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OK, so I just got my Nexus S4G two days ago, and I'm ready to root. My phone out of the box has 2.3.4 on it.
I follow this tutorial: http://www.droidfiles.us/nexus-s-4g/root-nexus-s-4g/ the link to which was provided by a good XDA'er. I get the bootloader unlocked and install CWR (recovery-clockwork-3.0.2.4-crespo.img) and that goes fine.
That's when things stop going fine.
First, I try to create a Nandroid backup, and that process seemingly completes fine until i note that the process says it couldn't mount /data. I don't worry about it.
So, I go to Mounts and Storage to prepare to push SuperUser.zip and I tell CWR to "Mount USB Storage" and I wait as directed, but the USB storage never mounts. I try mounting USB Storage and mounting /sdcard, neither of which work, so I can't push SuperUser.zip.
Figuring I did something wrong, I decide to restore from Nandroid, only to have CWR tell me that the MD5 checksum is incorrect and now I have no clean, base Nandroid to restore to.
Then I do some digging, and discover that there's a new CWR for the NS4G at Koush's site and I download the file (recovery-clockwork-3.1.0.0-crespo4g.img) from there, push it to my phone using fastboot's recovery command and start it up.
It doesn't work.
Clicking any of the options (like mounting partitions, or restarting/powering down the phone) causes the screen to go blank and just display the CWR logo in the middle of the screen. The only solution to get out of those loops is to pull battery and restart.
So, now, I'm wondering what to do.
I go back into fastboot, relock the bootloader and I now wait for a reliable root method to root a 2.3.4 NS4G on a Mac.
My questions are:
Where can I get a stock ROM to completely start over from scratch and even remove the recovery I've installed <-- found a base ROM here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1078213
Is there a fully reliable way to root the NS4G on a Mac, and if so how? (I've looked at this thread: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=878446 and it looks problematic as well).
Look in the dev section, stickies at top, the one talking about ns4g cdma. You have the su zip already. Put the cwm 3024 img file in the same directory as fastboot. You won't use adb. Boot into bootloader and do the fastboot command to unlock. Phone is wiped. Boot into phone normally and log in with gmail. On the phone, mount the device as usb so you can just copy the su zip to the root of the sd card.unmount phone on the Mac side then the phone side. Boot phone into bootloader. Do the command to fastboot the cwm into the phone again. Once finished, choose recovery on bootloader. It will boot into cwm. Choose install zip from card. Choose pick zip. Install su. Reboot into normal phone. Download busybox and a file manager you like that can handle root. With file manager, go to /system/etc and look for the sh file mentioned in the guide and add .old to the end of the file. If su pops up asking for permissions then you know everything is working. Boot into bootloader again. Install cwm again then choose recovery again. Once in cwm do wipe of caches and factory reset and dalvik. Go back and do backup with nandroid. Boot into normal phone. Sign into google again. Update profile and prl them you should be set. Pretty much that's what I did and it worked the first time around.
Follow the Mac guide in the link
herbthehammer said:
Look in the dev section, stickies at top, the one talking about ns4g cdma. You have the su zip already. Put the cwm 3024 img file in the same directory as fastboot. You won't use adb. Boot into bootloader and do the fastboot command to unlock. Phone is wiped. Boot into phone normally and log in with gmail. On the phone, mount the device as usb so you can just copy the su zip to the root of the sd card.unmount phone on the Mac side then the phone side. Boot phone into bootloader. Do the command to fastboot the cwm into the phone again. Once finished, choose recovery on bootloader. It will boot into cwm. Choose install zip from card. Choose pick zip. Install su. Reboot into normal phone. Download busybox and a file manager you like that can handle root. With file manager, go to /system/etc and look for the sh file mentioned in the guide and add .old to the end of the file. If su pops up asking for permissions then you know everything is working. Boot into bootloader again. Install cwm again then choose recovery again. Once in cwm do wipe of caches and factory reset and dalvik. Go back and do backup with nandroid. Boot into normal phone. Sign into google again. Update profile and prl them you should be set. Pretty much that's what I did and it worked the first time around.
Follow the Mac guide in the link
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm going to give your method a try. Thank you for your rapid response...
I see the subtle change you suggested: simply rebooting after unlocking and pushing recovery, and moving SU to the device via USB. Wish I'd thought of that.
(I'm still concerned about the Nandroid issue I reported. But I'll have to avoid any new ROMs for the time being, until I can get an answer for my Nandroid problem...)
My first nandroid choked. After root and final recovery install, I cleared all the caches it was *****ing about the first time, went in normally to make sure everything was okay, then went back and nandroid and no errors the second time. I probably will just stay with rooted stock but I would not flash other stuff until the dust settles and many of the bugs are worked out of the roms and kernels before jumping in.
TonyArmstrong said:
I'm going to give your method a try. Thank you for your rapid response...
I see the subtle change you suggested: simply rebooting after unlocking and pushing recovery, and moving SU to the device via USB. Wish I'd thought of that.
(I'm still concerned about the Nandroid issue I reported. But I'll have to avoid any new ROMs for the time being, until I can get an answer for my Nandroid problem...)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If cwm mount won't work then boot into the phone normally and copy over the file like usual is the only other quick and easy way to do it that I could think of at the moment the snafu happened. Yeah the way I did it might not have been the most efficient way but it got me past the hurdle that cwm made quickly. In the end, the result is the same so no big deal.
