Related
Does anyone know how to make a complete memory dump (RAM) of the XDA, apart from the m? commands. These commands give a memory, hex, text breakdown. What i'm looking for is a command that get's 32MB of data and stores is as 32MB of DATA (the the invoking and storing the dump is obvious, so no tips on those please, i only want the commands get this raw memory dump).
Regards,
René
I just read up on some of the other stuff in here.
Somebody mentioned the XDA has 32MB of RAM "AND!!!" 32MB of flash ROM.
So, is this true? And if so. Does this mean that the organizer data is held in flash ROM allways? (this would in my opinion not be correct with some of the functions of the XDA, but OK). And if so..... How do i make a raw dump of this memory?
Cheears,
René
dumping ram
Hi,
I'm not aware of a means to dump RAM using the bootloader functions. However I'm considering developing something for it. It shouldn't be too hard with a bootloader patch like we developed to get around 5.17 limitations.
What I'm looking for is info on how data is organized in RAM such as the filesystem. The 32 RAM contains semi persistent data while the ROM contains what is needed to reinitialize the device and system binaries. However, as far as I understand, applications you install additionally and any application data is only stored in RAM. Anyone knows how the filesystem works on the lower level? I'm looking to implement a tool that can read such a RAM dump and make sense outof it.
Ok, so i came up with the idea of using the m? functions for dumping the data (what is the difference between those anyway?), into a huge file (you get 80bytes for each 16 bytes of data, so 160MB for a 32MB model and a hellufa lot of time, say 4 hours at 105200), and than parse these back to the original 32MB, based on the hex dump supplied.
As to your question, for which i'd like the answer myself, about the file system: as it's windows, i hope it will be some form of FAT or NTFS, but what i've seen so far, i'm afraid it's the system MS developed for storing their office documents....
Does anyone know if parts of the data are stored encoded/crunched/ encrypted?
Anonymous said:
As to your question, for which i'd like the answer myself, about the file system: as it's windows, i hope it will be some form of FAT or NTFS, but what i've seen so far, i'm afraid it's the system MS developed for storing their office documents....
Does anyone know if parts of the data are stored encoded/crunched/ encrypted?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I doubt if its FAT or NTFS, as it needs to handle having its size limitations changed dynamically as the device manages objectstore<->memory changes.
And its all stored compressed.
..Chuck..
Well, I recently managed to work out what RAM belongs to the file system, and dump that ram only. And within that RAM I've found some files, and their compressed data, and used the BinaryDecompress calls to decompress it and verify the contents.
However I still can't work out the overall structure that provides the pointers/identifiers to the location of the files, I just happened to find certain files by searching on the filename (which is stored uncompressed BTW).
Has anyone else been trying this?
..Chuck..
I am a newbie and just bought my first PDA phone - O2 Atom
Trying to learn as much about it so that I can fully utilize it.
Reading the posts in this site is my first step.
I know this may sound stupid to the experienced users but
I've been reading posts asking about unlocking the Ext. Rom
What is the purpose of doing this ? What are the additional things I can do if I can unlock my ext. Rom vs just leaving the device "as is" ?
Anyone care to enlighten me ?
When you unlock the ext-rom you can see what's in it? Also you can turn it writeable, so you can do anything you like with it, make a copy of the content first. As it it persistent storage on most devices the content won't be erased by hard-reset.
On my magician for instances the ext-rom is concatenated to the internal storage folder enlarging it from 7 to 27MB.
Regards, M
Basically, the ext (extended) rom includes extra settings like operator network settings, extra operator programs and operator visual customisations. Really, if you are new to this, it is best to leave as-is, as unlocking only allows you to edit the Ext rom, which you will probs not want to do yet.
Thanks all for the info. I guess I need to find out more before I try this.
There seems to be 3 kinds of memory on my device:
1. Storage
2. Memory Card
3. Device (which itself seems to be broken into 2 ? One for programs and another for program storage ?)
One of the reasons I asked this question is because I encountered a low memory warning but when I checked the Settings/memory 1 & 2 still showed lots but on the General tab it showed Storage as .5KB left not sure how to interprete the info.
