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Greetings people!
Yesterday I got this message while booting up my TP (latest official ROM):
"The device is unable to boot because either you have turned off the device incorrectly or tried to install an application from untrusted source. Press END to reset your device or press any other button to cancel. This operation will delete all your personal data and restore the device to its factory default settings"
However apart from that message, phone works flawlessly without any noticable change in speed or stability! The only apparent problem is that it takes a while longer (about 10 seconds) to boot up because of that message. I tried a couple of backups, problem was solved at first, but returned later...
I do take daily backups, but since I hardly monitor my phone when I reset it, this problem could have been caused by an app or reg entry a while ago... and searching for the appropriate backup will be a pain in the ass.
Since there's no change in speed or stability, do you think it would be wise to keep using the phone as is, or is it possible this would cause further problems down the road?
Any other way to troubleshoot it (at least to find the program that's causing this) other than a hard reset?
Edit: couldn't wait so I reverted to a week-old backup, installed back most of my applications, and it seems to be fixed (for now)
Update! I just tried a new SD to try XDAndroid, and guess what, the error disappeared!
So there must be a program I had installed in the storage card, possibly trying to start a service or something on every reset... and failing.
Is there a way to troubleshoot this? Maybe through SKTools or anything similar? I have a ton of apps installed into storage card and it will be a pain in the back cover to try by trial-and-error.
Thank you in advance
edit: inserted my old storage card again, error did not appear, problem solved! At least for now
Still if anyone knows how to troubleshoot this, please let me know
Update: Seems this error occurs every time I use SPB backup.
Yesterday, after a scheduled backup, the error came back. To troubleshoot this, I removed the SD card, did a soft reset, the error was gone! I took another manual backup, and again, the error came back.
So there must be something happening with SPB Backup and my SD card. Probably messing with files on the SD, or the driver or whatever (no idea there, I'm a total noob when it comes to software).
Moved the issue to the SPB forum
I have this message to, but I have never used SPB Backup
Well, in my case, it was obviously something tampering with the SD card (even if not SPB backup, something else)
Have you tried rebooting your phone with the SD card taken off? I just wait till it boots normally, and then insert it back. Works for me every time.
If that still happens, that probably means whatever is causing the problem is in your main memory.
akpidis said:
Well, in my case, it was obviously something tampering with the SD card (even if not SPB backup, something else)
Have you tried rebooting your phone with the SD card taken off? I just wait till it boots normally, and then insert it back. Works for me every time.
If that still happens, that probably means whatever is causing the problem is in your main memory.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well I tried that just to see what would happen and I did not get the error message. So it is something on the SD card, but booting without it is not an option for me as I have several boot-start apps that are housed on it.
Perhaps one of those apps is broken?
As far as my case goes, I kept on using it for three months after the error appeared, without noticing any lag or issues at all. The only downside was that it took me three minutes to boot up, something I got used to.
If that's no big deal for you, I'd suggest you just leave it as it is for now, and check for lagging or specific applications failing (maybe one of them will be the app that's causing the problem?). If nothing happens down the road I think it could be safe to leave it as it is.
Now, if you can't stand this, I guess the only practical solution would be a hard reset. You can always play around with removing/reinstalling those apps you mention (or even better, installing them in the phone's memory) to check if and which one is broken, but I can understand that this not only will be a huge burden, but you may come to the conclusion that no specific app is causing this and something went south in the OS.
Personally the only apps which include a boot-up service I have installed into my SD are Football Monitor and PocketWeather. I tried removing both of them them back when I first had that issue, it didn't work...
Sorry I couldn't help more :/
Hello I am not knowledgeable on mobile devices, their hardware or software sadly. But I have a Metro PCS with that model that I somehow bricked? (is this a brick anyway?) by simply clicking on "upgrade" the android software :/
The cellphone doesnt have any weird things installed, just a flashlight and whatsapp. But it was handled years ago by a family member, who "upgraded" the OS, or so Im told (whatever they did, it couldnt have been advanced, but could have been dumb, system was stable however, and remained as such for years). The device must also have been locked by Metro.
