[Q] Woes of the S4 mini SCH-I435 (several questions about it) - Galaxy S 4 Mini Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I was recently given a new SCH-I435 from a family member. This is my first time having an android in a very long time(Switching from an iPhone 4s). I have a few questions about it. (this may be a lengthy post)
First I know that you cannot flash custom ROMs to it, as the bootloader is still locked. I have heard that there are some de-bloated stock ROMs out there, but have entirely failed to find any. I can probably get by without it, as I already have it rooted, but there are several things I am attempting to do, and every time I look up how to do it, step one is having a custom ROM.
If anyone can point me to a de-bloated stock ROM I would greatly appreciate it (or at least one that is compiled to not be a "production build" as I keep running into "adbd cannot run as root in production builds" and it is severely limiting what I am trying to do, and what I am going to want to do in the future)
What I am trying to accomplish next is taking over the "connected as installer" feature that Verizon has on it when you plug it into USB (I am using linux exclusively so have absolutely no use for their software). I figured I may as well put this feature to good use. I am attempting to swap the ISO file in /system/etc for a CrunchBang LiveCD.
This has only been a partial success, apparently /system is it's own partition, and there is not enough room to fit the whole ISO (It is 739mb and it stops at 423mb) Even though it does not get the whole ISO copied, if I reboot my computer the ISO does indeed boot into the options, but fails to load the live session (no brainer there) so I know I am on the right track. I don't want to use DriveDroid for this, as it is very very finicky, and only seems to work 1 out of 6 times (and that is a kind guesstimate) My guess it that the "connected as an installer" is messing with it, so I would hope to turn the problem into the solution.
So I either need to find a de-bloated ROM that can free up ~ 400mb on /system, find a way to link the ISO from elsewhere on the device (I tried a soft symlink from my SD card and that did not work, it opens the ISO as an archive and not a file system), find a way myself to free up ~400mb on /system, or find a way to re partition /system to be larger (I have the 16gb S4, so I have plenty of room to spare).
I would prefer the debloated ROM(I don't know if that will free enough room), but finding a way to re-partition would be a close second (Every guide I have found for re-partitioning starts of with "First you need cyanogen(or another custom ROM)") I may need to re-partition it anyway. (Honestly I would like to learn how to do all of these, as they would be valuable tools in the future)
I had more questions, but got kinda lost writing this up, I will append them to this post later when I remember them... Thank you in advance for any help you may send my way.
**edit**
Oh yea, my other issue is accessing the files on the phone under Debian Wheezy. I have tried mtpfs, jmptfs, ptp mode, mtp mode, go-mtpfs (that one somewhat works, I can see *some* of the files, and probably take them off the device, but I attempted to add a file to the SD card and it corrupted the entire card, had to reformat it, just glad I did not do that to the phone)
ADB partially works, but only for taking files off the device, or putting them onto the device in non root areas, I get stuck with "adbd cannot run as root in production builds". I have tried almost everything I can find under the sun in regards to USB access.

