Database Develop

[Q] Things I want to know about flashing and more!

A lot of things are never explained. Its really easy to just flash a ROM but there is a lot more to the process that could help.
I have soo many questions its ridiculous.. Why not ask them all at once? Im not dumb, I would like to see someone find complete information on any of these things..
1. Nobody ever explained what we can do with Clockwork Recovery, I know that I can restore previous ROMS with it but what else? Could I easily just flash back to my original 2.1 out of the box modded phone ROM even though I am on 2.2 now?
2. When I flash these ROMS, should I be doing like a format of the internal SD card to make it all fresh and what not?
3. What about App2SD? Thought sounded way cool when I first heard about it. How can I get that working? Couldn't I just use that and never have to backup my apps between ROMS anymore? Maybe I don't get it but theres no info on it either.
4. What is Nandroid? Sounds cool.
5. What would be the best way to back everything up between flashes?
At the moment, I just use TB to back up my important apps and then restore them + data afterwards. And for contacts and stuff I just uses Google sync, easy enough. It seems pointless to back up though because the Titanium Backup folder still remains after flashing, why do things still remain? Is this a good thing?
6. What the heck is kernel swapping and more specifically, what does it do? I have a general idea what a kernel is but feel free to explain!
7. Anything else about the finesses of flashing would be awesome to read about. This is all that comes to mind but yeah, feel free to really lay on the details.
I don't really care how ridiculous this seems, its a forum. More specifically, the Q&A section. Any help would be awesome!
[Edit] Ha, go figure. No replies. Was worth a try.

Those are all very good questions.
I agree with you that so far there is not a good central repository of information to explain all this that I know of.
I recently flashed to Cognition 9.1 after reading bajillions of threads to try and piece together the proper procedure. You see people making suggestions left and right, but half the time they conflict with each other, and the other half are stated in terms that only someone that already knows how to do it would understand.
There are two wikis and a couple guides out there with good information, but they tend to be grander in scale. "How to make your Captivate take over the world" articles are great and useful. But it's very difficult to find information on the small specific bits contained in those guides.
To understand all those little bits requires lots of googling and taking notes. I can't tell you how many e-mails I've sent myself from work containing little snippets of "do this", "try this", "how to..." that I've slowly come across after scouring these forums for hours on end.
That's not to say I don't appreciate all the info given from the users here. I'm just saying it'll be nice when all that knowledge gets pooled into one central location like one of the wikis rather than scattered sentence by sentence amid thousands of pages of posts.
And the next response to me from some snarky person will undoubtedly be "Well if you want the wiki to have that info then do it yourself!". My response then would be, "I don't know that information which is why I'm saying it would be nice if..."
The next snarky response to expect would be "If you want to know stuff then search the forums you newb. That's how *I* did it!" And my response to that would be, "And wouldn't you have been incredibly overjoyed to have NOT spent hours of your free time trying to piece together knowledge out there? And why the heck didn't you then post a straight-forward guide of simple steps on how to do it. And why the heck aren't you being a good person and helping me out now rather than being snarky and telling me to figure it out myself??"
So here's my answers to your questions which won't be very good but maybe if enough of us clueless people discuss this kind of stuff we can start to hash out more specifics.
1. Clockwork Recovery? I really don't know. I've read so many cryptic discussions about Clockwork that I can't tell you what it does. I know it can be used in flashing ROMs, but in following the Cognition line it's easier to use the Odin One Click method.
The name of it however makes it seem like its purpose is to recover from something to something. I'd assume that means you can recover our phone to stock if we have problems, but I bet that assumption is wrong.
2. Flash internal SD when updating ROM? Funny story that... I found this thread because I was doing a search on that very thing. I have seen mentioned in a couple places people saying you should do it. However in most "How to flash a ROM" discussions I've read they don't have formatting the internal SD as part of the scenario. And nowhere (yet..) can I find instruction on how to do it properly. I'm assuming I shouldn't just hook it up in USB mode to my computer and having my computer run a format on it. So I won't.
I know that the Odin tool does a "Master Clear" which I assumed would wipe the internal SD. But when I look at my internal SD it still has all sorts of stuff on it from before still. So evidently to "Master Clear", which is suggested in many "How to flash a ROM" guides, doesn't format the internal SD but "clears" some other mystical information.
3. App2SD. Well when I look up App2SD at Appbrain the description says, "helps you to move apps to either external or internal storage thru' the system Settings." Ok... great... So if I have apps installed (which default to internal SD) then I should be able to run this to move those apps to my external SD.
What happens when I flash a new ROM though like you said? The apps are on my external SD, but can I instantly use the apps on the fresh ROM or do I have to use App2SD again to move them to internal SD or what?
4. Nandroid! It does sound cool doesn't it? In most "How to flash ROM" guides and just about every other guide people say "Make sure to make a Nandroid backup before proceeding". Ok, doing a search on Nandroid I find this in the G1 forums:
"* What is Nandroid Backup v2.0?
Nandroid Backup is a set of tools and a script that will enable anyone who has root on their G1 and has the engineering/dev spl bootloader [1] (or has a dev phone) + a recovery image with busybox and adbd running as root [2] to make full system backups. These can then be restored using the fastboot [3] commandline tool and your phone in SPL/bootloader mode (hold camera + power)."
Uh.. say what? Ok I get what its end result is. It backs up my system. But what's this engineering/dev spl bootloader? I remember from WinMo that a bootloader booted the phone into a state where you could load a ROM onto it. Doesn't seem to fit exactly in this context.
I don't think I have a dev phone and I know I don't have any sort of recovery image. Busybox I recognize because Titanium Backup makes you install it. Don't know what it is though. And "adbd" has to do with running the Android developer kit or terminal or something which allows you to interact directly with Android on your phone I think. I couldn't get it to work on my computer so haven't been able to play with it.
So yeah, when everyone one says "Make a Nandroid backup" like it's the most simple thing in the world that every newborn baby is born with instant knowledge of doing... I must be missing something...
5. Backup between flashes. Well, from all the discussions I've read it sounds like you're supposed to use Clockwork Recovery or Nandroid or maybe both. Possibly you're also supposed to hunt down an ostrich and ride it to your local gas station to pick up a pack of bubble gum and donate it to your local charity of choice in order to get it to work.
Titanium Backup appears to backup your Apps so you can then install them again (I wonder if using App2SD affects that?). You can also back up system stuff, but everyone says not to do that. I assume that means it backs up various system files that would just mess up your new ROM if you restored them.
6. Kernel swapping. I know in general computing terms a Kernel is the very core of an operating system. Since there's swapping going on I assume there are different versions of the Android kernel out there and each one must have something different about them or there wouldn't be any swapping going on. As to what those differences are I couldn't tell you. Personally I'm going to stick with premade bundles like Cognition. That way I don't have to worry about kernel swapping and sacrificing chickens since some awesome genius (like DesignGears) has already done all that. Minus the chicken sacrifice possibly.
7. Flashing finesse. Like I said I've recently flashed from stock to Cognition 9.1 and everything seems to work (except my battery seems to be draining faster, even though I flashed from 100% charge, and did "Master Clear". So next step will be clearing the battery stat file which is another thing I need to research and doing another full charging cycle to see if that helps).
I scoured the forums before doing the flash looking for the proper steps and I finally came upon a post from someone that actually listed each step very clearly on how to do it properly. Huzzah!
Here's what KewlRobD posted:
"- I was running 2.1.7 so I disabled voodoo lagfix
- I powered off my phone and waited for it to reach 100% battery
- I removed my SIM card
- I then used ODIN to flash back to JF6
- I then used ODIN to Master Clear
- I then used ODIN to flash Beta9
- I then used ODIN to Master Clear again.
- I then put my SIM back into my phone and began customizing"
How many hours did I spend reading thread after thread to slowly piece parts of this together into some confused possible instruction list?? Well here you go, KewlRobD was very awesome and actually listed very clearly the steps to take.
The disabling lagfix part he mentions didn't apply since I was on stock and never applied a lagfix. However this is something else I'll have to research if I decide to flash to a new ROM because all "How to..." guides tell you to disable lagfix. Because again, all newborns pop out of the womb with instant knowledge on the disabling of the lagfixes.
Now the only thing he didn't mention was formatting the internal SD, nor did he mention anything about recalibrating the battery, clearing the battery stats file, bump charging etc. (besides saying to charge to 100% first)
So I'm still searching for the formatting of the internal SD information, and I remember reading somewhere about clearing the battery. I think I actually e-mailed it to myself. Yep, here's what Demented71 says about clearing the battery:
"As far as the battery, I would:
Charge your phone while it's on to 100%
Turn it off and charge to 100%
Turn it on and let it fully boot and turn it off again, charging to 100%
Then, when you unplug it, put it into recovery mode first, use CWR (the green recovery) to 'wipe battery stats' in it's advanced menu.
Then use your phone completely until it won't turn on, trying not to connect it via USB or wall charger.
When charging it up after that for the first time, try and leave it off and charge it to 100%, but let it sit for a few hours past 100%, and then use it normally. It's best to do this when your sleeping if you don't need your phone during that time. Another option is to buy the 2x battery+charger from eBay. Works great to always have a full battery."
Again, very helpful post with nice clear instructions instead of "Ur battery sux? Then reset it... duh!" However, there's one spot in there where he says to use CWR. I can only assume that means Clockwork Recovery. KHAAAAAAAAAN!! So in the end I need to do more research to figure out what exactly CWR is and how it works. *sigh*

