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Avoiding MicroSD when loading Custoom ROM

I'll admit, I'm no expert on this in the least, but I'll try to explain my dilemma.
I have a T-Mobile MyTouch, and I'd like to install Cyanogen for it's speed and other general benefits. I've followed this tutorial to the successful rooting of my phone, but when I got to section 3, it requires that I remove my micro-SD card and use the "provided" adapter to connect it to my PC to transfer the files.
I don't have any sort of micro-SD adapter, and it'd be a serious pain to go and find one to use. Is there any way I can load a custom ROM without needing to either format the SD card before doing so (so that I can put on the update.zip before I wipe the device), or some other way in general?
Another complication is that I plan to use the device without cellular service (wifi only). Would the cyanogen ROM do the "tutorial" screen in the beginning if I wanted to update to a new version? The tutorial screen on the basic OS requires cellular service, and it cannot be activated with Wifi.
Thanks. If there's anything I can explain better, tell me.

You don't need the adapter. If you have the MicroSD reader or adapter, it saves you a reboot. Just mount the SD card and copy the data to the phone like normal.

Really?
I followed the tutorial to the step where I factory reset. Then it requires that I format the SD. When that finishes, if I reboot the phone, then it brings up the Android Setup tutorial screen, and after that I'm back to the basic OS home screen. Can I load the ROM from there somehow, or would I have to re-root the phone and get back into the boot menu?
Or do you not need root to get into the boot menu?
Edit: Looks like I can. Ok, I'm a bit confused. What exactly does rooting the phone do? If performing a factory reset still allows you to access the system recovery, why did I need to root it in the first place? Or does the rooting process carry over through a factory reset?
Edit2: Also, how can I tell whether I have a 32A or 32B? I've heard that you should hold back and power when turning it on, but that seems to do nothing. I'd hate to put the wrong one on and totally screw it up.

Volume down + power key.
Hold that key combination for upwards of 5-6 seconds and it WILL display the information requested.
It should read as follows:
SAPPHIRE PVT 32B SHIP S-ON G
HBOOT-1.33.0006
CPLD - 10
RADIO - 2.22.19.26I
MAY 27TH 2009 19:06:41

Perfect!
I'm still wondering though, what does the factory wipe accomplish? If you can boot it up, transfer the files to the SD, and then go back into recovery mode, why must you factory reset? Or do you not have to?
If I follow what I just said, going into the base OS, putting on update.zip, powering down, booting in recovery, and loading the ROM, will it work?

Don't do that!
TheBigCheese0 said:
Perfect!
I'm still wondering though, what does the factory wipe accomplish? If you can boot it up, transfer the files to the SD, and then go back into recovery mode, why must you factory reset? Or do you not have to?
If I follow what I just said, going into the base OS, putting on update.zip, powering down, booting in recovery, and loading the ROM, will it work?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Absolutely NOT!
Do not ever try to apply and "update" file while the standard (T-Mobile) Cupcake build 1.5 is installed. You must "factory reset" or wipe your phone of any remaining data, which includes cache from various applications and user information. That's where Cyanogen's recovery image version 1.4 comes in handy. I suggest you research the One-Click Root Method to flash his recovery image onto your device. After you have done that; read up on numerous tutorials, finding one that you can fully understand...then go from there! Trust me, if you find some proper sources on this topic, it's quite simple - and well worth it.
BUT DON'T WORRY...when you flash that recovery image to your phone, there is a built-in feature that allows you to utilize a program referred to as "Nandroid" that will manually backup the current build on your phone. So, please believe the first thing you will be instructed to do upon flashing his recovery image is to backup your current ROM using Nandroid.
Good luck.

Thanks. The recovery flash program comes with the 1.4 version I believe. So I'll try that.
If I want to put a new version on it, I should download the img to the SD card and load it from the recovery flash application, right?
If it's that easy what is all this stuff in the tutorial about wiping the phone and SD, and needing the recovery mode?
Thanks for the help. The tutorial I was using actually suggested against flashing the cyanogen from the recovery flash program, so I skipped it.