The cellphone had an external SD card and videos on it, some downloaded from whatsapp, some recorded on the device itself. The only problem with the device was that it had a huge red bar 6gb+ on the storage report, assigned to System/others, and me being unable to delete whatever was in there. And unable to just move the programs to the huge SD card because all of them want core access or whatever.
Suddenly, from one day to the next, these videos whatsapp or natively recorded started showing a broken film icon and would not play from the gallery, whatsapp or the file browser. The gallery would show an error and only audio would play. Whatsapp would remain frozen at 00:00, and the file browser would display an error and not play.
I read that I had to uninstall an "Google" update that had broken videos, so I uninstalled an app called Google (not Chrome, and not Google something, it was a plain "Google" and had Googles search engine G logo), and things started working again.
The next day they were broken again, and this Google was not installed anymore, I stopped all of the cellphones running apps, nothing. Restarted, tried moving files to the core storage, back, nothing. I went to the OS settings and clicked on upgrade the OS, I remember it was at version 5 something. It didnt download anything and went straight to OS install showing an android green guy.
At about 30% in the green guy died with a red error, an error message and the progress bar disappeared. It remained frozen, I reset.
The system booted and showed "optimizing 1 out of 16" I knew this was weird since it had failed the update and I never saw a rollback. but let it run, it looped back to itself about three times.
I tried to learn those startup key inputs to load the bios or whatever, managed to load a screen to reset back to factory settings, did the reset. now it still loops, although it is 1 out of 3 optimizations.
Cant believe how this pos can get so messed up just by using the default buttons, google is happy to get all the information on users but cant keep videos working nor have a working installation...
Rants aside, did I actually mess up something?, shouldnt the installer do a full reboot before doing anything now that I think about it? how do I get this thing to work again?, clearly the factory reset is not a factory reset.
I bought a brand new Note 20 with ATT (locked) and was trying to set up all my accounts on the phone. Here is some background and issue:
My old device was S7 with a valid SIM and still active.
On the new device, I installed all of the apps manually. One of the apps is also Youtube Vanced (which is also on my old phone)
I felt I installed everything and then went to activate the SIM after a while. Once I inserted the brand new SIM card into the device, it gave me a warning that the SIM is not provisioned (as I haven't activated it yet). Then I started noticing random apps getting installed. These are the apps that I have never installed over the years.
I felt maybe the Vanced app was compromised, as it was the only one out of the app store. I kept uninstalling apps but new ones kept appearing.
I was in a bit of a panic mode and did a factory reset. Then repeated the steps. This time I did not install the Vanced. Everything was clean, except the apps starting appearing almost a minute after I put the SIM card. Then I performed a reset again thinking this is not the Vanced app issue (is this the right assumption?)
Then after the reset, I did not install any new apps at all, did not even provide my Gmail or Samsung accounts. I waited a few minutes to see if apps were installing. Nothing happened. I went ahead and inserted the SIM again and well, the apps started again. At this point I have reached a conclusion that this was due to the SIM card.
I did another reset and now haven't inserted the SIM (been few hours now and no apps installed).
Question 1- Is it possible that there is a problem with the SIM? If not, what could be the problem.
Question 2 - Does the factory-reset resolve the issues with any malware/virus or do we need additional procedures to make sure the device is "clean"
weirdissue said:
I bought a brand new Note 20 with ATT (locked) and was trying to set up all my accounts on the phone. Here is some background and issue:
My old device was S7 with a valid SIM and still active.
On the new device, I installed all of the apps manually. One of the apps is also Youtube Vanced (which is also on my old phone)
I felt I installed everything and then went to activate the SIM after a while. Once I inserted the brand new SIM card into the device, it gave me a warning that the SIM is not provisioned (as I haven't activated it yet). Then I started noticing random apps getting installed. These are the apps that I have never installed over the years.
I felt maybe the Vanced app was compromised, as it was the only one out of the app store. I kept uninstalling apps but new ones kept appearing.
I was in a bit of a panic mode and did a factory reset. Then repeated the steps. This time I did not install the Vanced. Everything was clean, except the apps starting appearing almost a minute after I put the SIM card. Then I performed a reset again thinking this is not the Vanced app issue (is this the right assumption?)