Clockwork Recovery is a very useful tool. With it you can do many system type things before the os proper (android) is loaded.
You can install "mods" which are modifications to the system, such as zmod, or replacing your battery icon. They are given to you in zip files that have the instructions in place as scripts and such that install the mod for you. No creeping around your internal file system wondering what goes where and I hope I get it right.
You can install roms the same way.
A nandroid back up is the backup (for us) that clockwork recovery provides. If you do a rom manager or clockwork backup, you just did a nandroid backup. It lets you rollback to a point of your chosing as long as you can root your phone and install rom manager.
rom manager downloads the clockwork recovery app to your phone. As long as it's the most recent version you can move the update.zip it puts on your phone to your computer, and then you can put it on your sdcard anytime you want. Once it's there, reboot into recovery, select reinstall packages, and you should be in the clockwork recovery program.
From there you can create or restore a backup, install a mod, or rom from sdcard and quite a few utiliy scripts like formating your sd, removing battery stats, and the like. Careful. Some of this will wipe your data and leave you without apps and such. Like new.
Titanium Backup is your friend. A nandroid backup is a fallback spot, or a relatively easy way to switch back and forth between roms, sort of. If you flash a new rom you don't want to do that. Titanium Backup allows you to backup all your apps and thier data. If you pay for it, and you'll want to, it allows you to do it all as a batch operation, instead of one app at a time.
While it's beyond my time constraint's AND expertise level to answer all your questions, I hope these helped some?
Edit: Before messing with this it's a good idea to be sure you can do the button combinations to get into recovery and/or download modes. DesignGears has a thread in development that explains this and offers a fix if you can't do it. Will help keep/get you out of reboot loops if something goes fubar.
Recovery: From power off, hold both volume buttons down and push power. Hold all three until you see the at&t white screen. Hold for a second or so then release the power button while still holding the volumes. You should boot into recover there. Blue text with some choices. Move with volume up and down, choose with power.
Download: From power off, hold both volume buttons and plug in your usb cable. You should get a big yellow graphic with "Don't turn target off." That's download mode. (If you are planning to use odin or odin one click then have that program running on your computer when you do this.
(Just in case ya didn't know. Don't mean to talk down to anyone.)

