What do nandroid backups NOT back up? Clarifications - T-Mobile Galaxy Note 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Ok so basically I was told whenever I do a backup, always pick everything except cache and recovery.
I am planning to try out different custom roms, and do nandroid backups back up EVERY SINGLE SETTING/EVERYTHING ABOUT THE PHONE? I customized everything and my launcher to my liking and took 2 hours to get every single thing to how I want it. If I were to restore this backup, it's going to be exactly how I left it right?

It should. Sometimes things can go wrong.
BAD ASS NOTE 4

Yep, it will be exactly as it was when you took the backup.

You probably already know this but I'll mention it for newbies who may read the thread.
Nandroid backups won't back up all files on your internal or external SD card storage.
So if you wipe your SD card and then restore your Nandroid backup, you're going to be missing some files on your SD card.
Which is okay for the most part.

Related

can I take an SD card w/ apps(2sd) and place in new phone

Hi, I was wanting to take my SD card from the G1 I use everyday and place it in my other G1. (reason: the other one physically looks better, and I'm thinking of selling one)
So, theoretically... Shouldn't I be able to do a nandroid backup and/or a bart backup via recovery, turn off both phones, place the SD card into the new(other) phone, boot into recovery, do a nandroid/bart restore. (I assume bart correct?) Then wouldn't the sd card work just the same as it did on the other phone?
Has anyone tried this? I couldn't find anything specific on this online. Will this work?
Thanks
ccooluke said:
Hi, I was wanting to take my SD card from the G1 I use everyday and place it in my other G1. (reason: the other one physically looks better, and I'm thinking of selling one)
So, theoretically... Shouldn't I be able to do a nandroid backup and/or a bart backup via recovery, turn off both phones, place the SD card into the new(other) phone, boot into recovery, do a nandroid/bart restore. (I assume bart correct?) Then wouldn't the sd card work just the same as it did on the other phone?
Has anyone tried this? I couldn't find anything specific on this online. Will this work?
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well... yes and no.
If you do a nandroid backup you will notice in the nandroid folder a strange number. (ex HT012345678)
The nandroid restore process verifies your serial number prior to doing the restore process.
Easy workaround might be to simply rename it to the other serial number of the other device. It should work just fine as long as both phones have the same SPL.
Take note however that this method may not be supported and you should make backups of your backups (not to sound redundant) just in case.
update: so I finally tried it.
Here's what I did:
backup everything on my SD card to my computer.
Did a nandroid backup, then a bart backup.
Turned off both phones, put my sim and the sd card in the new phone.
booted into recovery, did a bart restore and everything works great!
Note: the nandroid restore did fail. Bart however, did work.
I didn't try switching the serial number yet, but that most likely could work.

