[Q] Backing up entire tablet partitions - Barnes & Noble Nook Tablet

I want to make sure I understand this. I know cwm will backup the OS, but what if I wanted to backup my entire nook? More specifically, what if I wanted to take a picture of my nook as when it was a fresh install. Here is my theory:
Code:
dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0 of=/sdcard/backup.img
Will this work? Obviously I'd need an sdcard with a lot of storage, but will it backup everything so that, say, in the case all my tablet partitions get destroyed, I can just use dd to dump the img of the whole disk back onto the nook, and give me a squeaky clean nook? And how big would my sdcard have to be? at least 8gb? or at least 16gb? But yeah, my whole hypothesis behind this is to create a bootable sdcard that will do just that, backup everything from a complete stock, so that in the future if I messup my partitions, (like I did before), I can just dump images onto it, that will make it flawless.
At least I hope. Give me your thoughts. Thanks!

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That would work, technically, but the CWM backup option does do a full backup AFAIK, at least, I have never had any issues with the backup missing something. Using dd is a way to ensure you get a bit for bit copy, I worry about size though. It has been a long time since I used that, if memory serves you get every bit even if that bit is free space. When I did this for backup on my Ubuntu box ages ago I had to run it through gzip or bzip2 to get the size reasonable. I'm not sure if that is possible on the Nook Tablet.

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No is better if you backup partition one by one not the whole partition table. Anyways i don't recommend you to use dd as a "backup" method if there are other ways.
If you are looking for fresh install there are other ways to do it. like a normal standar user will do to "start-from-scratch" and root then boot into CWM from sdcard and backup your ROM. If you're advance user you will know how to pack it as a CWM flashable zip
I have a thread and use dd commands but for UNBRICK purposes not for "backup".
Be careful with what you do, just an advice.
~ Veronica

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I would have to agree, I have personally also had issues restoring a partition table to a flash based device. You could end up with a useless backup.

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Well, the reason I ask, is because for some weird reason, my partition table got corrupted. It was useless. i wish I would have backed up /rom. I got the serial number on the rom partition back, just not the mac address. but anyway, I had to clear the entire partition table and start anew. But I can't seem to get the partition table looking exactly like this:
Number Start End Size File system Name Flags
1 131kB 262kB 131kB xloader
2 262kB 524kB 262kB bootloader
3 524kB 16.3MB 15.7MB recovery
4 16.8MB 33.6MB 16.8MB boot
5 33.6MB 83.9MB 50.3MB fat32 rom
6 83.9MB 134MB 50.3MB fat32 bootdata
7 134MB 522MB 388MB ext4 factory
8 522MB 1164MB 642MB ext4 system
9 1164MB 1611MB 447MB ext4 cache
10 1611MB 2684MB 1074MB fat32 media
11 2684MB 15.6GB 12.9GB ext4 userdata
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It never gets aligned correctly. And that's why xloader won't ever load. I can get into clockworkmod backup. But that's the reason why I want that backup of the table. Whatever type of table it is, you can't recreate it in gnuparted.

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soshite said:
Well, the reason I ask, is because for some weird reason, my partition table got corrupted. It was useless. i wish I would have backed up /rom. I got the serial number on the rom partition back, just not the mac address. but anyway, I had to clear the entire partition table and start anew. But I can't seem to get the partition table looking exactly like this:
It never gets aligned correctly. And that's why xloader won't ever load. I can get into clockworkmod backup. But that's the reason why I want that backup of the table. Whatever type of table it is, you can't recreate it in gnuparted.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually you can recreate the partition table but that is very advanced.
About the command would be better:
Code:
# dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0pX of=/sdcard/mmcblk0pX
* where X is a number 1 to 11 (partition #) but partitions 10 and 11 are media and userdata too big don't worry about those yet they can be recreated so backup from partition 1 to 9 better.
For big partitions like system, cache, factory, etc is better if you add bs=4096 at the end of the code:
Example: backing up SYSTEM partition
Code:
# dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p8 of=/sdcard/mmcblk0p8 bs=4096
INTERNAL PARTITIONS
xloader = mmcblk0p1
bootloader = mmcblk0p2
recovery = mmcblk0p3
boot = mmcblk0p4
rom = mmcblk0p5
bootdata = mmcblk0p6
factory = mmcblk0p7
system = mmcblk0p8
cache = mmcblk0p9
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
~ Veronica

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lavero.burgos said:
Actually you can recreate the partition table but that is very advanced.
About the command would be better:
Code:
# dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0pX of=/sdcard/mmcblk0pX
* where X is a number 1 to 11 (partition #) but partitions 10 and 11 are media and userdata too big don't worry about those yet they can be recreated so backup from partition 1 to 9 better.
For big partitions like system, cache, factory, etc is better if you add bs=4096 at the end of the code:
Example: backing up SYSTEM partition
Code:
# dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p8 of=/sdcard/mmcblk0p8 bs=4096
​
~ Veronica
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How do you recreate the repartition table?
Code:
(parted) mklabel gpt
Because apparently Adam said it was different. But I dunno. I tried a gpt table. It didn't seem to work

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soshite said:
How do you recreate the repartition table?
Code:
mklabel gpt
Because apparently Adam said it was different. But I dunno. I tried a gpt table. It didn't seem to work
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1562130
... @meghd00t is the man for that, check last 2 pages of that thread.
If you really have f&%# up your device then that is your thread for support
~ Veronica

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lavero.burgos said:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1562130
... @meghd00t is the man for that
~ Veronica
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Eh... I tried that one. It didn't seem to fix anything.. I know it said it fixed the partitions but it actually didn't do anything. I was pretty surprised.
But the strangest part is this:
Code:
3 524kB 16.3MB 15.7MB recovery
4 16.8MB 33.6MB 16.8MB boot
/recovery ends at 16.3mb and /boot starts at 16.8mb. And I can't recreate this at all. parted automatically places the boot partition at 16.3mb. Have any clue on that?

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how did you "clear the entire partition table" ?
... so you're device is bricked right? and if you really wiped all the partitions you will need high level support.
A story of what exactly you have done so far will be helpful and i would suggest not to try anything else until you explain.
~ Veronica

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lavero.burgos said:
how did you "clear the entire partition table" ?
... so you're device is bricked right? and if you really wiped all the partitions you will need high level support.
A story of what exactly you have done so far will be helpful and i would suggest not to try anything else until you explain.
~ Veronica
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Part of it is on my dead nook topic:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1597155
But then, my partition table was corrupt. It wouldn't work at all. So I made a new partition table in parted:
Code:
(parted) mklabel gpt
Which pretty much deleted everything. Which is what I wanted. But. It's hard to recreate the exact same partitions in parted. for example, MLO starts at 131kb and ends at 262kb. But when I make the partition:
Code:
(parted) mkpart primary () 131kb 262kb
** where () denotes unformatted filesystem
It says the file size is 132kb, whereas the xloader partition should actually be 131kb. How the heck does that happen? Because the xloader partition is meant to be super secure, then that partition doesn't pass consistency check. And if I make it end at 261kb, it still won't pass the consistency check.
I don't know what B&N did with their partition table. It really is a strange table.