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Hi mates,
When we are flashing a Custom Rom from the CWM, we are normally instructed by the Devs only to do few steps on CWM like “Wipe Data/Factory Data Reset, Wipe Cache etc.. which we simply follow, but most of the people don’t know, including me, what these options and many other options of CWM are really standing for.
When I googled, I could not find a thread which explains about these options in a single thread, so I would like to share with my friends about what I found the Common Options of the CWM here...
Obviously these are commonly applicable for all the devices which are having CWM, but I am always concern about my favorite Galaxy S II.
People who are completely new to Recovery and these options, I suggest them to read this thread first and give a thanks to it's author.
What Is Recovery & Download Mode?
The oder and segregation of the below items in the CWM menu may vary or some of them may be removed in different custom recoveries designed by respective Developer.
CLOCKWORKMODE BASED RECOVERY MENU
1) Reboot Menu :
reboot system now
This one is self-explanatory.
2) Install Menu :
choose zip from (internal/ external) sdcard /
Lets you install any zip file (with any name) from any location on your SD card. The file can be for a ROM, a kernel, an application, a theme or any mod as long as it is in recovery-flashable zip format.
apply /sdcard/update.zip
This one is essentially the same as the ‘apply update from sdcard’ option of the main menu. widely used option for installing a ROM that you have downloaded and copied to your SD card. Entering this option will bring up a screen that will allow you to browse your SD card for the zip file.
apply update from sdcard
This can be used for installation of any official or unofficial update, ROM, kernel, theme etc. that is in a zip format installable from recovery, as long as the file is named update.zip and it has been placed on the root of your SD card (i.e. not in any sub-folder). Selecting this option will bring up a rather annoying confirmation prompt but this has saved us on multiple occasions from a lot of trouble we would have been into due to accidental key presses.
toggle signature verification
Turns the signature verification on and off. When signature verification is on, you will not be able to install any custom ROMs that haven’t been signed by the developers (most custom ROMs aren’t signed). Switching it off skips the signature verification check and proceeds with the installation.
toggle script asserts
Seldom-used option for a vast majority of users. It simply turns script asserts on or off. If you don’t know about these (I don’t), it’s best not to change this option.
3) Wipe Menu
wipe data/factory reset
This option wipes all user data on the device as well as cache. Doing this will leave your phone in the state it was in when you bought it or when any custom ROM was first installed. It will also wipe any sd-ext partition that you might have setup. (see more about sd-ext below under partition)
wipe cache partition
This is a good practice to do this before flashing any ROM. The /cache partition just stores temporary files that are not critical to device operation and can be re-generated easily, this Wipes the cache partition of the device to clear all the data accumulated there over use. This is often used before installing a new ROM, app, kernel or any similar mod via recovery.
Wipe Dalvik Cache
Allows you to wipe the cache for the Dalvik virtual machine. The dalvik cache wipe is quite similar to cache wipe but it stores the post ran java applications. Since Android is JAVA based, it uses the same java virtual machine for compiling. The dalvik cache just stores post-compiled applications in order to speed up the system. Wiping this just forces the system to re-cache those application. It causes no problems but a slight hint of lag on first boot. This is required before most ROM installations and at other occasions too, for fixing some problems.
Wipe Battery Stats
Wipes the saved battery usage statistics and effectively recalibrates the battery. Useful in various scenarios when Android isn’t showing correct battery levels.
4) Nandroid menu
backup and restore Undoubtedly one of the most important features provided by a custom recovery, the backup and restore feature – also known as Nandroid backup – allows you to take a snapshot of your phone’s entire internal memory including all partitions, and save it on the SD card.
Backup
Takes a Nandroid backup, as explained above.
Restore
Lets you restore a previously taken backup. Entering this option presents you with a list of existing backups from the SD card that you can choose from for restoration.
Advanced Restore (new options are available separately to restore from external or internal SDcard in the latest CWM)
This option is similar to the Restore option but once a backup has been selected to be restored, this option allows you to choose what parts of it to restore. You can choose to restore the boot, system, data, cache and sd-ext partitions.
5) Storage menu
mounts and storage
Allows you to perform maintenance tasks on all the internal and external partitions of your android device
mount/unmount /system, /data, /cache, /sdcard, /emmc.