The memory on your device is called RAM & is devided dynamically, by the OS, in a storage & a program part. When you install programs Via Act.sync & choose default they end up in ram, program files folder, this will cost precious space to run an application. So try to install to SD or storage folder. that's why BS is nice. You can use cabinstl to choose where you want to install when you install a cab directly on your magician.
Got the idea
You mentioned the operator blah blah.. does that means that i can unlock my simcard by unlocking the ext rom?
no extented rom and sim locks are 2 different things
Actually, oltp is a bit mistaking in his description of the memory regarding your specific phone.
The Atom is Windows Mobile 5 device.
On WM 5 phones there are two physical types of memory:
RAM and FLASH.
Unlike in older models, on WM 5 the RAM also called 'program memory' is only used to run programs, just like RAM in your PC.
The ROM or flash memory (slower, but isn't erased when power is lost) is divided in to 3 partitions:
ROM / OS - locked partition where the operating system resides. Only special tools like ROM upgrade utilities can write to this section.
Ext ROM - a locked partition where the operator / vendor of the phone stores some extras which are automatically installed after hard reset. As you already know you can unlock it and use as regular storage. Any data stored there will not be erased during hard reset.
Storage memory - this is the part of internal memory (flash) where you can install apps and store your documents and other files. Just like a PC hard drive.
...
Is there a sticky or a thread somewhere about editing ROM/Ext.Rom?
Thank you.
It's all in the WiKi!
Is there any way to Remove some Stock WinMo 6.1 ROM Files ? There are a few Pictures that I don't need in the Windows Folder (Album Sample) and they range between 412k ~ 842k each so there is a couple Megs of Storage Space that could be gained by Removing them any Info is appreciated.
Thanks
LGK1 said:
Is there any way to Remove some Stock WinMo 6.1 ROM Files ? There are a few Pictures that I don't need in the Windows Folder (Album Sample) and they range between 412k ~ 842k each so there is a couple Megs of Storage Space that could be gained by Removing them any Info is appreciated.
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Those pictures are save to remove or relocate (backup/save on your PC or whatever)...when you're looking at them in file explorer in the phone, just press+hold on any of the file names, and a menu will pop up with the option to delete.
sirphunkee said:
Those pictures are save to remove or relocate (backup/save on your PC or whatever)...when you're looking at them in file explorer in the phone, just press+hold on any of the file names, and a menu will pop up with the option to delete.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
But that's where I run into the Problem I have Resco Explorer installed and get a Message that says:
File '\Windows\Album Sample_01.jpg'
is in ROM memory!
You cannot delete it.
I tried thru regular File Explorer and the Delete Option is grayed out......
Yeah you know what, I had deleted all those pics right when I first got the phone, via the album view I think...but obviously (now) it retains a copy of them in that odd protected status you discovered. Looking at the pics in the /windows folder now, there's even some of those "album sample" ones that I've never seen before.
Sorry, I thought I'd already removed them from my phone cuz I didn't see them anywhere I'd expect to Some of the chefs around here will probably know if there's a way to trim that fat out of the windows folder, that's the kind of thing they're good at when assembling ROMs.
It's very simple people.
ROM stands for Read ONLY Memory. Think about what that means.
The only way to change what is on your ROM is by flashing, or I suppose you could use a hammer.
That's it.
dik23 said:
It's very simple people.
ROM stands for Read ONLY Memory. Think about what that means.
The only way to change what is on your ROM is by flashing, or I suppose you could use a hammer.
That's it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
And besides, removing these files from ROM would not free up space in RAM! Short answer, they're not taking up space that would be useful to you otherwise.
Ok then, I understand if the files in there are just unable to be deleted, but...
-If it's truly "ROM" (read-ONLY memory) on the phone, then how can it be flashed to a different one? In other words...the ROM image may indeed be read-only, but the physical memory it sits on isn't, correct?
-Doesn't the ROM image occupy a set amount of the on-board storage memory, that would otherwise be free for local storage? Therefore, some cooked ROM's eat up more/less space than others, affecting how much room is left for the user to store files etc, n'est pas? I think the OP's purpose was to try to free up storage space if possible, not just RAM overhead.
