[Q] Backup internal memory while device doesn't boot - Galaxy S III Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Hi all
Dad's I9300 (international) started making problems booting up a week ago (sometimes it did and sometimes it didn't for a few hours). Begged him to bring it in for me to backup. Of course he didn't and today the device refused to boot permanently. It simply gets stuck on the logo screen.
When boot into recovery I got lots of E: failed to mount /cache. After wiping the cache and rebooting into recovery I now get only E: failed to mount /system (see attached image).
Download mode also seems to be working.
Device is 4.1.2 with stock ROM and stock recovery.
The main concern here is to recover all personal data. After that, I don't care if the device gets bricked. I searched the web and came up with two possible solutions:
1) Reflashing the same stock ROM I flashed a while ago (hoping that what I have stored on my PC is what is actually flashed on the device.....), and not wiping the data. As I understand, flashing a stock ROM without wiping data shouldn't cause the device not to boot.
2) Flash PhilZ Touch 6 Recovery using Odin and use Aroma file browsing to copy internal memory files (pics, mp3, WhatsApp data, etc.) to an external SD and then start messing around with the phone. (as described here)
What's my best option here? It sounds to me that the second one is better, but I'm not familiar with flashing a recovery and possible consequences.
Can someone kindly advise? I'll greatly appreciate any word of wisdom...

Solved.

Related

[Q] Stuck in boot

I've tried to flash my rom to CM7 but something went wrong with the procedure because I am stuck on the android boot screen (Android logo lightning, it gets stuck for a while and then the letters continue flashing, cycling).
I followed the normal procedure: root, installed custom recovery, I made a backup with nandroid (normal one, which I copied to my computer), wiped data+cache (both caches) and I tried to flash from SD. Update went as normal but I got stuck in this boot screen.
After trying 2 or 3 times this same procedure and being unable to move on, I tried to recover my backup using nandroid: it said it was unable to recover and to do it from adb; adb says that it's unable to mount my sdcard.
From what I've read, I would need to repartition my card.. I chose that option in the recovery; still unable to recover my backup.
I figured that it would not be too bad if I lost my data, so after giving up on CM7 I gave up on recovering my data as well.. the problem is that even after wiping data and cache I'm still stuck in this same boot screen.
Any idea?
I can access recovery and adb so this has to have a solution..
I managed to boot after formatting /system.

[Q] - odin won't flash - "make_extf4fs failed on /dev/block/mmcblk1p10"

So my Galaxy S II I9100M was updating, and I, unknowingly wiped data/factory reset'd my phone with the Siyah 3.1.1 kernel (which I now know has problems)
So this turned bad, because it got stuck there for a long time. No problem, this happens sometimes? No.
I reset the phone, try to re-install the Resurrection ROM but my emmc will no longer show up. Factory reset is a nogo again, but I have another rom on my extsd, which does install, but doesn't boot.
I go into odin, download mode etc, flash xxlph onto the phone, but here's the kicker:
the odin flash gets stuck at data.img
yadayadayada lots of different rom flashes later, none go past data.img
I can flash kernels, get into recovery mode with non-stock kernels, and get into download mode, but the /data partition doesn't format. I even tried a specific kernel for recovery, rogue recovery, and that can't format it either.
Neither can it find the cache partition for logs.
formatting the /data from mounts and storage gives the error "format_volume: make_extf4fs failed on /dev/block/mmcblk1p10"
I saw somewhere (galaxy player 5 forums) that one can use adb to reset the partition sizes, but I have no table either. But I could find one. But I still don't know how to.
Anyone have any ideas and/or alternatives?
Love you all
pejmany said:
So my Galaxy S II I9100M was updating, and I, unknowingly wiped data/factory reset'd my phone with the Siyah 3.1.1 kernel (which I now know has problems)
So this turned bad, because it got stuck there for a long time. No problem, this happens sometimes? No.
I reset the phone, try to re-install the Resurrection ROM but my emmc will no longer show up. Factory reset is a nogo again, but I have another rom on my extsd, which does install, but doesn't boot.
I go into odin, download mode etc, flash xxlph onto the phone, but here's the kicker:
the odin flash gets stuck at data.img
yadayadayada lots of different rom flashes later, none go past data.img
I can flash kernels, get into recovery mode with non-stock kernels, and get into download mode, but the /data partition doesn't format. I even tried a specific kernel for recovery, rogue recovery, and that can't format it either.
Neither can it find the cache partition for logs.
formatting the /data from mounts and storage gives the error "format_volume: make_extf4fs failed on /dev/block/mmcblk1p10"
I saw somewhere (galaxy player 5 forums) that one can use adb to reset the partition sizes, but I have no table either. But I could find one. But I still don't know how to.
Anyone have any ideas and/or alternatives?
Love you all
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Discussion here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1615058
From the sound of it the only way to recover from this is with a JTAG, any other info about it is likely in that thread.
Thank you very much. Thread can be closed