These options let you toggle between mounting or unmounting these respective partitions. Most users don’t need to change these options.
format system, data, cache, sdcard or sd-ext
These let you directly format any of these partitions. Take extreme care with this option as formatting any of these partitions will result in losing all data on them, especially the boot and system partitions. Formatting the system partition will remove your ROM and leave your phone without an operating system while wiping the boot partition may brick your phone unless you restore or flash another one before rebooting your device. See below more explanation about these partitions.
mount USB storage
Lets you enable USB mass storage mode for your SD card right from recovery so that you can connect it to your computer via USB and transfer any files to/from it without having to leave recovery.
6) Advanced
This section contains a few options most users will not require, Here are the options from this section:
Report Error
In case of errors, this feature can be used to save a log of recent ClockworkMod recovery operations on the SD card that you can later report from Android using ROM Manager.
Key Test
Lets you press any of the hardware keys to see if they are properly functioning, and to see their key codes.
Partition SD Card
This option gives you a no-frills way to partition your SD card properly for use with ROMs that support data2ext (a very handy hack for low internal memory devices that enables an /sd-ext partition on the SD card to be used as the internal user data storage i.e. as the /data partition). Once this option is selected, you will be given options to choose the sizes for the /sd-ext partition as well as an optional /swap partition on the SD card, and will then automatically format it for you, leaving the remaining space for normal SD card usage. This option will wipe all data from your SD card so use it with caution!
Fix Permissions
Fixes the file permissions for the internal memory partitions back to default. This is very useful as a fix for several errors and Force-Closes that start appearing after you or an application you installed and provided root access end up messing up the permissions of important files.
PARTITIONS :
The Android uses several partitions to organize files and folders on the device. Each of these partitions has a distinct role in the functionality of the device, but not many Android users know the significance of each partition and its contents. In this guide, we will take you on a tour of Android partitions, what they contain and what can be the possible consequences of modifying their content.
Let’s start with a list of standard internal memory partitions on Android phones and tablets. These are:
• /boot
• /system
• /recovery
• /data
• /cache
• /misc
In addition, there are the SD card partitions.
• /sdcard
• /sd-ext
Note that only /sdcard is found in all Android devices and the rest are present only in select devices. Let’s now take a look at the purpose and contents of each of these partitions.
/boot
This is the partition that enables the phone to boot, as the name suggests. It includes the bootloader and the kernel. Without this partition, the device will simply not be able to boot. Wiping this partition from recovery should only be done if absolutely required and once done, the device must NOT be rebooted before installing a new one, which can be done by installing a ROM that includes a /boot partition.
/system
This partition basically contains the entire operating system, other than the kernel and the bootloader. This includes the Android user interface as well as all the system applications that come pre-installed on the device. Wiping this partition will remove Android from the device without rendering it unbootable, and you will still be able to put the phone into recovery or bootloader mode to install a new ROM.
/recovery
The recovery partition can be considered as an alternative boot partition that lets you boot the device into a recovery console for performing advanced recovery and maintenance operations on it. We have already learnt about this partition and its contents above.
/data
Also called userdata, the data partition contains the user’s data – this is where your contacts, messages, settings and apps that you have installed go. Wiping this partition essentially performs a factory reset on your device, restoring it to the way it was when you first booted it, or the way it was after the last official or custom ROM installation. When you perform a wipe data/factory reset from recovery, it is this partition that you are wiping.
/cache
This is the partition where Android stores frequently accessed data and app components. Wiping the cache doesn’t effect your personal data but simply gets rid of the existing data there, which gets automatically rebuilt as you continue using the device.
/misc
This partition contains miscellaneous system settings in form of on/off switches. These settings may include CID (Carrier or Region ID), USB configuration and certain hardware settings etc. This is an important partition and if it is corrupt or missing, several of the device’s features will will not function normally.
/sdcard
This is not a partition on the internal memory of the device but rather the SD card. In terms of usage, this is your storage space to use as you see fit, to store your media, documents, ROMs etc. on it. Wiping it is perfectly safe as long as you backup all the data you require from it, to your computer first. Though several user-installed apps save their data and settings on the SD card and wiping this partition will make you lose all that data.
On devices with both an internal and an external SD card – devices like the Samsung Galaxy SII – the /sdcard partition is always used to refer to the internal SD card. For the external SD card – if present – an alternative partition is used, which differs from device to device. In case of Samsung Galaxy S series devices, it is /sdcard/External_sd while in many other devices, it is /sdcard2. Unlike /sdcard, no system or app data whatsoever is stored automatically on this external SD card and everything present on it has been added there by the user. You can safely wipe it after backing up any data from it that you need to save.