I don't know if cwm backs up wimax keys so I did it manually. There's a post on how to do it, I don't know if it's in this section. It might be dev?
Ok guys..... newbie here .... literally I'm new to Boot unlocking, root, Flashing etc.
Anyway I have followed this forum for so long that I decided to take plunge yesterday and get my hands dirty.
Here is what I did:
Unlock bootloader, root and install recovery on my Atrix 4G. Atrix was @ 2.3.4 and 4.5.91 during unlocking & root.
Rebooted the phone and everything seems to be in place. Atrix loaded like the way I bought it 7 months back. No problem until now.
Also created a restore folder on my external SD. Worked fine and was successful in creating backup with time stamp
Now here are my steps and subsequent issues that I'm facing:
1. Downloaded CM9 zip file from this thread(http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1500535) along with Gapps to my external SD
2.Entered recovery mode during bootup and tried to flash CM9 and Gapps. Flashing seem to have gone well and completed (note I did not do clear data, clear cache or clear dalvik cache under advanced options being a newbie)
3. Reboot the phone and can only see red Moto logo and unlocked on top. Left for about 5 minutes and nothing happened.
4.Did a battery pull and entered recovery mode. wiped data, cache & cleared dalvik cache
5.Went to Install zip from sdcard option and tried to reflash CM9. Flashing seems to have gone well and completed
6. Reboot phone and again can only see Moto Red logo with unlock on top and nothing more.
7.Battery pull followed by recovery. But This time I tried to restore from my external SD. also wiped data, cache & dalvik cache
8.Restore took about 3 minutes and completed.
9.Reboot the phone. Now the phone boots and goes to Rethink possible screen and get sstuck.
10. Left it for 1 hr....nothing.
11.tried steps 7-9 again and still stuck in "Rethink possible" screen during boot.
What did I do wrong? Did I soft brick the phone? I can still enter recovery mode and read my internal and external SD and can see all files. i hope I didn't brick my phone doing this. If I did, I would regret!
Here are my options:
1.Try a stable ROM like CM7 and see what happens. I didn't want to do too much damage so haven't tried this option yet.
2.I know there is a way to hide 'unlock' during boot up (if someone can point to it obviously). Hide the 'unlock' and return the phone to ATT and tell them that phone would not boot after 2.3.6 update and get a refurbished one
Please let me know what your thoughts are. I'm currently crapping on my pants
Edit: I just tried Newtrino rom and stuck @ Moto screen which says unlock.
Edit 3/4/2012: Please go to the last post for the solution. Tenfar's CWM is old and cannot deal with latest ROMs. Use ROMRACERS latest CWM or touch based Koush's CWM for future ROM flashing.
Old CWMs will give you sleepless nights!
Ok tried restore again after wiping data, cache & dalvik cache.
Now after reboot, My Moto Logo screen says unlock and just starts flashing.
I can still get into recovery......
can someone please help me......
What you can do is: install a "stable" ROM of Gingerbread:
--Go in recovery, put a .zip of the ROM on your sdcard (with your computer), and after wiping data, install it .zip.
--Or you install a new ROM with fastboot
Anyway, be careful with your battery, because if it is empty, with no ROM on your phone, it'll be crap!
vsg005 said:
What you can do is: install a "stable" ROM of Gingerbread:
--Go in recovery, put a .zip of the ROM on your sdcard (with your computer), and after wiping data, install it .zip.
--Or you install a new ROM with fastboot
Anyway, be careful with your battery, because if it is empty, with no ROM on your phone, it'll be crap!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thank you for your response. However I tried that already Nutrino GB ROM. Again, I would go to 'M' screen which says unlocked and its stuck there for ever.
I used tenfar's CWM. Not sure if I need to use any other CWM. Also since my phone doesn't boot, I'm not sure how I can install any other CWM
Masterguy said:
thank you for your response. However I tried that already Nutrino GB ROM. Again, I would go to 'M' screen which says unlocked and its stuck there for ever.
I used tenfar's CWM. Not sure if I need to use any other CWM. Also since my phone doesn't boot, I'm not sure how I can install any other CWM
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Don't worry, soft bricks are easy to recover on the Atrix thanks to us being able to access fastboot.
For flashing a new recovery:
While your phone is off, press Volume Up + Power to power up, then release when a menu appears on your screen and navigate with volume down until you see Fastboot, select it with the volume up key.
Get the necessary files for fastboot, place them all in a folder called "moto" in your C: drive, and type in the following in a cmd window (assuming you're using windows and that the recovery image is called recovery.img):
C:/Moto> fastboot flash recovery recovery.img
C:/Moto> fastboot -w
C:/Moto> fastboot reboot
Now access your recovery wipe dalvik cache, cache, factory reset and then flash a new ROM. It SHOULD boot without issues. I personally use Koush's Clockworkmod Touch, also remember that Neutrino tends to get "stuck" sometimes after the first attempt to boot and requires a battery pull and then you try to boot again. (It takes a while)
littleemp said:
Don't worry, soft bricks are easy to recover on the Atrix thanks to us being able to access fastboot.