Then after the reset, I did not install any new apps at all, did not even provide my Gmail or Samsung accounts. I waited a few minutes to see if apps were installing. Nothing happened. I went ahead and inserted the SIM again and well, the apps started again. At this point I have reached a conclusion that this was due to the SIM card.
I did another reset and now haven't inserted the SIM (been few hours now and no apps installed).
Question 1- Is it possible that there is a problem with the SIM? If not, what could be the problem.
Question 2 - Does the factory-reset resolve the issues with any malware/virus or do we need additional procedures to make sure the device is "clean"
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
heard of it.. u well get a locked phone with security code,, and cannot access it.. always watch out for such SIMS.. because i dont know how its codded
Tekodrink said:
heard of it.. u well get a locked phone with security code,, and cannot access it.. always watch out for such SIMS.. because i dont know how its codded
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Its about license
weirdissue said:
I bought a brand new Note 20 with ATT (locked) and was trying to set up all my accounts on the phone. Here is some background and issue:
My old device was S7 with a valid SIM and still active.
On the new device, I installed all of the apps manually. One of the apps is also Youtube Vanced (which is also on my old phone)
I felt I installed everything and then went to activate the SIM after a while. Once I inserted the brand new SIM card into the device, it gave me a warning that the SIM is not provisioned (as I haven't activated it yet). Then I started noticing random apps getting installed. These are the apps that I have never installed over the years.
I felt maybe the Vanced app was compromised, as it was the only one out of the app store. I kept uninstalling apps but new ones kept appearing.
I was in a bit of a panic mode and did a factory reset. Then repeated the steps. This time I did not install the Vanced. Everything was clean, except the apps starting appearing almost a minute after I put the SIM card. Then I performed a reset again thinking this is not the Vanced app issue (is this the right assumption?)
Then after the reset, I did not install any new apps at all, did not even provide my Gmail or Samsung accounts. I waited a few minutes to see if apps were installing. Nothing happened. I went ahead and inserted the SIM again and well, the apps started again. At this point I have reached a conclusion that this was due to the SIM card.
I did another reset and now haven't inserted the SIM (been few hours now and no apps installed).
Question 1- Is it possible that there is a problem with the SIM? If not, what could be the problem.
Question 2 - Does the factory-reset resolve the issues with any malware/virus or do we need additional procedures to make sure the device is "clean"
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi!
Not malware , adware .
A carrier branded version will come with some preinstalled apps and even some games like candy crush or bubble something (verizon is specially terrible with this kind of sutff) so those weird apps that got installed after you put in the sim card is just ATT loading it their bloat.
Also if you downloaded vanced from the trusted sources , github or the xda links , theres nothing to worry about. Cheers
Hi, I have a samsung galaxy tab s2 the 9.7 inches one, but lately some apps have been crashing or having errors, chrome for example throws that snap somethjng wrong, perfect viewer sometimes gets stuck on an image and I cant chnge it, but all menus work, several apps keep crashing as well.
I have it with official firmware, never touched it, its rooted with magisk since before the problems started, apps that use root are file explorer, vanced manger and an app to disable some samsung bloatware.
I dont know how to troubleshoot android, on pc I would check memory and hdds, but theres nothing lkke that kn android that I could find.
I think it could be memory or storage, but everything Ive downloaded or copied/moved hasnt have any problems or errors. Or something is corrupted in the system, or I dont know what else or how to check.
What would you recommend to fix it? Hopefully starting with less drastic, as in less data loss, factory reset, flashing an original rom or somethjng.
The device is aSamsung galaxy tab s2 9.7 with android 7 with lean launcher.
All help is appreciated.
I believe this were an common issue for Android 7 and below !
and you have an old device and android which I believe it's no longer supported by the most of developers.
try to flash any custome roms & kernels if available.
If apps are randomly crashing then the reason might be it's caused by an update of Google's tool called Android System WebView.
Abdullah.Csit said:
I believe this were an common issue for Android 7 and below !
and you have an old device and android which I believe it's no longer supported by the most of developers.
try to flash any custome roms & kernels if available.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
But it hasnt happened before until now, what would it fix using a custom rom instead of the original?
jwoegerbauer said:
If apps are randomly crashing then the reason might be it's caused by an update of Google's tool called Android System WebView.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had that problem with my phone, my tablet never got that update.