/sd-ext
This is not a standard Android partition, but has become popular in the custom ROM scene. It is basically an additional partition on your SD card that acts as the /data partition when used with certain ROMs that have special features called APP2SD+ or data2ext enabled. It is especially useful on devices with little internal memory allotted to the /data partition. Thus, users who want to install more programs than the internal memory allows can make this partition and use it with a custom ROM that supports this feature, to get additional storage for installing their apps. Wiping this partition is essentially the same as wiping the /data partition – you lose your contacts, SMS, market apps and settings.
Now whenever we install a ROM or mod that requires we to wipe certain partitions before the installation, we should be in a better position to know what we are losing and what not and thus, we’ll know what to backup and what not.
Best Regards
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1134290
Yep. Been done before a long time ago. Tho I do admire your initiative in putting the info together
Stifler69 said:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1134290
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Click to collapse
No Doubt this one should be on the top of this thread,
What a simple and awesome explanation about the Recovery & Download mode, many thanks to pulser_g2
I know, majority of users only need the simple steps and shortcuts, they don’t care what’s happening internally and theoretically, but some are really curious to know…
Many thanks mate....
zaheedahmed said:
No Doubt this one should be on the top of this thread,
What a simple and awesome explanation about the Recovery & Download mode, many thanks to pulser_g2
I know, majority of users only need the simple steps and shortcuts, they don’t care what’s happening internally and theoretically, but some are really curious to know…
Many thanks mate....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nah mate you do what you have to do. It is a good thread and provides good information. Nice work. Just wanted to show you Pulsers thread as well though because he has done something similar to yours long time ago..But anyway good work and if you need any help let me know
Thanks, will save later text in PDF and keep it on PC just to have one more tutorial about things
Awesome write up!! Brilliant!
As you are so knowledgeable about CWM, perhaps I can ask you a question?
When I do a backup, it says that no external SD card was found, so it skipped the external?
When I check under mounts, the only option for the external SD card is to UNmount.... This would suggest that the card is mounted, correct?
So how would I go about backing up the external card too?
Thanks!
Sent from my SGH-I727R using xda premium
Question, if i do nandroid backhp through CWM, i suppose it saves files that i dl such as apps/games, or i need to download later again 600mb+?
Sent by powaaaaah of GT-I9100 Taparatatatalk!
shaggyskunk said:
Awesome write up!! Brilliant!
As you are so knowledgeable about CWM, perhaps I can ask you a question?
When I do a backup, it says that no external SD card was found, so it skipped the external?
When I check under mounts, the only option for the external SD card is to UNmount.... This would suggest that the card is mounted, correct?
So how would I go about backing up the external card too?
Thanks!
Sent from my SGH-I727R using xda premium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you for your appreciation,
I would like to express once again as I mentioned in the starting of the thread that this is only a humble effort of the undersigne that I searched for such information and combined at one place here....
As far as I know about your problem of SD card storage, this is a compatibility issiue which varries on one custom recovery to another, also one SD card to another. such issues are fixed by developers in their latest versions of recoveries.
I experienced once the same issue which was resolved when I changed my SD card.
And my current (touch) recovery of Redpill v1.3 allows me to Backup and restore from external SD card with all available options flowlessly.
Thanks
X-Plosiv said:
Question, if i do nandroid backhp through CWM, i suppose it saves files that i dl such as apps/games, or i need to download later again 600mb+?
Sent by powaaaaah of GT-I9100 Taparatatatalk!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Between CWM & Titanium, you should not have to download anything.
Sent From my Two Tin Cans & String Device on The Wookie Network
X-Plosiv said:
Question, if i do nandroid backhp through CWM, i suppose it saves files that i dl such as apps/games, or i need to download later again 600mb+?
