People were waiting to Unbrick Moto G Hard brick which happened during upgrade to Lollipop 5.x using OTA after a previous downgrade to KitKat. This was a known way to corrupt the bootloader with Lollipop image and thus resulting in Moto G hard brick. Due to this previous KitKat Blankflash always resulted in error like below,

greeting device for command mode
FAILED (blank-flash:greet-device:error reading packet)

or

(blank-flash:sdl-transfer-image:sdl-hello:invalid HDLC frame)

MBM-CI Lollipop Blankflash Story

After being turned down by Motorola and Lenovo forums, user ilikered from XDA finally listened to people and managed to provide new MBM-CI 5.0 file with new programmer MBN in Lollipop blankflash. I confirm that it works. Here is how you can unbrick Moto G Hardbrick.

Prerequisites to Unbrick Moto G Hard brick

  1. Hard bricked Moto G with corrupted Lollipop bootloader.
  2. USB cable
  3. Motorola Drivers if you don’t have already installed. My version was 2.5.4
  4. Riff BOX JTAG drivers and Driver Signature Enforcement Overrider
  5. New Lollipop Blankflash files
  6. Motorola Fastboot
  7. Flash5.1.bat.zip
  8. Moto G (1st Gen) Factory Firmware Images for Moto G (1st Gen). Don’t download from the first section. Scroll down and click “CLICK TO SHOW CONTENT”. Make sure you download the flashable zip with the right region matching to your phone. For Indian users, the file will named as “XT1033_FALCON_ASIA_DS_5.1_LPBS23.13-56-2_cid7_CFC.xml”

Prepare your signed drivers on computer

  1. Turn of your Antivirus for sometime. DSEO13b.exe may be recognized as unwanted program or virus.
  2. Turn of Windows UAC. It interferes with driver signing.
  3. Extract the Riff BOX JTAG drivers in a folder. A folder on desktop will work fine.
  4. You will see driver for both architecture. 64bit and 32bit. In next step, you will need to select the correct driver as per your Computer’s Operating System.
  5. Run Dseo13b.exe file click Next until you reach with a screen with following options.Sign Drivers in Windows
  6. Select “Sign a System File” and press Next.
  7. Now you will need to provide the path for qcsubser file. My system is 64bit Windows 10, so I copied from 64bit folder. Depending on your operating system, copy the path and pasted it in the space.qcusbser.sys Driver Path
    Unbrick Moto G Hardbrick
    Copy filename to complete the path
  8. Next, copy or write the file name after a slash to complete the path of file. Final thing should look something like this.
    Final file path for signing
    Final file path for signing
  9. Press OK once and after seconds you will should see successful message like this,unbrick moto g android 5 blankflash
  10. Press OK and then select Exit and then again OK. Now you will need to restart the system in “Disable Driver Signature Enforcement” mode using F8 key at startup.

Install Signed Drivers and Run Blankflash

As said, you will need to start system in “Disable DSE” mode using F8 key at Windows bootup. We want to do this so, we can install the above signed file.

Note: If your system is Windows 8 and above then you will need to first enable the Windows advanced bootup menu.

  1. After rebooting in “Disable DSE” mode, run the Device Manager or type “devmgmt.msc” in RUN prompt and press enter.
  2. Now, connect your Moto G, a new unknown device should appear as “qhsusb_bulk” in device manager.
  3. Right click the qhsusb_bulk and select Update Driver.
  4. Select the above signed driver from the browse menu and let it install.
  5. Now, Moto G will be identified as “Qualcomm HS-USB QLoader 9008” in Ports section (COM & LPT)
    Note: Whatever, you do now, JUST DON’T DISCONNECT PHONE
  6. Extract the above downloaded Blankflash file in a folder on desktop.
  7. Run the “blank_flash.bat”Unbrick Moto G Hardbrick
  8. Your Moto G will be unbricked in an instant.
  9. Don’t Disconnect Now. Let the phone recharge for around at least 1 hour on USB CABLE VIA COMPUTER ONLY. Your charger will not be identified.

TROUBLESHOOTING: Device not charging

As currently, the charger support is not available the device will only install by USB cable from computer. For that, computer should identify Moto G as Moto Mfastboot mode. If your device is not charging then disconnect the cable, uninstall Motorola Drivers and then reinstall it. Connect the cable by holding Power Down on mobile.

Flashing the device with Lollipop Rom

  1. Extract the flashable ROM zip in a folder on Desktop.
  2. Now extract Flash5.1 zip file and also the Mfastboot file. The final thing should look like this,rom flash prepare
  3. You will need to wait till the battery status on screen shows “Battery OK” instead of “Battery Low”. You can try to restart phone using command prompt in mfastboot folder. E.g. mfastboot reboot.
  4. When battery status is changed you can proceed safely. In my case it didn’t change and I proceeded anyway.
  5. Run flash5.1.bat file by double clicking it.
  6. Press enter when asked. This will be after the phone reboots back into bootloader for first time.
  7. Wait for sometime and then again press enter when asked.
  8. After everything is done, phone will be back in bootloader and now you can select Normal Bootup with “Volume Up” on phone.
  9. Disconnect the phone and congrats as you have unbricked your hard bricked Moto G.

Comments and queries are welcome.

By Mrinal Buddekar

Data Manager and a technology enthusiast! Mrinal Buddekar is Pune based blogger who loves building server, websites, technology, and affiliate blogging.

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