Related

How to install froyo on sd card

So first of all i must say that im a completly noob at the android instalation on kaiser
I search for a noob tutorial but i coudnt fiind can someone post here a tutorial including files thanks
Here is the Guide in Sticky
How to replace Windows Mobile with Android (Guide) by Dukenukemx
scroll down to Installing Applications Onto SD Card using Ext2
This should help. The guide help me greatly, very easy to follow.
Hope this helps.
Its not tricky, I mean even I can do it, come on
I did edit a wiki page on this, but appears to be down, so here goes, from memory.
Backup any data first, just in case, not taking any responsibility for loss of data.
Firstly ensure your SD card if formatting correctly (FAT32), use on Gparted (linux live CD) to do this, (for me, I created two ext 2 partitions as well as I thought this would work best, works for me).
You then need the HaRET application to allow you to run Android. Google "haret.exe"
Extract the files this should create the right directory.
You then need to choose a build, this is personal choice, but I'll post the one I am testing right now. milanche's CyanogenMod 6 Kaiser
Put the installandroid.tar into the folder you created above.
Move to your SD card.
Find and run HeRET.
When screen shows text, tap and hold the center of the screen until you get a menu.
Choose install (ensure the options are set to SD).
Select Install
Once done, select Quit.
This then installs Android and can take a while, just leave it to get on with it.
You should then been booted into Android.
I might have forgotten something, as I am doing this from memory, but it should be fresh since I installed this last night.
Looks good to me, nice guide, don't think you missed anything
Thatnk you Zenity, but I know I couldn't have done this without your help in the begining when I first tried it. I know how it can seem all a bit over whelming.
I know a lot of people say 'search for it' but I did that just to see what I would find, and to be honest, I didn't get anything but that was of any use, so I can sympathis the search doesn't always get you the right results.
I could not remember the direcotry names when I wrote that at work and had to do it in a hurry as the entire office can see my magnified screen so it was a quick brain dump, not as nice as I would have liked to have written it given the time (which I did on the wiki but its down).
Anyway Keeps it fresh in my mind too.
I can only do this when I'm given the right files, I got confused myself when people started talking about different zImages. I tend to go for the builds where everything is bundled into one packing, as some can seem fragmented, ie Fresh Foryo, I don't doubt that it may be a good rom, but its deleivery is complicated (for me ).
Wish I had more time an experience to make my own build, I have done a bit of linix hacking in my time with shell scripts (getting wifi cardds working ona laptop etc), Its all interesting stuff.
thanks guys u helped me alot in the end i will instal android on an ext2 partition
Dear Leona,
The link seems no longer valid, can you tell where to find the latest HaRET application? Besides, how should I format my SD card? by special software? Thanks.
Dave
If you'd have problems with using Gparted Live CD like me... just because it does not mount SD card in adapter... here is what I did to partition the SDHC 4GB card...
I booted with HARET but did not select to install.. it gracefully fails to terminal
command: su
command: fdisk /dev/block/mmcblk0
deleted all current patrition (d)
created new partitions whith calculated size (8192 for 256MB)
changed type of the first and biggest patririon to FAT32 (t => c)
written all the changes to the partition table (w)
Than you should take out the card before rebooting and format FAT32 partition in win to upload all te android boot files, rebot the phone and follow with instalation...
But I must say, now I am using Scooters Cyanogen in NAND and it it far far easier
After I choose run, then a list of Linus commands ran, then it said
:loseup:/dev/block/loops: No such file or directory
Failed
Failed to reach system.img on SD card
By the way, anywhere I can download a complete set of files for running? Thanks.
try this:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=813382&page=31
look for the 4th post...
or this:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=855733
read a lot before attempting to do anything! use the search tool too, could be of some help.
For SD Partitioning, I remembered this Thread, which might help.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=619290
Sounds like you are not holding the centre Dpad button (or pressing the centre of the screen) while haret is loading, yes this can be Hit and Miss it winds me up no end.
If you have access to a Linux machine (or boot a Live CD), as well as being useful for SD partitioning it also maybe used to try out Atools (you'll need to install python and python-tk (via the package manager)) as this will get you the right Kernels, images and configure your default.txt file for you, though I haven't managed to get the build script bit working yet, but that is down to my lack of understanding the instructions

[Q] htc Desire -USCC I think I REALLY made a mess!