Sent by powaaaaah of GT-I9100 Taparatatatalk!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Of course it backs up all your installed apps and system data along with the ROM, but it do not back up the additional data which is downloaded and stored in User's partition of your SD card by the applications, such data will remain on your SD card untill you format it, available to support your apps when you return to the previous ROM.
awsome eplanation
as above posts say awsome explinationculdnt b clearer now then all
zaheedahmed said:
Of course it backs up all your installed apps and system data along with the ROM, but it do not back up the additional data which is downloaded and stored in User's partition of your SD card by the applications, such data will remain on your SD card untill you format it, available to support your apps when you return to the previous ROM.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, but when I do format/wipe all, I guess then it deletes all that is on SD card as well, such as game files and music? If so, I'd rather just copy paste it on my PC, then after doing all wipes and formats, just copy back from PC
Zaheed, you are far too humble! Your post was brilliant, informative & timely.
Sent From my Two Tin Cans & String Device on The Wookie Network
X-Plosiv said:
Yes, but when I do format/wipe all, I guess then it deletes all that is on SD card as well, such as game files and music? If so, I'd rather just copy paste it on my PC, then after doing all wipes and formats, just copy back from PC
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When you do normal wipes (data/ factory reset, cache, dalvik) before installing/restoring ROM, it won't touch any data which is saved in your SD Card normally, but it is more safer if you back such application data to you PC which normally find in a folder "Android/ Data /xxx" in the root of SDcard
Thanks for info.
I have read a lot on this but am still nor clear whether a wipe data/factory reset includes a full cache wipe. Most rom install instructions tell you to do both, but it seems a wipe cache is redundant if you factory reset.
SimboXXX said:
Thanks for info.
I have read a lot on this but am still nor clear whether a wipe data/factory reset includes a full cache wipe. Most rom install instructions tell you to do both, but it seems a wipe cache is redundant if you factory reset.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, you are right, I also understand the same, but the option for merely wiping cache is kept for using in some odd situations, like when we fingered to the ROM and got some error, then we got a no-wipe version of the existing ROM to reflash, such case we need only to wipe cache…. I have got an error recently on CWM when I reflashed my no-wipe Checkrom v6 without wiping anything, then I wiped only cache, problem solved…..
what ever may be the theory, do as the developers directed for their ROM…..NO RISK
shaggyskunk said:
Zaheed, you are far too humble! Your post was brilliant, informative & timely.
Sent From my Two Tin Cans & String Device on The Wookie Network
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thanks mate...
Thanks for the thread, you can never know too much. On second thoughts, there's probably no danger of that.
What would be really good if you have the knowledge, is a detailed guide on CWM Edify scripting. I'm sure many people would find that useful, especially me. There doesn't seem to be a lot of good guides or information on the language, at least I can't find them yet. If you have any good links I'd definitely appreciate it as well.
Here's another bit of information, that answered a question I had....
In case anyone else has this question...
Here is the answer from:
http://android.stackexchange.com/qu...ter-no-sd-ext-found-skipping-backup-of-sd-ext
" This means you do not have an ext3/4 partition on your sdcard. This really ins't a big deal, this is like a legacy part of the nandroid backup process. CM doesn't "officially" support the sd-ext partition any more anyhow."
Hope it helps someone else... In the end, the answer is pretty straight forward.
Sent From my Two Tin Cans & String Device on The Wookie Network
Sent from Down The Rabbit Hole, using Tapatalk 2
My Nook Simple Touch (1.1.2) is now not working because I wiped ALL the partitions before attempting to restore a backup (which I didnt know was bad at the time)
Notes
1. I have two backups:
a) the first is 239mb which contains my ebooks and pdfs
b) the second is the boot partition (77mb) - I backed up again when when noogie was on micro SD
2. So basically (both backups) I backed up the NST without selecting the whole physical drive.
3. After a failed root, I tried to restore the backup (and seeing it fail), I decided to wipe the whole partition before attempting to restore again :crying:
4. Are there any restorable backup images that can be downloaded online? Or anything which can restore the partition table including the ROM partition with the serial address etc.
5. Please help me restore the Nook back to factory or any working state. Cos AFAIK i've bricked the device.
p.s. I have tried touchnooter and installed touchformatv2 but all I get now is a Read Forever load screen. N2Tsecurity doesnt work without the ROM partition.
Please Please Help Me Im so sad (I know this is down to carelessness on my part but I really need help)
Did you really wipe all the partitions (like write zeroes over the entire physical drive)?
Or did you just try to repartition it?
The question is whether you truly wiped out the /rom and /factory partitions.
Sometimes partitioning them correctly you can rediscover the file system.
The /rom partition is necessary, even ClockworkMod needs to be able to see it.
The /rom info is replicated in /factory/rombackup.zip
Renate's solution may work.
