[Q] a few Noob questions regarding TWRP NANDroid backups - Nexus 5 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Hello, I have a few questions regarding the TWRP recovery particularly the NANDroid backups, please bear with me as I am new to this. I have made a few backups using twrp but I want to put them onto my pc in order to save space however when I plug my phone into my pc I don’t see the TWRP folder unless I boot into recovery and then plug it in. Is this how it is supposed to be?
I wanted to test out restoring a backup that I had saved onto my pc onto my device. To test this out I created a backup through TWRP booted into recovery plugged in my device into my computer copied the backup file located in the TWRP folder and then deleted it from my device. Next I wanted to copy the backup that I just put on my pc back onto my phone and then eventually restore it through TWRP. However I only get as far as copying it from my device onto my pc. When I try to copy it back into the TWRP folder on my device I get an error saying “cannot copy data.ext4.win000 its file size is larger than the device limit” The backup is 4.83gb and I have 10.7gb free. Does anyone know why this is happening?
Last question, seeing as a NanDroid backup is basically an image of your whole device, let’s say I am selling my device and I don’t want the buyer to have any way of accessing any of my data. Would the deletion of my backups, factory reset and an advanced wipe where I select all the partitions to be wiped be enough?
Thank you in advance for your help!

1 - no. You're on lollipop i presume. Read my /sdcard thread in general
2 - sounds like its being mounted as FAT with 4GB file limit. Try web push method
3 - not really. You'd be best overwriting the data partition with files first.

Related

First Attempt at root and flash CM& - one last question

OK so I know we don't have superoneclick to root any more so I need to download CM7, install it on my sd card and flash CWM via NV flash. I also know that I need to backup before clearing data and installing cm7.
My question is after to flashing CWM via NV flash can I boot up the phone and copy my backup to my pc before clearing data and installing CM7?
I am kind of a nonrisk taker and would like to have a copy of the backup on my pc in case I screw this process up and screw up my sd card at the same time.
If you have clockwork recovery installed, do a backup. Then on your sdcard you'll have a directory called clockworkmod, and backup under there. You can copy that to your pc if you're super paranoid about messing something up. Just keep in mind when you do a restore it checks the md5 sums, so do not rename anything, and when you put it back on your sdcard, make sure the pathname is the exact same as before. (Example clockworkmod/backup/12.31.2121blahblah.
Thanks, I think I got the copying part, but what I am asking is whether its ok to power up the phone after flashing CWM via NV flash and creating a backup but before installing CM7? Please tell me if this is a dumb question. I'm a lawyer, I'm used to being told I ask dumb questions.
Of course. CWM sits on a partition that's normally used for the reset to stock recovery. After you install it, and do a backup, your rom is still there. You can boot to it like normal, copy stuff to the computer, and then reboot again into recovery to install cm7.
Thank you kind sir.

[Q] Help with TWRP

Flashed a ROM and the ROM moved the all files in the root of my storage to a folder within a series of subfolders.
This is bad because my TWRP folder containing my backups was in the root of my storage.
But of course things can't just work how you'd expect, so my computer and phone refuse to copy the TWRP folder back to where it belongs.
My computer refuses to copy the files "data.ext4.win000"
There seems to be nothing I can do about this. My phone wont copy it and my computer won't either.
However, I am wondering if there is a way to make TWRP restore from a backup that is not where it belongs.
Whenever I go to restore, it doesn't give me an option to search elsewhere for my backups. Yet for some reason I am allowed to install a .zip from wherever I want.
Is there some sort of terminal command I can do within TWRP to make this work? Thank you.

Bootloop due to a mistake

I have run into a problem, I was trying to install CM12 and besides factory reset I did format data in TWRP and and now internal memory was formated. I am not able to see any zip files of nandroid backup now. I had copied the nandroid backup to pc but phone's storage is neither shown in PC. What to do now.
If you can still boot in twrp use the adb sideload. Just seaech on youtube how to copy files by that.

[Completed] Restoring TWRP Nandroid .win files

My Mum's managed to mess up her tablet (seems to have reset it but not factory reset, as it's still encrypted, password protected, etc, just all her apps and even Apex Launcher have vanished) and the only recent backup I can find is a TWRP backup made with Online Nandroid Backup.
TWRP doesn't seem to recognise the files however, as it doesn't list any backups. I looked at the log and see that when pointed to the internal storage (which it can't mount as it's encrypted), it looks in /data/media/TWRP/ and I've recreated that structure on the microSD (where the backups are), giving me /data/media/TWRP/BACKUPS/0000000000000000/2015-04-05--07-14-50/
In that folder I have:
boot.emmc.win
cache.ext4.win
data.ext4.win
recovery.emmc.win
system.ext4.win
and .md5 files for each of those.
The .win files I can open with 7-zip, to show the files without that extension (e.g. data.ext4).
If anyone could help me restore this backup I (and more importantly my Mum) would be very grateful!
I tried installing Nandroid Manager and ES File Explorer and both failed, so something's clearly messed up. SU 2.46 is installed and I checked root with Root Checker and updated Busybox.
OK, I found a good tip to make a new backup (I just ticked boot to make it quick) and check where TWRP puts it. It turned out to be /micro_sd/TWRP/BACKUPS/Lenovo_A5500-HV/
So I moved my existing backup folder there, formatted /data to remove the encryption and then I was able to restore the backup. Now the tablet's stuck in a boot loop though and I can't even boot into recovery, so I'll have to start from scratch and then try and restore just /system and /data.

Full Backup using the TWRP Backup Tool program

Good afternoon,
My question is as follows,
1. The Backup Tool program creates a unique file when it generates the complete backup by the computer, different from the one created by TWRP, if it only needs to restore a single item has?
Note: I use the Backup Tool to be able to back up directly to the PC because I do not have enough memory card to fit the DATA folder.
2. With the complete backup, I read in some topics in the forum, that do not go type information, photos, downloads, etc. Is this right? If so, why in full backup is this information missing?
Thank you.
costafabiof said:
Good afternoon,
My question is as follows,
1. The Backup Tool program creates a unique file when it generates the complete backup by the computer, different from the one created by TWRP, if it only needs to restore a single item has?
Note: I use the Backup Tool to be able to back up directly to the PC because I do not have enough memory card to fit the DATA folder.
2. With the complete backup, I read in some topics in the forum, that do not go type information, photos, downloads, etc. Is this right? If so, why in full backup is this information missing?
Thank you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can use twrp to pc and copy your internal storage off. Just drag and drop the folders you want from internal to your pc. No need to do a back up of it
godkingofcanada said:
You can use twrp to pc and copy your internal storage off. Just drag and drop the folders you want from internal to your pc. No need to do a back up of it
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good afternoon,
Are you telling me that when I connect the phone to the PC via TWRP and all the folders appear, if I copy them, is it the same as doing a full backup by TWRP?
Because if so, what caught my attention is that, folders total 700 mb and backup 6 gigs.
No what he's saying is that TWRP only backs up the system content. So your ROM, apps, app settings, customisation etc is all saved in the TWRP backup.
But it doesn't save "loose" user files, so things like photos, downloads, etc saved to your SD or internal storage aren't included in the TWRP backup.
So for a complete backup, you want a TWRP backup + copy the photos, downloads, etc folders via PC onto your desktop.
Copying the folders is NOT going to be equivalent to a TWP backup, as you don't see any system/firmware files in PC.
What to use to Backup Complete phone Firmware, pictures and Everything on the phone??? So if it crashes you caab restore phone back to like it was before Crash? Thanks

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