I've never tried to do anything beyond readily available 3rd party apps. I've never jailbroken anything or rooted. I don't know how to work with ROM's and I've never used command prompts beyond installing difficult software on my desktop. (I'm using Win 7 on my PC) and I have no linux or coding experience. That said, I'm smart, I research things fully b4 I actually DO anything & I follow directions exactly when i do something unfamiliar.
I bought my Desire about 45 days ago thru USCC. Stock it's running 2.1. On Fri using UnREVoked 3.21 I tried to root. It appeared to work. I have the Superuser file at least...
However, when I followed unlockr.com's tutorials for downloading & flashing ROM's it became obvious that something was not right (screens weren't the same, options weren't the same or even close in some cases, & controls, like pushing power to go back after recovery didn't work.) The screen turned black, I had a minor heart attack & then the phone finally rebooted into it's original USCC configuration.
Now, I DID have an option to "install from SD card" but nothing that said "flash from sd card" and I'm assuming -maybe incorrectly- that there's a difference??
After 4 days of searching sites, I know there are too many posts on USCC rooting & Desire for a noob like me to know what to do. I have a mess that I need help to untangle.
Prior to my failed ROM attempt, I had installed save to sd... which I think may have moved everything to my SD card. Since rooting, I tried using Root Explorer to remove facebook, twitter, City ID etc.... EX: I can see bloatware files on my SD card, and the program SAYS it deletes them, but it reboots on exit and there's CityID again!
I can mount the SD card as a disk drive on my PC and look thru the SD card files. (some of which appear 2B duplicates. When I rooted, I installed the Hboot drivers and followed the unrevoked directions exactly. I renamed the recovery file as update and left it as a zip... but there are now two "update.zip" folders on my SD card. They are different sizes and neither contains all of the files of the other; although some of the files in each of the zip's are duplicates.
I don't know what files SHOULD be on my SD card and what is extraneous material. I don't know what I need to install to get to where I'm ultimately trying to go... which is running 2.2, getting rid of these "extra" files and gaining the ability to wifi tether my phone.
I do NOT know if I have S-off or not... and I'm not sure how to tell. AND, I'm not sure if this is the base cause of the other issues or not.
Is there anyone willing to get me thru the vast amount of material & help me to get my Desire running the way it is capable of functioning?
At this point, I'm even willing to switch carriers to get what I want if the issue is USCC's proprietary nature...
Thanks in advance to any1 willing to help out
Bethyk said:
I've never tried to do anything beyond readily available 3rd party apps. I've never jailbroken anything or rooted. I don't know how to work with ROM's and I've never used command prompts beyond installing difficult software on my desktop. (I'm using Win 7 on my PC) and I have no linux or coding experience. That said, I'm smart, I research things fully b4 I actually DO anything & I follow directions exactly when i do something unfamiliar.
I bought my Desire about 45 days ago thru USCC. Stock it's running 2.1. On Fri using UnREVoked 3.21 I tried to root. It appeared to work. I have the Superuser file at least...
However, when I followed unlockr.com's tutorials for downloading & flashing ROM's it became obvious that something was not right (screens weren't the same, options weren't the same or even close in some cases, & controls, like pushing power to go back after recovery didn't work.) The screen turned black, I had a minor heart attack & then the phone finally rebooted into it's original USCC configuration.
Now, I DID have an option to "install from SD card" but nothing that said "flash from sd card" and I'm assuming -maybe incorrectly- that there's a difference??
After 4 days of searching sites, I know there are too many posts on USCC rooting & Desire for a noob like me to know what to do. I have a mess that I need help to untangle.
Prior to my failed ROM attempt, I had installed save to sd... which I think may have moved everything to my SD card. Since rooting, I tried using Root Explorer to remove facebook, twitter, City ID etc.... EX: I can see bloatware files on my SD card, and the program SAYS it deletes them, but it reboots on exit and there's CityID again!
I can mount the SD card as a disk drive on my PC and look thru the SD card files. (some of which appear 2B duplicates. When I rooted, I installed the Hboot drivers and followed the unrevoked directions exactly. I renamed the recovery file as update and left it as a zip... but there are now two "update.zip" folders on my SD card. They are different sizes and neither contains all of the files of the other; although some of the files in each of the zip's are duplicates.
I don't know what files SHOULD be on my SD card and what is extraneous material. I don't know what I need to install to get to where I'm ultimately trying to go... which is running 2.2, getting rid of these "extra" files and gaining the ability to wifi tether my phone.
I do NOT know if I have S-off or not... and I'm not sure how to tell. AND, I'm not sure if this is the base cause of the other issues or not.
Is there anyone willing to get me thru the vast amount of material & help me to get my Desire running the way it is capable of functioning?
At this point, I'm even willing to switch carriers to get what I want if the issue is USCC's proprietary nature...
Thanks in advance to any1 willing to help out
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i cant tell you how to fix it, but what i can say, is if you really borked it, you can take it into a uscc store saying you have no idea what happened. i used to work for uscc until about 2 months ago. until that time, out of the 3 corporate stores i was working in, not one associates knew what rooting was. and none of the "smartphone team" had either. so they would most likely just send you a replacement. good luck
I thought about that... And I really don't even mind paying for it if I need to replae the phone, I will... But I figure at this point, worst case scenario I have aphone I can "play" with and figure out IF I can do any of this stuff successfully. I've discovered in the last year that I sort of have a talent for figuring this stuff out. This is the first time I've ever needed to find help with a problem and I've built several complete systems. I'm hoping there's someone who might be willing to suggest a course of action. If you have any ideas- even if I brick the darned thing- I'm willing to give it a try!
Thanks to anyone brave enough to reply!
Bethyk
Sounds like the second tuturial you were following was trying to root your phone again, but with the older method.
Turn on your phone holding volume down. You will get a white screen with some options in the middle, select recovery (it says at the top of this screen s-off or s-on, yours should say s-on, this is how to find this out.)
When recovery loads it should say clockwork recovery, a custom recovery flashed by unrevoked during the rooting process.
Use this recovery to flash a zip of whatever rom you want. Be sure to wipe data also if changing roms or any problems arise.
I've figured this much out at this point... I did root my phont with unREVoked 3.21. However, I did NOT S-OFF the device. So I'll try what mercianary suggests & let you know how it goes! Thanks a ton!
Bethy
Are you using the mouse button at bottom of phone to select in black and green recovery screen? If you are using power button to select it will give you a blank screen.