Also, there is a tool called testdisk available for linux that I've used to recover data and partition layouts before; I would expect that it may work a champ for situations like yours.
To use it, you would need a linux box or find a windows port and boot the NSTG or NST from the noogie disk.
Testdisk can recover deleted partitions automatically, including the all-important /rom partition.
That one's important because it contains device-specific info for your NST. It'll do it automatically, but you do need to read up on what commands to give it. You can also rebuild the table manually using fdisk (and I've done so successfully before.)
A windows file recovery utility might let you recover /rom as well (or the files from it.)
You most need the contents of /devconf, and there are lots of files there. I am not sure which ones are absolutely required.
I've been experiencing the dreaded "Low Internal Memory" problems on my HD2 running a MIUI GB ROM.
I was told this was because the included A2SD, well, sucks. I was advised to use Data2EXT instead. Since I wanted to start with a clean slate anyway, I decided it was time to completely wipe my HD2 and install everything anew. This is what I did:
Wiped the HD2 with Task29 (using the HD2 Toolkit)
Installed ClockworkModRecovery v1.3 150MB (I wasn't sure I actually used the 150MB version when I initially installed CWM Recovery)
Cleared data/cache with CWM Recovery
Reformatted the 1GB sd-ext partition on my SD Card (using MiniTool Partition Wizard)
Installed ROM with CWM Recovery (from zip)
Installed A2SDKiller scripts (from zip)
Rebooted phone into MIUI, but did not install anything.
Rebooted into CWM Recovery and installed the Data2SD Installer.
Rebooted into MIUI again
It seemed everything was fine. If I looked at my memory usage, instead of only 210 MB of total storage I had previously, I now had almost 1GB. I setup my Google account and started to install some apps. Somewhere along the line one of the apps hung the phone so I rebooted it again.
But when it was done rebooting, much to my surprise all installed apps were gone. In fact, the phone was behaving like it was the first time it was started (asking me for my Google credentials again, etc). At first I thought this was perhaps due to the hung app, so I did all the above steps again (including wiping the phone).
Again I installed a few apps, and this time I rebooted the phone to check if all was OK now. It wasn't. Again the phone behaved like it was the first time I booted into the new ROM and all installed apps were gone. I've tried about 5 times now and every single time with the same results.
So what could be wrong here?
just a thought (i havent checked, you can do that) but what type of ext did you create? ext2? ext3? ext4? perhaps data2sd (you called it data2ext in the title, data2sd in the post, , ,which is it? they're probably different) doesnt play nice with whichever one you created?
Hi, and thank you for your answer.
samsamuel said:
just a thought (i havent checked, you can do that) but what type of ext did you create? ext2? ext3? ext4?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ext3.
perhaps data2sd (you called it data2ext in the title, data2sd in the post, , ,which is it? they're probably different) doesnt play nice with whichever one you created?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm pretty sure they are the same (since took the installation procedure from this forum post and they call it both Data2Ext and Data2SD).
I will check to see if the filesystem matters. Thanks!
I just checked and ext3 should be fine.
Zippy1970 said:
I just checked and ext3 should be fine.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Check to see see if there's any script left from old method in system/etc/init.d
This is a complete guess but worth a try
EDIT: this is the script that the A2SD killer removes from system/etc/init.d
delete("/system/etc/init.d/40a2sd");
delete("/system/etc/init.d/03stuff2sd");
delete("/system/etc/init.d/10apps2sd");
delete("/system/etc/init.d/04apps2sd");
delete("/system/etc/init.d/01data2whatever");
delete("/system/etc/init.d/98zipalign");
delete("/system/etc/init.d/02cachedalvikcache");
So make sure that has been removed then try flash the new zip file
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium
wis1152 said:
Check to see see if there's any script left from old method in system/etc/init.d
So make sure that has been removed then try flash the new zip file
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, all those files have been deleted.
It seems to be working now. I wanted to test if changing the Ext3 partition to Ext2 would make any difference so I fired up MiniTool Partition Wizard again. I wiped the partition and formatted it as Ext2.
Or so I thought.
The partition still said it was Ext3. Then it hit me. I had forgotten that you actually have to "Apply" the changes, which I hadn't done before. So I clicked Apply and it wiped the partition and actually formatted it as Ext2.
I then redid the whole thing (install ROM & A2SDKiller scripts, reboot into ROM, reboot into CWM Recovery and installed Data2SD). And now it seems to be working fine.