[Q] new to cyanogenmod + Titanium Backup + Link2SD

Hey,
I have decided to give CyanogenMod a go for the first time.
I've been rooted for some time now - running a stock Gingerbread 2.3.4 rooted.
I've heard so many good things about CyanogenMod and I have had an itch for a bit of a change, that I decided now is a good time to give it a try.
I was hoping you guys might be able to help me clarify a few things first though.
I have Link2SD installed and setup. I have linked a couple of apps using and I was wondering if anyone knows how it works with Titanium Backup?
What I was hoping to be able to do was:
Code:
1)
Make a back up of some of my apps + their data using Titanium Backup - Some of these apps have been moved using Link2SD
2)
Install ClockworkMod Recovery and make a full nandroid backup.
3)
Make a backup of all the contents on my SD card - from the fat32 partition primarily.
4)
Install CyanongenMod using ROM Manager
5)
Redo the ext2 partition on my SD card and reinstall Link2SD once CyanogenMod has been installed
6)
Reinstall Titanium Backup and restore all the apps I backed up.
I was hoping that by doing the above I could hang onto all the custom settings I have in some of the apps.
For the apps that have been linked using Link2SD, will Titanium backup restore them properly as long as that ext2 partition on the SD card is there?? Or am I going to run into issues?
I have done some searching on these forums but there seems to be no clear cut answer.
Any help or advice would greatly be appreciated!
Thank you
You'll be fine - just make a full Titanium backup and a nandroid (just in case).
Do a full wipe, install CM with gapps, install your apps2sd, then restore your Titanium backup...
Titanium Backup will just restore the apps to the /data partition (or the ext if you have app2sdext enabled), but since link2sd is setting up individual symlinks for each app, those probably won't be carried over when you restore with Titanium Backup. You will have to redo those apps. But this may be time to look into a full app2sdext option. It is much simpler than link2sd and there aren't any noticeable performance hits (unless you do data2sd).
Good catch bass - I missed the Link2SD detail!
@danger-rat @bassmadrigal
Thank you guys for giving me some advice.. it is much appreciated!
So the app2sdext option can be done using dark tremor?
I was looking at dark tremor previously when I was trying to decide what method to use to relink apps.
Do you guys know of a good tutorial to go about setting it up? Is it done pre install of Cyanogen? Or post install?
My other concern about moving apps to the SD card using methods like link2sd and dark tremor is recently I had a situation where my ext2 partitions filesystem actually became corrupted. I ended up having to a 'fsck' on it to repair it ( I am pretty sure I got lucky with that ). Using the app2sdext do I still have the options to decide what I move to my SD card?
You can use Darktremor or S2E as the popular methods. S2E is a bit more intuitive (its an app in the market, with a front end GUI).
Install after you've installed CM.
As far as corrupt cards, just make sure you backup from time to time. Titanium or nandroid should do the trick. The advantage of having an ext partition is that once you have the partition, you can reformat it without losing your regular SD partition...
i would also recommend S2E, recently went from dt to
s2e and its working great.
Sent from my Transformer TF101 using Tapatalk
I remember seeing you mention s2e once before! At the time though I couldn't use it since I wasn't running CyanogenMod
That sounds like a good plan.
What do you think of this
Code:
1)
Do a Titanium Backup of my apps+their data
(including ones that have been moved using link2sd)
2)
When I install CyanogenMod, setup and install s2e
3)
Install Titanium Backup and start recovering my apps.
Since Titanium Backup should restore apps linked via
link2sd back to the default /data directory, I should just
be able to relink them using the s2e method?
I was wondering something else to actually.
@danger-rat you have mentioned in the past that you do not like the most recent version of the ClockworkMod recovery due to stability and reliability issues (I have seen a few other people say this as well). If this is still the case, can you recommend a version to install? From Rom Manager itself, can you choose a different version of ClockworkMod recovery to install?
Sorry for all the questions!
EDIT ------------------------------------------------
Just after I posted this I noticed there is an option in Rom Manager "All ClockworkMod Recoveries" - It looks like this option will allow me to install older version of ClockworkMod?
I use CWM 2.5.1.4 and install via ROM Manager, just as you suggested...
Thank you sir for suggesting a version and confirming I can do it via ROM manager.
Hopefully I can try this in the next couple days. Will report back success/epic failures!
Thank you baseballfanz as well!
Sent from my Nexus One using Tapatalk
Why posting a question in general section???
Thread moved.
hey sorry I wanted to ask one more question...
Since I plan on implementing s2e I will have to reformat my ext2 partition to ext3 or 4 (I think it said ext4..)
My question is, what should I do with my fat32 partition?
After I backup all the data on it, should I reformat it as well? Then after I get CyanogenMod installed, move back only what is important - Titanium backup directory for example? Or copy everything that was on it. There will probably be a lot of useless/old files on there that aren't really useful.
EDIT ---------------------
Sorry Mr.Clown for posting in wrong section.. I'll post correctly next time!
i went from dt a2sd to s2e with no need to redo anything on my sd card. i had ext4 already.
if you use amon ra you can change ext 2 to ext 3 or ext 4.
Sorry, I was gone all day and away from a computer. Glad others chimed in. But to start, S2E and DarkTremor's a2sd both are not selective on which apps are installed to the sdcard. It is an all or nothing approach. That is the difference between app2sdext and link2sd. With S2E, you just install it and open the app. Select the checkboxes to move apps to the sdcard and then I recommend moving the dalvik cache as well (as it takes a lot of space). Reboot, and any apps you install/restore will be automagically put on the sdext partition.
