Toshiba chromebook 2 - "Chrome OS is missing of damaged. Please insert a recovery USB stick or DS card."

[rickglyn]

Chrome OS Version

65 (from memory)

Chromebook Model : Toshiba Chromebook 2 (2014 SWANKY)

Issue description:

Recovery is successful, I get the "tick" but I remove the recovery USB stick the machine always displays the message -

"Chrome OS is missing of damaged. Please insert a recovery USB stick of SD card." and doesn't boot normally. This is the only screen / message I am getting.

I was using the device in Developer mode, and just before the problem set OS Verification Off so that I could add the nano editor binary to the system. I've

not been able to boot it since.

I opened up the chromebook and removed the write protection screw from the board but that didn't help, I still get the same message after a 'successful' recovery.

I would try a live Chrome OS USB stick to help troubleshoot but in the current state USB booting is not enabled. Any help to a way forward would be greatly appreciated.

[Jason Clinton]

Hit <TAB> on the boot screen; it should show you an error message. Provide that error message here.

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[rickglyn]

Here is a link to a photo of screen after pressing Tab:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1FG9b-S3I1JXSduZj8PtWm6sfVWXaqDO9/view?usp=drivesdk

Is this the error message: recovery_reason: 0x17 RW firmware version rollback detected.

On Sunday, 19 November 2017 16:48:51 UTC+1, Jason Clinton wrote:

Hit <TAB> on the boot screen; it should show you an error message. Provide that error message here.

On Sun, Nov 19, 2017 at 8:45 AM, rickglyn <richard...@gmail.com> wrote:

Chrome OS Version

65 (from memory)

Chromebook Model : Toshiba Chromebook 2 (2014 SWANKY)

Issue description:

Recovery is successful, I get the "tick" but I remove the recovery USB stick the machine always displays the message -

"Chrome OS is missing of damaged. Please insert a recovery USB stick of SD card." and doesn't boot normally. This is the only screen / message I am getting.

I was using the device in Developer mode, and just before the problem set OS Verification Off so that I could add the nano editor binary to the system. I've

not been able to boot it since.

I opened up the chromebook and removed the write protection screw from the board but that didn't help, I still get the same message after a 'successful' recovery.

I would try a live Chrome OS USB stick to help troubleshoot but in the current state USB booting is not enabled. Any help to a way forward would be greatly appreciated.

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[Jason Clinton]

Most likely explanation is that you somehow installed a newer firmware signature counter version over the production firmware and tripped the rollback protection when you went to recovery (which has a lesser version). There is a way to do that and still have the system boot but it's too late for that. Do you have a USB drive with the OS and the newer firmware on it? From memory, this failure mode will still boot a USB drive. I'm not sure if that will work with dev_boot_usb=0 which it's also too late to change.

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[Richard]

I downloaded and tried a USB stick with this file CARMOS-20171116010101.img but no joy. Is this the correct image to try?

[Jason Clinton]

I don't know what that is. Let's step back: how did you get into this state? This is extremely rare.

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[Richard Glynos]

I have been using this device, my first chromebook, for a couple of years with no issues. From the beginning I invoked Developer Mode in order to use Crouton, which has been great. I am a keen fan of Linux.

I'm used to the command line and installing software. I'm not a great fan of vi(m) so recently when I wanted to edit some bash commands I downloaded nano. I soon realised I couldn't move the binary into /usr/local/bin even as root user. I discovered I needed to set OS boot verification off and then make / (root) writable. Well, I got as far as issuing the command to turn boot verification off. When I came to reboot, well it just wouldn't.

Then, first of all Recovery wouldn't work. So as explained earlier, I took the machine apart and removed the write protection screw. I was then able to run recovery. However, when I removed the USB stick as prompted, the device wouldn't boot.

I have a couple of recovery USB sticks that work and the system confirms recovery has completed successfully, but it doesn't boot normally, just always says "Chrome OS is missing or damaged. Please insert a recovery USB stick or SD card."

The Carmos image is from a site hosting Google Chrome OS -

https://chromium.arnoldthebat.co.uk/?dir=daily

I tried a USB stick with this image but it wouldn't boot. Maybe the version is wrong.

[Jason Clinton]

>  Well, I got as far as issuing the command to turn boot verification off. When I came to reboot, well it just wouldn't.

This is probably the critical part. What was this command?

[Richard Glynos]

It was:

sudo /usr/share/vboot/bin/make_dev_ssd.sh --force --remove_rootfs_verification

from this page:

https://gist.github.com/erikpmp/e4cf127d6c67734d286b

[DennisLfromGA]

Richard,

It was:

sudo /usr/share/vboot/bin/make_dev_ssd.sh --force --remove_rootfs_verification

I do that on each and every CrOS upgrade so I can put scripts in /etc/init and other things to launch crouton.

I've never had any problems removing rootfs verificaiton, apart from the time when things broke on my Acer C7 parrot and they fixed those.

So as explained earlier, I took the machine apart and removed the write protection screw. I was then able to run recovery. However, when I removed the USB stick as prompted, the device wouldn't boot.

I may be wrong but I suspect that removing the r-w protect screw left the BIOS vulnerable to being at least partially overwritten and the atb image may have written to that area.

~Dennis

[Richard Glynos]

Oh, that's interesting about your regular use of the rootfs command. So that in itself shouldn't have prevented it from booting and shouldn't have prevented recovery from completing successfully afterwards.

It's strange that removing the write protect screw appeared to allow recovery to complete 'successfully' maybe just coincidence. I guess it won't hurt to try again after replacing it.