Again, I get it if the files baked into a ROM image can't be deleted once it's cooked...I'm just thinking that a ROM without unneccessary files in it WILL save usable space on the phone.
Read Only Memory
ROM is "usually" only ever read. In the day to day use of the device you are reading data from it. Kind of like a printed page from a laser printer
When you flash the ROM, you are actually writing to it, like when the laser printer prints the page. To get a new page, you need a laser printer. To get a new rom, you have to have a program to flash it.
After it is done printing, nothing changes on the page and it can only be read.
Same thing with a ROM, the amount of space will not change until it is flashed.
"-If it's truly "ROM" (read-ONLY memory) on the phone, then how can it be flashed to a different one? In other words...the ROM image may indeed be read-only, but the physical memory it sits on isn't, correct?"
Yes and no
A more accurate term would be Read Only Memory That Can Still Be Written To, But Isn't Very Often.
ROM has a better feng shui
"-Doesn't the ROM image occupy a set amount of the on-board storage memory, that would otherwise be free for local storage? Therefore, some cooked ROM's eat up more/less space than others, affecting how much room is left for the user to store files etc, n'est pas? I think the OP's purpose was to try to free up storage space if possible, not just RAM overhead."
No, there is RAM and ROM, these are separate, and have different functions.
"Again, I get it if the files baked into a ROM image can't be deleted once it's cooked...I'm just thinking that a ROM without unneccessary files in it WILL save usable space on the phone."
No, a ROM without unneccessary files in it WILL save usable ROM storage space.
I hate to say it, but hit the wiki
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Read-only_memory
[url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_memory
Once you understand the types of ram, and how and more importantly WHY they are used, this will make sense.
Cingularly Twisted said:
A more accurate term would be Read Only Memory That Can Still Be Written To, But Isn't Very Often.
ROM has a better feng shui
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LOL great analogy, thanks
That's what I suspected, but just wanted to be sure!
Hi there,
I'm programming something for Windows Mobile 2003. It basically removes and creates files around. One of the files it deletes is special file.reg, which is normally picked up during the hard-reset.
The file gets deleted using "DeleteFile" and very soon after, I force a hard-reset.
The problem is, the special file.reg is deleted from the file system tree, but it is apparently still available from the hard-reset.
I was wondering if there was another function I had to call to "flush" the file system? If not, I need to find a good trick to 1) enforce the file deletion (like rename first, then delete) and to 2) flush current ghost files left around.
The file system on those persistent drives are fat12 and/or fat16.
Thanks in advance for any input,
Simon
The hard reset returns the machine to its first power up state. If 'file.reg' was part of the original build, then the hard reset will restore it from ROM.
Also any programs you have installed to run on startup, will also be lost, so it is going to be a little difficult, if not impossible, to get rid of this file programatically.
Right, but I'm not talking about the ROM.
I'm talking about the persistent memory which are mounted as \Platform and \Application on this device. Those are FAT12 and/or FAT16, and files deleted (normally) do not come back.
In this case, the files are not coming back, they are not hidden either, but the hardreset process is able to pick them up somehow.
I mean, I call it the problem of the "Ghost files", because they are supposed to be nowhere, but they are found during during the hardreset.
(The files are not recreated, they are still not there, but their contents gets loaded. The info in them cannot be placed in ROM as it contains stuff that changes often)
They come back after a hard reset because during cold boot, they're being copied there from the rom or being created by the system. You may be able to delete them afterwards, but the only way to prevent them from being formed will be to re-cook the rom and stop them from being copied/created during boot-up.
The files DO NOT come back, it's gone, I cannot re-delete it. But somehow it is "read" by a program during the hard-reset.
This file is not part of the ROM, it's part of the persistent memory that doesn't get wiped out upon hardreset but is read-write.
I need to wipe out the ghost file that is stuck on the read/write partition... and I need a way to avoid these being created!
I understand that, but clearly the file is being created (or copied from rom) during cold re-boot, otherwise you wouldn't see it coming back. There isn't going to be any easy way to prevent that, unless you can re-cook the rom, or include some sort of user customization that would delete the files prior to using the device. There are lots of ways that the rom could create the files and put them onto persistant storage.