[Q] Corrupt /cache causing bootloop

Hi,
My battery ran flat on my I9100 International GS2 I plugged it in and turned it on, it started to boot and then shut down. I left it to charge to 100% and now when I turn on I get bootloop around the Samsung logo. I suspect it's corrupted my bootloader and/or device partitions.
I'm running Stock+Root XXLSJ with Philz CWM 3.00 recovery (based on CWM 6.0.1.5)
When I boot into CWM - I get message: "E:Can't open /cache/recovery/last.log"
When I try to mount /cache it fails with similar message. (I also cannot mount /data. The others are OK)
When I try to wipe cache partition it fails to format it (hangs for about 10 mins saying "formatting", and then reboots my phone)
When I try to factory reset it fails to format /data (hangs for about 10 mins saying "formatting", and then reboots my phone)
So I suspect my /data and /cache are corrupt and need to be recreated.
How can I recreate these partitions?
I thought reflashing CWM might stick them back if they are missing - I tried a couple of different versions. No luck. Same errors.
I thought I'd take the opportunity to upgrade to CM10.1 RC2 - But I can't flash ROM in CWM - it fails with "Installation aborted (Status 7)"
I think I need to flash via ODIN and click the "Re-Partition" option unfortunately CM ROMS can't be flashed in with ODIN! Arrrgh!
So I think I need to flash another stock ROM via ODIN with re-partition option, then flash CM via CWM. It's a bit of a pain, do you think this should work (is that what repartition option does) or is there some other easier/better way?
Thanks
-KENT
As you've already tried dirty flashing (without wipe) your kernel (which rarely works, but worth a shot anyways), yeah, back to stock via Odin & restore backup or reflash rom/kernel & start again if you don't have recent backup.
Will this work ? It should. One bit of advice tho, I noticed you're planning to repartition.
Don't.
At least not in the first instance. Do a normal Odin flash of stock & see how that goes before you go down the repartition route. Doing that when not necessary seems to cause more bricked phones than every other cause put together.