For flashing a new recovery:
While your phone is off, press Volume Up + Power to power up, then release when a menu appears on your screen and navigate with volume down until you see Fastboot, select it with the volume up key.
Get the necessary files for fastboot, place them all in a folder called "moto" in your C: drive, and type in the following in a cmd window (assuming you're using windows and that the recovery image is called recovery.img):
C:/Moto> fastboot flash recovery recovery.img
C:/Moto> fastboot -w
C:/Moto> fastboot reboot
Now access your recovery wipe dalvik cache, cache, factory reset and then flash a new ROM. It SHOULD boot without issues. I personally use Koush's Clockworkmod Touch, also remember that Neutrino tends to get "stuck" sometimes after the first attempt to boot and requires a battery pull and then you try to boot again. (It takes a while)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Many people also seem to have suggested RACEROM CWM. Which one would you suggest? I'm so nervous about all this now. Just have this butterfly in my stomach
flash the latest recovery and wipe everything in recovery and flash neutrino again. It should work after that. try neutrino 2.2 though. 2.5 still has it's kinks.
1st off, relax. It's difficult to brick your phone from this point Just don't get any bright ideas with .sbfs lol.
As others have said, make sure you're on latest recovery.
Question: are you installing from internal or external SD? Internal is recommended for flashing most ROMs.
Sent from my MB860 using xda premium
Masterguy said:
Many people also seem to have suggested RACEROM CWM. Which one would you suggest? I'm so nervous about all this now. Just have this butterfly in my stomach
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As someone else said, the ONLY thing you should NEVER do is flash an .sbf or go through an OTA update, that's a surefire way to hard brick your phone. From this point on it's VERY DIFFICULT to completely brick your phone using software only.
RomRacer's CWM is based I think on v5.0.2.7? Koush's latest recovery is v5.8.1.5. I honestly couldn't name any tangible differences other than the touch interface, which is the reason I use it in the first place. (I hate mashing volume keys like a madman) It really doesn't matter which CWM you use, but when I soft bricked my phone I recovered with CWM Touch.
I would recharge your battery to 100% before trying to recover it, as that is one less headache to worry about, but if your phone starts saying 'Battery is too low to flash', do not panic, you only need a USB cable you don't mind sacrificing (doesn't have to be new). I will go into detail in case you actually need to do this.
Just make sure you use the fastboot -w command and wipe EVERYTHING through CWM before trying to flash anything else.
Solved:boot loop issue
littleemp said:
As someone else said, the ONLY thing you should NEVER do is flash an .sbf or go through an OTA update, that's a surefire way to hard brick your phone. From this point on it's VERY DIFFICULT to completely brick your phone using software only.
RomRacer's CWM is based I think on v5.0.2.7? Koush's latest recovery is v5.8.1.5. I honestly couldn't name any tangible differences other than the touch interface, which is the reason I use it in the first place. (I hate mashing volume keys like a madman) It really doesn't matter which CWM you use, but when I soft bricked my phone I recovered with CWM Touch.
I would recharge your battery to 100% before trying to recover it, as that is one less headache to worry about, but if your phone starts saying 'Battery is too low to flash', do not panic, you only need a USB cable you don't mind sacrificing (doesn't have to be new). I will go into detail in case you actually need to do this.
Just make sure you use the fastboot -w command and wipe EVERYTHING through CWM before trying to flash anything else.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks I was able to fix my boot up issue using ROMRACERS CWM. I didn't use any command prompt or anything. I just downloaded zip file from this thread, entered recovery mode -->Install Zip from SD card --> Chose ROMRACERS zip --> it automatically flashed the recovery and I then rebooted recovery under advanced options.
After that Wiped data,cache & Dalvik Cache and proceeded to install CM9 and it booted up up flawlessly.
I'm kind of surprised that tenfar didn't add a not to use his CWM as the latest ROMs use latest ext format.
That seems to be issue. However, I'm pleased with your guidance and final output. Thanks a lot dude.
Masterguy said:
Thanks I was able to fix my boot up issue using ROMRACERS CWM. I didn't use any command prompt or anything. I just downloaded zip file from this thread, entered recovery mode -->Install Zip from SD card --> Chose ROMRACERS zip --> it automatically flashed the recovery and I then rebooted recovery under advanced options.
After that Wiped data,cache & Dalvik Cache and proceeded to install CM9 and it booted up up flawlessly.
I'm kind of surprised that tenfar didn't add a not to use his CWM as the latest ROMs use latest ext format.
That seems to be issue. However, I'm pleased with your guidance and final output. Thanks a lot dude.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you sooo much. I was having this exact problem. I did what you suggested and my phone works. Thanks!
Initially tried to 'fastboot flash' the steelhead CWM, but when trying to enter the bootloader at startup, I'd get nothing.
Moved on to just using 'fastboot boot steelhead.img'. Pushed the latest CM10 and gapps. Think I did a factory reset, and cleared dalvik cache, then installed the CM from sdcard. Seemed to install good, upon reboot, all I got was the Cyanogenmod logo and a fuzzy screen.
This is where I get careless.
