Is there a way to image the state of my phone as it is into a ROM or something similar? I wasn't sure if this is what is called "dumping the rom", just wanted to make sure. Appreciate the help!
dumping the rom will output the contents of the rom, but not your personal files into a raw file that you can then play around with.
If you want to transfer your sms or something use a backup program like SPB backup or pim backup
Mmm not worried about the personal stuff, more the apps I installed/personalization work I have done on top of the cooked rom. I tend to screw up my phone a bit so having that already personalized rom would be sweet. Is that what dumping the rom will do for me?
Cheers
theoretically yes. I've never tried it but the "undumping" part is really complicated and takes so long that you might as well just recustomize your phone.
dumping is typically used on clean roms to extract the base of the rom (the "purest" part of the rom like the kernel and stuff) to use in cooking. Although its reasonable to think that you can dump your rom, rebuild it, and reflash it, you'd have to reflash EVERYTHING, including the system files.
For this reason, theres not really any point in doing so, because if you wanted to upgrade your rom build with a newer one, this method would not do so.
Related
(sorry newbie question)
I would like to try some of these ROM's, but would like to be able to switch back to my main device ROM easily.
Is there any way to backup my ROM and make it as easy to reinstall as these new ROM's seem to be (i.e., just booting in bootloader mode or whatever and running an exe)?
I looked through the forum and there seemed to be a way to easily back it up on a memory card, but no instructions for now to restore it...and the backup program seemed to create a .bin file not an .exe file.
So is there any way to backup and restore the original ROM?
No, all wrong.
You'd have to dump your ROM, which means: read it out over a wired connection onto your PC. Then you'd have to convert, pet and feed that dump to make it become a NBH file. The NBH file can then be flashed back onto your device.
No, there is no BIN files, it's either RAW or NB or NBH, while only the last one can comfortably be flashed using a ROM Updater Utility.
So yes, there is, but I don't recommend you to try, you'll fail and most probably brick your device. First read the wiki, read the forums, spend some hours per day for maybe two, three weeks reading those forums and at some point you will know yourself if your're ready or not. And I'm not joking. Once you know when you get a RAW file, where the NB files come from and what an RUU and NBH file is, then you know enough to get it done...
Sidenote: restored ROM dumps in all kind of languages can be found here in the forums. If you have a Touch Cruise, the shipped ROM is on the Xda-dev ftp server. If you got an o2 orbit 2, it depends: I could provide the original German ROM, while for UK o2 customers, I dont know, you'd have to search the forums.
BTW: it sounds very frustrating, I know. But I promise, it's worth it. Spend those two weeks and in the end they'll be well spent two weeks because its all the same with all devices. Once you know it, you know everything.
How to dump your rom:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=371533
It refers to a wiki link halfway through the first post, but it's not linked correctly.. this is the link: http://wiki.xda-developers.com/index.php?pagename=Hermes_HowtoDumpRom
What I do wonder myself still is, how to dump the radio rom.. Haven't managed that one yet.
I am wondering if there would be a problem restoring a full backup to a different ROM with SK tools backup.. Give it that is form WM6 to another WM6. For example, I have Helmi's WM6 ROM and I want to flash to xplode's WM6 ROM.
It "may" be OK, but I wouldn't do it. Usually is a bad idea to restore a backup to a different cooked ROM (by the way, xplode one is 6.1, not 6).
The SPB Backup 2.0 is advertise as restoring backups to a different ROM version, but I didn't try it...yet... "Starting with version 2 it allows you to restore your data after ROM upgrade or on another device. With the desktop Backup Sync tool you can save your backups on desktop in automatic manner for later archive review or restoring on another device."
If you are decide to flash a new ROM, you can let as know if the backup work or not.
I will try it tonight, though I'm very wary as I don't want get stuck with hours of flashing back and forth.
spb backup
I am used the spb backup 2.0. It's really a very good backup system.
Try it, or look a demo Here!
So does the SPB Backup actually back up all your installed programs, register codes and stuff?
It's really annoying to try a ROM, install all your stuff, then decide you want to try another ROM only to have to re-re-re-reinstall everything.
Unless you belong to the type of people that think its a good Idea to put desel in a lead free petrol car or think that drink toilet cleaner will help with bad breath, I would not suggest using a back up of one device rom version to another. (even less if you want to from one device to another).
The issue here are the system files as they can be part of your back up (CAN as in its up to you to define) and the version of these files can be different,
The best praxis is always to syn your data (contacts, my docs) over your PC.
As for backup tools for things like Call logs you shuld try Dotfred pim backup
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=299705
This has worked fine for me in the past (with in the same rom Version).
My thoughts, how ever it might work fine for you, again it might be also be fine for you to have a brick. Myself I would follow best praxis
Hello,
I'm sorry if I shouldn't post this here, but I think this is the right place.
Please, is there any solution how to make complete ROM image from my tweaked HD2? I've installed official ROM (1.48), changed some registry settings, installed some programs and now I want to put this tweaked ROM to another HD2 mobile.
Thank you very much!
yes, use spb backup, it makes a full backup, custom backup or scheduled backup of anything. I am using it and its verry good at what it does.
