah, "brick" is abused here...
It should rather be called a system in an unbootable state.

but anyway, this (only?) help if you have rebooted the device without shutting it down while being disconnected from power 17 times (yes, weird bug, discussed in another threead)...

Re: How to unbrick without reflashing (maybe this should be stickied)
 

Yes it should as I believe booting it in R&D mode, erases the boot flags. (Not sure this is the correct terminology)

Orginal post has been edited, to hopefully use the term bricked properly. Hopefully no one was confused or lead to a wrong conclusion based on that mistake.

Hope everyone is having a great day today!

The N900 rules!

2d

Re: How to unbrick without reflashing (maybe this should be stickied)
 

Updated link:

http://wiki.maemo.org/User:Jebba/Flash