GSM Droid Bionic

I originally posted this here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=42437715

First some venting: I went to Israel for business. Before I left I did some research and found out that Pelephone (the local CDMA carrier) should be able to provide me with a CDMA SIM. Upon arrival I found that while these SIM cards are available online they don't sell pay-as-you-go in stores. I returned to my hotel room with my tail between my legs and quite accidentally discovered this thread.

I was attempting to enable my Bionic to use a pay-as-you-go SIM from a local GSM carrier (Cellcom) from my hotel room, using nothing more than my Windows 7 laptop, the guest WiFi, and a borrowed thumb drive. At several points during this process I seriously considered jumping out of the window of my 17th floor hotel room. I soft bricked my phone at least twice and learned A LOT (and I didn't consider myself to be a novice before beginning this). But thanks to all of the notes here I did eventually SUCCEED! In the interest of sanity I'm putting together what I did and what worked for me. I'm hoping people can take this and begin adding information to it so we can have ONE unified place with the latest method (instead of forcing people to read 117 pages and have to filter through what worked with ICS and what no longer does in JB).

This is by no means a final tutorial or guaranteed set of directions. It is simply what worked for me in my specific situation. I've incorporated troubleshooting tips and directions from these 117 pages, and hopefully this can be expanded upon into a more comprehensive guide in the future.

READ THESE DIRECTIONS ALL THE WAY THROUGH BEFORE BEGINNING

My phone is hardware rev A

Getting Setup
Make sure you have the latest Motorola Drivers installed: http://developer.motorola.com/tools/usb_drivers/
Starting with a freshly imaged phone:
It's guaranteed you'll have to data wipe at some point during this. You might as well make sure you're running a clean build before you start.

• RSDLite: http://forum.xda-developers.com/show....php?t=2021891
• Images: http://sbf.droid-developers.org/cdma_targa/list.php

By the way if you get the error: "Failed flashing process. 5/24 oem fb_mode_set -> Phone returned FAIL" Try the following:

1. open the file : cdma_targa_9.8.2O-72_VZW-22_cfc
2. remove the lines:
   
   Code:

   <step operation="oem" var="fb_mode_set" />
   <step operation="oem" var="fb_mode_clear" />

3. Save
4. Restart RSDLite and flash again

Root Your JellyBean Bionic
EasyRoot didn't work for me on my hardware, I used a thumb drive to create an Ubuntu boot and did it "manually", if you have any Linux experience it shouldn't take very long. Here are links to both procedures:

• Root: http://forum.xda-developers.com/show....php?t=2246747
• EasyRoot: http://forum.xda-developers.com/show...php?p=40870178

RadioCOMM: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/6725402/Radi....2_Install.msi

1. Boot Bionic, connect USB cable, set connection mode to anything other than "Mass Storage Device"
2. Make sure USB Debugging is DISABLED (when I had it enabled, RADIOCOMM was unable to find my phone)
3. Start RadioComm
4. select Main -> MA -> Common -> MDM 6x00 chipset base
5. select settings -> USB -> USB PST Driver
6. select the FTM Common1 tab
7. Try the buttons at top to read Version and MEID, if response is GREEN, you can proceed. If RED, there is likely a driver error that you need to resolve. (If drivers are correct, you should see moto usb networking listed under NETWORK Adapters in Windows Device Manager). Possible ways to fix driver issue…
   1. re-install Moto 5.4.0 drivers and reboot PC.
   2. reboot phone (remove/replace battery if possible).
   3. when connecting phone to PC, ensure its connected in PC MODE, not USB Mass Storage, Charge Only or other...
8. in the NVAccess drop down, select 1877
9. click read.
10. should show 07000000000000000.... change the first characters to... 8703E80400000200
11. click write
12. exit radiocomm
13. disconnect phone
14. power phone off, insert Non-VZW SIM, and power up.

Build.prop edits

1. Backup existing Build.prop
2. Update build.prop with the one CellZealot provided (Don't do the apk/odex renames yet) (http://db.tt/TdVtcfHH)
3. You can try using *#*#INFO#*#* and changing the value but this did not stick through reboots for me. It should however help you determine which value of ro.telephony.default_network is appropriate for you.
4. If you need to be able to switch between Verizon and GSM carriers, in build.prop (be sure to do this before a data wipe because modifying the default_network value may cause the crash loop)
   1. Change both appearances of the value:
      
      Code:

      ro.telephony.default_network=0

      To:
      
      Code:

      ro.telephony.default_network=10

   2. In order to get 4G/LTE data with Verizon you will also have to restore these values to the VZW values (note I set these when I returned to the states, I do not know if it affects your ability to use GSM):
      
      Code:

      telephony.lteOnCdmaDevice=1
      ro.mot.phonemode.vzw4gphone=1

5. Set chmod on build.prop to 644 (rw-r--r--)
6. Restart
7. This brought me to the "android.phone.com has stopped" crash loop, if you end up here do this:
   1. Boot into recovery and data/cache wipe
   2. On the first boot you will get this crash once, click OK then you will never see it again
   3. FYI: Every time you start your phone you will see "SIM Card from unrecognized source" error (if you're using the GSM SIM). This is expected right now, be patient!
   4. In other experiments I've noticed that sometimes it is possible to update the value without getting into the crash loop, but the value doesn't "stick". The build.prop file will say one thing while the *#*#INFO#*#* menu says something different. To fix this do a data/cache wipe.

APK/ODEX Renames
I haven't done this yet, the message doesn't bother me that much, and the risks of this change seem to outweigh the benefits. Doing this before a "Clear data" seems to prevent you from ever getting passed the "Please wait, this may take a few minutes" screen during an initial boot. Your only respite will become a complete re-image of the phone as this screen will never go away. I've reproduced this twice: Rename the files, do a factory reset, then wham, phone is completely unusable. After a complete re-image you MUST start from step 1! So keep this in mind if you ever need to factory reset your phone (without doing a complete flash) you will need to put these files back to their original state or you may end up needing to reflash your device but if you want:

1. If you did a data wipe above you will need to root again, as the data wipe will have unrooted you (see above)
2. Now rename the APK and ODEX files to get rid of the "SIM Card from unrecognized source" error. Files to rename are:
   • Stk.apk
   • Stk.odex
   • VzwPhoneService.apk
   • VzwPhoneService.odex

APN Updates
If you don't get data with your GSM SIM you may need to setup your carriers APN:

1. "System Settings" -> "More…" -> "Mobile networks"
   1. Verify "Data enabled" is checked
   2. Select "Access Point Names"
   3. Click menu key to get "New APN"
2. A Google search should do the trick for the appropriate values for your carrier. I simply searched for "Israel Cellcom APN" and this was the first result which contains everything you ever needed to know about Israel APNs. I'm sure similar sites exist for other carrier/country combinations:http://prepaidisraelisim.com/index.p...formation_id=7

Finally:

1. If you don't want root, now is a good time to unroot
2. Reboot your phone one more time for good measure
3. Enjoy GSM on your Bionic!

And now that I'm home, I drive to the AT&T store to buy a Galaxy S4 and ditch Verizon and Motorola and CDMA permanently. Some things cannot be unseen.