Thanks.
SPB backup can backup the full ROM and anything else (all programs, registry tweaks, localization) and recovery that to another phone, totally from scratch?: )
yes SPB backup can backup the full ROM and anything else (all programs, registry tweaks, localization) and restore that, but if that other phone is a different brand i dont know how the backup will solve compatibility issues regarding registry or 3rd party settings.
I don't think so
My (official) ROM had 180MB, then I installed some programs and SPBBackup has now only 80MB. So I think SPBBackup doesn't backup all the windows files.
I need a tool, which can create image (LEOIMG.nbh) for use with CustomRUU.exe on another HTC HD2.
i guess i misunderstood your point, in this case you'll have to use some cooking rom utilities, see Rom thread for this. sorry.
Anyway, thank you.
I take it that you want to clone the device?! As long as you are using two identical devices (i.e. two HTC HD2's) SpriteClone could be your answer. Try here: http://www.spritesoftware.com/products/sprite-clone
Hope this helps.
Phil
Hello,
I am currently using an xda touch diamond that I have been configuring and
maintaining etc. with much devotion over the last ~two years... For that reason, I understandably fear flashing. However, I am running into the hardly-any-space-on-internal-storage-left-problem, and subsequently have been heavily searching for solutions that might enable the deletion of individual rom-files. I think I read twenty times, no, it's not possible. So my question is: Would it be possible to clone the complete device without any data/config loss whatsoever into a file (simililar to what sprite backup does), and in advance of flashing/whatever you will call the complete restore process actually DELETE certain files that used to be undeletable on the device itself.
Thanks for answering this....
Matthias
me1235 said:
Hello,
I am currently using an xda touch diamond that I have been configuring and
maintaining etc. with much devotion over the last ~two years... For that reason, I understandably fear flashing. However, I am running into the hardly-any-space-on-internal-storage-left-problem, and subsequently have been heavily searching for solutions that might enable the deletion of individual rom-files. I think I read twenty times, no, it's not possible. So my question is: Would it be possible to clone the complete device without any data/config loss whatsoever into a file (simililar to what sprite backup does), and in advance of flashing/whatever you will call the complete restore process actually DELETE certain files that used to be undeletable on the device itself.
Thanks for answering this....
Matthias
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You yourself are describing a 'playful' method of building a new ROM!
This is what ROM cooks do when a ROM is made. They remove or edit - files or folders that are inbuilt and add their custom folders to it and 'cook' it. So in a sense the answer is 'YES' you can remove what you don't like in your ROM. But NO you can't do it by your suggested method. You can cook a ROM yourself or ask a cook on forum to do you a favour and delete unwanted files from your ROM and you can flash custom ROM with better space on it - Flashing is not that bad to be honest! I have done it on my WinMo - uncountable times! More than the number of times you might have changed your wallpaper!
So just make sure you read instructions on how to do it. Back up all your data on storage card and contacts too! - there you are ready to go!
After first flash of new ROM you won't take more than 2 hours making your phone as it is! (and you get faster with each flash!)
yes, drupad2drupad is right,
what I would add, I know what you mean, been facing the same decision. Spend year customizing and didn't want to loose it, on the other hand phone become slow and full. Well if there was a simple solution to this, this forum would be 95% smaller. there isn't any universal solution.
you will loose something. some settings, (registry or config files), some customizing. etc.
by using different backup programs or by setting them differently, you can trigger how much to backup, and how much to revert. BUT if you backup everything, (all registry and all files) after flashing you are right where you was. no big change.
what I do is I copy all int.memory to SD card, export all registry, backup only messages (contacts and calendar are in file pim.vol, if you end all programs and disable today plugins, you should be able to copy there and back this too, not loosing nothing by backup converting)
then flashing new rom, restore messages, copy pim.vol back and then slowly, restoring setting for each program I care to do so.
it's either a file in \program files or in \windows or a part of registry. there you open your big exported reg file, search for a name of program and cut,paste to empty reg file and import.
I made a backup script to do this automatically, but it's not possible to make it universal, it will backup only those programs it's set to backup.
back to you question about deleting rom files. you can, after a fashion, but deleting such will only add info to ignore this rom file. which means, rom file stays, but is not visible. thought, you can clean your int memory. removing temp and accumulated useless files, moving programs you use rarely to SD, but this is very time consuming and advance thing to do.
thanks
first of all, thanks to the two of you for such devoted answers! thanks a lot , really.
My guess is it will take me (I'm quite obsessive) 6-10 hours -- research etc. to make sure everything will definitely go fine and finally restore everything to the prior state. Never having messed around with flashing etc., I think it's too much effort to gain some lousy 20 mb.
I still really appreciate your answers. It's a shame there is no universal method to do this is a few steps, with some utility, for everyone...
So I was wondering, what do you think, on a system like the touch diamond, running windows mobile 6.1, with I think ~100 mb internal storage, how many mb should in your opinion at any point in time be free space, to ensure things are running smooth? (And, I suppose/hope flash memory deterioration due to little space left is not that much of an issue...)