Instead of instantly reverting to the nandroid I have, I pushed the Quantum Singularity files to the sdcard, factory reset, wipe cache, installed it from zip. No boot. Back into cwm, tried again, but this time I formatted something that I'm not sure of.
I can fastboot into the recovery, but it can't read the sdcard or mount it. Errors on the bottom are all related to 'Can't mount /cache/recovery/' as well as 'cant mount sdcard'.
If I run shell and then 'ls' it shows the sdcard directory, but won't let me do anything to it, keeps forcing me to /data/media/.
I tried OneClickRestore, but it loads the spinning orb on the screen and just sits there.
I have these files still but not sure what to do with them;
boot.img
cache.ext4.tar
nandroid.md5
recovery.img
system.ext4.tar
Tried to fastboot boot recovery.img, but it says its too large.
I will continue to try and straighten out my situation, but any kind words would be much appreciated to give me a shortcut.
EDIT
Found a way (I think) to scan the partitions. Still trying to understand, but I think I need to repartition the sdcard (block 13?) See attached pic.
HomeR365 said:
Initially tried to 'fastboot flash' the steelhead CWM, but when trying to enter the bootloader at startup, I'd get nothing.
Moved on to just using 'fastboot boot steelhead.img'. Pushed the latest CM10 and gapps. Think I did a factory reset, and cleared dalvik cache, then installed the CM from sdcard. Seemed to install good, upon reboot, all I got was the Cyanogenmod logo and a fuzzy screen.
This is where I get careless.
Instead of instantly reverting to the nandroid I have, I pushed the Quantum Singularity files to the sdcard, factory reset, wipe cache, installed it from zip. No boot. Back into cwm, tried again, but this time I formatted something that I'm not sure of.
I can fastboot into the recovery, but it can't read the sdcard or mount it. Errors on the bottom are all related to 'Can't mount /cache/recovery/' as well as 'cant mount sdcard'.
If I run shell and then 'ls' it shows the sdcard directory, but won't let me do anything to it, keeps forcing me to /data/media/.
I tried OneClickRestore, but it loads the spinning orb on the screen and just sits there.
I have these files still but not sure what to do with them;
boot.img
cache.ext4.tar
nandroid.md5
recovery.img
system.ext4.tar
Tried to fastboot boot recovery.img, but it says its too large.
I will continue to try and straighten out my situation, but any kind words would be much appreciated to give me a shortcut.
EDIT
Found a way (I think) to scan the partitions. Still trying to understand, but I think I need to repartition the sdcard (block 13?) See attached pic.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Interestingly that fuzzy thing appears to be the cyanogen logo still, just without horizontal sync. Maybe your tv though it was some form of progressive scan? You have the stuff to flash directly to the processor? omapflash?
animal24 said:
Interestingly that fuzzy thing appears to be the cyanogen logo still, just without horizontal sync. Maybe your tv though it was some form of progressive scan? You have the stuff to flash directly to the processor? omapflash?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your reply. You may be right about the progressive scanning, although I never had any issues before. As for the OMAP thing, I don't think I'm that deep into it yet. I still can access the bootloader, and some what function. I think I can reset the partitions straight from ADB.
I still have these Nandroid backup files that I'm sure could help out, but i think I will need to flash them with Odin, just not sure how.
http://omappedia.org/wiki/Omapboot
Found this when searching for how to create a partition on an omap
animal24 said:
http://omappedia.org/wiki/Omapboot
Found this when searching for how to create a partition on an omap
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
if you use ./flash-all.sh it will recreate your partitions from scratch, I just did that to my Q. I think the latest CM10.1 nightlies are not booting properly, I've already tried 3 nightlies and none works. flash-all will return your Q to working order as long as you have access to fastboot.
https://developers.google.com/android/nexus/images#tungsten
trschober said:
if you use ./flash-all.sh it will recreate your partitions from scratch, I just did that to my Q. I think the latest CM10.1 nightlies are not booting properly, I've already tried 3 nightlies and none works. flash-all will return your Q to working order as long as you have access to fastboot.
https://developers.google.com/android/nexus/images#tungsten
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ok thanks, I seem to have somewhat recovered back to stock. Manually flashed all those files through fastboot one at a time worked the best.
The battle continues, when I try to do a backup in CWM, I get 'SD Card Space Free 15MB' to which it tries to backup then fails.
The battle continues!
updated adb incase anyone needs it
This is the first time I'm using a device that doesn't have an external SD card, but I've all along understood that the internal SD card does not get wiped when you do a factory reset, and I'm sure I read that again on another thread just the other day.
My N7 is rooted using Wug's toolkit, with CM10.2 and Bulletproof kernel.
Yesterday I decided to do a factory reset (under Settings, Backup & Reset, Factory Data Reset), but after I did it, all the stuff I had on the internal SD was gone, including my backup files, the ROMs I had transferred there, etc.
Surely this is not meant to be the case, is it??
internal sdcard used to be a different partition.
Now it is just a directory in your /data and the "sdcard" is an emulated sdcard.
I know stock ROM and stock recovery wipes /data and everything in it including the virtual sdcard.
TWRP recovery will only remove the /data user stuff, leaving the virtual sdcard alone.