[Q] Desperate newbie with deleted files problem….help please!!

I have a real cry for help!
Somehow all my pictures disappeared from my Galaxy Nexus. My only possible explanation (since it could not have decided to delete them itself!) is that I must have been a complete idiot and last night when I thought I was deleting a video I had just taken I must deleted the camera directory itself. This is supported by the fact that there was no ‘camera’ directory when I looked this morning. I then took a new photo and the directory reappeared. I have plenty of experience with PC’s but I’m a newbie with smartphones. I figured if I don’t write any more files to the phone then most of the actual data should still be there so I hoped to do some kind of undelete.
I’ve done some research and it looks like the ‘feature’ of only connecting as an MTP device (rather than USB mass storage) is potentially a killer blow. Without an assigned drive letter it seems that none of the usual recovery programmes will recognise the phone.
In theory an alternative might be to take a complete image of the phone contents and somehow recover the data from here?
I am pretty desperate as I have five months of pictures/videos of my kids etc, and most of that data must still be on the phone – but how to get to it?
Finally – yes I am a complete plonker, I shouldn’t have made such a stupid mistake and I should have backed up the phone or the pictures. I have learned my lesson. But given that, is there anything I can do?
BTW - the phone came from 3 network (via a reseller) and I have not touched it with respect to unlocking/rooting etc. It is in the state I received it.
HELP please!
Thanks very much...........
I believe the MTP vs. USB Mass storage would be a driver thing. There are many different versions of drivers so its possible there are ones that will mount the phone with a drive letter. I can think of some other things to try (Boot into fastboot mode by turning phone off then powering on by holding power, volume up and volume down at the same time and holding till it vibrates). You could also try Disk Management under windows to see if you can assign a letter
In the future I highly recommend setting up a google account and using Google Photo/Instant Upload to keep a backup of your photos. You dont even have to sync anything else
Thanks for your suggestions, much appreciated.
I’ve now tried going into fastboot mode and connecting to PC but no joy – Windows recognises there is a device connected (usually ID’d as an OMAP4440) but can’t find a driver.
Disk Management also doesn’t show the Nexus as a drive and therefore won’t allow a Drive letter to be assigned.
Try these (obviously no guarantees and I havent used any personally)
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=fahrbot.apps.undelete
http://android-photo-recovery.com/tutorials/deleted-file-recovery-for-google-nexus-phones.html
EDIT: Found another:
http://www.wondershare.com/disk-utility/recover-deleted-photos-from-nexus-s-and-galaxy-nexus.html
Thanks again, I appreciate all suggestions. Yes I have come across these and unfortunately they don’t solve my issue. The last two are amongst those I’d seen reported as not working as they need a drive letter. I had installed both anyway but found that to be true (
The first requires root access which I don’t have. If I understand correctly, to root I’ll need to unlock the bootloader first, and unlocking will erase all the data anyway??
Unfortunately, you are out of luck. You cannot mount the storage on a GNex in USB Mass Storage mode, and I am pretty sure that none of the "undelete" programs that run in Android support ext4 (which is what our GNex internal storage is formatted).
If you are running 4.0.1 or 4.0.2, you can still get root access without losing your data (but not on 4.0.4), but I can't see how it will help you given what I mentioned above.
I am on 4.04 so sounds like I can't get root access without overwriting, can I roll back to 4.01/2 without overwriting the data? (sounds unlikely but I have to ask - I upgraded from 4.02 without losing data....).
If not, is there a way to get a data image without rooting? That way at least I have the data preserved if at some future point it becomes possible to do an undelete on Ext4 data??
Gavdroid said:
[snip]
can I roll back to 4.02/3 without overwriting the data?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately no.
Gavdroid said:
If not, is there a way to get a data image without rooting? That way at least I have the data preserved if at some future point it becomes possible to do an undelete on Ext4 data??
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I believe there are utilities to "do an undelete" on ext4. The problem is how to get access to the data image. I don't really know of any way to pull off the data partition of a GNex to your computer, but it may be possible.
Have a look at this thread. I think shaaXo managed to find a way for your computer to see the memory on the GNex and likely dump it (although it is not very user-friendly).
That sucks. If it's deleted, it's gone for good. Sorry, buddy.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA
Thanks very much I will go through that post and see where I get to!
Edit! - uh-oh, taking a quick look it seems you need to use CWM, which I take to be ClockworkMod, which I thought required the phone to be rooted to install it? And if I understand correctly, rooting requires an unlocked bootloader, which wipes your data??
I will take a deeper look in case I've misunderstood (very likely), but am I thinking clearly here?