Awesome response, Sulphur4724. Thank you very much.
I had no clue Clockwork Recovery was capable of doing so much stuff. I'll definitely have to check it out now.
And that answers our question on how to format the internal SD. Now we just need to find out under what circumstances it's a good idea to do so.
Along the same lines I've also heard people mentioning repartitioning the SD. I'm assuming that's only to do with the various lag fixes out there?
And thanks for clearing up the Nandroid inquiry. I always thought when people said "Make a Nandroid backup..." that they were referring to a program called Nandroid. No wonder I couldn't find an app called that!
So to simplify a little:
1. What can I do with Clockword Recovery (CWR)?
CWR backs up your ROM to an update.zip file that you can store elsewhere in case you want to restore your ROM to saved state. It also allows you to install modifications to Android such as a new battery icon. And finally, it allows you to run system utilities such as formatting the SDCard, or clearing the battery stats. CWR also works in conjunction with an App called "Rom Manager" to perform some operations.
2. Should I format the internal SD when installing new ROMs?
Not sure yet. But in order to actually DO the formatting you would use Clockwork Recovery.
3. What is App2SD and how do I use it?
Not sure yet. The description sounds simple. Move apps to the external SD card. But earching the interwebs for information is giving descriptions involving repartitioning the system into 2 partitions, flashing things, running adb commands, etc. Maybe all that information is old and it's now a simple process? We need more info.
4. What is Nandroid and how do I do it?
Nandroid is basically backing up your ROM so you can use it to restore later. To do this you use Clockwork Recovery. See question 1.
5. What's the best way to back up everything between flashing ROMs?
Using Rom Manager and Clockwork Recovery you can make a backup (Nandroid) of your current ROM. See questions 1 and 4.
In order to back up applications you will want to use an app called Titanium Backup (often referred to as TiBu). With TiBu you can make backup copies of any apps you want. Along with that you can tell it to back up any data for those apps (which would be game saves, app settings, etc.). You can also back up system files and data, but this can often lead to ROM issues if you replace a new ROMs files with old backup files so do your research and be careful.
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Besides the formatting internal SD and App2SD questions, does that all sound right so far?
Does anyone know if all this is universal Android stuff, or if it only pertains to the Captivate?
By the way, thanks for asking these questions, Shival!

And that answers our question on how to format the internal SD. Now we just need to find out under what circumstances it's a good idea to do so.
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You can also format the SD card by settings/sdcard and phone storage.
Along the same lines I've also heard people mentioning repartitioning the SD. I'm assuming that's only to do with the various lag fixes out there?
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Lagfixes will take care of themselves. I'm not real sure how this works, tho I always do it and it ain't hosed me yet. From my days as a computer geek I seem to remember that when you make a partition you should make the blocks, where stuff actually gets written, as small as possible. When a file is written to a file system it is written to these blocks. On the last one it uses, if it doesn't fill it up that space is wasted. So smaller blocks = smaller waste = more free space. Not really expert about this (hell, about any of this) so someone else may be able to clarify better, but it's workin' for me so far.
And thanks for clearing up the Nandroid inquiry. I always thought when people said "Make a Nandroid backup..." that they were referring to a program called Nandroid. No wonder I couldn't find an app called that!
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I spent a while lookin' for it too.
CWR backs up your ROM to an update.zip file that you can store elsewhere in case you want to restore your ROM to saved state
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An update.zip is a stored mod or rom before it's applied to your phone. Made by the developer with install scripts and such to automate the process. The actual backups you can find and inspect under clockworkmod/backup on your sdcard once you've run a backup. They are saved as img files that can be written back to your phone if you have an issue you can't recover from using cwm. But they are NOT the update.zip files. Those are the android format for installing stuff from recovery.
2. Should I format the internal SD when installing new ROMs?
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The jury is out on this. Some guys swear by it, some guys say "nah." What it will do is wipe all YOUR data and stuff off the phone, leaving it with just the OS ROM as created by the dev. cwm can do it, or you can do it from settings/sdcard and phone storage.
3. What is App2SD and how do I use it?
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Most phones have a finite amount of storage that the system can use. Most of them have a relatively small amount actually. As cappy owners we have a whopping 2 gb of that storage. But the other guys usually have considerably less. Applications get written to that space and it quickly runs out on other platforms. so app2sd moves apps to the external sd. Or the internal for us, since our total storage is 20 gb. (i think.) The unreserved space is formatted by the phone to look like an external SD card to the phone. anyway, it's not as big an issue for us as 2gb is a LOT of space that will take a while to fill up.
You can also back up system files and data, but this can often lead to ROM issues if you replace a new ROMs files with old backup files so do your research and be careful.
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For backups this is fine. If you flash a new rom do NOT restore system settings from an older backup. It will restore stuff that may not work with what your flashing and will gum it all up but good. FC hell. You are pretty safe restoring apps+data as that just restores the apps data itself and doesn't overwrite any system files.
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Does anyone know if all this is universal Android stuff, or if it only pertains to the Captivate?
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I dunno! This is my first android phone!

Sulphur4724 said:
You can also format the SD card by settings/sdcard and phone storage.
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Ah cool, thanks!
From my days as a computer geek I seem to remember that when you make a partition you should make the blocks, where stuff actually gets written, as small as possible. When a file is written to a file system it is written to these blocks. On the last one it uses, if it doesn't fill it up that space is wasted. So smaller blocks = smaller waste = more free space. Not really expert about this (hell, about any of this) so someone else may be able to clarify better, but it's workin' for me so far.
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Yeah if I remember correctly small blocks mean less space wasted, but it also means more I/O which slows performance. And bigger blocks mean more potentially wasted space but faster performance since there is less I/O going on because you're writing bigger amounts of data at once rather than a bunch of tiny writes. In today's computers where space is cheap you want to make bigger blocks to enhance performance. Not sure what's suggested for NAND. And my memory could be faulty on all that, but that's what I remember from back in the day of tiny hard-drives.
An update.zip is a stored mod or rom before it's applied to your phone. Made by the developer with install scripts and such to automate the process. The actual backups you can find and inspect under clockworkmod/backup on your sdcard once you've run a backup. They are saved as img files that can be written back to your phone if you have an issue you can't recover from using cwm. But they are NOT the update.zip files. Those are the android format for installing stuff from recovery.
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Ahhh, ok. So update.zip is literally the file Android uses to make updates with whether it's a mod or ROM. The backed up ROM then will be a .img file?