Not sure which of the two actions on the Ext partition caused it to start working: the wipe or the change to Ext2.
I spoke too soon. I thought it was working since a reset didn't clear all my installed apps. But if I look at the total storage space, it's back to 216MB total. So it looks like Data2Ext isn't running...
*SIGH*
I'm just about to give up on Data2Ext. First of all, I thought I had figured out what was wrong. For some odd reason, whenever I tried to write to my 16GB microSD card on my computer using an SD adapter, it would crash every now and then. Also, partitioning through MiniTool Partition Wizard often resulted in a "Bad Disk" error. I tried this with 3 different 16GB microSD cards. All experienced the same problems when using an SD card adapter (it wasn't a broken SD adapter because I've tried several).
I then dug up an old external microSD USB card reader I had laying around. Using that, I was able to write to the microSD cards just fine and I didn't experience any problems partitioning either.
Speaking about partitioning, it took me a while to figure out that:
Partitioning through ClockWorkMod Recovery doesn't work properly. The FAT32 partition becomes incredibly slow, and the Ext partition is not recognized by Data2Ext
Ext3/Ext4 partitions don't work with Data2Ext. At least, not on my phone
Ext2 partitions only work if they are set as the primary partition
You must name the partition sd-ext or it will not work
Just a FYI for anyone finding this thread in the future.
Anyway, once I figured that out, I was finally able to get Data2Ext working. Sort of. Let me try to explain.
Previously after I had installed Data2Ext and setup some apps, a reboot of my phone would bring it back to a factory reset state. So all installed apps were gone, just like any settings I had altered. Oddly enough, if I looked at the sd-ext partition I could see the data was still there. It simply wasn't used by the phone. But after I had partitioned the sd-ext partition as Ext2, all was fine. A reboot didn't reset the phone back to factory settings.
So I happily reinstalled all my apps, restored my SMS as well as my WhatsApp backup and thought all was fine now. But I did notice the phone wasn't very stable. Every now and then it would become unresponsive for 10-20 seconds. Sometimes I got an error message that a certain app had become unresponsive and I was offered a choice to either shutdown the app or to wait. And sometimes, the phone would spontaneously reset itself.
Today the phone again became unresponsive. Oddly enough, long-pressing the power button did bring up the shutdown window. So I tapped "Shutdown". Next, the phone hung on "Shutting Down". It didn't come back to live. So I removed the battery lid and pressed the reset button.
After it had rebooted, I was greeted with a factory reset phone again. I was about to throw the phone through the window! But when I did another reboot, all my apps were back again as well as my settings. Except for the settings of my individual widgets. Those had all disappeared for some reason. Also, I got quite a few error messages that some apps had stopped unexpectedly. I rebooted again and again the phone behaved as if it were factory reset. But yet another reboot brought everything back...
I now suspect it has something to do with the phone not being able to mount sd-ext every now and then. Either way, my problems aren't solved yet so any tips are much appreciated.
Zippy1970 said:
*SIGH*
I'm just about to give up on Data2Ext. First of all, I thought I had figured out what was wrong. For some odd reason, whenever I tried to write to my 16GB microSD card on my computer using an SD adapter, it would crash every now and then. Also, partitioning through MiniTool Partition Wizard often resulted in a "Bad Disk" error. I tried this with 3 different 16GB microSD cards. All experienced the same problems when using an SD card adapter (it wasn't a broken SD adapter because I've tried several).
I then dug up an old external microSD USB card reader I had laying around. Using that, I was able to write to the microSD cards just fine and I didn't experience any problems partitioning either.
Speaking about partitioning, it took me a while to figure out that:
Partitioning through ClockWorkMod Recovery doesn't work properly. The FAT32 partition becomes incredibly slow, and the Ext partition is not recognized by Data2Ext
Ext3/Ext4 partitions don't work with Data2Ext. At least, not on my phone
Ext2 partitions only work if they are set as the primary partition
You must name the partition sd-ext or it will not work
Just a FYI for anyone finding this thread in the future.
Anyway, once I figured that out, I was finally able to get Data2Ext working. Sort of. Let me try to explain.
