Hibreak Pro: Android 14 GSI Release

25 Apr, 2025

Warning: If you end up bricking your device or you end up getting sucked into a wormhole, I am not to be held responsible.

1. Motivation for Building This

Well, Bigme's OS is riddled with garbage which has invasive permissions. A clean stock Android experience was what made the Hisense A9 stand out for me. And thankfully building on the work of Damian and co. on the Hisense, I was able to port the accessibility app and get it running on the Hibreak Pro with some modifications of my own.

2. A Few Notes

Also, for those who don't know, GSI stands for Generic System Image, it is a system image that you can load on your device. The Lineage OS that is talked about for the Hisense, was also a GSI.

For the Hibreak Pro though, I have used ponce's AOSP build of Android 14. Link here.

I did not use Lineage as a base because it required having superuser and ADB access to get the screen working on the first boot. Might post a download for that as well based on popular request.

The fingerprint sensor was not working on the Android 15 builds I tried- and in general were a bit unstable with the e-ink screen. Might troubleshoot that a bit later.

3. Links

• Repository Link (Do not patch the image with the script in the repo, it will brick your device)
• Download Link
• Donation Link

4. Installation Instructions

I wrote a post earlier on how to flash an Android 15 GSI on the Hibreak Pro. Link here Follow all the instructions mentioned there- apart from the fact that instead of flashing the GSI in the post there, you would be flashing the GSI I provided above.

5. Setup Guide

5.1 Initial Boot

1. After flashing the GSI and rebooting, you would have a black blank screen. If you are still connected to the computer, wait to hear a chime on the phone signalling that the phone is connected to your PC.
2. With the phone now booted up, simply press the power button to lock your screen, you'll hear the sound signalling that it is locked. Press the power button again, and the screen should now be fully functional. This only happens on the first boot.
3. Now, open the app drawer and open the A9 Accessibility Service. Don't be confused by the name; I have not bothered to change the name of the app or the package. This was very much built from source for the Hibreak Pro.
4. You'll now be in accessibility settings, enable the accessibility service.
5. Double tap the bottom action button to bring up the accessibility menu- or open the settings to tweak the settings to your liking.
6. The phone on the first boot is in dark mode. Head over to display to change that (if you want to of course)

5.2 Treble Tweaks

Head over to Settings -> Phh Treble Settings

5.2.1 Network Fixes

• Open IMS features and do all the actions listed there i.e.
  • Create IMS APN
  • Install IMS APK for MediaTek R+ vendor
  • Enable Request IMS network
  • Enable Force the present of 4G Calling setting
• I did not have data connection to begin with, that was because of the APN not existing for my carrier. Your mileage might vary. To set up the APN, head to your Network Settings and set up the APN for your carrier.

5.2.2 Display Tweaks

• Note that the refresh modes are by default enabled per application. If you want to have a global refresh mode, you can disable per-app refresh mode in the A9 accessibility service.
• Head back to Phh Treble Settings and do the following:
  • Force allow Always-On Display. While this is optional, it is still highly recommended, unless you want your last screen to still be displayed when you lock the phone.
  • Enable Mediatek GED KPI support
  • Enable the toggle to Disable SF GL backpressure
  • Enable the toggle to Disable SF HWC backpressure
  • Reboot
• Optional:
  • Disable animations in Accessibility settings. Though this causes the Always-On display mode to not function correctly. It will just display a black screen in its stead.
  • Enable the bold font in display settings!
  • Change the contrast mode to High in Color contrast settings in Accessibility settings

5.2.3 Telephony Tweaks

• Head over to Settings -> Phh Treble Settings -> Misc Features
• Scroll down to Telephony and enable the following options:
  • Allow binder thread on incoming calls
  • Force display 5G network
  • Disable "Voice Call In" route

5. Reporting Bugs

Report them on GitHub as an issue.

6. Wrapping Up

I shall continue to working on this and making tweaks to make this better. There are lots of stuff in Damian's patching script that I did not implement, since it was making an image that would crash the DisplayManager which would crash the display and put the phone into a bootloop.