And to answer your last question, if you already have an ext partition on your card, there is no reason to change it. It may say ext 3 or 4 is needed, but I am running ext2 on mine without any issues (I have been too lazy to take the time to change it). Just make sure the ext partition is wiped (which can be done in recovery under Mounts and Storage). The fat32 can be wiped, but it isn't necessary. Although, if it has been awhile, you may want to consider it, just to get rid of some of the stupid folders that devs can't figure out how to keep them out of the root of the card.
@bassmadrigal
thanks for the response man!
All or nothing eh? I will give it a try and hope for the best! At least then I will have more flexibility in the amount of apps that I can have!
I think I will just reformat the entire card since it has been a while. There is so much stuff on the card now I don't really know what is what anymore. I will keep a back up of it though juuuust in case.
I think the ext2 partition might have some files left over from link2sd so I think I might wipe it out as well and start again.
I have since removed all the apps I moved using link2sd just to calm my nerves a little bit (ha!).
I am currently trying to purchase titanium backup but it looks like maybe the market is having issues. It is stuck on "Authorizing purchase..." seems like a few people have had this.
In the mean time I will install the recovery image and do a nandroid backup!
Just as an FYI, if you redo your partitions (ie repartitioning your sdcard through the recovery), that will erase and format both partitions. I think by default, clockworkmod will do an ext2 partition, whereas Amon_RA gives you the option between ext3 and ext4. One thing to keep in mind, in the past, with ClockworkMod v3.x, it had been known to cause issues with partitioning cards. I don't know if that has been fixed in the v5.x, but I know it doesn't exist in v2.x and it also works properly in Amon_RA.
All or nothing really isn't a bad approach. I have a class 4 32GB Sandisk, and I don't seem to have any speed problems. Then, with some of the apps that have a large amount of data, I will move those individually with Titanium Backup. Two big ones are Google Earth (16MB of frickin data), and Firefox (I don't remember how much, but it is still a large amount). But I had to move those because I was running out of room in my internal memory (I have a lot of apps installed).
I was actually just about to update this thread!
I have been busy since my last post!
I have since installed clockworkmod recovery, done my backups, installed cyanogenmod, and am just in the process of going through it.
I FINALLY got titanium backup pro key to install.. I think there must have been something wrong between google and the titanium backup app, but after like 2 hours of trying it finally went through!
I think I am okay with the "All or nothing approach" as well. I know now that I need to start to take backups WAY more serious! So if I ever run into a situation where my ext partition dies, I won't be devastated!
I think what I will end up doing is reformatting it all tomorrow at work. I will turn the phone off, remove SD card, format using a Linux system at work, place card back in and go from there.
To restore my ROM Manager backup and my Titanium Backups I just have to copy those folders back to the SD card (after the format) from the backup I made of the SD card prior to formatting it (sorry if I am sounding repetitive, I can't tell if what I am saying will make sense to anyone other then myself lol + plus I am EXHAUSTED!)
That's awesome though its working for you. I have a class 10 8 gig kingston SDcard and so far its been great!
So when I setup s2e (I have it installed, but not configured!) I should select the check boxes "Applications, Private apps, and Dalvic Cache"?
You mentioned that you use Titanium Backup to move certain apps like Google Earth... I was just wondering in what direction you were moving them? From the phone to the SDcard, or from the SDcard to the phone? Sorry for probably another really stupid question I just wanted to make sure I was following you correctly!
Thank you again for all your help though. Things have gone smoothly so far
In S2E move applications, private apps, dalvik cache and optional too download cache.
As for moving data to sd card individually by Titanium, you are moving the data from internal memory to sd card
Yes, all you need to do is copy those folders back, but if you restore any of your nandroid backups, you will reset everything in your system back to the time before you installed S2E. So, I would only do that as a last resort. But, Titanium Backup does not have that limitation. It is just restoring the data to whatever the system is setup to do.
Once you do get everything up and running properly, it would be beneficial to do a nandroid. But as far as a lot of backups, you can set TB to run on a schedule to back up your phone every so often while you are asleep. And then, I just make sure I do a nandroid before I flash ANYTHING.
And ditto for what baseballfanz said. I never bothered with the download cache, as that is stored on a different partition within the phone (the /cache partition). Unless you resize all your partitions, it is probably pointless to move it. And yes, I am moving the data (ie the saved games/settings etc) for the app to the sdext partition with Titanium Backup, but you probably won't need to do this for a while (I have 213 user apps installed according to TB).
@bassmadrigal and @baseballfanz
Thanks guys for all your advice!
Sorry for the million's of question, I'm learning a lot from you guys though!
So.. Cheers!
Nandroid is similar to Acronis (imaging software) for PC so I definitely follow you when you say that restoring an Nandroid backup will erase anything I have done since doing that particular backup.
Good to know that moving those folders back onto the SDcard is all I have to do so now reformatting the card isn't as scary! Oh and I have to make sure I grab the Titanium Backup License file - Sorry I just read this is the old method!
I will definitely take your advice and produce a Nandroid backup once everything is up and running just in case! I have been thinking about it and I figured I could automate a backup of the Titanium Backup folder and the clockworkmod folder by using the rSync app. I could just copy everything to my NAS during the night, which would ensure I have two physical copies just incase my SD card decides to dead.
thanks for clarifying the direction of the data being moved using titanium backup. I figured it was that but wanted to be sure. I still have a lot of learning to do with that app to get fully familiar with it!
I'll be setting up my two new partition today and hopefully I can start restoring apps later this afternoon. Will report back my status.
Thanks again for the help!
cheers