Yeah if I remember correctly small blocks mean less space wasted, but it also means more I/O which slows performance. And bigger blocks mean more potentially wasted space but faster performance since there is less I/O going on because you're writing bigger amounts of data at once rather than a bunch of tiny writes. In today's computers where space is cheap you want to make bigger blocks to enhance performance. Not sure what's suggested for NAND. And my memory could be faulty on all that, but that's what I remember from back in the day of tiny hard-drives.
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Never thought of it like that, touche'. Now I gotta try changing sizes.
Ahhh, ok. So update.zip is literally the file Android uses to make updates with whether it's a mod or ROM. The backed up ROM then will be a .img file?
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Roger that. Now ya got it.

WOW!
This thread RULES! Sulphur4724 and sschrupp, many thanks, I learned a lot. If I have the time this weekend I'll try to edit this information into a backup / memory FAQ, if you think that would be useful.
sschrupp check out this guide if you haven't seen it before, it's pretty idiot proof; I had no trouble and I am an android n00b.
edit: nevermind the forum isn't letting me post links because I'm new here. It's a great guide though, so if you want, go to the website android police, and under the guides tab, read the guide called "complete guide how to fully back up and restore your android phone using nandroid backup and clockworkmod rom manager"

Glad I could help. I'd let this stand a few days and see if there are any corrections. I'm going by what I know which may or may not be 100% correct. I came to this phone from a Blackberry. Everything I'm trying to pass on I learned from reading the cognition thread and branching from there. Yes. All of it! Even before the 4k post cleansing it got a while back.
But see I can't code, and I wanna participate. So I'm doing what I can to be part of this community and if it takes some weight off the guys that DO code... well that's full of win.
/shrug

Sulphur4724 said:
But see I can't code, and I wanna participate. So I'm doing what I can to be part of this community and if it takes some weight off the guys that DO code... well that's full of win.
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Yeah that's how I see it too. Also I almost always buy the pay version of apps that really help me that independent devs here on XDA write.

Why does ROM manager run after startup? Is it okay if I disable this through autostarts? I don't run pre-scheduled backups so I can't think of any reason for it to be running in the background all of the time.

This thread is epic!
So worth it =]
I really hate that the phones storage is called internal SD, I get soo confused reading thing that say "do something to the SD" I am like, WHICH ONE!? and then I explode.
I tried to install a lagfix on a Cognition ROM once, it failed. Did it right after flashing, created the file system then I tried to do the lagfix and it failed. I never tried again. Don't know if its worth it anyways.
Battery has been a super drain! It is incredibly hard for me, a light user who is mildly OC, to let the battery get below 80% and yet, within ten minutes off the charger it starts going down lol. I keep it clean and everything, nothing is running and I always disable background data. I probably do need to redo the battery bin file. Wish I had time, either at work or I am in class.
Phone runs fine I think so I guess I'll just forget formating the internal SD. Maybe I'll try it someday though. I'd imagine the device would clog up eventually.
I just wish I was smart enough to make use of some of the more advanced facets of Android.
I guess there are just too many devices and technology moves so fast that its almost impossible to make a guide. Searching for the info is sort of fun and I do try.
I love it when you are searching for something specific but you learn so much more along the way and I, usually forget what I was searching for in the first place.
This CyanogenMod thing sounds cool. I want it, when its finished, I know barely anything about it though.
I cannot keep up at all with the Cognition releases. I barely know what the changelogs are even talking about when I do lol.
Do our phones work more efficiently with a linux distribution? I just use my Windows Vista partition mainly but I have Ubuntu. Screw windows 7, I am sticking with Vista lol. I'd imagine it would be super hard to find the same tools we use to mod our phones via windows, for Linux.

Komodo Rogue said:
Why does ROM manager run after startup? Is it okay if I disable this through autostarts? I don't run pre-scheduled backups so I can't think of any reason for it to be running in the background all of the time.
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Be careful in your thinking. Just because an app is loaded in memory does not mean it is actually doing anything. This is not windows with hundreds of processes going on. Android actually prefers to have things in memory to make accessing them faster and consuming LESS battery power as a result of not having to load them every time you want to access them. Each activity is assigned a number corresponding to its priority which determines what gets kicked out when you want to load something that is not already present and more memory is needed than what is available.
You can see this in action by utilizing a system monitor that tracks cpu activity for each process. Most apps that are in memory use ZERO cpu time unless/until you open them. For the ones that do, such as an email app, they will only use cpu time when retrieving messages which takes little energy. If you endlessly kill these with a task manager, you willuse MORE battery as a result of these having to be reloaded by the os instead of accessing them from ram, not to mention the battery drain caused by the task killer constantly polling to see what is in memory.
Sent telepathically using vulcan mind meld app.

newter55 said:
Be careful in your thinking. Just because an app is loaded in memory does not mean it is actually doing anything. This is not windows with hundreds of processes going on. Android actually prefers to have things in memory to make accessing them faster and consuming LESS battery power as a result of not having to load them every time you want to access them. Each activity is assigned a number corresponding to its priority which determines what gets kicked out when you want to load something that is not already present and more memory is needed than what is available.
You can see this in action by utilizing a system monitor that tracks cpu activity for each process. Most apps that are in memory use ZERO cpu time unless/until you open them. For the ones that do, such as an email app, they will only use cpu time when retrieving messages which takes little energy. If you endlessly kill these with a task manager, you willuse MORE battery as a result of these having to be reloaded by the os instead of accessing them from ram, not to mention the battery drain caused by the task killer constantly polling to see what is in memory.
Sent telepathically using vulcan mind meld app.
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Thanks for the response, that's helpful information to know. I don't use a task killer but I DO have quite a bit of apps disabled at boot through the app "autostarts" that I am going to turn back on now. Quickoffice comes to mind as an example; I use that maybe two or three times a week so I didn't see why I should have it "running" all of the time, but now I'm going to re-enable it.
Nevertheless, the only time I see myself using ROM Manager is before a system flash... and sadly if you read the thread I wrote about flashing to a new ROM, it turns out I may NEVER be flashing a new ROM. So in THIS case, shouldn't I just disable it from startup?