[Q] Internal memory "access denied"

I have been trying for two days to access my internal memory (aka sdcard0). I have flashed all the way down to Roger's stock rom . I have formatted it, tried using the "restore-sdcard-after-downgrade" tool several times. I have flashed modem, core, and ROM several times with different modems and kernals. I have tried to mount/unmount the memory using various methods; recovery, numerous apps on Google Play, changing it's permissions. I have done everything that I have found worked for others with this problem, except use ADB code to rewrite the reparations. This stuff is Greek to me (and I don't speak Greek).
Can someone take me through this process, step by step. Assume I have no idea what you are talking about, because I don't now the first thing about how to use code/script/whatever it is called. Internal memory is intact; it works fine, because odin can access it and write to it. I have written several back-ups to it. The phone can't see it and cannot use it. I can't seem to figure out how to use my extScCard to install apps, despite trying things that worked for others. This leaves me with an extremely limited amount of memory to use for apps. Stock ROM has taken most of it. Also, I have lost USB connectivity, thus cannot use PC for odin functions, tool kit, or even file transfer. I have mobile odin and recovery. If I need a file I have to remove extSdCard, put it into an adapter, insert it into PC, transfer files, and then reverse the process in order to get them onto my phone. Just to clarify, I am unable to download files directly to my my phone via wifi, due to lack of internal memory. However, phone is currently stable (no bootloop or brick issues issues.
You can expect a generous donation if you can help me get this thing working again.

Lost ALL images and videos - will rooting possibly save me?

Hey all,
as I was backing up files from my phone (internal storage full, 500MB to go) via USB, and after I'd done a bunch of PDFs and what not, I wanted to start moving videos / photos. That failed instantly and after that, EVERY SINGLE IMAGE / VIDEO file was gone from the phone. I installed three "recovery" apps - they couldn't find a thing. I have a bunch of family stuff I really, really would like to have back.
I downloaded the MIUI unlocking tool and wanted to 'get going' with rooting, but I'm getting a "Unlock will erase user data" notification, for if I continue. This does not seem what I want.
- Can I continue without definitely trashing any hope of recovering files?
- Is there another way to get to files that magically disappeared (no Sync on, no OneDrive auto-backup, no nothing at all) that do not required root, and/or ...
- Is this a "known" problem? I cannot seem to find anything.
Many, many, many thanks......
As MIUI Unlocking tool says, it will delete all the data on the phone.
Whelp, this is happening. I'll give it a go before I can't get the files...
I have to wait 2 weeks for the MIUI tool to allow unlocking the bootloader. So I guess at this point I'd mostly like to know if the Mysterious Case of the Disappearing Files is something that's more common on the Redmi Note 5 - or on Android 8.1 / MIUI? I'd like to assure the reader at this point that, while threads like these are a dime a dozen and it often boils down to user error, I'm not a complete nitwit and assure you I was doing nothing other than Ctrl-X -> Ctrl-V to harddrive, got an error message, 40GB were magically freed up on internal storage and ALL files were gone. All of it. Folders too.
Updating thread title, hope that's okay..
Realistically, considering different "undelete" / "recovery" apps are not finding ANYTHING!!! at all, how likely is it even that something will be found once the device has been rooted? This almost seems like it had a system reset while it was still enabled...... Just everything gone / re-encrypted / whatever. Is that even possible? Again, though, the device DID NOT reboot. The files were there......then 40GB was gone.
It is possible to recover the data but the process will require root permissions. Install Disk digger pro from playstore. And give root permissions it can easily recover the most of the photos ( May recover all but possibilities are less ) Give a try bro it will definitely help you. As it helped me before.
I had something similar back when I had Redmi Note 3. Files just disappeared when I put them inside obb folder. However, they reappeared when I entered the recovery (it was custom) and I copyed them via cable onto my pc. They weren't there when I connected normally turned on phone to the pc, and it was annoying. So whatever you are doing, don't format your phone, otherwise you'll lose the files forever.
If rooting and installing an app to recover the files won't help, I suggest you flashing twrp and trying to find them from there using the cable and a pc, or whatever.
Thanks. It's a shame I'm finally "getting in to" rooting only now, now that I have a problem. When I tried many years ago I felt it was too complicated and most of all risky....
The main problem I have with rooting is that the Mi Unlock Tool wishes to Reset the phone, re-encrypting it in the process, and destroying any hope of recovering data. I intend to flash OrangeFox before it can reset.... Does anyone have a better idea....? It's really very, very much appreciated!

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