Which recovery are you running?
sfhub said:
internal sdcard used to be a different partition.
Now it is just a directory in your /data and the "sdcard" is an emulated sdcard.
I know stock ROM and stock recovery wipes /data and everything in it including the virtual sdcard.
TWRP recovery will only remove the /data user stuff, leaving the virtual sdcard alone.
Which recovery are you running?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for that! (Thanks coming your way). Well, better to know now than later! The down side is that I lost my CWM backups and my Titanium Backup files, but the good thing is that I think I have a TWRP backup that's on my computer.
I'm using TWRP, but not really liking it, cos I cannot boot into recovery from the phone and have to keep relying on the Wug Toolkit. I've just downloaded CWM and will be switching to that.
So the moral of this story is that if we are to do a factory reset, we should do it via recovery, correct? I'm presuming CWM will also leave the virtual sd card alone, yeah?
Oh one more thing, I think I lost root after the factory reset!!
I checked my All Apps and SuperSu wasn't there anymore. Just rooted it again using Wug kit.
oohyeah said:
I'm using TWRP, but not really liking it, cos I cannot boot into recovery from the phone and have to keep relying on the Wug Toolkit. I've just downloaded CWM and will be switching to that.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am not sure what issue you are having with TWRP, but you can flash it to the recovery partition and boot to it automatically. If that's the only reason you don't like it, I'd work on fixing the install rather than jumping to another recovery.
oohyeah said:
So the moral of this story is that if we are to do a factory reset, we should do it via recovery, correct? I'm presuming CWM will also leave the virtual sd card alone, yeah?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would probably do it from recovery. I don't know what CWM does on this platform as I've only used it on other platforms.
What do you mean you can't boot into recovery with twrp? I'm using twrp and have no problem booting into recovery.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app
geckocavemen said:
What do you mean you can't boot into recovery with twrp? I'm using twrp and have no problem booting into recovery.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When I try to boot into recovery, it ends up showing a dead android with the red triangle "!" sign. I remember doing some searches and it seemed like this was normal. I remember the reason was that the N7 would always rewrite the recovery or something. From your responses, I'm guessing it's not normal?
The only way I could get into recovery was using the Wug toolkit using USB debugging/ADB, which really sucked, cos if it bootlooped and I can't get into the system to turn on USB debugging, then I'm not sure what I would do (though I read there's some way around it or something). I had never encountered any such thing with all my many other devices which all run CWM.
So what's up with all that?
"su" enter' next line "reboot recovery" in the Android Terminal window should also boot your device into recovery
User_99 said:
"su" enter' next line "reboot recovery" in the Android Terminal window should also boot your device into recovery
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This will work fine. If you have no aversion to installing apps, Rom Toolbox Lite gives you power widgets you can put on your desktop then go to recovery with one touch. I use Quick Boot PRO, although the free version of that all may do recovery also. One might work for you until you want to play with mods.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 4
oohyeah said:
When I try to boot into recovery, it ends up showing a dead android with the red triangle "!" sign.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That is stock recovery.
You need to get rid of /system/etc/install-recovery.sh
You can get rid of it by hand, or just install SuperSU from TWRP. Then flash TWRP to the recovery partition.
Thank you everyone for your input!
I'm happily back on CWM right now. If I revert back to TWRP next time at least I'll know what to do!
oohyeah said:
Thank you everyone for your input!
I'm happily back on CWM right now. If I revert back to TWRP next time at least I'll know what to do!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
None of your blunders has anything to do with TWRP.
khaytsus said:
None of your blunders has anything to do with TWRP.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OK let me get something straight.
Obviously, the factory resetting that wiped out all internal storage (the original point of the thread) has nothing to do with TWRP, and I never said it did. On this point though, I'm surprised that it doesn't seem to be more well known that a factory reset would do wipe out all your data (did several searches and only found 'confirmations' that your internal SD data would be left untouched), though I'm glad that I know it now.
The suggestions on different ways to boot into recovery were helpful, though I believe that I would still have encountered the dead android, or would I not have?
What's certainly still not clear to me though is regarding the problem of not being able to boot into recovery and getting the dead android with the exclamation/triangle. After the first few replies, I expected to hear that this was NOT meant to be the case and that I did something wrong in the process or whatever.
However, what I seemed to get was that this is the expected behavior, and what I needed to have done was to "get rid of /system/etc/install-recovery.sh".
So let me ask these questions for clarification:
1. Is the dead android normal, given what I did/didn't do?
2. Is deleting /system/etc/install-recovery.sh part of the process of installing TWRP in order to be able to boot into recovery?
3. Would I also need to get rid of /system/etc/install-recovery.sh if using CWM?
(so far it doesn't seem to. After installing CWM I'm not getting the dead android and I didn't delete the install-recovery.sh).
Thanks. And just to be clear, I hope no one takes it the wrong way that I'm bashing TWRP or anything, because I"m not. Just been a long time user of CWM and this is the first time using TWRP and encountering the dead android.
oohyeah said:
So let me ask these questions for clarification:
1. Is the dead android normal, given what I did/didn't do?
2. Is deleting /system/etc/install-recovery.sh part of the process of installing TWRP in order to be able to boot into recovery?