Else I'd go as far as "donating" some chrismas bucks to some kindred spirit in guiding me through the process, I just don't have the nerve to do this, for 10 mb... never again will I buy a device that has too small internal storage!
thanks to everyone...
matthias
(edit) ps.: I find it funny that the files in rom can store data (like the 16 MB mxip initdb.vol which is said to carry contacs I believe) - for the novice, like myself, it's kind of difficult to understand why files can be written to, but not decreased in size to free up memory somehow - or do they have a "size limit" / "fixed size"?) but anyway, you need not comment on this.
There is a way that you can reduce your file storage size quite easily....
Thanks to AnDim, see here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=377514.
Do the following steps:
1. Use a back-up tool such as Resco Backup and make a back-up on your storage card.
2. Use Total Commander and copy all of the files in your Windows directory that are NOT part of the ROM. You can do this quite easily by chosing the "Hide files in Rom" part. Then copy and save these files on your desktop.
3. Use AnDim's HTC ROM Image Editor. Open your original rom with this (I hope you have it).
4. Add the files you copied from your desktop to the rom you opened with AnDim's tool.
5. Delete any duplicate files that were in the original rom from the ones you just copied.
6. Save the new rom and flash it.
7. Use Resco Back-up to restore your original rom.
8. Use Total Commander to delete the files created by Resco Back-Up in your Windows folder that you had previously added to the rom.
After all of this, you will find you have much more storage space and a quicker rom because all of the files you added that overwrote a rom file will no longer have duplicate files and also rom files take up less storage space.
Good luck!
hi mitsi,
thanks for that post, highly appreciated! this looks like a solution to the problem I described -- After doing some time-consuming cleanup, I now have some ~10 MB free, so I think I'll wait for this to decrease down to let's say 5MB in the future, and then follow your steps -- which seem to be advanced, but feasible. This is really a great hint. Hope others who run into the same problem will find this thread helpful too. I'm really impressed with quality and helpfulness in this forum, outstanding. Will have to go out and help others where I can now to compensate for my bad conscience
Grüße nach Berlin aus dem Schwarzwald!
M.
I recommend using SPB backup.
I used that program to do what you wanted to do ever since I used Axim x5 (currently TP2).
I have it set up so it automatically make a backup every week on Sunday, so just in case if something goes wrong (bad cab or driver) I can have most of important changes and not LOSE a thing.
So, good luck : )
Hello,
Hoping someone could clear up a couple things for me. At my work we use the mc9090 RFID scanners which run windows mobile 6.1 currently. Currently we use motorola osupdate to push applications in a CAR file once the OS update util flashes the stock rom which are .sig files and .bin files. My question is do i have any chance of dumping the rom and if so would I be able to get it back on the device. Currently i was able to use imgfs tools to dump the os partition into a .raw files but that is as far as i got with dumping. So since they are signed files how would or is it possible for me to get them back on the device? I just didn't want to waste anymore time if i am not going to get anywhere on this. Also not saying that I would be able to use it but is package builder for wm what actually generates the .sig files?
Any ideas about how i could make this work would be awesome or any other ideas. The goal here is for us to have a base wm6.1 with all of our software on it and configured when we image a gun. I am sure motorola would hook us up with microsoft to do this but trying to figure out if anyway i could pull this off internally since we update so much..
thanks
jphilpot said:
Hello,
Hoping someone could clear up a couple things for me. At my work we use the mc9090 RFID scanners which run windows mobile 6.1 currently. Currently we use motorola osupdate to push applications in a CAR file once the OS update util flashes the stock rom which are .sig files and .bin files. My question is do i have any chance of dumping the rom and if so would I be able to get it back on the device. Currently i was able to use imgfs tools to dump the os partition into a .raw files but that is as far as i got with dumping. So since they are signed files how would or is it possible for me to get them back on the device? I just didn't want to waste anymore time if i am not going to get anywhere on this. Also not saying that I would be able to use it but is package builder for wm what actually generates the .sig files?
Any ideas about how i could make this work would be awesome or any other ideas. The goal here is for us to have a base wm6.1 with all of our software on it and configured when we image a gun. I am sure motorola would hook us up with microsoft to do this but trying to figure out if anyway i could pull this off internally since we update so much..
thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My suggestion is to set up one of your devices with all the setting and configurations exactly the way you want them, and then image that device using a program like Sprite Backup http://www.spritesoftware.com/ It's a tool I use to keep my device secure, since I do a lot of tweaking on it.This way, if any of my adjustments end up breaking it, I can always restore to a configuration that I know works. The same principal should work for what you need.
sprite
Unit ZER0 said:
My suggestion is to set up one of your devices with all the setting and configurations exactly the way you want them, and then image that device using a program like Sprite Backup http://www.spritesoftware.com/ It's a tool I use to keep my device secure, since I do a lot of tweaking on it.This way, if any of my adjustments end up breaking it, I can always restore to a configuration that I know works. The same principal should work for what you need.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We tried sprite clone in the beginning and didn't work out right. Some stuff didn't come across right, so not saying i havent learned
enough now to fix that stuff but as far as us implementing it i don't see that happening.
I will give it another look since we have 100 licenses :]