Symbol for unknown relation?
It's perfectly fine to have equality signs.
When you solve equations, what you really do is say
Assume that the following is true
$$4x-4=\frac{(2x)^2}{x}$$
then
$$-4=0$$
is true.
Contradiction, the original assumption is false.
I put a question mark above an equal sign, like this: $\stackrel{?}=$. (In MathJax, just type $\stackrel{?}=$
.)
I like to put the $\iff$ (if and only if) symbol at the beginning of every new line, like this: $$\begin{align} 4x-4 &=\frac{(2x)^2}{x} \\ \iff-4 &= \frac{4x^2}{x} -4x \\ \iff-4 &= 4x -4x \\[0.2em] \iff-4 &= 0\end{align}$$ So $4x-4=\frac{(2x)^{2}}{x}$ if and only if $-4=0$, which is true.