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Root Ulefone Power 3 using Magisk from Linux

noraj (Alexandre ZANNI)
, ,
🇬🇧

Disclaimer: for advanced power user only. If you don't understand what your are doing, then don't do it.

Prerequisites#

  • Phone unlocked (OEM unlock)
  • USB debug enabled
  • Apply all OTA updates
    • Android version: 7.1.1
    • Android security patch level: May 5, 2018
    • Kernel version: 4.4.22+release@release32 #2 Fri Nov 24 19:25:19 CST 2017
    • Build Number: Power_3_G03

To unlock the bootloader, check OEM unlock in the developer menu, then reboot to bootloader mode (adb reboot bootloader), then perform the unlock fastboot oem unlock. THIS WILL WIPE ALL DATA.

Rooting with Magisk#

Download and install this build (or a more recent one) because latest release of Magisk (v25.2) won't work for this device. In the future if v25.3 or higher is out, go for it as it will include the fix.

Then, on your PC, download the latest stock update of the official ROM. corresponding to your region and the version installed on your phone. Looking on the official Ulefone support software download page, the update is available to download on their Google Drive. The file is named GQ3056MF1_HCS986A_Ulefone_v40.gz.

Plug your phone to your PC with an USB cable.

Run adb devices to pair your PC with your phone (accept the popup on the phone).

Extract the ROM: tar xaf ./GQ3056MF1_HCS986A_Ulefone_v40.gz. You'll get all extracted in a folder named s986a_gq_gq3056_a2_66_512g48g_fhdp_bom3-n1_Power_3_G03_user.

As we can see on Magisk app, the Ulefone Power 3 has a ramdisk, so as explained in Magisk documentation we need to fetch a copy of boot.img.

We have do not have a separate vbmeta partition because no vbmeta.img is extracted from the firmware package and we can also confirm by running adb shell ls -l /dev/block/by-name that shows file not found.

We can copy the boot image we extracted to the phone with the following command:

$ adb push s986a_gq_gq3056_a2_66_512g48g_fhdp_bom3-n1_Power_3_G03_user/boot.img storage/self/primary/Download/

Now we can click Install on the Magisk app. Before selecting the image we have to check Patch vbmeta in boot image option. You will have to select boot.img from the download folder to select the image to patch.

Then we'll download the patched image to our PC (the path is written in Magisk logs).

$ adb pull /storage/emulated/0/Download/magisk_patched-[ramdom].img

Reboot the phone in bootloader/fastboot mode:

$ adb reboot bootloader

In fastboot mode flash the boot image:

$ fastboot flash boot magisk_patched-[ramdom].img

Now reboot the phone.

We can launch the Magisk app to check the root was successful.

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