The Complete Guide: Upgrading the Samsung Ativ SE to Windows 10 Mobile

Status
Not open for further replies.

asellite

New member
Jun 11, 2015
46
0
0
Visit site
Alright guys, I’ve never gotten to contribute anything to this forum before so I’m excited to bring you this guide. I’m just a guy, I’m not a programmer, I’m not a hacker, just a lover of Windows and super excited to bring W10M to your Ativ SE. Obviously if you brick your phone doing this I’m not responsible. Think long and hard about this decision before attempting! :D

I can’t take credit for any of the hard stuff. I just turned the babble from the Windows 10 on Ativ SE thread into a comprehensive guide. The real credit goes to these guys and gals:
Brad Herr
fatclue_98
Jeemo
arct1cblu3
So check out That Thread and make sure to give them lots of thanks and lovin.

On to the fun stuff.

First things first -> Download this ZIP

Inside you’ll find three files:
1. CustomPFD_003.xap
2. CustomWPSystem_006.xap
3. WP8.1 SDK Tools Setup.zip
4. Extract the ZIP and set the Custom XAP files aside.

Install the WP8.1 SDK Tools on your PC. This will install three programs on your computer which can be found in Start > All Apps > Windows Phone 8.1 SDK

In this folder will be the following programs:
1. Windows Phone Application Deployment 8.1
2. Windows Phone Developer Power Tools 8.1
3. Windows Phone Developer Registration 8.1
We won’t use #2 so disregard that program.

Now that your PC is set up to upgrade your phone we need to make sure your phone is ready to receive the update. There are a few important things to know about where you need to start with your phone.

You MUST begin this process with STOCK Windows phone 8.1.1 this means only OTA updates. If your phone is not on STOCK Windows Phone 8.1.1 then you need to flash back to 8.0 (there are many tutorials on this) and re-upgrade using OTA updates to 8.1.1.

Once you’ve confirmed you’re on STOCK Windows Phone 8.1.1 we need to do a hard reset of your phone. This is a MUST. Some people say you need to do this twice, I did mine once and it was fine. In order to do a hard reset on your phone, proceed with the following steps:
1. Shut your phone all the way down.
2. Power on your phone while holding the Vol Down button
3. You should see a screen with an exclamation point!
4. IN ORDER (not all at once) press: Vol Up > Vol Down > Power > Vol Down
5. Your phone will now wipe itself and give you a fresh 8.1.1 set up screen. This may take some time so just leave your phone be until it’s finished.

When setting your phone back up from the hard reset, ONLY:
1. Connect to WiFi
2. Connect to your Microsoft account
3. DO NOT RESTORE ANY BACKUPS YOU’VE MADE
4. Wait for all apps to finish installing
5. Skip Verizon’s bull crap and you will be taken to the start screen.

Go directly to the Windows Store, then search, download, and install “Preview for Developers”
Once this program is installed open your phone settings and navigate to Storage Sense
Select Phone, then select the Preview for Developers app and tap ‘move to SD card’

Alright, your phone is 99% ready to go, now we need to switch back to the PC to finish up a few more things. Don’t worry, you’re already more or less half way there.

Back on the PC! Remember those programs you installed from the setup file in the ZIP? Time to put them to use. Go ahead and plug your phone into your PC and make sure your phone shows up under My Computer, you need a solid data connection between the two for this to work.

1. Again, navigate to Start > All Apps > Windows Phone 8.1 SDK
2. Open the program “Windows Phone Developer Registration 8.1, the onscreen instructions here are pretty clear but in case you’re having trouble make sure you’re device is unlocked and on your Start screen with the live tiles. This won’t work unless you’re there on the phone.
3. Click to register your device as a developer phone.

Now let’s look at those files you set aside from the ZIP folder.

Open your phone in My Computer on your PC and open the SD Card folder. This is called the root directory and this is exactly where you want to place the file. Now paste CustomPFD_003.xap into this folder and close the file explorer.

Sweet another part done. Finally, we have to deploy (or sideload) the WPSystem XAP file.

1. For the last time, navigate to Start > All Apps > Windows Phone 8.1 SDK
2. Open the program “Windows Phone Application Deployment 8.1
3. Leave the Target: “Device”
4. For app, click Browse, then select your CustomWPSystem_006.xap
5. Your phone may need to be on the home screen now, so do so (better safe than sorry!)
6. Click Deploy
7. Check your app list from your phones Start Screen to make sure it has been installed as an app.