I tried to install a lagfix on a Cognition ROM once, it failed. Did it right after flashing, created the file system then I tried to do the lagfix and it failed. I never tried again. Don't know if its worth it anyways.
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The answer to this is... sometimes. The phone can get pretty laggy if there are a lot of os writes and reads. A lagfix helps out with this. It depends on your patience and how fast/cool you want to be. (I do it just for the geek factor! RAWR!)
Battery has been a super drain! It is incredibly hard for me, a light user who is mildly OC, to let the battery get below 80% and yet, within ten minutes off the charger it starts going down lol. I keep it clean and everything, nothing is running and I always disable background data. I probably do need to redo the battery bin file. Wish I had time, either at work or I am in class.
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I have tried every thing I could find/read/think of and my battery life still sux. Why? It's not a phone, it's an ENTERTAINMENT CENTER! Seriously, the Amoled screen on this puppy is pretty as hell but it's also hell on a battery. When it's open, it's eating energy as fast as it can put it away. My philosophy after hours and hours of trying to figure this out is this: Enjoy the phone and keep a charger handy. Try this tho, next time you flash something rom wise pull your sim card. DG says that when the modem.bin file flashes with it in it can cause it to keep the modem open all the time causing massive battery drain. I tried this last flash and it does seem to make a difference. /shrug
Phone runs fine I think so I guess I'll just forget formating the internal SD. Maybe I'll try it someday though. I'd imagine the device would clog up eventually.
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I haven't done a master clear or format in several flashes and I've had no ill effects. I can imagine a point down the road where issues may ensue, but not recently.
I just wish I was smart enough to make use of some of the more advanced facets of Android.
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Don't we all!
I guess there are just too many devices and technology moves so fast that its almost impossible to make a guide. Searching for the info is sort of fun and I do try.
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There are some guys trying, they just aren't advertising well!
This CyanogenMod thing sounds cool. I want it, when its finished, I know barely anything about it though.
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CDE is about as close to CyanogenMod as we have right now. Want a sneak peak? There's your huckleberry.
Do our phones work more efficiently with a linux distribution? I just use my Windows Vista partition mainly but I have Ubuntu. Screw windows 7, I am sticking with Vista lol. I'd imagine it would be super hard to find the same tools we use to mod our phones via windows, for Linux.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you are coding or plan on coding i'd say yes. If not? nah. winders works just fine. Or as fine as it ever works.

cm7 broke my nook

I put in CM7 two days ago, and every thing was working fine. I restmy nook and it would not power on at all. I tried for 2 hours, and nothing. I was able take it back to the store and get a new one. What could cause that problem? After I installed cm7 it worked fine, I then took my sd card out reformatted it to put files on it. Then when I reset my nook and no power, no nothing.

Same Issue
I had the exact same thing going on. I installed CM7 and it worked great for a cpl days. Last night I plugged it in to charge it (left it on), and when I woke up it was off and unable to turn on. Black screen.
I put in my CWR sd card and held the nook, volume up, and power buttons to turn it on. I figured I just go back to eclair auto-nooter because I know its stable, so I formatted system and data and flashed the stock barnes and noble 1.0.1 rom. However...
I still have the same issue. The device doesn't power on. I'll return it to the store if I have to, but I'd prefer to fix it so that we can raise awareness.
Edit: I figured it out. The flashable repartition-boot-with-stock.zip was corrupted on my CWR sd card. I made a new one and I'm right as rain. Follow the instrustins HERE to fix the black screen issue with CM7. Although it will restore you NC to stock.

More than likely something happened to your boot partition. Please investigate the threads titled "guide to my nook won't boot"

jd95 said:
After I installed cm7 it worked fine, I then took my sd card out reformatted it to put files on it. Then when I reset my nook and no power, no nothing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thread should be called, I didn't read the directions and broke my nook. cm7, as well as all the other froyo/ginger roms that I've seen run off of the sd card. If you wiped those files off, it shouldn't be expected to still work.

jeremiah_mn said:
Thread should be called, I didn't read the directions and broke my nook. cm7, as well as all the other froyo/ginger roms that I've seen run off of the sd card. If you wiped those files off, it shouldn't be expected to still work.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The CM7 nightlies are not meant to be run from the SD card. There is also a build of HC that is not meant for the SD card. In my experience, nookie froyo ran better from the sd card, but it could also be run off internal storage.
So i respectfully disagree with your opinion. Which was actually a statement of incorrect facts.

jeremiah_mn said:
Thread should be called, I didn't read the directions and broke my nook. cm7, as well as all the other froyo/ginger roms that I've seen run off of the sd card. If you wiped those files off, it shouldn't be expected to still work.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're wrong here, I don't believe CM7 even comes available for SD card, it's an internal install..
And there is a very common theme here... Install CM7, works fine, reboot, it's dead.. Have to do XYZ to get it back up running. Something is hosing something, surprised nobody has figured it out yet.
I remain on rooted Stock 1.0.1.

sparhawk36 said:
More than likely something happened to your boot partition. Please investigate the threads titled "guide to my nook won't boot"
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not trying to be a ****, but I did exactly what you said, and stated so in my post.
I followed the instructions listed here
I've actually done this many times in the past. Most of the time its because I'm messing around in adb. I even keep a spare sd card with me, ready to do this at all times.
In this instance, however, it is not fixing it.
Fixed it. My sd card went bad. The post in the link still works, although it restores your NC to stock.

