Hello,
I wonder if anyone know... What happens when let's say i have 9gb of data on my s2 and i want to backup it with nandroid? It should be possible to do this to sd card, but what if some apps are on phone and some on sd card? How backup then?
If i upgrade to a newer custom built rom, i them try to backup, wouldn't it restore the older backed up firmware? Or just apps and settings, but not rom itself?
Thank you,
Tomas
no one? did no one fill their phone and tried to backup? maybe there is a solution to backup to a computer?
execine said:
Hello,
I wonder if anyone know... What happens when let's say i have 9gb of data on my s2 and i want to backup it with nandroid? It should be possible to do this to sd card, but what if some apps are on phone and some on sd card? How backup then?
If i upgrade to a newer custom built rom, i them try to backup, wouldn't it restore the older backed up firmware? Or just apps and settings, but not rom itself?
Thank you,
Tomas
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nandroid backups are an image of
/system
/data
/dbdata
(on CF-Root, not sure about original CWM) it also includes .android_secure, which is SD-stored apps.
I don't understand what you are asking.
If there is not enough space you obviously have to delete something.
BTW: data-partition is around 2,1GB and system-partition 500MB, so there is no way a single backup can use 9GB
Maybe I am not being very clear, sorry about that
Coming from an Iphone, i am looking for a total phone backup solution. Itunes backs up literally everything - your apps, music, photos etc. It's filled probably with 20gb of different data.
Question is if I have my phone filled with games, different apps which make let's say 10 gb (not that much counting in that one game may be up to 1 gb), so how do i backup this? To SD card?
What if I have 20gb of data , 10 of which are on phone, 10 on sd card, in this case i wouldn't be able to backup everything?
One more technical question about rom upgrades. Currently i installed Villain Rom and have a backup made with nandroid. When i upgrade to a newer Villain Rom 1.5 or whatever comes out and I do the restore, i suppose it will restore 1.4 rom version with it's all apps and settings?
In this case, how do i backup only accounts, contacts, sms , apps, photogallery but not rom itself?
Sorry for all those questions, but i'm reading the forum all over, and there's still hundreds of questions i'm looking to find answers, so that i could comfortably migrate from iphone to galaxy..
execine said:
Maybe I am not being very clear, sorry about that
Coming from an Iphone, i am looking for a total phone backup solution. Itunes backs up literally everything - your apps, music, photos etc. It's filled probably with 20gb of different data.
Question is if I have my phone filled with games, different apps which make let's say 10 gb (not that much counting in that one game may be up to 1 gb), so how do i backup this? To SD card?
What if I have 20gb of data , 10 of which are on phone, 10 on sd card, in this case i wouldn't be able to backup everything?
One more technical question about rom upgrades. Currently i installed Villain Rom and have a backup made with nandroid. When i upgrade to a newer Villain Rom 1.5 or whatever comes out and I do the restore, i suppose it will restore 1.4 rom version with it's all apps and settings?
In this case, how do i backup only accounts, contacts, sms , apps, photogallery but not rom itself?
Sorry for all those questions, but i'm reading the forum all over, and there's still hundreds of questions i'm looking to find answers, so that i could comfortably migrate from iphone to galaxy..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Regarding restoring only apps/accounts/etc but not the rom iteself, within cwm, in backup and restore, chhoose advanced restore and the restore data.
Im not certain whether it restores gallery or sms.i sync my photos via dropbox, and backup my texts seperately.
Sent from my GT-P1000 using XDA Premium App
So there is no unified backup solution for android? You would have to back up everything separately ?
execine said:
So there is no unified backup solution for android? You would have to back up everything separately ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's fairly simple:
Nandroid for your ROM and user data that is on the PHONE and /data partition
For the /sdcard and /sdcard/external_sd, that's up to you to sort out... Perhaps back up the contents by connecting to your PC? Then copy the contents of the SD? That way you have your nandroid backup stored on the computer just in case
so then in case something goes wrong, i restore with nandroid and manually copy contents from PC and ALL of my phone's data (software, contacts, gallery etc) will be there?
execine said:
Coming from an Iphone, i am looking for a total phone backup solution. Itunes backs up literally everything - your apps, music, photos etc. It's filled probably with 20gb of different data.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, now you have a phone that doesn´t hide everything from the user it shouldn´t be that hard to make a backup.