Selling my N1, How Do I erase backup and all my data? Thanks

Hello I'm selling my Nexus One, it is rooted running Cyanogen. I'm not selling sd card with phone, i'm just selling the phone. I did a data and cache wipe so is all my info gone? If someone did a restore (nandroid) wouldn't that bring all my information back? When I first rooted and when I switched roms months back I did a nandroid backup, so now i'm wondering if someone could simply do a nandroid restore and get back all of my data, i'm concerned about text, contacts, gmail information, personal info inside of apps, etc... Thanks
If you wiped data and cache, then your phone is almost completely empty. The last thing remaining is the sdcard. If you are sending that with the phone, you will need to wipe it. If you are keeping it, then there is nothing else to do.
And your nandroid backups are stored on the sdcard, so either way, whatever you choose to do from the above will get rid of nandroids.
bassmadrigal said:
If you wiped data and cache, then your phone is almost completely empty. The last thing remaining is the sdcard. If you are sending that with the phone, you will need to wipe it. If you are keeping it, then there is nothing else to do.
And your nandroid backups are stored on the sdcard, so either way, whatever you choose to do from the above will get rid of nandroids.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thanks, i'm not including sd, because he already has a larger sd card, so without my sd card the nandroid backup wont do anything? so all my text, contacts, passwords, emails and things are gone?
Correct, Titanium save it to sd card, no
sd no nandroid restore
Sent from my Transformer TF101 using Tapatalk
baseballfanz said:
Correct, Titanium save it to sd card, no
sd no nandroid restore
Sent from my Transformer TF101 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
great! thanks

what is the difference between cw backup and titanium backup?