3. Would I also need to get rid of /system/etc/install-recovery.sh if using CWM?
(so far it doesn't seem to. After installing CWM I'm not getting the dead android and I didn't delete the install-recovery.sh).
Thanks. And just to be clear, I hope no one takes it the wrong way that I'm bashing TWRP or anything, because I"m not. Just been a long time user of CWM and this is the first time using TWRP and encountering the dead android.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Dead android = stock recovery, so normal there.
When you flash a custom recovery on a stock ROM, there is a file, /system/etc/install-recovery.sh, or I actually prefer just renaming /system/recovery-from-boot.p, which will automatically verify your recovery image and restore it to stock if it doesn't match. So you must always remove this file, or the ROM will restore the stock recovery on boot.
TWRP makes it easy to remove either file by mounting /system in read-write mode and using its built-in file manager to remove it. You can do the same in CWM using adb.
As for point 3, yes, try to reboot into recovery again. If you didn't remove (either file), you'll find stock recovery again.
Thanks, Khaytsus. I booted into recovery (long press power button, reboot menu, recovery), and it booted straight into CWM, like it always has with my other devices. (And to confirm, I have not even looked for the install-recovery.sh file, let alone removed or renamed it.)
So far it seems to me that TWRP requires removal of install-recovery.sh, whereas CWM does not, but this doesn't seem to be what you guys are telling me is supposed to be the case.
oohyeah said:
Thanks, Khaytsus. I booted into recovery (long press power button, reboot menu, recovery), and it booted straight into CWM, like it always has with my other devices. (And to confirm, I have not even looked for the install-recovery.sh file, let alone removed or renamed it.)
So far it seems to me that TWRP requires removal of install-recovery.sh, whereas CWM does not, but this doesn't seem to be what you guys are telling me is supposed to be the case.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It really depends on what ordering you do your actions in.
/system/etc/install-recovery.sh doesn't exist on a stock factory shipped system.
It only gets put in place after you install an OTA. If you do all your upgrades using the factory images, you'll never encounter it.
What it does is during your boot process, it will check to see if your recovery is different than what it expects (ie stock). If so, it will install stock recovery by taking the stock kernel and patching it.
If any of the following are true, it will not overwrite your recovery:
/system/etc/install-recovery.sh is missing (or modified to not run as the original file)
/system/recovery-from-boot.p is missing
you are not running the stock kernel
The most common way for install-recovery.sh to be missing is you always used factory images.
The most common way for install-recovery.sh to be modified to not do the original function is if you installed SuperSU. It will overwrite install-recovery.sh with its own.
So in all the back and forth, it is quite possible you got rid of install-recovery.sh or had it modified simply by installing root.
If you then subsequently installed custom recovery, it would stay in place.
Previously you were installing TWRP and flashing it onto the tablet, but upon booting into android, install-recovery.sh realized it wasn't stock recovery, and overwrote TWRP with stock recovery.
That is why whenever you rebooted, you got fallen android (which is stock recovery)
If the way you installed cwm is to use "fastboot flash recovery cwm.img" then the only reason it is around is because something else you did got rid of or modified install-recovery.sh. cwm would be no more immune to install-recovery.sh than twrp was.
oohyeah said:
Oh one more thing, I think I lost root after the factory reset!!
I checked my All Apps and SuperSu wasn't there anymore. Just rooted it again using Wug kit.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just to clarify, you didn't lose root. You just lost the supersu app, a root permission manager, because it was installed to your /data partition. The su binary was still in /system, all you would have had to do was install supersu from the market.
I'm not sure what else you were expecting from a "factory reset"
creaturemachine said:
I'm not sure what else you were expecting from a "factory reset"
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you read the thread? He explained his reason for expectation quite well.
I just started up on a Nexus 4, and was also surprised to see this. Coming from a Galaxy S2, the "sdcard" being left intact was pretty convenient when flashing from ROM to ROM. Albeit, leading to some messiness. When did Nexus change to this behavior?
Skaziwu said:
I just started up on a Nexus 4, and was also surprised to see this. Coming from a Galaxy S2, the "sdcard" being left intact was pretty convenient when flashing from ROM to ROM. Albeit, leading to some messiness. When did Nexus change to this behavior?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Depending on which level you are looking at, it didn't really change the behavior, but rather how your data is organized.
Factory reset has always wiped out /data.
On older devices, they put the /sdcard in a separate partition and formatted fat32.
These are the ones that were surviving a factory reset.
On newer devices, the internal /sdcard is starting to migrate onto a directory in /data and the "sdard" you see is "virtual". Since it is on /data, when you wipe data, the virtual sdcard is also wiped.
Some recoveries try to simulate the previous behavior by doing a "rm" of every directory except the virtual sdard when you choose to wipe, instead of the erase/format that Android is doing.
The advantage of keeping the sdcard as a directory under /data is you don't need to decide how much space to split between the sdcard and your /data. Also permissions on files are more flexible being in an ext4 filesystem. Finally since everything is emulated and accessed via MTP, you don't need to unmount the filesystem, so your PC can access it.
There are also cons with this approach, but that is what Google is going with.