There are basically 4 interesting partitions on the phone:
system (about 500MB) - This holds more or less the whole Firmware. While it is technically just a partition on the flash-memory, it is used like a ROM in normal usage, so the only situation where something will be written on this partition is a firmware-upgrade.
data (about 2GB)- This partition holds all user-installed apps and their settings.
sdcard (about 12GB) - This is not really a sdcard. Instead it is a part of the internal memory, you can use it for example for media, documents, images etc., whatever you like. This partition can be accessed on your computer as a regular USB-storage, and you can do a backup of it the way you like, either simply copying everything, or using a backup-solution of your choice.
external_sd (optional) - This is the micro-sd-card you can put in your phone. Obviously you can use it for anything you like. This partition is also accessible as a USB-storage or you can use a simple USB card-reader to access it on your computer.
Usually all your applications and settings will be stored in the /data/-partition.
If you choose the Move-to-SD option in the application-manager, some parts of the application will be moved to the (internal) /sdcard/-partition, but all the user-data/settings still remain on the /data/-partition.
So the maximum space you need to backup all your settings and apps is under 3GB.
Now to the possibilities of a backup, and the importance of the different things.
A nandroid-backup will basically make an image of the /system/ and /data/ partitions (also a bit more, but that´s not really important).
Usually it will use the /sdcard/-partition, which actually is still in your phone.
If you restore a Nandroid-Backup your System will be in the exact state before the backup, including all applications with their settings (which also means contacts, e-mails, sms etc).
Obviously everything that has changed after the backup will be lost.
A restore well also restore the complete firmware from the backup.
A backup from Nandroid can only be restored on the same phone, with the same partitions.
The second possibility to make backups would be TitaniumBackup.
This program will store all your installed applications and their data.
Default it will store it on the internal /sdcard/, but it is probably more useful to change the path to the external_sd.
Everything in Android is an application, so this will also save all your settings.
During a restore TitaniumBackup simply reinstalls your applications and then restores their settings.
TitaniumBackup can restore your applications with any Firmware, and in theory even on other phones (it may not work with special System-apps but it surely works with most "user-apps")
So Clockworkmod is great if you want to play around with different firmwares, especially Custom ROMs.
You can install different ROMs, make a backup and very easy and fast switch between them.
For a "regular" backup TitaniumBackup is maybe the better choice, it can backup all your settings and applications and for example if a Firmware-update goes wrong simply restore anything.
There is no real need to backup the /system/-partition anyway, you can simply download the Firmware and flash it, there is no user-data on this partition.
sdcard and external_sd usually only contains media, which you probably have somewhere on your PC anyway, so there is no real need for a backup, maybe for the pictures and videos you make with your phone, but again you should copy this on your PC regularly anyway. And if you want you can easily copy everything on it as well.
What if I have 20gb of data , 10 of which are on phone, 10 on sd card, in this case i wouldn't be able to backup everything?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Question is if I have my phone filled with games, different apps which make let's say 10 gb (not that much counting in that one game may be up to 1 gb), so how do i backup this? To SD card?[/quote]
Apps can´t be several GB in size on Android. Normally you have only around 2GB for Apps, if you use the App2SD-feature it can be expanded a bit.
If applications need a lot of data, for example like navigation-programs or games, they will download this on the first start and store this on the /sdcard/-partition.
As I said, you can access this easily like a removable drive and copy everything you like.
It isn´t also that important to make a backup of this, as it can be downloaded again anytime, and if something goes wrong it usually will mess up your system and don´t influence the data-partition anyway (well as long as you don´t repartition the whole memory)
Thank you, that does explain a lot!
I connected my S2, but i can't see to find any installed apps browsing through USB, or i shouldn't be seeing that?
Tomas
execine said:
Thank you, that does explain a lot!
I connected my S2, but i can't see to find any installed apps browsing through USB, or i shouldn't be seeing that?