Thanks
Clear system cache...
Wiped dalvik and system cache, but still having the same problems.
Thanks
totopesce said:
Wiped dalvik and system cache, but still having the same problems.
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try using the stock launcher.
See what apks are running and cached right when this happens is it may give you a clue.
I would completely backup all critical data now.
Android is normally very stable.
Scan with Malwarebytes. If you can't find the root cause, suspect a virus, rootkit etc.
This is rare but can happen.
Karma Firewall can help you to see what's accessing what and how often. It uses almost no battery or resources, freeware, adfree, a near perfect little app.
Cant remove lean launcher it gets stuck in android is starting and it doesnt let me change to stock, installed nova just to check if it was lean and still the same problems.
Installed malwarebytes, had to run the scan several times cause it kept crashing, it completed and it didnt find anything.
Installed karma firewall and will see if I find anything.
Thanks
totopesce said:
Cant remove lean launcher it gets stuck in android is starting and it doesnt let me change to stock, installed nova just to check if it was lean and still the same problems.
Installed malwarebytes, had to run the scan several times cause it kept crashing, it completed and it didnt find anything.
Installed karma firewall and will see if I find anything.
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Figure out how to get the stock launcher back.
Any 3rd party app you can't uninstall is already malware. Check Device Administrators to see if it's registered there. Nova is no saint either.
If you can't resolve it error on the side of caution that it is malware and nuke it. Sometimes you never find out which one it was... getting rid of it is all that matters.
Sorry, what I meant was that after uninstalling it it got stuck in androiid is starting, somehow I lost the stock launcher, so it got stuck with no launcher. Found the launcher that came stock, installed it and uninstalled the other 2.
Apps are still crashing, I deleted all apps that I dont really use.
totopesce said:
Sorry, what I meant was that after uninstalling it it got stuck in androiid is starting, somehow I lost the stock launcher, so it got stuck with no launcher. Found the launcher that came stock, installed it and uninstalled the other 2.
Apps are still crashing, I deleted all apps that I dont really use.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Lol, that can crash it for sure.
See if you can find a common apk between the effected apps. Any recent system app updates?
New or uninstalled apps?
A system apk may have gotten corrupted.
Android is pretty good compared to Windows when uninstalling apps but occasionally a poorly designed app will screw it up.
It's just about factory reset time or your equivalent.
If it an old load that's probably best anyway.
I haven't reloaded in almost a year but I'm ready to go at any time.
Takes me about 2 hours to get it back within 99%. All the data I need for a full restore is on my SD card otherwise it would an additional 6-8 hours to restore the SD card data as well.
If you don't have a complete reload plan that saves all your critical data no matter what, implement one now before you get burnt.
Those stories are too common here
Dont remember when it started, cause at first it was one app from a github that was having problems, then yesterday magisk started and when I got that working it all when to hell.
The app that I use most has a backup/restore file that I saved on my sd, what do you use to backup/restore?
I would think that some backup solution could bring the problem back or am I mistaken, like if you fully restore something corrupted it should still be corrupted?
A factory reset could be corrupted as well? I mean after a factory reset, assuming its software, could it still have the same problems?
Though I dont really have any critical data on the tablet its mostly for browsing, youtube and reading comics. Still its a bother to re configure everything xD. IIRC I think its only been factory reset once.
Thanks.
It's unlikely the factory reload image is corrupted.
The current one your using likely is.
Other than apps that allow you to back them up like Poweramp or perhaps bookmarks, most app data I would write off just in case that was connected to the current issues.
None of my database is on internal memory except DCIM and downloads (both I back it up at least monthly). Critical apps like Poweramp are backed up on the SD card as export backup files.
The Poweramp setup would literally take a week to recreate. Most apps you can throw together rather easily.
All the SD card data is then again backed up at least twice to other separate drives.
I will try Samsung Smart Switch to restore home settings and see how it does on the next reset.
If you issues are of unknown origins being conservative about what you allow on the new load could save you more time in the long run.
If you unintentionally import corrupted data you'll end up doing it over again.
Or do so if the reload time isn't that great and is an easy write off for you.
Fun times... especially if the reload doesn't fix it
Did a factory reset and problem solved, took me less time than I thought to get my most used apps ready to go.
