Got a Sony Xperia XZs about a couple of months ago to replace my iPhone.
Main reason was with our move to Montevideo I wanted a dual SIM phone and I didn't want a Samsung.
The Samsung deal is a long story, but in short, Samsung tech support in the US was the only people ever that mistreated when trying to get camcorder repaired, after literally stealing a device we shipped to their repair facility and claiming they shipped it back to us and we were trying to rip them off. Anyway, we just don't buy anything Samsung at our household, period.
I digressed, going back to the Xperia. Great phone! But I badly missed the fingerprint reader, until I found out that in the US they are simply disabled by firmware.
After I learned that, the thought about figuring out how to change the firmware stuck with me. I decided to try the procedure when my son eventually discovered my unlock key simply by watching me do to unlocking pattern a couple of times.
I will not reproduce here the whole process, you can do Google search and you will find plenty of pages that explain it.
In summary this is what I did:
Downloaded xperifirm tool. With that tool I found the right Indian firmware for my phone and downloaded it.
Got the flashtool for Sony devices. Built a firmware file from the downloaded and unpacked files.
A note here is to delete a fwinfo.xml file on the root download folder. According to one page I found if that file is included in the firmware file it gets corrupted.
With the firmware file built I went into "flashing mode". When you initiate the flashing process you are prompted with a dialog to exclude certain items and wipe others. I simply used the default settings and that works well to replace the firmware without loosing any data or config.
A note on the flashing process. Relatively early in the process, the console showing the files being upload to the phone suddenly stopped showing any activity. After a couple of minutes of inactivity I thought I finally bricked the phone, but armed myself with patience and waited. Eventually the flashtool picked up and kept going reporting on files being uploaded to the phone until it was done.
I unplugged the phone and turn it back on. Got another scare when the Xperia logo color animation took forever... Again I thought maybe I bricked the thing and all I got was a fancy screen showing an animation. But no, eventually the phone booted, reported an upgrade in process and was usable right from the start.
I went to the security settings and to my surprise I found the fingerprint manager, fully functional!
For this phone this feature is a game changer. If you own one of this great phones, you have to do this flashing and get the fingerprint reader working. You won't regret.