khaytsus said:
You're wrong here, I don't believe CM7 even comes available for SD card, it's an internal install..
And there is a very common theme here... Install CM7, works fine, reboot, it's dead.. Have to do XYZ to get it back up running. Something is hosing something, surprised nobody has figured it out yet.
I remain on rooted Stock 1.0.1.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ive done all kinds of stupid things to my nook including an attempted install of Slackware... but I have never bricked it. Ive been running the CM nightly builds without any kind of problems as well. Well, no problems outside what one would expect from development software that is still in a rapidly changing state. If you want stability and reliability, EMMc installs of CM and HC and even Froyo are probably not where you want to look right now.

admiralnorman said:
Not trying to be a ****, but I did exactly what you said, and stated so in my post.
I followed the instructions listed here
I've actually done this many times in the past. Most of the time its because I'm messing around in adb. I even keep a spare sd card with me, ready to do this at all times.
In this instance, however, it is not fixing it.
Fixed it. My sd card went bad. The post in the link still works, although it restores your NC to stock.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So to be clear here, your problem with CM7 not booting was related to your SD card "going bad"? Or was your restore process hampered by this?
You had installed CM7 to emmc and such, right? How would the SD card be affected by that?

If you formatted your card in your NC then that's the problem. Don't format your card with CW because it'll wipe the boot sector giving you a black screen. It's fixable, many people have made the same mistake on the #NookColor channel. Go there for help because it's faster than waiting for someone to respond here.

Edited for derp.

combustiblemonkey said:
Ive done all kinds of stupid things to my nook including an attempted install of Slackware... but I have never bricked it. Ive been running the CM nightly builds without any kind of problems as well. Well, no problems outside what one would expect from development software that is still in a rapidly changing state. If you want stability and reliability, EMMc installs of CM and HC and even Froyo are probably not where you want to look right now.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree with this statement. I'm happily back to Eclair and advanced task killer.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

succulent said:
If you formatted your card in your NC then that's the problem. Don't format your card with CW because it'll wipe the boot sector giving you a black screen. It's fixable, many people have made the same mistake on the #NookColor channel. Go there for help because it's faster than waiting for someone to respond here.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not helpful information contained in this post.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

khaytsus said:
So to be clear here, your problem with CM7 not booting was related to your SD card "going bad"? Or was your restore process hampered by this?
You had installed CM7 to emmc and such, right? How would the SD card be affected by that?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The recovery SD card was not in the nook when it went bad. The Nook and the card weren't even in the same building. I would assume that the SD card simply wore out. It was an old card that saw much use. Everything from sitting in a camera to running the R4 in my Nintendo DS. I will give it the burial of a Patriot, Westboro Baptist protest and all.
I still have no idea why CM7 tore up the boot of my Nook. I was reading a book in aldiko before I fell asleep, but I don't rememeber what else I was doing.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

admiralnorman said:
Not helpful information contained in this post.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
YOUR post was useless. His post was completely accurate. If it wasn't what caused YOUR issue, fine, but what he said was 100% true.
By the way, you realize you didn't start this thread, right?
admiralnorman said:
The recovery SD card was not in the nook when it went bad. The Nook and the card weren't even in the same building. I would assume that the SD card simply wore out. It was an old card that saw much use. Everything from sitting in a camera to running the R4 in my Nintendo DS.
I still have no idea why CM7 tore up the boot of my Nook. I was reading a book in aldiko before I fell asleep, but I don't rememeber what else I was doing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So what does your SD card going bad and your NC not booting have to do with each other????

khaytsus said:
YOUR post was useless. His post was completely accurate. If it wasn't what caused YOUR issue, fine, but what he said was 100% true.
By the way, you realize you didn't start this thread, right?
So what does your SD card going bad and your NC not booting have to do with each other????
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Right. You asked for clarification on my earlier post. I provided it. It seems you don't like your quesions being answered. Next time use periods instead of question marks. Or properly label them as rehtorical.
- Sent from my HTC Evo 4g using XDA Developer's app.

It's the boot partition. Same exact thing happened to me. The nook seemingly won't power on due to not having anything to boot from. Luckily the uSD has boot priority so if you get one of the CWR IMGs floating around here and follow the guides, you can be up and running relatively quickly.

paranoid__android said:
It's the boot partition. Same exact thing happened to me. The nook seemingly won't power on due to not having anything to boot from. Luckily the uSD has boot priority so if you get one of the CWR IMGs floating around here and follow the guides, you can be up and running relatively quickly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So any idea what's causing it to get wiped/corrupted? Formatting SD from within the booted ROM or unknown?

These types of threads are funny. People are too quick to blame the rom alone (even when clearly marked as dangerous / test / experimental, etc ones) after making the decision to risk the normal operation of the device in the first place. Take some responsibility people

Exactly.. I don't usually post in forums but this kind of stuff bothers me. I wasn't able to boot my Nook Color for a few hours but I never blamed it on anyone but myself. Almost every one of the custom Roms, Mods, etc says something like "Use at your own risk" Nobody is forcing you to try anything. If you think you "bricked" your Nook Color (which is almost impossible) you shouldn't blame it on the Rom or Mod or even expect to take it back to the store.. YOU took the risk. Even if you installed a Rom that slapped you and gave you the middle finger it's your fault in the end because no one forced you to try it (most likely...). I'm sorry if I haven't offered a useful solution to "cm7 broke my nook", but anyway all this is purely my opinion and I apologize if I have offended anyone but people need to take some responsibility for their actions.

[Q] Booting from SD issue.

Hello all, I have been reading things on here for quite a while and have found a fix to just about every issue I have coe across except this one. I would like to first apologize if I just missed it through my searches.
I was running CM7 latest beta off of my SD. I am not rooted and did it this way so I could just take out the SD card and get the full nook experience. This was working great until last night.
Now whenever I try to turn the nook on or attempt to reflash a stable version all I get is the loading screen and then blackness. I cannot get to recovery at all.
I am hoping that I wll not have to lose everything I have done to it but it is not looking good. I am hoping there is a way that I do not have to start over from scratch.
I am assuming that the SD card is the problem and I have ordered a new sandisk as that is what the general consensus seems to be using without any issues. If it is the card, I have heard that win32 disk imager (older version which I have) will be able to clone the card so I can just rewrite the image to the new card. Having used the program, I still have no idea how to clone that image.
Any help would be MUCH appreciated and I would be extremely grateful. Again, I am sorry if I just missed the thread and I will gladly call myself an idiot for doing so. I am just starting to freak out and was hoping for some help. You all rock and this community is amazing so I thank you all for keeping my nook awesome. Thanks again.

