He who waits with prudence
He will be rewarded in due time
Now the wait is over
Lend your ear to a legend
The long awaited, indeed hotly anticipated /e/ OS ‘Q’ upgrade AOSP Android 10 for the Galaxy S9+ ‘star2lte’ has been released as ‘dev’ release e-0.13-q-20210120 and has been downloadable to the general public since January, 25 2021.
I was able to manually install it fresh & clean via TWRP Recovery 3.5.0_9-0 with Samsung Firmware Android 10, build date Deember. 2020. A custom eRecoveryrecovery-e-0.13-q-20210120 is also available. My first impressions correspond to those of the S9 'starlte’.
The disadvantage of a Quad HD+ 2960x1440 pixel display resolution becomes apparent during the initial setup: The font is very small, the icons small.
Switching to dark design saves my eyes and S9+ battery.
Adjusting the display size from ‘dafault’ to ‘large’ creates well readable views and the appropriate icon size.
The fact that the eOS ROM generated on 20.01.2021 is released with ‘Android security patch level 5. Nobember 2020’ at the end of Janauar 2021 and with older microG Services Core 0.2.14.204215 speaks volumes - at least for me, as already with the S9 'starlte’.
Hi @SuzieQ, thanks for your continued input and feedback on /e/ especially relating to S9+. Can you clarify for me, are we not getting the 0.14 version for S9+?
Hi @Sean, I cannot speak on behalf of the /e/Team but solely to the best of my knowledge and belief. As the s9+ continues to be supported on /e/OS and there are no plans to discontinue it, …
… the e-0.14-q version is only a matter of time. We must continue to exercise patience. But at least - the first step has been taken and the 8.1 Oero era is behind us.
Hello SuzieQ,
I have a Samsung S9+ from /e/store and would like my phone is updated to /e/OS Q,but I…’m not
technical and can’t update myself.Could you do it for me?Ofcource I pay for transport and pay you for the work.I would be very glad if you want.I know nobody to do it.
Let me something know.
Greetings Strosse
Hello @Strosse,
Instead of paying me for the upgrade, you may make a donation of any amount to /e/, e.g. here or here.
Money should not flow between our bank accounts. You are responsible for shipping costs there and back. We both commit to discretion and respect each other’s privacy.
If you agree, please PM (Message) me with your home address so I can quote you the cost of insured return shipping with online tracking.
Galaxy S9+ ‘star2lte’ is AOSP Android 11 ready. So life after Android 10 is possible. I’m delighted.
LeOS ‘R’ 20210202-RW-full-bvN also runs on the Samsung Galaxy S9+ ‘star2lte’, is completely ‘de-googled’ and without any Google Play Services, but with microG, F-Droid, DAVx5 and Calxy SeedVault Backup via Nextcloud instance.
The version of TWRP we used to test the ROM was 3.3.1-1
I used TWRP 3.5.0_9-0 from Decmber 2020 for the /e/OS ‘Q’ installation; in the meantime TWRP version 3.5.0_9-1 from Jan 27, 2021 is available.
However, after the successful and straightforward installation of /e/ OS ‘Q’, eRecovery e-0.13 and no longer TWRP Recovery is installed on the S9+ without any indication.
eRecovery is good for processing OTA updates and for a few simple additional tasks. However, the feature set is much smaller than that of TWRP Recovery.
The ‘Update recovery’ option in the developer options is functional. It allows the automatic update of eRecovery with system updates “Update the built-in recovery with system updates”.
There are several ways to install eRecovery on a Samsung Galaxy. One easy way is via TWRP Recovery, which is recommended in the /e/ documentation.
First transfer the eRecovery .img file to the Galaxy’s internal storage or microSD card.
Open the Main menu of TWRP Recovery on your Galaxy.
Now tap on the Install option on the main menu of TWRP.
In TWRP, switch from ‘Install Zip’ to ‘Install Image’ (bottom right) and select e-recovery.img file.
Once the file is open, “Swipe to confirm Flash”.