Thanks for the help.
totopesce said:
Did a factory reset and problem solved, took me less time than I thought to get my most used apps ready to go.
Thanks for the help.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yay! Success!
And a minty fresh OS load.
Load apps and especially updates over time to see if one these were the cause.
Forced reloads are rare but they happen usually caused by a rogue app screwing up boot or a malware infection. Otherwise you can usually track down the root cause which is preferable to avoid it from happening again.
Lazy techs misuse factory reset a lot
Will do that, install apps just as I need them and try not to instal a bunch at once.
I had a problem with an sd card and sent it to samsung, they did just that factory reset it and gave it back with the same problem, and they dont even let you know so you can back your stuff up, just lucky it was fairly new at the time and I had the sd card with me.
totopesce said:
Will do that, install apps just as I need them and try not to instal a bunch at once.
I had a problem with an sd card and sent it to samsung, they did just that factory reset it and gave it back with the same problem, and they dont even let you know so you can back your stuff up, just lucky it was fairly new at the time and I had the sd card with me.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sammy tech support sucks.
I'm using the Lexar .5 tb V30 card, just format in phone and it's good to go. Zero issues for $64.
Been using it for over a year now. Play movies and music from it all the time from it flawlessly.
Been using Lexar flash cards for over 15 years and all cards are still functional. No failures or card related issues at all. I like that brand a lot.
I'm actually in a very serious problem as I have a problem with restoring my whatsapp messages please help me asap I uninstalled my whatsapp on 16th July and last I backed up it on 7th July. Now when I try to restore the messages after reinstalling it shows my google account but it doesn't show the size of backup and also it says no Internet connection please help me. Also my whatsapp images and whatsapp videos folders have disappeared. I really want to get back my chats. Hope someone will really help me as it means alot to me now
Connect to a wifi or a hotspot, or get better signal then H+
Kenora_I said:
Connect to a wifi or a hotspot, or get better signal then H+
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm already using WiFi and I tried using mobile data as well both didn't help and I tried reseting network settings and all still it didn't work out
ruinaaaa said:
I'm already using WiFi and I tried using mobile data as well both didn't help and I tried reseting network settings and all still it didn't work out
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you check your google account the backup.
It could be app problem, try resetting and other stuff.
Kenora_I said:
Did you check your google account the backup.
It could be app problem, try resetting and other stuff.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey yes I checked it as well in google drive it shows the backup I can't restore it locally because I deleted the whatsapp databases like or two months ago will it affect this
Try clearing the data and cache of whatsapp or reinstall it.
Kenora_I said:
Try clearing the data and cache of whatsapp or reinstall it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tried this too and tried so many things.I watched so many youtube videos and searched a lot in google as well still couldn't find any possible way to recover
Albert83BCN said:
Hi guys!
I have been facing this issue this whole week while trying to move all my chats to a new phone I just bought as with the old one the charging port was dying and I could not bear it anymore. So almost everything restored smoothly from Google Backup and it was like being in my phone again with a few wizard steps but then I Installed WhatsApp (WA) and gone through the typical activation and restoring process and. as many, I got stuck at the 24% sometimes, some others 31% and 39%, and never got past the 39%.
I Tried almost everything: restoring from Google Drive, transfer all WhatsApp directory to internal storage and trying to restore from there, etc. Going back to the old phone to create fresh backups just in case they were corrupted as many people suggests, getting every time more delay to be able to activate WhatsApp again up to 12h for both SMS and call activation... just to mess again and feel back at square one, I guess you all feel the pain.
Well, the good news is that I finally managed to restore all the chat history!!! (well, cannot be certain that 100% was restored but I do not miss anything ATM and I can go back up to 2012 chats so I guess that qualifies as "everything" hehe).
So, I'm posting here because I've been searching a lot on the forums and the reddit and for all the people that is having this issue recently, almost no body came back to report success and I know it feels really discouraging It certainly gives the impression that this issue has no fix at all, and that you should accept losing all the chat history and starting from the start again. But from all the data I've been gathering during this week, at least two or three people reported to eventually being able to restore the chat; they fell in one of these two categories: they either transferred to a different phone where the backup seemed to restore okay, and then exported and restored in the target phone with success (something like a "bridge" restore mode, most of the cases I've read did it this way) or they finally succeeded by sheer brute force by trying again and again and again.