what is the difference between cw backup and titanium backup?
which is better, more safe (for brick issue) , faster ...
what is meant by nandroid backup?
Difference between Nandroid and Titanium backup
I am glad I found this, I have been looking for a thread I could submit a useful post in so that I would be able to see the thank button.
Nandroid backup is the type of backup that CWM does.
i.e. when your phone is rooted you can go into the recovery and one of the options is nandroid backup.
A nandroid backup copies every single byte of data stored in the phone onto your SD card (or wherever) and is an absolute backup of one particular state of your phone.
It is a very powerful tool, you do a nandroid backup before flashing anything and if it all goes wrong the nandroid backup will restore everything back to the way it was before you messed it all up.
(with the Note you need to be careful because the nandroid backup does a wipe and write on restore and that will trigger the hard brick issues with the leaked ICS ROMs that you will no doubt have read about in the stickies.
Titanium backup is a tool that is run from inside the OS and can back up the installation files and app data of all your apps, it will allow you to remove and replace individual apps or batch replace the whole lot.
It can also force the OS not to update certain apps if you want them to run at an older version.
It can sync its backup files to Dropbox or Google drive too.
I guess in a nutshell the differences are these:
Nandroid will only back up a snapshot of the whole phone but does not need a working OS to do it.
Titanium will only work if you can get the phone to boot into android but it can do more specific backups and roll backs.
Let me know if that has answered your question buddy.
amateurstuntman said:
I am glad I found this, I have been looking for a thread I could submit a useful post in so that I would be able to see the thank button.
Nandroid backup is the type of backup that CWM does.
i.e. when your phone is rooted you can go into the recovery and one of the options is nandroid backup.
A nandroid backup copies every single byte of data stored in the phone onto your SD card (or wherever) and is an absolute backup of one particular state of your phone.
It is a very powerful tool, you do a nandroid backup before flashing anything and if it all goes wrong the nandroid backup will restore everything back to the way it was before you messed it all up.
(with the Note you need to be careful because the nandroid backup does a wipe and write on restore and that will trigger the hard brick issues with the leaked ICS ROMs that you will no doubt have read about in the stickies.
Titanium backup is a tool that is run from inside the OS and can back up the installation files and app data of all your apps, it will allow you to remove and replace individual apps or batch replace the whole lot.
It can also force the OS not to update certain apps if you want them to run at an older version.
It can sync its backup files to Dropbox or Google drive too.
I guess in a nutshell the differences are these:
Nandroid will only back up a snapshot of the whole phone but does not need a working OS to do it.
Titanium will only work if you can get the phone to boot into android but it can do more specific backups and roll backs.
Let me know if that has answered your question buddy.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thx alot for ur reply
amateurstuntman said:
I am glad I found this, I have been looking for a thread I could submit a useful post in so that I would be able to see the thank button.
Nandroid backup is the type of backup that CWM does.
i.e. when your phone is rooted you can go into the recovery and one of the options is nandroid backup.
A nandroid backup copies every single byte of data stored in the phone onto your SD card (or wherever) and is an absolute backup of one particular state of your phone.
It is a very powerful tool, you do a nandroid backup before flashing anything and if it all goes wrong the nandroid backup will restore everything back to the way it was before you messed it all up.
(with the Note you need to be careful because the nandroid backup does a wipe and write on restore and that will trigger the hard brick issues with the leaked ICS ROMs that you will no doubt have read about in the stickies.
Titanium backup is a tool that is run from inside the OS and can back up the installation files and app data of all your apps, it will allow you to remove and replace individual apps or batch replace the whole lot.
It can also force the OS not to update certain apps if you want them to run at an older version.
It can sync its backup files to Dropbox or Google drive too.
I guess in a nutshell the differences are these:
Nandroid will only back up a snapshot of the whole phone but does not need a working OS to do it.
Titanium will only work if you can get the phone to boot into android but it can do more specific backups and roll backs.
Let me know if that has answered your question buddy.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thats incorrect as per my post regarding backup cwm does not take a snapshot of whole phone. One more thing you need to backup seperately is efs. See my thread on that. http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1606012
Sent from my GT-N7000 using Tapatalk 2

how to backup apps on micro sd card using titanium?

the other day my tablet reset. i had to download everything again. when i use titanium backup it will only backup to the tablet which it sees as the sd card which gets erased if you have to restore the tablet. there doesn't seem to be a way to change it in the settings. any way to backup my apps to my external sd card? i did search here but nothing clear came up. i am running stock with root. no cm 10 or any of that stuff
bckrupps said:
the other day my tablet reset. i had to download everything again. when i use titanium backup it will only backup to the tablet which it sees as the sd card which gets erased if you have to restore the tablet. there doesn't seem to be a way to change it in the settings. any way to backup my apps to my external sd card? i did search here but nothing clear came up. i am running stock with root. no cm 10 or any of that stuff
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You have three choices. The first is to just copy the backup folder on sdcard to ext_sdcard. Then it does not get wiped out in a reset. The second is to use the CWM card you had used to root to do a nandroid backup to SD. That way if reset, just restore and everything is back. The third way is to use my swap zip to swap sdcard and ext_sdcard. Then TB backs up to your external card. I prefer the nandroid backup myself.
Sent from my Nook HD+ running CM10.1 on emmc.
i recently just set my backups to back up to my sd card
first thing is make a folder on the sdcard, something like TitaniumBackup
in the TB app, press Menu in the top rightthen > preferences, then down to the backup settings > Backup folder location > hit back once or twice until you are on /mnt > find ext_sdcard > then click the folder folder you made on the sd card and then hit use current folder.
I do the nandroid backup probably once every 4-5 days just to be safe in case i eff something up lol
Yea I am using a 16gb card. At first I used the wrong zip and my open space wasn't enough. Found the 4gb zip and all is well with the nandroid backup. This is the second time in 3 days I had a tablet reset. One thing I like about apple products is less crashing and such but loving this tablet for $179.
bckrupps said:
One thing I like about apple products is less crashing and such but loving this tablet for $179.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Less crashing because they don't allow you into the area where you can mess things up in the system (unless you jailbreak) Also, much less complexity with tens rather than hundreds of device configurations. I'll take more complexity, a little less stability but the ability to do what I want :cyclops:

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