I think I solved the issue on my own so thank you anyways. Sorry for wasting board space with this. Thanks to everyone though for everything, without you all I would not know how to do anything with my nook. This thread can be closed.

[Q] I rooted Captivate w/Froyo 2.2 - Now lots of problems

I finally updated to the official AT&T Froyo 2.2 probably about a month ago. Everything was working great. I wanted to root/enable sideloading apps/unlock. I used SuperOneClick 2.1.1. The root worked fine (at least I think so). I was not able to enable sideloading apps so I read online how to change the value of sideloading apps from 0 to 1. I also unlocked the phone using the Galaxy S unlock app from the the Market.
Almost right after the SD Scan would take a long time and then I would get a red SD card symbol saying "Low on Space - Database storage is getting low". I tried clearing cache's to fix the problem. It didn't fix anything. Soon thereafter I started getting "Message Memory Full - Incoming messages rejected due to full...." I cleared phone log/txt messages but it hasn't fixed anything. I looked at my internal and external SD card. My external card is 3.68 total with 17MB available. My internal has 12.67GB available.
Today all of a sudden if I try to look at my missed call I get "samsung captivate the application phone (process com.sec.android.app.dialertab) has stopped unexpectedly. Please try again". I get similar messages trying to open Gmail. I haven't gotten it on any other apps yet as far as I know. It vibrates like crazy when the apps crash.
Can anyone help me with the problem? It's making my phone useless right now and my battery is dying much quicker than before. Thanks!
-T

My vote is to go with a custom ROM. It will solve all of these problems. Cognition is the most similar to stock and is quite easy to flash. As for the problems you are having, I don't know what to tell you.
Try Cognition 4.5.3. You won't be disappointed.

Thanks for the quick replay Jack especially on a Fri night. What exactly do I do? Is it difficult to do?

Well, not busy tonight. Watching pre-season football.
Flashing a Froyo rom is not too bad. Since you have stock 2.2 it will be a little more tricky than if you were still on 2.1.
First, what is your build number? look on the sticker under your battery to see a four digit number beginning with either 10 or 11.
I will private message you with more.

taltal13 said:
Thanks for the quick replay Jack especially on a Fri night. What exactly do I do? Is it difficult to do?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Make sure you READ EVERY LINE OF THE OP. When you think you got it, read it again, then give it a shot. For the time being just factory reset your phone, should clear up some of your issues. Good luck
sent from long ago, in a Galaxy far, far away.

^^^ he's right. READ, READ, READ... until you're sick of it. It will pay off and keep you from bricking. Sorry I didn't mention that. But I will be glad to help you if you need.

and if (or when) you manage to brick it do not panic,, go back and read some more,, seems that almost everything an idiot like me can do is fixable,, and most normal people are pretty safe,, they are not going to kill their phone,,,,if they read and follow instructions,,,not doing those two have found my phone in some pretty unresponsive states,, but I am running mosaic VI now and loving it,,but have been on so many I had to go look,,and have finally I hope learned the value of reading ( and those other people probably do know more than me so I should not think I know better ,,,yet)

taltal13 said:
I finally updated to the official AT&T Froyo 2.2 probably about a month ago. Everything was working great. I wanted to root/enable sideloading apps/unlock. I used SuperOneClick 2.1.1. The root worked fine (at least I think so). I was not able to enable sideloading apps so I read online how to change the value of sideloading apps from 0 to 1. I also unlocked the phone using the Galaxy S unlock app from the the Market.
Almost right after the SD Scan would take a long time and then I would get a red SD card symbol saying "Low on Space - Database storage is getting low". I tried clearing cache's to fix the problem. It didn't fix anything. Soon thereafter I started getting "Message Memory Full - Incoming messages rejected due to full...." I cleared phone log/txt messages but it hasn't fixed anything. I looked at my internal and external SD card. My external card is 3.68 total with 17MB available. My internal has 12.67GB available.
Today all of a sudden if I try to look at my missed call I get "samsung captivate the application phone (process com.sec.android.app.dialertab) has stopped unexpectedly. Please try again". I get similar messages trying to open Gmail. I haven't gotten it on any other apps yet as far as I know. It vibrates like crazy when the apps crash.
Can anyone help me with the problem? It's making my phone useless right now and my battery is dying much quicker than before. Thanks!
-T
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not sure how much of knowledge you have gained before doing these attempts of changing some values to enable side-loading...
I would suggest to do factory reset since you are still on FROYO and see if this does the magic.
If it gets locked back to AT&T, I suggest just talk to AT&T rep to unlock & side-enabling. Once all is well, you can do rooting as you did before. Hope this helps to solve your problem.
For any other help, we have XDA here and get some time to go through forums. As others suggested, please read, understand and act.

A day after I posted this the phone seemed to be working right. However Jackman pointed out if it happened once it's almost sure it will happen again. I tended to agree with him so did a factory reset and then flashed with Cognition 4.5.3 with a lot of Jack's help of course. Right now seems to be working flawlessly. I do like this whole custom ROM idea. Even thinking about buying a used Captivate on ebay just so I can mess around with other ROMs. Thanks everyone for your help & input. If you have any other suggestions my ears are always open...
Tal

taltal13 said:
A day after I posted this the phone seemed to be working right. However Jackman pointed out if it happened once it's almost sure it will happen again. I tended to agree with him so did a factory reset and then flashed with Cognition 4.5.3 with a lot of Jack's help of course. Right now seems to be working flawlessly. I do like this whole custom ROM idea. Even thinking about buying a used Captivate on ebay just so I can mess around with other ROMs. Thanks everyone for your help & input. If you have any other suggestions my ears are always open...
Tal
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just for a bit of encouragement ive been using Cognition 4.5.3 as my daily driver for the past 4-5 months and have never had a single issue with great battery life. Ive tried numerous other roms on this forum and always have run into a boot loop, force close, or other random issue that makes my phone unstable but with Cognition I experience what my phone was meant to be like.