I fall in this 2nd category. In the most recent attempt I was doing what I've been doing again and again and again with just minor variations in the workflow and finally succeeded. TL; DR; I think in reality in many cases attempts could succeed by just letting the phone restore the backup endlessly, by not giving up and assuming the restore process went wrong when it has been stuck forever at either 24, 31 or 39% and force closing..
But I know in the midst of desperation OCD kicks in and you want step-by-step success case scenario reproduction so I will tell you all the steps that I followed that I can remember that got me to finally have the backup to end successfully:
0. First of all, in the winning attempt I had already uninstalled WA from the new phone and removed totally the WA folder in the internal storage / sdcard storage. Not sure this is mandatory but just to tell this was the case.
1. Since I got WA working perfectly on the old phone at every moment, I backed up locally for the Nth f%!?&ยท( time. This left me with the latest local backup plus a few others in the databases folder as a result of keep messing up.
2. I copied the full WhatsApp directory from the internal storage of the old phone to a safe place. This could be the PC or whatever, but PC transfer via USB seems too sloppy. You maybe could do it via ADB, whatever, I went by the route of coping it to the external SD with some random explorer utility like ES File Explorer. It does not matter, the point is to be able to backup the full WhatsApp folder in order to restore it as similar as possible as the original. What we are more interested right now is in the database folder but having all images, videos etc in place will help in getting it like before the easiest way. (Disclaimer: Ok guys sorry if some steps are too obvious to XDA users which usually are highly educated in the matter, but I was thinking of sharing/linking this text on the reddit and others, so please bear with it).
3. I installed latest WA in the new phone, opened the app (I intended to not open but I somewhat forgot) and got to the welcome screen, immediately closed the app at that step.
3. I restored the full folder to the new phone internal storage, pure copy/paste style (as said, in my case via the SD since both phones have SD slot and was very convenient, but via USB, cloud, etc. can be done).
4. I went to the databases folder and only kept the msgstore.db.crypt12 file and the latest backup with a date (ie: msgstore-2019-11-21.db.crypt12), deleted the rest. Honestly I do not think this is crucial but I somewhat wanted to make it easier for WA to know which one to target, I thought about keeping only the msgstore.db.crypt12 but some random dude pointed that the one with the date was needed. I was under the assumption that file structure is identical in both but just wanted to get done with this and keep both, just in case.
5. Before opening again the WA to try to activate and restore with this full local copy, I opened the Android settings app and went to applications > whatasapp > storage, as suggested by user redweaver, thanks for the tip! by keeping looking at the storage usage of the app during the restore process we could get insight about if it was really doing something or the app was really stuck. Keep open for now. In my case, I saw also on the old phone that my data used for the app was 780+ MB, so I had an idea of what should be on the new phone by the time it finished (if it did!).
5b. I don't think this is really necessary but I did it just in case. I was planning to go to work and let the thing running as long as it would need, and I would make sure that the process would get maximum uptime and nothing would get in the way. So I went to Applications > WhatsApp > Battery usage (or something like it) and disabled the battery optimizations for this app. I also went to the developer mode settings and enabled do not lock the phone while it is charging and everything that looked like it might be relevant. Again, most likely this has nothing to do, but reproducible steps, right?
6. Now open WA and activate it as usual, but when it seems that the activation step ended and you go to the next screen, immediately put the phone in air plane mode or disable data/WiFi, whatever. The goal is that it cannot reach Google Drive to look for the online backup. Honestly maybe in the end is not the culprit of GDrive but many people states that the GD backup is broken at this time and suggests going the local route, so we will do it like this.
7. WA should tell you that looking for the backup is going too slow and to skip this step (sorry to not have exact message, I have it in Spanish, but something in these lines, BTW excuse my somewhat limited English ). The point here is to click on the link that says skip the step and when you are prompted with a popup, click also on Skip.
8. WA will display the typical restore / transfer-like screen where the process starts. At this point you have to enable again data plan / WiFi at least or exit air plane mode, don't know really but even if restoring from local it complains about not having internet connection, maybe needs it to encrypt with the key or something? don't know.