Soft brick - stuck at boot logo; need suggestions

Hey all,
I've got a N7105 (Galaxy Note II LTE) running CM12.1 and TWRP which I was planning to change shortly as it's old and the USB port has issues (charges but doesn't pass data; luckily it has a microsd slot). As it happens, the other day I left it discharge fully and turning it back on left it stuck at Samsung logo (not boot animation, the splash screen before it) forever.
I am: not a noob, I've rooted and flashed plenty of devices before.
I tried: removing battery for a while, charging fully, removing microsd and sim, clearing Cache and Dalvik. Nothing works.
I can: get into ODIN mode (but it's useless as USB data is not working); get into TWRP recovery; explore the Data partition in TWRP
I cannot: mount the System partition in TWRP, not even manually. It just does not let me select it, and gives an error whenever it needs to access it (e.g. if I try to backup it is says Error: unable to mount System)
I want: if possible to solve the issue without formatting Data. I had a TB backup but kinda old, so I got a Nandroid of Data and Boot out from TWRP and I suppose I could then recover stuff extracting from Nandroid through TB, but I've never done it and would rather be able to get a fresh TB backup and move on from there.
A few questions I have: any idea on why I am not able to mount System in TWRP? Could it help to reflash Boot or System, and if so how do I go to do that considering what I have is the whole CM rom package? (I remember being able to fastboot flash single partitions on Nexus devices but that's because the stock rom comes packaged in separate images).
Any input would be greatly appreciated!
Lazer Bear said:
Hey all,
I've got a N7105 (Galaxy Note II LTE) running CM12.1 and TWRP which I was planning to change shortly as it's old and the USB port has issues (charges but doesn't pass data; luckily it has a microsd slot). As it happens, the other day I left it discharge fully and turning it back on left it stuck at Samsung logo (not boot animation, the splash screen before it) forever.
I am: not a noob, I've rooted and flashed plenty of devices before.
I tried: removing battery for a while, charging fully, removing microsd and sim, clearing Cache and Dalvik. Nothing works.
I can: get into ODIN mode (but it's useless as USB data is not working); get into TWRP recovery; explore the Data partition in TWRP
I cannot: mount the System partition in TWRP, not even manually. It just does not let me select it, and gives an error whenever it needs to access it (e.g. if I try to backup it is says Error: unable to mount System)
I want: if possible to solve the issue without formatting Data. I had a TB backup but kinda old, so I got a Nandroid of Data and Boot out from TWRP and I suppose I could then recover stuff extracting from Nandroid through TB, but I've never done it and would rather be able to get a fresh TB backup and move on from there.
A few questions I have: any idea on why I am not able to mount System in TWRP? Could it help to reflash Boot or System, and if so how do I go to do that considering what I have is the whole CM rom package? (I remember being able to fastboot flash single partitions on Nexus devices but that's because the stock rom comes packaged in separate images).
Any input would be greatly appreciated!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The note 2 has this issue that makes it unable to be recognized by PC, so this isn't your phone problem, the only way to solve it is replacing the usb socket in your phone, anyway i can recommend dirty flashing your rom first, just flash the rom in recovery and wipe cache and Dalvik cache only then reboot.
If that didn't work, I'm afraid you might have to...... clear data ?
MigoMujahid said:
The note 2 has this issue that makes it unable to be recognized by PC, so this isn't your phone problem, the only way to solve it is replacing the usb socket in your phone, anyway i can recommend dirty flashing your rom first, just flash the rom in recovery and wipe cache and Dalvik cache only then reboot.
If that didn't work, I'm afraid you might have to...... clear data
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the input, I was thinking something along those lines but I wasn't totally sure, I always avoided dirty flashing as I heard of people having issues. Happily, it worked! Weirdest think I saw in a while, it gave me a bunch of errors with System partition (unable to mount, unmount, find), then it gave a "proceeding to patch system partition unconditionally", then it completed. The whole thing took less than 20secs so I do not think it even actually flashed the ROM. Now I am just getting some Play Services error, likely need to reinstall gapps, but phone boots just fine!

Unable to boot into TWRP after reformating /data

Hi guys,
Having a bad time setting up my S7 Edge (international model).
End goal is to have it rooted with a Lineage OS ROM.
Successfully flashed TWRP (3.1.1.0) using Odin3 (v3.12) and had no issues booting into TWRP and looking around.
Issues began when I tried to wipe the internal storage in preparation for a new ROM; I got errors along the lines of "unable to mount /data" invalid directory, "unable to mount /system" etc, and the wipe would fail.
Following another user's guide I formatted my /data partition to ExFat (plan was to then format it back to Fat4, which supposedly fixes the issue), however this froze the phone. I was able to reboot it after leaving it a few hours, however now the phone just freezes on the TWRP logo when I try boot into recovery.
I have reflashed TWRP to no avail.
From what I've read online, flashing a new ROM via Odin might recreate all required partitions (namely /data) ? Issue with this is I can only find .zip, not .tar ROM's as required by Odin.
Have I just turned my phone into a brick ?
Any suggestions on what to do next would be greatly appreciated !
Many thanks,
Pron

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