Hi Farmer Ted,
this is not a ROM issue, recooking the ROM will not help. The problem is a FAT12 or FAT16 filesystem that has bogus data in it.
The problem is most likely a bug in the program that reads the persistent folders... It probably reads it in a way that goes around the change made by DeleteFile()...
Changing that program is not possible (in ROM and I don't have the source, it's also necessary). I just need to make sure it can't find the file I've deleted on the persistent directory (not in ROM).
In my another post I reported the SD card space will lost by unknown reason, some of guy in this forum has confirmed it.
And now some users have found one reason that may cause it.
You can do test yourselves to see is it happen to you.
1. Make sure your oneX SD free space is more than 5G, otherwise after test you may have problem.
2. Check your sd card free space and write it down.
3. Connect one X to your pc by usb disk mode. copy one file (any size of file) from pc to X. no need copy big file.
4. disconnect one x from pc. And check on phone to see current SD free space.
If you are lucky, the free space is go down just the same size of the file you copied to it.
If you are not you will see additional 1G space disappeared. Yes if it has problem you will looe 1G, it always 1G not other number.
Try yourself and give the feedback. It maybe just one reason cause space lost, but it is east to find now.
Sent from my HTC One X
I lost 4gb in "bad sectors", you can check it with windows chkdsk.
Formatting the sd card is the only way to get the bad sectors back. It's been described in other threads.
chkdsk /f /r to recover bad sectors wont work.
yes I have format SD yesterday and get all space back. But not sure will it happen again or not.
Sent from my HTC One X
For me there are 2GB missing.
Trying to format
mmx6688 said:
If you are lucky, the free space is go down just the same size of the file you copied to it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Interesting choice of words. I move a lot of music, pics, and docs between my PC and my phone and never noticed what you described. To test it, I just moved a PDF file from my PC to the phone via USB and storage decremented by the size of the file.
It's to the point now that everyone's loaded up their phones with a ton of different apps. I have 82 downloaded apps installed. As with every other Android phone, a specific app or combination of apps can cause strange behavior. So "luck" may not have anything to do with your storage issue. Your phone could have a defect in its NAND memory, but it could also be an app or utility you're using; especially if it's not optimized for ICS or the way HTC's segmented memory.
This is from Paul at MoDaCo...
"One of the downsides of Ice Cream Sandwich is that, with its one contiguous on-board memory, there is no option to connect this to your computer as good old ‘mass storage’. The One X gets around this by partition it’s memory in two blocks - the old style ‘/data’ partition which comes in at 2.11GB (where your apps and data go if you don’t ‘move to SD’) and the virtual / sdcard partition totaling 25.24GB, which can be accessed via mass storage! Personally, I can’t decide whether it’s better to have that one big space and be limited to MTP or to have this solution... but for people wanting to easily drop content on their device, mass storage is definitely a big plus."
Does it happen if you completely restore your device and try it without adding your own apps? If it doesn't, it's something you've done to the phone not vice versa.
Hm that's strange...
I have 3,14 GB in bad sectors. Is it not due to detaching the device before it's unmounted (ejected)?
No such problem.
Tried 2 times. Once with a 280k file and another time with 6M+ file.
Did you change the connection back to charge only before you pulled the USB cable?
Actually I have been moving files in and out of my HOX (with PC) all the time. My total still shows 25.24G for the phone storage.
In fact I did the other test you mentioned in another thread. Property showed a number that was larger that all the files selected (ctrl-A). That was contrary to what you found out.
pehkblui said:
No such problem.
Tried 2 times. Once with a 280k file and another time with 6M+ file.
Did you change the connection back to charge only before you pulled the USB cable?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you copied a file to your phone before? What does checkdisk say when you attach your device?
It is indeed necessary to unmount the device before unplugging it from USB. Because if there's any writing to the device, it could result in data corruption.
I just pull out the phone from usb cable. How can I change to charging then pull out?
The issue I described not happen to me after I format the SD. It happen to other users I know.
