After setting up my wife's A7 and using it for three weeks, I have decided to open mine up. I waited because I wanted to see if CES had anything I wanted more. I decided they didn't.
So, I am starting from scratch again.
The main issue I've had with my wife's A7 has been the lack of storage space for apps, especially the big games.
Bazbob seems to have a solution by partioning the microSD card and using Apps2sd.
I took a new Class 10 16GB microSD card.
I downloaded and burned Ubuntu onto a CD from here: http://www.ubuntu.com/desktop/get-ubuntu/download
Put the card in my laptop, restarted it into Ubuntu.
Ran gparted.
Shrunk the Fat32 partition to just under 8GB and added another partion as ext2 primary.
When I restarted my laptop, my sd reader in the laptop doesn't work.
When I put it into the A7, it says the SD card has Total Space of 7.73GB.
At this point, I'm not sure what to do next.
Help is appreciated!
jazzbone said:
After setting up my wife's A7 and using it for three weeks, I have decided to open mine up. I waited because I wanted to see if CES had anything I wanted more. I decided they didn't.
So, I am starting from scratch again.
The main issue I've had with my wife's A7 has been the lack of storage space for apps, especially the big games.
Bazbob seems to have a solution by partioning the microSD card and using Apps2sd.
I took a new Class 10 16GB microSD card.
I downloaded and burned Ubuntu onto a CD from here: http://www.ubuntu.com/desktop/get-ubuntu/download
Put the card in my laptop, restarted it into Ubuntu.
Ran gparted.
Shrunk the Fat32 partition to just under 8GB and added another partion as ext2 primary.
When I restarted my laptop, my sd reader in the laptop doesn't work.
When I put it into the A7, it says the SD card has Total Space of 7.73GB.
At this point, I'm not sure what to do next.
Help is appreciated!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You needed to make a second partition EXT2 and format it. You then need to mount the partition. I did this by using the install-recovery.sh that it located in /system/etc. I used the following tutorial and it worked. I got over 12gb of space to install apps.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=832799
I did try to mount the new partition to /storage which is also /sdcard and i was still not able to use titanium backup to move apps. The only way i have alot of space is use this method.
I'm also mounting the fat32 partition to location /storage so that when i download apps thats where they are stored until you install them. Also Titanium backup dumps the backups here. This is done with a custom mod of Dexters 1.0c mod.
I did not use adb, i used a app called quicksshd which allows you secure ftp into the tablet and make changes. I suggest using a windows programs called winscp and putty.
Thanks for replying rfisher.
Turns out that my laptop lost the drive letter for the sd card. That's fixed now. When I insert the card into my laptop, it says that you need to format the card in the drive to use it. Any idea why?
I am confused by your instructions.
You said
You needed to make a second partition EXT2 and format it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I did that. First partition is FAT 32, and second partition is EXT2, primary.
Maybe I didn't format the partition? I just created it.
I'll install busybox and see how far I can get with it.
With the other A7, I was never able to work with ADB.
This device really makes me feel like an idiot.
Still can't believe I was the first to get Google Apps working on my wife's tablet!
no adb
Well, the hours of frustration have returned...
I can't get adb running on my laptop.
I installed Android SDK.
When I type adb in the cmd window on my laptop, I get
"adb" is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file"
I have tried moving the ADK folder to c:\
and
to:
C:\Users\Bucks HP
No luck.
I added the path c:\android-sdk-windows\platform-tools
to the environment variables in my system properties.
My head is going to explode!
Well, I got adb working, I think...
Problem was in the cmd window. I had to change the path.
Now, I can't install busybox. I followed the instructions from the wiki.
When I type "adb push busybox /data/local"
it returns: cannot stat 'busybox' : no such file or directory.
I pasted the busybox file in the
C:\android-sdk-windows\platform-tools
folder.
Was that the right place for it?
Is the busybox file just a text file?
Also, mine is named busybox-armv6l
Should it be renamed? I tried "adb push busybox-armv6l /data/local"
and got the same result...
I gave up on installing busybox via the wiki instructions.
I installed Titanium Backup and installed busybox through it.
Now, when I type: cd /system
mkdir sd
I get :
mkdir failed for sd, read-only file system
What does that mean and how do I fix it?
Thanks
The saga continues...
With the busybox from Titanium Backup installed,
I needed to type:
adb shell
su
mount -o remount,rw /dev/block/mmcblk3p1 /system
exit
exit
Then, following the tutorial, I am up to step 12:
12) Now comes the tricky part: making Android mount your new partition at boot time. All the hard work would be useless if Android discarded the mount points every time we restarted our phones. To do this we’ll need to create 2 scripts and store then into /system/etc. Obviously the scripts should be started by init.rc and need to run as root. Fortunately Android’s init.rc have a gap that makes this possible. The scripts are named install-recovery.sh and init-sd2.sh.
My question is: How do you create scripts?
You would create them with notepad++ which is a windows program. Then using adb push them to the /system/etc directory.
I used a app called quicksshd and a windows program called winscp to copy the files to the directory. If you used my method you first need to make the /system directory rw before it will let you copy the files. It worked for me, the only thing i did differently is edit init.rc to mount the first partition of the sd card to /storage, but this was creating a modded 1.0c rom. So the result is about 4gb for my sd memory and 12gb for installing apps.
jazzbone said:
The saga continues...
With the busybox from Titanium Backup installed,
I needed to type:
adb shell
su
mount -o remount,rw /dev/block/mmcblk3p1 /system
exit
exit
Then, following the tutorial, I am up to step 12:
12) Now comes the tricky part: making Android mount your new partition at boot time. All the hard work would be useless if Android discarded the mount points every time we restarted our phones. To do this we’ll need to create 2 scripts and store then into /system/etc. Obviously the scripts should be started by init.rc and need to run as root. Fortunately Android’s init.rc have a gap that makes this possible. The scripts are named install-recovery.sh and init-sd2.sh.