[Q] Having problems with rooted SGH-T679 running CyanogenMod 10

Hello everyone, thanks for taking the time to read my thread. i'm really having a hard time here. I'm trying to take pictures, but it has become so unstable, and I can't reply. and it keeps saying i don't have any space in my SD. I've NEVER had this problem with my other ROM/Default.
There are 2 SDs, one is the one i bought and put it, so i can put all my music and i thought the other i would be able to have it for pics and other stuff. But I can't see it. i've taken out so much music to try and make space (like 10 folders/albums). But it's still saying it doesn't have enough space.
I'm right now rooted. used ClockworkMod then installed CM10 I believe. or CM11 and right now i'm running android (I went from a 2.3.6) to 4.1.2. on an SGH-T679 and the ROM is CyanogenMod version, Build date Apr 2, 16H EDT 2019, CyanogenMod version 10-20130402-UNOFFICIAL-Ancora_tmo. I hope that's enough info.
So I'm guessing if anyone from these forums. Has anyone been through this? Or has heard of someone else having problems. Because my #1 thing is just walking around NYC, taking pics. But when I can only walk around and like take 3 or 4 pics. i'm like :crying: all day. And i don't have the $ to just buy a camera like that.
P.S. and since yesterday, It takes longer to load the battery while charging unlike before. I thought that it was weird. But then to waste/discharge the battery.
Thank you

This may or may not solve your problem, sometimes there are hidden files that stay on your internal storage and eat up all your room. In your file manager enable hidden files, then look for things you can remove. One of hem right off the bat would be .thumbnails, I'm sure there are more but honestly you have to look around your storage, there may be old downloads or cache files that are still there. Hope this helps.

I think i flashed my ROM, data, cache, dalvik-cache and I think data was the last one. and since i've done that. I can't start my phone. It says samsung. then the samsung cyanogenmod start up screen, and it just hangs there. can anyone help me with this pls? I pressed
start button + down volume button. Then it says that it's going to download the OS for me. But i think that just hangs too cause it takes a while. and then it goes back to the start up screens that won't go anywhere.
Thanks D'vari, but unfortunately i think i'm passed that. Now i need to know just how to start my phone and get it past the phone.

You probably have conflicting data somewhere. Try power + volume up. That should get you into recovery. Then wipe everything except system and you should be able to boot up.

It took so long, because i read somewhere else to press vol down + power button. so i was trying. And It got me into Odin, and that said an OS is important, do you want to dl an OS now? so i said, well, i don't think i even have one left, so i chose yes. then it would say it was downloading for hours. but then it would boot up into the boot up screen loop. which was kind of good, but i didn't think so at the moment. Then i read how to get into cwm in my phone. so then i did it, and i had to do an advanced restore before regular restore was coming back MD5 mismatch. So It's like i flashed my old system, restored it to factory cyanogenmod factory. Tomorrow i'll flash cm10 and google apps and something else that had swipe working on this phone. maybe it was just upgrading to CM10, because now it's in version 9 and swipe is not working.
Thanks for your help

cyanogenmod issues as well
I had the same issue last week when updating to 10.1. but it did say that it may take a while to boot up. I didn't stress it. I just plugged it in by my bed and went to bed. when I woke up the next morning, I had it!
I did the volume up/power-wipe clean-reboot and then I slept. give that a try. maybe you are just like me and worrying that it is taking too long and you have F-ed up your phone!
On a different note, this 10.1 is awesome. But I can't get it to recognize my sd card. it does show that one is mounted but wont save anything and wont let me access the files. I have wiped the sd card clean and formatted to fat32. but that is doing nothing for me. any other suggestions here? I need my music and the space! this is taking so much time, it almost isn't worth the effort. but I love the cyanogenmod 10.1. but can't keep if it wont work right. ???
Deefex said:
It took so long, because i read somewhere else to press vol down + power button. so i was trying. And It got me into Odin, and that said an OS is important, do you want to dl an OS now? so i said, well, i don't think i even have one left, so i chose yes. then it would say it was downloading for hours. but then it would boot up into the boot up screen loop. which was kind of good, but i didn't think so at the moment. Then i read how to get into cwm in my phone. so then i did it, and i had to do an advanced restore before regular restore was coming back MD5 mismatch. So It's like i flashed my old system, restored it to factory cyanogenmod factory. Tomorrow i'll flash cm10 and google apps and something else that had swipe working on this phone. maybe it was just upgrading to CM10, because now it's in version 9 and swipe is not working.
Thanks for your help
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

I'm using pac 4.2 and I can switch were I want my pics stored from the camera settings maybe that ROM would help your situtation.

Thank you for all your help. But i decided to switch over to JellyBean. But i've been having some minor problems with it. I just flashed this ROM after doing something stupid in CWM (as you all know) while using cyanogen. I actually really like this ROM. I though CM10 futuristic looking. this beats that by a lot of points. I just have a problem now. The icons in the apps menu/section, are spaced too far apart. IDK what I did to cause this. Cause i was messing with those options of icons rows and colums for the desktop, but i set it back to default and that still didn't do anything to the apps section.
The other problem I'm having is with the camera. I try to open it, but it just says camera can't go on, 'wait-report-close'. That type of message. IDK what it is because the main reason for switching was to be able to take lots of pics. I love taking pics with my phone. And i found out what had my internal memory soooo clogged up. I had a .txt music cache file that was 848MB. Once I erased that, I know have 50% free space.
It looks really retarded . I know i'll fix it somehow, someday. I think there's even an upgrade now for slimbean, maybe I should try that. But right now i'm in google play store. in the 'my apps' list. and going through what i used to have, and installing my old apps, one by one. a grueling task, but I really want to use this ROM as my main rom.