Sent from my HTC One X
Although I'm in a similar situation to others in this thread I'm not sure it's caused in the same way, so a bit of clarification would be great.
First of all, my situation is as follows.
My mass storage currently has a hidden directory called 'System data' which is taking up a whopping 15gb of space, leaving me with very little space to use. You can see what is taking up the space on your phone with DiskUsage (sorry can't post links yet).
After doing a bit of searching around the issue there doesn't seem to be a specific cause but perhaps uploading files from your PC could have been the reason it happened to me, I probably uploaded about 6 or 7gb worth of videos and albums since I got my phone.
I found a few threads around this issue, I can't post links but if you search for 'system data size android' you should find some similar topics.
The two solutions which seem to be viable are to either factory reset your phone or to root your phone then grant an explorer application superuser rights to delete the 'System data'.
However I'm not sure these solutions will actually fix the original issue as oppose to just stopping it from happening for the time being.
Can someone else check DiskUsage and see if they have an overly large 'Systems data' folder then report back please.
mmx6688 said:
I just pull out the phone from usb cable. How can I change to charging then pull out?
The issue I described not happen to me after I format the SD. It happen to other users I know.
Sent from my HTC One X
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You shouldn't just pull out the phone from USB cable, because there is a chance data is being written to the device (umount in linux, eject mass storage device in windows), as is the case with flash memory. You also shouldn't change to charging, because that can also corrupt the data, as it is the same thing as pulling the USB cable out.
Nevertheless, this probably doesn't explain the bad blocks problem. I don't remember pulling out my phone before ejecting it, but still I have 3GB of bad blocks...
Can anyone else run the checkdisk program and check the amount of bad blocks? Just connect the phone as USB storage device; start -> cmd and type 'chkdsk X:' (where X is the drive letter where the phone is mounted to)
seedoubleu said:
Can someone else check DiskUsage and see if they have an overly large 'Systems data' folder then report back please.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Mine's a little less than a GB. I've used 11.62GB of storage and have 14.23GB free. The question is what app or process is writing files to your Systems data folder?
Birdskenburg said:
You also shouldn't change to charging, because that can also corrupt the data, as it is the same thing as pulling the USB cable out.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This I am not too sure. The phone should be smart enough to know it can't just change to charge only if there is data transfer.
In fact, when you change to charge only you will see a message on the phone screen saying preparing phone storage.
I used chkdsk, there is 1G (1048576) in bad sector. I have since tried copying files into the phone a few times, and the bad sector number never changes (after I have disconnected and reconnected the usb).
Here we go,
The type of the file system is FAT32.
Volume HTC STORAGE created 01/01/2011 21:00
Windows is verifying files and folders...
File and folder verification is complete.
Windows has checked the file system and found no problems.
26,470,048 KB total disk space.
288 KB in 8 hidden files.
28,064 KB in 867 folders.
11,210,816 KB in 6,979 files.
14,680,064 KB in bad sectors.
550,784 KB are available.
32,768 bytes in each allocation unit.
827,189 total allocation units on disk.
17,212 allocation units available on disk.
So this could be due to disconnecting without doing it safely as I charge my phone via my PC at work each day...
I don't really feel comfortable rooting my phone now due to that customer service chat thread about warranties so I guess a factory reset and then making sure I safely remove the phone each time from the PC is my only option.
One interesting thing about the chkdsk is that it says:
Volume HTC STORAGE created 16/11/2061 6.05 PM
I have a sdcard prepared some 50 years in the future.
seedoubleu said:
Although I'm in a similar situation to others in this thread I'm not sure it's caused in the same way, so a bit of clarification would be great.
First of all, my situation is as follows.
My mass storage currently has a hidden directory called 'System data' which is taking up a whopping 15gb of space, leaving me with very little space to use. You can see what is taking up the space on your phone with DiskUsage (sorry can't post links yet).
After doing a bit of searching around the issue there doesn't seem to be a specific cause but perhaps uploading files from your PC could have been the reason it happened to me, I probably uploaded about 6 or 7gb worth of videos and albums since I got my phone.