Hi,
I'm currently using the Skipsoft Android Toolkit to unlock flash TWRP onto my device. I've followed to first steps (install drivers, backup device and unlock bootloader) to the letter and everything went smooth.
Now the final part of installing TWRP is not going so well. Flashing the custom recovery works as expected and I end up in the TWRP menu. However, as soon as I reboot my phone and try to go back to the recovery via Advanced Reboot --> recovery, I end up in the default One Plus Recovery Menu. Now the tool mentioneds when this process fails, renaming the Recovery Restore Files is recommend to prevent the system from flashing the stock recovery on boot (what happens to my device). I follow this option in which I end up back in TWRP, flash a zip named 'permanent-recovery.zip' (while read only mode is turned off in TWRP) and reboot my device. Still when I use Advanced Reboot to open recovery, I end up once again in the Stock Recovery.
Is there anyone who could tell me where I am going wrong and how to solve this issue?
Thanks in advance
Rawrden said:
Hi,
I'm currently using the Skipsoft Android Toolkit to unlock flash TWRP onto my device. I've followed to first steps (install drivers, backup device and unlock bootloader) to the letter and everything went smooth.
Now the final part of installing TWRP is not going so well. Flashing the custom recovery works as expected and I end up in the TWRP menu. However, as soon as I reboot my phone and try to go back to the recovery via Advanced Reboot --> recovery, I end up in the default One Plus Recovery Menu. Now the tool mentioneds when this process fails, renaming the Recovery Restore Files is recommend to prevent the system from flashing the stock recovery on boot (what happens to my device). I follow this option in which I end up back in TWRP, flash a zip named 'permanent-recovery.zip' (while read only mode is turned off in TWRP) and reboot my device. Still when I use Advanced Reboot to open recovery, I end up once again in the Stock Recovery.
Is there anyone who could tell me where I am going wrong and how to solve this issue?
Thanks in advance
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The basic "mechanics" of what happens seems to still be as follows:
As your phone is delivered with Stock OS, it has these two files installed:
Code:
/system/recovery-from-boot.p
/system/etc/install-recovery.sh
I know from looking at mine when I got it that it had /system/recovery-from-boot.p installed. If it's there, it is run when it runs at boot.
To stop that behavior you have to get rid of those files before you reboot the first time from recovery or else recovery will be replaced with the stock image. I'm aware that supposedly the custom recovery supposedly renames either one or the other or both of these but am not convinced it does this or whether installing root (either Magisk or SuperSU) does it. Either way, since you're stuck with the problem, either from file-manager in TWRP if that's all you can boot to, you need to rename /system/recovery-from-boot.p to something like /system/recovery-from-boot.p.orig and maybe the other one /system/etc/install-recovery.sh to /system/etc/install-recovery.sh.orig as well.
Once even the .p file is gone, it's not going to rewrite recovery. You must, of course, be rooted before you can touch those files although if you can sideboot TWRP, it seems like you are rooted while it is booted and "should" have access to system files if you can mount system rw.
I've fixed it this way on other phones. On this one, installing the "official" TWRP and Magisk did it. When I booted into /system after installing Magisk, I looked for the .p file and found it renamed to /system/recovery-from-boot.bak.
I found a link for a Samsung s8 for the same purpose. It's probably identical. http://www.teamandroid.com/2017/04/25/install-galaxy-s8-twrp-310-recovery/3/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I looked into those two files while in TWRP and noticed I only had the recovery-from-boot.p file. This was already in fact renamed to recovery-from-boot.p.bak. I renamed it once again (just to be sure) and after flashing the .zip I mentioned earlier, the TWRP did not last another reboot...
Can I after flashing TWRP again, immediately flash Magsik? I intended to hold off rooting because the rom I was going to install has Magisk build into it. I don't want to create a conflict when flashing later on. Is this going to be an issue?
@hachamacha I've reread your post and wondering if rooting my device is even going to make a difference right now? Since I'm already able to rename files in the system directory, would it even make a difference?
Rawrden said:
I looked into those two files while in TWRP and noticed and only had the recovery-from-boot.p file. This was already in fact renamed to record-from-boot.p.bak. I renamed it once again (just to be sure) and after flashing the .zip I mentioned earlier, the TWRP did not last another reboot...
Can I after flashing TWRP again, immediately flash Magsik? I intended to hold off rooting because the rom I was going to install has Magisk build into it. I don't want to create a conflict when flashing later on. Is this going to be an issue?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To me, it doesn't sound like a conflict to re-install Magisk over itself in FOS and see if that helps. The real "action" that counts is all about whether you've already booted into the OS after installing TWRP and then how you go about getting rid of the .p file without doing a regular reboot via the OS. Even installing the FOS ROM should get rid of the .p file (rename it), so something else is going on. I'll look around some more and update this if I can.
By the way: Depending upon how exactly you got from TWRP to the OS the first time, it could already have rewritten the stock recovery by the time you noticed *.p file renamed to *.bak.
OK: I recalled how I did this without a problem: I wrote instructions somewhere but have no idea where. This is what I think I did:
1) fastboot flash recovery recovery.img (custom/TWRP)
2) fastboot boot recovery.img (so force it to load recovery without a traditional reboot).