My question is: How do you create scripts?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi rfisher
Thanks for replying!
While waiting, I opened Notepad++, copied the text in the tutorial window into it and saved the file as Unix.
Then, I copied it to a USB drive, put it in the A7, and copied to the system/etc folder.
Is that acceptable?
Then, I followed steps 13-15.
I think I did something wrong. I am not seeing it in Root Explorer. What should I be looking for?
Was I supposed to install Apps2SD already?
I got winscp and quicksshd working. YEAH!
Used them to copy the files as you did.
Restarted A7.
Still don't see the other partition.
PS. I was just rereading your earlier post and you mentioned:
I did try to mount the new partition to /storage which is also /sdcard and i was still not able to use titanium backup to move apps. The only way i have alot of space is use this method.
I'm also mounting the fat32 partition to location /storage so that when i download apps thats where they are stored until you install them. Also Titanium backup dumps the backups here. This is done with a custom mod of Dexters 1.0c mod.
Looking on my A7, I don't see a location that is /storage
My tablet is fresh out of the box, without any firmware updates yet.
I'm having a very weird problem here. I decided to get USB OTG for my phone and flashed a zip that's has worked for me before. Everything worked fine, until I discovered that my SD card didn't mount. Root Explorer could find it fine, or at least the files from it in emulated/0 but ES File Explorer couldn't (both apps had Sdcard as a file in the root, with a toast appearing that told me it wasn't mounted when I tried clicking on it), nor could any app that needed internal storage for something (be it the camera, Play Store couldn't install apps and an emulator I have couldn't find the file/folder). I tried flashing the "recovery zip" from the thread (I will link to it) but that did nothing. TWRP could mount the SD card, unlike everything else though. In addition to that, all three file managers (Root Explorer, ES and TWRP's file manager) had conflicting stuff in the root directory. TWRP was able to mount SDcard, but couldn't find a folder named "storage" that the other two could. Root Explorer could also find the recovery zip that I moved to the root (since I wasn't able to download stuff, I had to use OTG to get it on the device), while the other two couldn't. Root explorer could also find the emulated/0 folder which contained all the files and folders from the SDcard. This is very strange and I haven't been able to find anything on this. Factory reset is my last resort, mainly because it takes so long for titanium backup to set up all the apps again .
Here's some info on my phone (before I flashed the USB OTG zip):
16GB Nexus 4
Beanstalk 4.4 ROM
Faux Kernel
Multi ROM Manager installed
TWRP as a custom recovery
Thread I keep talking about: http://forum.xda-developers.com/nexus-4/orig-development/usb-otg-externally-powered-usb-otg-t2181820
If you need any more info just ask!
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!
bump, please. I can't do a titanium backup, which means if I factory reset, I will lose everything. I have some good scores on some great game, might sound a little sad but I don't want to lose it, plus some other stuff that I've managed to accumulate that will piss me off if I lose it. Anyone?
Hi,
I've recently rooted my I9505 using Philz Touch recovery method, and I adjusted the platform.xml file to allow Titanium Backup to write direct to external SD. After rebooting, I get several "Unfortunately, xxx has stopped" for several apps. When I connect the phone via MTP the Card and Phone storage spaces both show remaining space, but are both empty, and if I open ES File Explorer and look in the /storage folder it's completely empty, which I assume is causing the problems with the apps as they can't find their stored files.
I've tried putting a backup copy of platform.xml back in /etc/permissions while in recovery, checked permissions on that file are set to 644, and even reflashed the same stock ROM back on the phone using Odin, but the errors continue.
Is there a way I can fix this without doing a wipe data/factory reset? I can get adb access as root in recovery if needed.
Thanks in advance!
B
Done a bit more testing this evening and if I do a factory reset and reflash to stock then everything works as normal. I then reflashed Philz Touch and did a custom nandroid restore of /data only, and the problem returned (the nandroid backup was taken after the issue started).
So the issue points to something in the /data rather than something in /system or elsewhere, if that helps anyone to diagnose?
After migrating back from f2fs to ext4 I found out I couldn't touch the files that I adb pushed back onto the device. The pictures I took with the stock camera app wouldn't save until I renamed the old DCIM folder, which caused it to create a new one and proceeded to work normally. How can I make my files and folders writeable again? ES shows that all the files and folders do have RW tags.
I'm running the Android L mako port with the Unleashed kernel.
Very similar problem here, after doing a restore with CWM of 4.4.4 backup, I'm unable to save files to user storage. Owner is 0 root, GID is 1028 sdcard_r, permissions drwxrwx--x.
Can save to ./Downloads though. ?:|
Did you ever resolve your issue?
I'm running on Magisk and for the life of me cannot figure out how to make the system writable (both root explorer and es do not work). Even getting errors using twrp file manager (made sure to mount system in twrp prior to). Any suggestions? I made sure to grant rw rights at the "/" level vs "/system".
edit: looks like i can copy files from any non-storage directories to /system just fine, but not if i want to copy something from my downloads folder or anything on the sd card.
RussianBear said:
I'm running on Magisk and for the life of me cannot figure out how to make the system writable (both root explorer and es do not work). Even getting errors using twrp file manager (made sure to mount system in twrp prior to). Any suggestions? I made sure to grant rw rights at the "/" level vs "/system".
edit: looks like i can copy files from any non-storage directories to /system just fine, but not if i want to copy something from my downloads folder or anything on the sd card.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hmmm. The system is writable with Magisk alone. You do not need anything else. Getting the error in TWRP and Magisk? Strange!
Can you screenshot the failure?