I found a few threads around this issue, I can't post links but if you search for 'system data size android' you should find some similar topics.
The two solutions which seem to be viable are to either factory reset your phone or to root your phone then grant an explorer application superuser rights to delete the 'System data'.
However I'm not sure these solutions will actually fix the original issue as oppose to just stopping it from happening for the time being.
Can someone else check DiskUsage and see if they have an overly large 'Systems data' folder then report back please.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wait.. did you find the files called "system data"?
I ahve this issue too. around 12GB
Birdskenburg said:
I have 3GB of bad blocks...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have 3,145,728KB being reported as bad sectors. I'm guessing since your results are so similar to mine they aren't really bad sectors. More than likely they're either protected files, protected disk space, or something in HTC's unique configuration of storage (see above) that's not being read correctly by CHKDSK. If we all get the same result it's probably not an issue with the device itself.
P.S. - If someone does a hard reset (w/o loading any apps) and CHKDSK still reports 3ishGB in bad sectors that would confirm it's an issue with CHKDSK reading the phone's storage.
seedoubleu said:
Here we go,
The type of the file system is FAT32.
Volume HTC STORAGE created 01/01/2011 21:00
Volume Serial Number is 7CE0-1CDB
Windows is verifying files and folders...
File and folder verification is complete.
Windows has checked the file system and found no problems.
26,470,048 KB total disk space.
288 KB in 8 hidden files.
28,064 KB in 867 folders.
11,210,816 KB in 6,979 files.
14,680,064 KB in bad sectors.
550,784 KB are available.
32,768 bytes in each allocation unit.
827,189 total allocation units on disk.
17,212 allocation units available on disk.
So this could be due to disconnecting without doing it safely as I charge my phone via my PC at work each day...
I don't really feel comfortable rooting my phone now due to that customer service chat thread about warranties so I guess a factory reset and then making sure I safely remove the phone each time from the PC is my only option.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's a lot!
Well, I don't think this problem has anything to do with unsafely disconnecting the device, this shouldn't give bad blocks; at the utmost corrupt files.
Then again, I don't know that much about the subject. I believe the memory controller keeps track of bad sectors on a lower level, and bad sectors are mostly caused by damage/faulty hardware. If we'd really have bad sectors, a high level format wouldn't solve the problem (which it did, appearantly). So I think this problem is software related, or related to the memory controller. But again, I know very little about this.
Birdskenburg said:
That's a lot!
Well, I don't think this problem has anything to do with unsafely disconnecting the device, this shouldn't give bad blocks; at the utmost corrupt files.
Then again, I don't know that much about the subject. I believe the memory controller keeps track of bad sectors on a lower level, and bad sectors are mostly caused by damage/faulty hardware. If we'd really have bad sectors, a high level format wouldn't solve the problem (which it did, appearantly). So I think this problem is software related, or related to the memory controller. But again, I know very little about this.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not really very clued up either, just learning as I'm going along.
It seems like too much of a coincidence that the size of the system data file on the storage card is pretty much exactly the same size as the amount of bad sectors shown from the chkdsk.
It seems there's a more overarching issue at hand here which is slowly affecting more of us.
BarryH_GEG - I think that's what we need to find out, what files are actually in that System data directory, if anyone has root access they may be able to dig deeper with an explorer app.
Supaiku - Yup, System data is directly below Storage Card but doesn't show up on any explorer apps, only when using DiskUsage.
BarryH_GEG said:
I have 3,145,728KB being reported as bad sectors. I'm guessing since your results are so similar to mine they aren't really bad sectors. More than likely they're either protected files, protected disk space, or something in HTC's unique configuration of storage (see above) that's not being read correctly by CHKDSK. If we all get the same result it's probably not an issue with the device itself.
P.S. - If someone does a hard reset (w/o loading any apps) and CHKDSK still reports 3ishGB in bad sectors that would confirm it's an issue with CHKDSK reading the phone's storage.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah I think you're right. Still, it's strange that seedoubleu is reporting to have more than 14GB of 'bad sectors', what would be hidden there?
I still think this has something to do with the device's memory controller, because the 3+ GB really isn't accessible.