Tomas
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, they are stored in /data
You back that up using nandroid, then you restore it via nandroid and they will be there. What you see on your PC via USB is the "internal SD".
Understood, thank you. Things getting more clear after a week of reading and using the phone ))
Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk
execine said:
I connected my S2, but i can't see to find any installed apps browsing through USB, or i shouldn't be seeing that?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, you see the (internal) /sdcard/ partition and (if present) the /external_sd/ (the MicroSD-card you have in your phone)
To simply backup your applications, the easiest way is TitaniumBackup.
This will store the .apk and settings for each up in a folder of your choice (on /sdcard/ or /external_sd/, as you usually have no direct access to the other partitions)
You can copy this folder on your PC, or even in the TitaniumBackup-folder of another phone and use it there.
There are several advantages using TitaniumBackup to save your Apps over CWM-recovery. You can use it with the enabled phone for example, and also just restore individual Apps, if you like.
I had Asphalt 8 installed on my phone while running a GPE rom. Then I decided to try CM12 out. So I got the rom, wiped everthing (except internal) and flashed the rom. When I restored the game using Titanium Backup it asked me to download the data again. I, of course, thought it's because of the wipe.
After some time I got bored of the game and deleted it (including the data). Then I wanted to go back to the GPE rom. So I got the latest zip, wiped everything (except internal) and flashed. Next thing I know is that the Asphalt 8 game data is back in the /android/obb folder, even though I deleted it.
So I guess GPE and CM12 use different partitions for this or how is it possible?
And how can I access those "hidden" partitions to delete the data from them? Without changing roms back and forth. Cause, even though I can't see the files and folders on the internal memory, it still uses the space.
Google likely restored the data from the data backup they take of the phone, if you agree to it when setting up your Google account. Simply delete the game again, and this time remove it from your app list in the Play Store. The next time around it shouldn't restore.
Strephon Alkhalikoi said:
Google likely restored the data from the data backup they take of the phone, if you agree to it when setting up your Google account. Simply delete the game again, and this time remove it from your app list in the Play Store. The next time around it shouldn't restore.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
They restored 1+ GB of data without me knowing? And without an internet connection? As I was not connected to a wi-fi. I usually also opt, at rom set-up, to not have my stuff backed up to googles servers.
So that's very unlikely.
And even if it were so, why do those files take space on my internal starge?
The MicroSD card is intended for your stuff, not app data. Therefore, to adhere to Google guidelines apps store their parts in internal storage. Now, if you didn't have data of any kind active and opted out of Google backing up data, the only possibilities I can think of are that Titanium Backup didn't delete the data, or the internal storage was not fully wiped.
Strephon Alkhalikoi said:
The MicroSD card is intended for your stuff, not app data. Therefore, to adhere to Google guidelines apps store their parts in internal storage. Now, if you didn't have data of any kind active and opted out of Google backing up data, the only possibilities I can think of are that Titanium Backup didn't delete the data, or the internal storage was not fully wiped.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I already said that I generally don't wipe the internal storage. I deleted data folder manually using ES File Explorer and emptied the recycle bin while on CM12. On GPE the data was back.
I did the math. Everything on my internal memory combined uses about 1 GB. But it shows me that it has 4GB used. So I went back to GPE, deleted the game data manually, and flashed CM12 back. Now it shows 1 GB used space on the internal memory.
Let me give you another example. A friend had GTA: San Andreas while on GPE. I flashed CM12 on that phone, but did not delete the game data, nor wiped the internal storage, just a simple /cache, /data and /dalvik-cache wipe.
On CM12 she didn't install GTA anymore and there is no trace of the GTA data folder in /android/obb.
Here is the thing: Something is taking up nearly 5 GB on the internal storage. I checked every folder in the internal storage (hidden and visible) and everything combined adds up to a max of 1.5 GB.
Something is using space. That something is the GTA data. It has almost 3 GB of data. Fits perfectly to the used space.
The only explanation I have is that they use different partitions of the internal memory or a different data format. Otherwise I can't explain how the same data doesn't show up on GPE and CM12 if I didn't delete it.