Previously after I had installed Data2Ext and setup some apps, a reboot of my phone would bring it back to a factory reset state. So all installed apps were gone, just like any settings I had altered. Oddly enough, if I looked at the sd-ext partition I could see the data was still there. It simply wasn't used by the phone. But after I had partitioned the sd-ext partition as Ext2, all was fine. A reboot didn't reset the phone back to factory settings.
So I happily reinstalled all my apps, restored my SMS as well as my WhatsApp backup and thought all was fine now. But I did notice the phone wasn't very stable. Every now and then it would become unresponsive for 10-20 seconds. Sometimes I got an error message that a certain app had become unresponsive and I was offered a choice to either shutdown the app or to wait. And sometimes, the phone would spontaneously reset itself.
Today the phone again became unresponsive. Oddly enough, long-pressing the power button did bring up the shutdown window. So I tapped "Shutdown". Next, the phone hung on "Shutting Down". It didn't come back to live. So I removed the battery lid and pressed the reset button.
After it had rebooted, I was greeted with a factory reset phone again. I was about to throw the phone through the window! But when I did another reboot, all my apps were back again as well as my settings. Except for the settings of my individual widgets. Those had all disappeared for some reason. Also, I got quite a few error messages that some apps had stopped unexpectedly. I rebooted again and again the phone behaved as if it were factory reset. But yet another reboot brought everything back...
I now suspect it has something to do with the phone not being able to mount sd-ext every now and then. Either way, my problems aren't solved yet so any tips are much appreciated.
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I have similiar problem before, The ext partition always failed. Now I used Extended TWRP to create the ext partition, it is stable now.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2120297
I can't get Data2Ext to work. I'm either getting tons of force close errors, or it's not seeing the sd-ext partition at all. I tried with Ext2/Ext3/Ext4 partitions (Ext3 didn't seem to work at all). With or without a swap partition. Nothing worked.
I also tried Data2ExtV2 and even DataOnExt. The result was always a ton of force close errors and a very unstable phone.
So anyone any ideas? It sucks only having 200MB of internal storage.
Hmmmm... That's odd. I just wiped my phone again (Task29), reinstalled MAGLDR, CWM Recovery (150MB) and my ROM without Data2Ext or anything and I'm getting the same force close errors and it's telling me I don't have enough internal storage to install apps.
So apparently there's something else going on with my phone?
What ROM are you using?
Try increasing system partition size!
Sent from my NexusHD2 using xda premium
shanman-2 said:
What ROM are you using?
Try increasing system partition size!
Sent from my NexusHD2 using xda premium
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Click to collapse
Actually, I found out it was because I used the wrong cache size this last time. So it's not the cause of all the other problems, but most certainly the cause of the problems this last time I flashed the ROM.
Ok, I've given up on Data2Ext. I can't get it to work. No matter what I try it's incredibly unstable and slow - if it works at all.
1. Make a backup of your SDCard.
2. Download EXTRecovery here.
3. Unzip it and place the 4EXTRecovery folder in the root of your SDCard.
4. Start MAGLDR, choose option 10, then 1, then 3 and select the folder (4EXT~), then boot from SD in the MAGLDR main menu.
5. In the 4EXTRecovery go to Advanced -> Partition SD Card -> Remove all partitions and start from scratch.
6. 1st sd-ext partition: 1024MB, skip 2nd sd-ext partition, SWAP partition is OPTIONAL, I recommend 256MB.
7. Press Yes and pick: "EXT4".
8. When it's finished, choose: "Print partitiontable" to check if it's actually there.
9. If it's there, go back to the main menu and press: "Install from SDCard".
10. Locate your ROM and install it.
Goodluck.
EDIT: Oh, I just read you've given up on it.. all this work for nothing, lol.
Ohwell, maybe I'm lucky and someone else stumbles upon this and can use it.
EDIT 2: Use DataOnEXT and have a /system size of about 285MB, 300-350MB if you have Bad Blocks!
EDIT 3: Try it with: "Jellybean 4.1.2" by Tytung, definitely works!
I rooted two nooks, and made tar backups of their partitions (I also got the dd image just in case). Out of curiosity, and with the goal of keeping minimal backup and increasing the partition for side-loaded contents to maximum, I tried to compare the contents of each partition. Since I followed the same process for rooting (Touch-Formatter v2, 1.2.1 update, NookManager, NTGAppsAttack - but before booting the Nook I got the backup), I guessed quite a lot of them are the same, and found some interesting results.