Finally, for the sake of safety, confirm the installation by running “Reboot Recovery”. Now the Galaxy should boot into eRecovery and you can use it to install the /e/OS ‘Q’ for example.
unfortunately, i have an /e/.shop S9 … .after installing Q through TWRP following the install guide it encrypted directly. with TWRP 3.5.2_9 i do not have access to the internal storage.
is there another way to install the erecovery.img over the existing TWRP?
on the other hand i could wait for twrp 3.5.2_10 is out, right? then your description shall work.
The custom recovery can be replaced like the OS. The /e/Recovery has compared to TWRP in lower in feature set, but it manages the OTA update flawlessly in the background (without possibly errant messages) and handles encryption well.
I test and use besides eRecovery and TWRP Recovery also SHRP SKYHAWK Recovery Project. It’s less known, but at least as functional as TWRP, can also handle ‘Magisk’ and ‘Treble’ and is visually appealing.
thanks for your explanation and information about additional recoveries.
in my case i want to use /e/recovery.
i first flashed TWRP, sideloaded /e/ image and overwrote TWRP with /e/recovery after just copied /e/recovery IMG file via win-explorer.
i do not know if this is the quickest way … but it worked
I think this omission might be the cause of some of my confusion. The rest of it can be explained by trying to use several outdated guides instead of one that is actually complete and current. This stuff changes so fast so I can understand the lag in documentation… especially within a dev community where information can turn to assumptions that live only in the heads of the initiated.
I can only assume by eRecovery you’re referring to these dev builds which feature a recovery image. The stable builds don’t have this and it’s like you said… It’s not mentioned here or here or here, or even here where it probably belongs. The best I could find was this discussion that can (presently) only be viewed using googles webcache. (It’s not on wayback)
I too have an s9 that shipped with /e/ running Android 8.1.0. So far I’ve been able to flash a stock Android 10 Rom but when I side loaded /e/Q I got error 7, and some explanations that aren’t making sense to me
One helpful user told me that I had to reboot to recovery in between wiping the system, and wiping the system and data partitions. I didn’t see that in the docs either. One guide says it’s mandatory to install this patch and another patch (no-verity-opt-encrypt-samsung-1.0.zip). The vendors side loaded ok but the other one related to encryption failed with error 1.
What I don’t know is:
1-Do I need to reinstall Stock rom using Odin or is there another way to install /e/Q?
2-Why does a stock rom need to be installed if it’s pretty much going to be blown away immediately using TWRP? Clearly installing the stock rom insures the sideloading of the /e/ zip file but I don’t understand the mechanics
3-Is the real reason why I went wrong because I didn’t use twrp recovery to (overwrite itself?) by installing the eRecovery variant?
4-Do I need to side load the vendors file and the no-verity-opt-encrypt-samsung-1.0.zip file that kept failing for me (I did re-reboot to recovery in between)
There’s no lack of places to get lost. Getting lost is the price to pay for knowledge and I’ve been paying over the last week. I finally feel like I’m close and that there’s just one or two pieces of info that I’m missing.
Update: I followed the upgrade instructions after a little break and saw this
Since my device was not encrypted (I think… since I didn’t encrypt it) I proceeded to sideload the /e/Q zip file.
It installed! Rebooted, Then said encryption unsuccessful…It said I needed to erase all data… ok nothing to lose at this point… It rebooted into TWRP and I saw an error but it went too fast.
So at this point… this is the furthest I’ve gotten.
1-Do I need to wipe/format/repartition or do anything manually?
2- Does the “no-verity-opt-encrypt-samsung-1.0.zip” need to be installed? If so… precisely when?
I re-ran the vendors zip file, rebooted into recovery, then tried to sideload the dm-verity and forced encryption disabler. It fails with error code 1 preventing me from booting into /e/ proper (I think).
I wiped the cache, rebooted to recovery and tried to sideload dm-verity again but like before it fails with error code 1.
Hi, else where I think you said you were using this phone in USA? I may be quite wrong … but you may need to consider if you are experiencing a Samsung Regional lock. There seems some uncertainty how this all works!
You might check what you are experiencing with posts by master USU /e/ Installer @egx470