Great job! We’re done with most of the icky stuff now, the rest is mostly simple button pushing. What we’re going to do next is use WPSystem to convert Preview for Developers into a registry editor. It sounds scary but it’s relatively easy if you follow the directions closely. There’s a few things you need to make sure of before we move on to the next steps or nothing will work from here on out and they are as follows:

1. Preview for developers must be installed on SD Card storage
2. Custom PFD must be on the SD Card (root directory)
3. CustomWPSystem_006.xap must be on phone storage

CustomWPSystem is the app we deployed with the SDK, it may have deployed to the SD Card depending on your phones settings. Now is a good time to go into Storage Sense and make sure all of these things are where they are supposed to be. A few quick button presses and presto, we’re good to go. Onwards!

Go ahead and go to your app selection screen on your phone from the Start Menu and open up the newly deployed CustomWPSystem app. When it opens there’s a lot of writing. Ignore it.

1. At the top you’ll see “SD Card Permissions” in Red. Tap it.
2. Browse and select SD Card ONCE.
3. Tap the check mark at the bottom to apply the changes.
4. “SD Card Permissions” should now be Green! Yay!
5. Click “Browse XAP” at the bottom.
6. Browse and select the CustomPFD_003.xap that we put in the root directory of the SD Card
7. Click the “APPLY XAP” Button

Good news, you’ve successfully turned the “Preview for Developers” app into a zombie slave to do your bidding! If you aren’t proud of yourself by now, you should be!

NEXT WE WILL BE EDITING THE REGISTRY. EDITING MICROSOFT WINDOWS REGISTRY FILES IS DANGEROUS (yes more so than everything else you’ve done so far) FOLLOW THESE DIRECTIONS CAREFULLY! PURPOSELY OR INADVERTANTLY CHANGING REGISTRY FILES OTHER THAN THOSE LISTED CAN AND WILL PERMANANTLY DAMAGE OR DISABLE YOUR DEVICE.

Okay guys you’re doing great. Let’s edit the registry, just relax and focus. YOU CAN DO THIS!
1. Soft reset your phone by holding the Vol Down and Power buttons until the device reboots.
2. Open Preview for Developers (the now Zombified Version)
3. Navigate to HKLM > System > Platform > DeviceTargettingInfo
4. Change phoneManufacturer to “NOKIA” (without quotes)
5. Change phoneManufacturerModelName to “RM-927”
NOTE: We do the 927 because that HAPPENS to be the supported Lumia Icon, which HAPPENS to have the same chipset/architecture as the Ativ SE. It also includes provisioning for Verizon and it’s network!
6. Tap “Write” then tap “Apply”
7. Close the app.

HOME STRETCH! YOU’RE IN THE HOME STRETCH! YOU CAN NOT MESS THIS UP IF YOU TRIED!

You’re almost there guys, seriously. All you need to do is this:
1. Open the Windows Store
2. Search for and download the “Windows Insider” app.
3. Select “get preview builds”
4. Select your desired insider ring (fast or slow)
5. GET THAT MOTHER F*%#(&$ UPDATE YO!
6. NEVER DO A HARD RESET EVER AGAIN!

Well, that’s the end everyone. I hope you enjoy Windows 10 Mobile as much as I do. There are so many new great features, everything is running super smoothly on my Ativ SE. Again I can’t take credit for any of the hard stuff. I just turned the babble from the Windows 10 on Ativ SE thread into a comprehensive guide. The real credit goes to these guys and gals:
Brad Herr
fatclue_98
Jeemo
arct1cblu3
So check out That Thread and make sure to give them lots of thanks and lovin.

Alright guys I’m out!
Peace,
asellite

EDIT: Here's some screens of the finished project!
wp_ss_20151111_0001.jpgwp_ss_20151111_0003.jpgwp_ss_20151111_0004.jpg
 
Last edited:

PuckCowboy

New member
Oct 10, 2012
327
0
0
Visit site
WOW! Awesome work Asellite!

Out of curiosity, what do you recommend between fast and slow ring? (Especially if our ATIV SE is our daily driver.)

Thanks for this amazing guide! I'm going to give this a shot as soon as the next upcoming RTM release is available!
 
Last edited:

asellite

New member
Jun 11, 2015
46
0
0
Visit site
Definitely Fast at this point. Any earlier in the dev cycle I'd be nervous but at this point phone breaking updates are extremely unlikely and you get all the new toys the fastest! Don't expect all the newly added features to always work immediately though. I've been a PC insider since 9926 and mobile for a long time on some other devices. Always been fast, always a blast!
 