Using GS4 I9505, and my internal storage is getting shorter shorter, day by day. almost like its vanished. i've check emulated 0 and legacy drives nothing there. but as i gethered it coz of CWM, now using twrp, uninstalled CWM but still storage isn't available for usage.
Your space is still lost because it's still allocated to CWM for nandroid backups, even though you no longer have CWM on the device. Therefore, you need to put CWM back on the device, go into its backups and storage menu, delete any existing backups it made, then free the allocated space.
When you put TWRP back on to the S4, your space should return.
He can delete the CMW folder from the storage. The backups are there and they are not hidden.
I provided an in-depth explanation of this in an earlier thread on the same topic, but in essence CWM protects the nandroid backups space so nothing else can write to that area. This is because CWM performs incremental backups by default, and deleting older restore points messes up all of them. The protection persists even after CWM is removed, so when switching recoveries, all backups need to be deleted in CWM, and all allocated space freed using the "free allocated space" option in the backup and restore menu.
EDIT: To point out the obvious, there would be no need for a "free allocated space" option in CWM if the space weren't protected.
Well, that's stupid. With TWRP I can simply go inside the folder and delete the backups (without the need of booting into recovery and deleting them from there).
Calling it stupid is a bit harsh, and besides, Koush probably will disagree with you.
By default CWM is set to do incremental backups and does this as a space-saving feature. For example purposes let's say a nandroid backup is 2GB. Using the standard .TAR method four nandroid backups would take up 8GB. Switch to .DUP and those same four backups may only take 3GB. This is because .DUP only backs up the files that have changed between the current system and the previous backups, rather than backing up the entire partition. Since CWM in .DUP doesn't back up the entire partition when making its backups, it's vitally important that the backups be protected. Otherwise, deleting an older backup makes it impossible to restore any later backups.
The example I used in my other discussion to illustrate this was four backups, labeled A through D. A is the master backup and B through D are the incremental backups. If the space wasn't protected, deleting backup C in a file manager would render backup D invalid because of missing files. Naturally, deleting backup A would render all subsequent backups invalid, as it is the master backup.
In CWM it is possible to switch from .DUP to .TAR and thus stop CWM from allocating space for backups. The OP didn't do that, which is why his space disappeared even after switching to TWRP. There may be a manual method of removing the allocation through a terminal, but it's simply easier to restore CWM, delete the backups, free the space, then switch back to TWRP.
hi folks,
i have an i9505 running stock rooted 4.4.2. i noticed that under device storage it is telling me that of the 9.95gb available internal memory, only about half is free. it says "applications" is using about 3gb. however all the files on the internal storage only add up to about 800mb. i have used es file explorer's sd card analyzer to look at all the files on the internal storage, and it confirms only 800mb or so is there. where is the 4gb or so other data?
w.
You're rooted. Do you have a custom recovery installed?
yes i have CWM installed. i just used it to wipe the cache partition and davlik cache. didn't make any difference.
You made nandroid backups however, right? Two things you need to know.
1. CWM by default protects the internal storage where nandroid backups are stored. You need to delete the backups and delete protected storage to get the space back.
2. CWM is no longer supported. Switch to TWRP as certain ROMs will not install with CWM. In addition, TWRP does not protect the storage like CWM, and it allows nandroid backups to be stored on the MicroSD.
yes i have several CWM full backups but they are on the ext SD card. no backups on the internal memory. what is the protected storage you're referring to? CWM is supported for a stock kit kat 4.4.2 rom isn't it?
In CWM the location where the nandroid backups are made is on the internal storage, and is protected from being modified by the user outside of the recovery. This is because of how CWM makes backups. The default backup format is to take incremental backups. The space is allocated so that the end user cannot randomly delete backups outside of the recovery, because in an incremental backup only the changes between the last backup and the current ROM state are backed up. Deleting a backup between the earliest and latest backups screws up all backups following the deleted date. It is possible to change the way CWM does backups, but most end users don't dig deeply enough into the recovery to find these things out.
CWM's protected storage space is on the internal storage, and it is the biggest reason your internal storage isn't reading the correct amount. You need to head into the backup menu and free all unused storage to get that storage back. Once you do that, you really want to install TWRP, because it avoids this problem altogether.