FRP bypass and unlock on a Samsung Galaxy Tab S2

I use an Android tablet for reading ebooks. My favourite ebook reader is the Sony PRS-650 which was ahead of its time in a lot of ways. But these days I like to have internet connectivity whilst reading so I can do both dictionary lookups, Wikipedia lookups, and quick Google searches. But at the same time I don’t really want the total distraction of an iPad, or Android tablet, so the ideal solution for me was to use KOReader - an ebook reading app heavily inspired by the Sony Reader interface - and which has the ability to do those dictionary and Wikipedia lookups and keep me mostly self-contained.

So I bought a Google Asus Nexus 7 which is really nice, but for my use case running any modern version of Android on it shows how much it is lacking in both CPU and RAM. It was OK for a while, I read a good handful of books on it, but I eventually wanted something more capable. I’d heard about the Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 8.0 which is slightly wider and perhaps slightly lighter and above all more powerful. Both devices have very high resolution displays, which is a must for font rendering, and seems to bea thing if the past for Android tablets.

I managed to snag a “faulty” Tab S2 8.0 on eBay that was listed as powering on and off, but was locked to a Google Account. This is something I knew could be worked around, and this blog post gives a brief outline of how I did it.

FRP bypass

FRP is basically an account lock. The device will require the owners account to be logged in even after a facory reset. A bit like iCloud lock on Apple devices, but this is much less well implemented. A comprehensive YouTube video by Muhammad Mubeen was of great help to do the bypass.

1. SamFW FRP TOOL > MRP > Open YouTube > View
2. Choose browser > Open Samsung Browser
3. Download and install technocare.apk from androidfilehost.com (this adds options we’ll use)
4. Open a new tab with frpbypass.io for the FRP bypass links
5. Choose link from frpbypass tab: Settings
6. Settings > Lock Screen & Security > Other Security Settings > Device Administrators > Find My Device (uncheck)
7. Settings > Apps > Google Play Store > Disable
8. Cloud & Accounts > Add Account > Google
9. (login and verify)
10. Settings > Apps > Google Play Store > Enable
11. Restart
12. Settings > Apps > TecnocareTricks > Uninstall

FRP unlock

By enabling OEM Unlock the FRP lock will also be switched off, which is very handy. By factory resetting the device whilst in that state, FRP will be permanently disabled. Result!

1. Settings > System > About > Build number (tap 7 times)
2. Settings > System > Developer Options > OEM Unlock
3. Reboot to recovery mode (Power, Volume Up, Home)
4. Factory reset

Android update

From here I installed Lineage OS 20 (Android 13) on the device, which would otherwise be limited to very old Android 6 or 7. Other options are Lineage OS 17.1 (Android 10) Stock Android 7 Lite.