Last edited:

Brad Herr

New member
Sep 17, 2015
21
0
0
Visit site
Great work, OP. One suggestion: Make your final instruction all caps, bold, underlined... anything to make sure our friends understand that YOU MUST NOT EVER DO A HARD RESET AGAIN after updating to W10 on the Ativ SE in this way.

Just a thought :)
 

asellite

New member
Jun 11, 2015
46
0
0
Visit site
Great work, OP. One suggestion: Make your final instruction all caps, bold, underlined... anything to make sure our friends understand that YOU MUST NOT EVER DO A HARD RESET AGAIN after updating to W10 on the Ativ SE in this way.

Just a thought :)

Noted, I'll make the change now. Thank you Brad Herr!
 

TechFreak1

Moderator
May 15, 2013
4,611
5
38
Visit site
Great Guide, A little tip, never post your IMEI, MEID and MDN !!

Also as a precautionary measure never post your MAC address or PRL-ID.
 

Kevin Houle1

New member
Mar 27, 2015
128
0
0
Visit site
Great work, OP. One suggestion: Make your final instruction all caps, bold, underlined... anything to make sure our friends understand that YOU MUST NOT EVER DO A HARD RESET AGAIN after updating to W10 on the Ativ SE in this way.

Just a thought :)


What happens if you hard reset?
 

rhapdog

Retired Senior Ambassador
Aug 26, 2014
3,035
0
0
Visit site
EDIT: Here's some screens of the finished project!
I removed the screenshot that contained your IMEI, MEID, MDN, etc.

Did that on TechFreak1's request. Hopefully didn't overstep my bounds, but you needed to be protected from that. You should consider masking out the offending numbers that TechFreak1 suggested and reposting the screenshot after it has been edited.
 

asellite

New member
Jun 11, 2015
46
0
0
Visit site
I removed the screenshot that contained your IMEI, MEID, MDN, etc.

Did that on TechFreak1's request. Hopefully didn't overstep my bounds, but you needed to be protected from that. You should consider masking out the offending numbers that TechFreak1 suggested and reposting the screenshot after it has been edited.

Thanks for looking out. I appreciate the assistance, no offense taken!
 

asellite

New member
Jun 11, 2015
46
0
0
Visit site
Great Guide, A little tip, never post your IMEI, MEID and MDN !!

Also as a precautionary measure never post your MAC address or PRL-ID.

Thanks for the suggestion, the mods removed that for me. I didn't even realize what I was doing, I was just excited to share the screen caps!
 

Kevin Houle1

New member
Mar 27, 2015
128
0
0
Visit site
Windows 10 Mobile will boot but it will be missing a vast majority of the system apps such as Settings and Store! You'll have to reflash to 8.0 and start from scratch. ^_^


Ah sweet. One question. Will windows 10 allow apn settings to be changed? Will mms and tethering work for people not on Verizon?
 

TechFreak1

Moderator
May 15, 2013
4,611
5
38
Visit site
Thanks for the suggestion, the mods removed that for me. I didn't even realize what I was doing, I was just excited to share the screen caps!

I figured as much :), next time take the time crop out the bottom off the about screen / the section that contains these numbers in the future :). Your more than welcome to repost the offending image as Rhapdog suggested :).
 

asellite

New member
Jun 11, 2015
46
0
0
Visit site
Ah sweet. One question. Will windows 10 allow apn settings to be changed? Will mms and tethering work for people not on Verizon?



I'd assume not. Entering the RM-927 will download W10M with Verizon provisioning. I would try to find a phone with the same chipset on your carrier. ^_^

Someone more knowledgeable might be able to provide more information though.
 

raycpl

Active member
Apr 6, 2013
6,107
16
38
Visit site
Thank OP.
My colleague who sit beside me in the office has been eyeing my 920 (hobbling along since early days of W8 until now, with W10 10581). Hope your good work will exorcise his misery that is W8.0 !!!
 

asellite

New member
Jun 11, 2015
46
0
0
Visit site
Thank OP.

My colleague who sit beside me in the office has been eyeing my 920 (hobbling along since early days of W8 until now, with W10 10581). Hope your good work will exorcise his misery that is W8.0 !!!


No worries! Glad I could bring your coworker some hope and happiness!
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Members online

Forum statistics

Threads
322,736
Messages
2,242,598
Members
427,978
Latest member
Duouser3