1. Boot partition is nearly the same except uRamdisk. I inspected the contents of the two uRamdisk files using bootutil by Renate, and they are identical.
-> Why are they different, and can one replace the other?
2. As we all know, rom partitions are different, but it looks only a few of them can meaningfully affect the operation. Anyway, it's small and I decided to leave them untouched and keep two separate copies.
-> What is the BCB file by the way? It just has zeroes inside. Is it automatically created if not there?
-> Some files in the devconf directory seem to be modified during the normal process or firmware update, notably BootCnt (four zero bytes), Bq275020Dffs (12 in the rombackup.zip, 13 after 1.2.1 update). What are these? Any idea?
3. The factory partition, I want to bust it (empty it up and resize it to the minimum), and let me know if I'm on a dangerous path. The idea is that I don't need rombackup.zip because I can revive the rom partition with my own tar backup if something bad happens, and it's out of date anyway after 1.2.1 update (some files in the rom partition are modified). Also, with Touch-Formatter and CWM, I wouldn't need the factory.zip file.
-> What are the files in the "touch" directory? One of my nook has them, but the other doesn't. Looking at the data inside they must be related to the display or touch screen. Maybe byproduct of calibration?
-> Can I use 1.2.1 update file with CWM instead of using Touch-Formatter, bringing it to a new fresh 1.2.1 Nook? According to this post, it seems possible.
4. The system partitions are identical, as expected. but with CWM recovery, we wouldn't need a backup of it, right?
5. The cache partition is way too big. I know the firmware update uses this space (when I resized it to something like 64MB, 1.2.1 update didn't work. I needed to increase it to something like 128MB to make it work). However, for normal operation, we surely don't need it that big.
-> How small can it be? I know it depends on individual's usage patterns... but in my case, I mostly use Nook for reading side-loaded contents. I've gone down to 32MB, but I guess that's still big.
-> Do we really need the cache partition? Can we just symlink it to somewhere in the data partition?
Out of curiosity, I just deleted BCB and BootCnt in the rom partition, and rebooted. First it said "Install Failed", a screen I have never seen before on Nook. So I looked into the rom partition and found that BCB file is recreated, but not BootCnt. On the subsequent boot, it said "Installing Rom", and then quickly rebooted. Now it's back to work. So, I guess these two files are essential for normal operation. Again, this time I deleted all files in the factory partition and also deleted BootCnt. Now, it tries to do the "Installing Rom" thing, but fell back to "Install Failed" screen. I opened up the rom partition again and I saw only BCB and BootCnt files, and none else. Nook surely formatted the rom partition first before trying to recreate it.
So I wonderfully bricked my Nook, and thought this is a good time to test if the rom partition backup works. I mounted the rom partition, untarred the backup, and rebooted. There we go, the Bronte Sisters are back. So the conclusion is that
1. When the BCB file's missing, it's simply recreated after a failed boot.
2. When the BootCnt file's missing, Nook thinks the rom partition is corrupted and tries to recreate it using rombackup.zip in the factory partition. I think this may have some side effects because firmware updates only change the files in the rom partition, leaving rombackup.zip untouched. So you will go back to the old rom partition after the built-in rom recovery.
3. The best rom recovery, I think, is using your manual backup of the rom partition. And maybe updating the rombackup.zip with a new one too?
BootCnt is a 32 bit little-endian count of the number of failed boots.
Once it hits eight your Nook will boot into the recovery image uRecImg, uRecRam.
You could also echo about anything to that file to make it arithmetically greater than 8.
Code:
echo 000 > /rom/devconf/BootCnt
That is 0x0a303030 > 8
Normally this is a B&N thing that asks you about factory restore.
If you replaced those two files it could be Clockwork Mod Recovery.
Hello
After in ulocked my nexus 4 bootloader i discovered that the data partition was wiped during the process. Because i forgot to save my photos i'm curently trying to recover thoses using apropriate tools.
So i made a backup of the data partition of my nexus 4 using "dd" (adb shell 'stty raw && dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p23' > ~/userdata.img)
I got the entire partition image and i tried data recovery tools as :
- foremost
- photorec
- magicrescue
unfortunately i did not found any deleted pictures or any usefull document and i dont realy understand why.
Thoses tools usualy find jpg images from formated gard drives or sd card and i already used theme in the past.
Can any one explain if the unlocking process wipes the data partition by overwriting the entire partition or anything like that ?
Sory for my lousy english