3) install ROM from that point and after done just hit the reboot button (or install Magisk from that point and hit reboot).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
---------- Post added at 09:26 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:59 AM ----------
Rawrden said:
@hachamacha I've reread your post and wondering if rooting my device is even going to make a difference right now? Since I'm already able to rename files in the system directory, would it even make a difference?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just saw this note:
Anytime you're in TWRP, you're automatically "rooted" for the time you're there. It's integral to TWRP having permissions to do anything like install etc. If you just "loaded" TWRP (as in fastboot boot twrprecovery.img) then you'd be rooted, but when you rebooted to the system, you'd be unrooted. While you were in TWRP, in theory you could make file system changes to the /system partition (a) if TWRP lets you mount it rw which I think that first swipe does and b) if you can see the correct files in it's file manager.
So it "seems" like those file changes should be actual file changes to the correct place. Keep in mind that while booted in TWRP, TWRP may have it's own ./system/ that has nothing to do with the OS's ./system folder, so you've got to be able to mount the OS's ./system. TWRP's ./system is already fine and of no importance for this. I can boot mine into TWRP and look around to try to clear this up, but it might not be crystal clear to me either.
The output of a TWRP terminal emulator "mount" command might be of use but it will be messy. Maybe if you can do this in emulator from TWRP:
# mount | grep system, and look at that output, perhaps put it in this post, it'd be of help. The mounted rw ./system we need is going to be the same one you'd see from adb shell or terminal emulator while booted from the OS. My guess is that the one we don't want from TWRP's perspective will be mounted as /system (params...) and that the the OS's system either will not yet be mounted and you'll have to go to mounts and mount it and then look at the output of the mount cmd again to figure out what it was mounted as. Sorry about how complicated this explanation has become. Anyway: The ./system that corresponds to the OS is the only one we care about.
There's no easy way to explain it so I'll leave it hidden to spare anyone having to look at it:
I just booted into TWRP and used terminal emulator and file manager to explore:
findings: While in TWRP, using terminal emulator to do a
$ df and then a $ mount command shows no ./system mounted specifically. // maybe not a surprise.
// TWRP just mounts it's root / file system and there is a /system folder, just not a specific mount point for it.
// TWRP does not auto mount the OS's ./system partition by default. It depends what you're going to do there.
Without going into "mounts" and clicking on /system, it won't even try to mount /system for the OS.
If you can get that mount to work in read/write mode, then you should be able to see the ./system mount using terminal emulator as such.
$ mount | grep -i system (and look specifically for ./system on the right side of whatever appears).
In theory you should be able to make changes to the OS's /system partition now. When you're done, unmount it. (I'm assuming all this works from TWRP, a dodgy assumption)
At this point: I'm just trying to figure out how TWRP does things like installs OS zips to the /system & /data partitions which it is clearly successfully able to do. It could do it without mounting anything because it could use the linux dd command, which just writes to the /dev name. OR: It could mount /system and use it. I'm not sure which.
hachamacha said:
OK: I recalled how I did this without a problem: I wrote instructions somewhere but have no idea where. This is what I think I did:
Quote:
Code:
1) fastboot flash recovery recovery.img (custom/TWRP)
2) fastboot boot recovery.img (so force it to load recovery without a traditional reboot).
3) install ROM from that point and after done just hit the reboot button (or install Magisk from that point and hit reboot).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I followed these steps and I managed to install FreedomOS without any issues. My phone booted normally and after a few complimentary steps I booted back into recovery and... TWRP! No more stock recovery. Thanks a lot!
Just one more question: TWRP currently asks whether it is allowed to install itself as a system app. Now I assume it is already a system app, but I'm not expert at this so I can't say for sure. Would you recommend me to install TWRP as a system app?
Rawrden said:
I followed these steps and I managed to install FreedomOS without any issues. My phone booted normally and after a few complimentary steps I booted back into recovery and... TWRP! No more stock recovery. Thanks a lot!
Just one more question: TWRP currently asks whether it is allowed to install itself as a system app. Now I assume it is already a system app, but I'm not expert at this so I can't say for sure. Would you recommend me to install TWRP as a system app?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Great! Glad that worked. I guess it's all about how that first boot to the OS occurs.
Anyway: Your question, I'm assuming is about TWRP "Manager" the app? If so, yes, it should be a system app. The thing is that "Official TWRP Manager" doesn't really do much of use that you wouldn't just as soon do from fastboot, so it's not critical and nothing other than TWRP manager will "not work" regardless of what you designate it. All saying it's a system app does is puts a slot for it in Magisks "root table".
Cheers.
hachamacha said:
Great! Glad that worked. I guess it's all about how that first boot to the OS occurs.
Anyway: Your question, I'm assuming is about TWRP "Manager" the app? If so, yes, it should be a system app. The thing is that "Official TWRP Manager" doesn't really do much of use that you wouldn't just as soon do from fastboot, so it's not critical and nothing other than TWRP manager will "not work" regardless of what you designate it. All saying it's a system app does is puts a slot for it in Magisks "root table".
Cheers.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Done! Can I just say how grateful I am to you for helping me out with this? Your answers have been extremely detailed and I've learned quite a few things. Unfortunately I can only thank your posts once, because you've earned more than that. Thanks again and keep being awesome!