Unbrick Amlogic S905x3 T95 Max + (plus) TV box after install Armbian - Tutorial

[Pita Bread]

After initially and successfully booting Armbian 23 jammy from an SD memory card in the TF slot or from a USB flash device in the blue 3.0 port, I had installed Armbian using the /root/install-aml.sh, removed the SD card/USB flash and rebooted Armbian easy peasy. It worked fine for a while. My thread about it is here at this link.  But it got bricked, seemingly by itself after a power failure in the home. I managed to recover it with an image of Android, however, all of Armbian was deleted (and no backup either haha 😉).

 

Here is a tutorial to recover this box and the steps may also work for other tv boxes that have the S905x / S905x2 / S905x3 chip.

 

Download Amlogic Burn Card Maker v2.0.3 (not other versions) from Here or Here.

 

Download stock android firmware T95MAXplus-X3-9.0-2GB4GB-6330-0720-20200616-Android.rar from Here or the same firmware but as img a file from MEGA

 

Unpack the archive file in 7zip, if you have the rar file. But there is no unpacking to do if you have the img file.

 

Insert a new good micro-SD memory card into the SD card adapter, and plug it into your PC
- be sure there is only one single partition on the SD memory card formatted as FAT32

 

Run the 'Burn_Card_Maker.exe' executable file. Make sure it is version 2.0.3

 

Change language to English if it is not already in that:

 - Click on the Chinese menu (or garbled text menu) in the upper-left corner, and choose the second option.

 - Dialog screen appears and now simply select 'English Version' and click OK button.

 

Select your SD memory card drive letter under 'Choose Disk:'
 - you may need to use Disk Management in Windows and apply a drive a letter to the SD memory card.

 

Check mark the Yes box on under 'To Partition and Format' or tick the box 'Formatting SD card'
- a new menu pane will popup. follow through and format the SD memory card.

 

Check mark the Yes box on under the Normal SD bootloader for Erase Bootlooader

 

Check mark the Yes box on under the Erase Flash for Normal Flashing

 

Do NOT check mark the Yes on (click to Uncheck it) under 'reboot'.

 

Click 'Open' button under 'Select Burn Package f:' and select the factory stock Android file T95MAXplus-X3-9.0-2GB4GB-6330-0720-20200616.img
- make sure there are no spaces in the file name of the img

 

Last step in Burn_Card_Maker: Press 'Make' button and wait to finish.

 

 

Go to the TV box. Disconnect the power cable from the tv box device. Then insert the micro SD memory card in your tv box device and power on the device. If it didn't boot at all, the you may need to use the toothpick method. Disconnect power cable again. Put a toothpick into the audio jack, press and hold the reset button while you insert the power cable. The tv box will enter into recovery and the firmware will be flashed automatically. Be patient and wait up to 10 minutes. After the TV BOX fully starts, remove the micro SD Card. and the update will completed. The T95 Max (whatever it is) graphic logo will appear and stock Android 9 will start.