9. Now is the feared moment! Even this time, I got somewhat stuck at 31% again. I left it do its thing, and some time later, it prompted for the popup that has a progress-bar from 0 to 100 (honestly, what is the difference between both?!) which also got stuck at 31%. If you let it be, it starts going back and forth many times, I guess maybe its going chat per chat and the progress-bar represents each one? Dunno. Thing is, even in the prior attempts I got at this point and the backup did not finish successfully. But this time I was decided to let it do its thing as much time as it would take, until the end. In the process the phone might display a pop up saying that WA does not respond. I clicked a few times in the 'keep waiting' option, then I just forgot because I did not have time to mess with it and hoped that it was still working on the background, which bring us to step 10.
10. While we are contemplating the backup process, we can go to the settings app again and look how the internal data is going for the WA. In my case, after some time under the restore process, when I went there I saw WA had occupied 0.91 GB of data space. After going back and forth again between WA and settings, the usage keep growing: 0.96, 1.03, 1.10... I thought it was on the right track, and encouraged me to keep waiting. Maybe in the end the process is too slow for old databases. Note that some people speculates that having messages from very long ago might be the culprit here due to changes in the table structure and that this might be the reason breaking the restore process. And maybe it is the case, but even if it is, in my case I finally succeeded where previously I didn't and without deleting anything, so this does not seem to be a deal-breaker or I would have never succeeded. I say it because some people reported that deleting old conversations and trying again finally made them succeed. Now I suspect the true reason was simply that by making the database smaller the process finished earlier, but YMMV.
11. Cannot be totally sure, but in my case, I noticed that leaving WA on the background and clicking on the WA icon again might stop the process for true and bring a message about not being able to recover the chats, I got this previously, do not try to open the WA normally, only leave it temporally to look to the space usage in the settings to get back to it by swyping between recent apps to keep the same instance open and working, this was a key point in my success trial that did not happen during the previous ones.
12. And finally, while I kept switching between WA and the settings and when I last saw like 1.30GB of space used (almost twice the space compared to the old phone, maybe it leaves a lot of temp data) I don't know if I either messed with the app-switching or it really finished, but then I got prompted to the screen where you enter your name or nickname. And when I completed this step, I finally got to the chats screen and everything was like in the old phone! Where previously I would get to a lot of empty chat rooms with maybe 40 total messages restored according to WA. Hurray!
Notice that in my case it was still reporting 31% on the WA background screen under the progress bar popup when it finished!! so it seems that is not really mandatory to experience the 100% complete to have it work in the end, but YMMV.
OK, maybe not the most elegant "guide" out there but I wrote it in a hurry and my english sucks, I just hope it might help someone to not lose their WA chats forever.
Good luck!
Edit: I almost forgot but, for the sake of completeness. I also tried a certain script that can backup WA from the phone and retrieve the encryption key, it will also leave an unencrypted copy of the chats database that can later be viewed with a WhatsApp viewer like this. The script is called WhatsApp Key/DB Extractor, and it still works as of 2019, just look at the latest posts in the thread. Guys here on XDA most likely know about it but if not, you might give it a try. I tried it because I assumed that maybe I could circumvent the restore issues by going that route and pushing the backup via ADB, but turns out the legacy WA won't prepare the database due to the time out of sync issue, or at least the data seemed to be lost after performing the restore process, and the unencrypted database on the PC cannot be digested by WA latest versions by just putting it into the internal storage directly according to what other users commented. But, if you finally give up trying the restore process, it still could be relieving to know that you keep a local copy in the PC that can be viewed with another PC tool, at least you get a backup and the conversations are there, in a different way though. Maybe in the future there's a process that can restore them again to a different phone, and you could then merge the new chat database with the older backup with tools like Merjeapp.
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This has the solution
Kenora_I said:
This has the solution
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Thank you but today I read this in the afternoon. This guy has solved it through whatsapp databases but I don't have a way go backup locally as I deleted my whatsapp databases two months ago. All I can do is recovering from google drive but the thing in this guy's scenario his chat was actually being restoring but I can't even do that since it says that I have an Internet connection problem