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Help Flashing the M835 from MetroPCS to Cricket

SoulDroid1

Member
Jul 28, 2011
88
13
Note: This is just a QnD copy-and-paste from my thread at the cricketusers.com forums. So, if some of these threads don't line up to what we have here, that's why.

Just as the title says, I'd like to flash my M835 over to Cricket. I've spent the last several days just hunting down the right drivers to access the phone via QPST and as of right now, QPST can see my phone, I have the SPC Code, and I'm ready to roll. I'm the guy that posted about the M835 on the Facebook page, btw.

BUT! Before I get going, I have a few questions that you guys can hopefully answer.

1.) I know I have a tri-band phone. I downloaded the "45713MyCricketForum.prl" from the Official Cricket PRL Thread. Would this be what I need? It figures since it was pulled from Austin, TX, and since that's where I live, that one would be a safe bet.

2.) This phone was never activated. Meaning, I don't have an actual number/account from either MetroPCS or Cricket. Can I go ahead and flash using the "QPST Tutorial with Pictures (Cricket)" post with the aforementioned PRL and later, activate through a local Cricket store?

EDIT: Saw this posted by chrisngrod:
You WILL need an active Cricket account in good standing to flash a phone over to your account. After you are done programming all of your account's info in the phone, you will need to change the ESN on your account (aka activate) the phone for talk and text to work. Data should already work at this point if you have a data capable phone/plan and have setup everything.

3) I said earlier I obtained the SPC Code and along with the code, it said "The ESN/MEID you provided is clean for activation." I've seen other posts for other phones using 000000 to unlock, or are they already unlocked? Rather, should I use CDMA Workshop to unlock my phone?

Can't think of anything else at the moment, but here's what I've done so far:

DISCLAIMER: This is all from my own trial and (tons of) error. If you do this, I'm not responsible if anything goes wrong.

On the phone, I went to Settings -> About Phone -> Device info. Copied everything down in a Word file and triple-checked what I had typed.
I used CheckESNFree.com to get my SPC Code. It took the MEID-DEC, but not MEID-HEX.

(My research showed that from here down, these steps could work for most non-Cricket CDMA Huawei Android devices)
On the device, I dialed *#*#2846579#*#*
A menu appeared with MMI_TestII, ProjectMenu, and Debug Screen. Tap ProjectMenu
In the next menu, I went to (3) Background setting
On this next menu, I went to (4) Usb ports setting
Selected Manufacture mode (4th one down) and restart the device

After the device came back up, I connected it to my PC. Installed the proper Huawei drivers. Checked in Device Manager, Ports, "DBAdapter Reserved Interface (COMXX)", where COMXX is the port QPST needs. Mine is on COM31, for example.

I fired up QPST Configuration, and went to the Ports tab, clicked the "Add new port" button, and added COM31.
Then clicked "Clients -> Service Programming"

Then I stopped and posted all this...... :D

Later, I posted another question in the general Flashing section and was told this. Should I do this or will it be an issue if I just flash in QPST?
All you need to do is load PRL and reset spc to either 333333 or 000000 for them to be able to activate it. That's the basic flash and they will be able to activate it for you.

Sorry if that's all too much at once, but I've never flashed before and just want to make sure I do it right. Odds are, I've probably left out some crucial steps.
 
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Hello there!

Unfortunatly, I don't know much in flashing phones to a different provider...however, if you've gotten this far, have you tested activating it and doing a PRL update via Cricket's Network? Not sure what the number is...

1. If you needed that to activate then you are correct, however, after you are able to flash the phone, you should contact Cricket via their number and see if you are able to update the PRL similar to Metro's method of dialing Activation and pressing 5.

2. I'm not familiar with Cricket so I can't be sure if that's right or wrong. However, I can defiantly say that there shouldn't be a problem activating it with Cricket if the setup was done correctly. Just don't call Metro. XD
Again, not familiar.

3. Normally, phones are not sold unlocked, however if yours is, then you shouldn't need to use the workshop, unless there's something preventing you from gaining access to Cricket.

Sorry I'm not much help, Cricket doesn't service my area so never had experience with it, but it sounds right from what you did. Is the phone working might I ask?
 
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Oh, wow. I posted a reply 4 or 5 days ago. I guess it didn't take.

Anyway, I have flashed the M835 through QPST. I'll be taking it in to get service on Wednesday. There weren't very many things that needed changing in QPST, which was surprising. I dialed *228 and it says "Welcome to Cricket" so at the very least, it looks like voice is good to go.

However, I was NOT able to get the information on the M.IP tab in QPST to stick. Which essentially means I don't have the data side setup correctly as of yet. Something else related to that is that every time I change the APN settings and reboot, it all reverts back to MetroPCS settings rather than keeping the Cricket settings.

I've even gone as far as editing the apns-conf.xml. The settings are still there, but it always revert back to Metro.

I probably just need to push some NV items to the phone via CDMA-Workshop, but CDMA-WS simply won't read my phone properly.

I also came across some things in various forums about needing to place the "Android Adapter Modem" in diag mode. Not sure if that's the case or not, but I'm still researching. In fact, I found this method, but I'm not very optimistic about it:
I installed an app called APN Backup & Restore from the market. Used that to delete all APN data. Then Settings -> Wireless & networks -> Mobile networks -> Access Point Names worked as normal. I restored default data, deleted all but one entry. Edited the remaining APN to the settings here and set the Type to default and saved. This let me select it using the green dot. Then I edited again, deleted all text from the Type field and saved again. Then from this point turn the phone off and reboot.
I already have that app installed as well as APN Settings Shortcut (since our M835s don't have the menu option mentioned above), so I may give it a go, anyway.

TL;DR - Voice and text likely working, data..... not so much, but I'm working the problem! :D
 
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I would be very, very careful deleting data like the quote you posted, doesn't sound accurate, I believe he's missing a data entry but I wouldn't know, I barely began to use QPST.

AS for Diag, yes, that's the only way to get to the core, except deleting all the info, just doesn't sound right, don't hold me to that.

Wish you luck with Cricket, although I don't think this phone is worth the trouble.
notsure.gif
 
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