Downgrading Samsung Galaxy V Plus SM-G318HZ Firmware (Solve Bootloop when Modding)

Trying to install a ROM or flashing other mods on your Samsung Galaxy V Plus SM-G318HZ Android phone but got it bootloop? Maybe it's because the updated firmware with enhanced security.

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KituTech —  As we know, our Samsung Galaxy V Plus SM-G318HZ got a system update once. Apparently, the system update bring an additional security patch to the system.

This is thanks to kikaa@XDAForum who mentioned it on the Samsung Galaxy V Plus thread there.

How do we know we got the updated firmware? Well, simple. Go to our phone's Settings → About phone. If we scroll down and there are a line mentioned "Asks security version…", then we got an updated version.

So, if we plan to mod our Samsung Galaxy V Plus SM-G31HZ Android phone, especially installing a custom ROM, downgrading the firmware to the older one is necessary to avoid bootloop.

Note: Don't forget to backup our phone's data and internal storage first. Although after flashing the firmware I found that it's not erasing my Samsung Galaxy V Plus SM-G318HZ data, better safe than sorry. 😀

Tools & materials:

• A Windows PC
• Samsung USB driver installed on the PC
  SAMSUNG_USB_Driver_for_Mobile_Phones.exe (35.4 MB)
• Odin Windows app
  Odin3-v3.14.4.zip (4.3 MB)
• The old Samsung Galaxy V Plus SM-G318HZ Firmware
  [zon3-android.net]G318HZDXU0AOF5_G318HZOLB0AOF5_XSE.zip (528 MB)
• A good micro USB cable, preferably the original one came with our Samsung Galaxy V Plus's phone.

Steps downgrading Samsung Galaxy V SM-G318HZ Android phone's firmware with Odin

1. Install the Samsung USB driver on our Windows PC.
2. Download and extract the Odin.zip to get the Odin .exe, then double click the Odin….exe to run it on our PC.
3. In the Odin main menu, Click "AP", then locate and select the Samsung Galaxy V Plus SM-G318HZ firmware (don't forget to extract it as the firmware file we downloaded is in a .zip file). Wait for Odin to check the integrity of the firmware to make sure it's not corrupted, it should will show "Checking MD5 finished successfully" on the left message log.
4. Boot our Samsung Galaxy V Plus Android phone into download mode: Power off it, then press and hold the power + home + volume down buttons simultaneously and hold it a few seconds until the phone's vibrates. Press volume up to continue on the warning screen.
   
5. Connect our Samsung Galaxy V Plus SM-G318HZ Android phone to our PC with micro USB cable. If everything is normal, it should be shown on Odin as "Port…"
6. Click "Start" to begin the flashing. It will take some time, with the final message log would be "All threads completed…" with a big "PASS" green message at the top.
   
   
   
7. Done! Our Samsung Galaxy V Plus SM-G318HZ phone should be reboot automatically in a moment.

From my experience, my Samsung Galaxy V Plus data is retained and nothing was erased. However, it's always recommended to do factory reset (Settings → Backup & reset → Factory data reset) after flashing a firmware to our Android phone.

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And that is all, now our Samsung Galaxy V Plus SM-G318HZ Android phone has used the old firmware, it's time to kick some mods and ROMs!