Originally Posted by TheBigCheese0
Edit: Looks like I can. Ok, I'm a bit confused. What exactly does rooting the phone do? If performing a factory reset still allows you to access the system recovery, why did I need to root it in the first place? Or does the rooting process carry over through a factory reset?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am unsure why you didn't need root to flash the RC29 image, but you definitely need root to flash a custom rom as most require you to download and install different radios and SPL's.

Arg. So I wiped the system and booted the Cyanogen 4.1 ROM. Now it's stuck at the boot screen.
Luckily I backed up. So I'm going to try the latest stable release instead with the same process.

Why even apply 4.1 build?
TheBigCheese0 said:
Arg. So I wiped the system and booted the Cyanogen 4.1 ROM. Now it's stuck at the boot screen.
Luckily I backed up. So I'm going to try the latest stable release instead with the same process.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
4.1.2.1 is the most recent experimental build. There's no need to backtrack unless you're switching from STABLE to EXPERIMENTAL - vice versa.
WIPE, RE-FLASH, and REBOOT. Again, keep in mind that regardless of an upgrade or full-on WIPE then installing a ROM...that FIRST BOOT is going to take a while. The splash screen image should sit there for about 2-3 minutes, then your booting image, which will obviously be Cyanogen's little custom image - WILL take upwards of 10 minutes. You're only STUCK in a "boot loop" when the reflective imagery FREEZES momentarily, then starts up that same image again. That's a boot loop issue. Just keep your fingers crossed and be patient.
Good luck.

i thought you cant flash 32a builds to the tmobile mytouch?

mahfuzurkhan said:
i thought you cant flash 32a builds to the tmobile mytouch?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's a 32B.
The splash screen image should sit there for about 2-3 minutes, then your booting image, which will obviously be Cyanogen's little custom image - WILL take upwards of 10 minutes.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ah. That's my problem then. I let it sit for maybe about 5-7 minutes before pulling the battery.
I'll try it again.

Great! It works!
I just have one more question, but it's much more involved.
Is there any way I can get rid of the startup "android setup" tutorial screen? It seems to be tied to the device, unless Cyanogen also included it in their distribution. The problem being that if I plan to use it on wifi only, I cannot connect to the cell towers to setup the phone if I update Cyanogen.

[Q] Bootlooping - Anyway to save it without a wipe?

So, the tablets been working fine. It's been running some older version of CM10 unofficial from March of 2013. It would deep sleep every now and then and boot loop, but it's always come out of it. Now, this weekend while out of town, it deep sleeps, so I reboot it and it just boot loops now. I can get to recovery (TWRP) and I've tried re-flashing the zips for the rom and kernel, but I'm not getting any results. It hangs on the circling Cyanogen logo and just keeps spinning in circles. I've tried everything short of factory reset...
This thing was mainly used for games, and I really really don't want to lose the data if at all possible. Is there a way to get this thing to work without a wipe? Flash a different rom over top or something? Any help is appreciated.
Details:
TF101
CM10 Unofficial from March
Tim Kat Kernel 47b
TWRP 2.3.1.1
It is much appreciated! I'll be updating it once I get back into it and am able to back it up. Thank you!!

Hard to say what will fix it. I know a lot of KatKiss users have had data corruption issues during some random reboots and the fix is to turn FSYNC on (zip file in the KatKiss thread). I am not sure if that would fix this issue you had or not, but it has to be flashed before it gets corrupted.
Here is what I would do:
Since a dirty flash is not helping (wipe caches & system and reflash), make a backup of the DATA partition.
Wipe the data, system & caches.
Flash the ROM, kernel and GAPPS.
Boot up, login with your google account.
Go to the Play Store and grab Titanium Backup and the Pro Key.
You can then use TiBu Pro to restore from a Nandroid (it is in the menu under special backup/restore). It works for most all apps and games, but there may be some that do not work. Not much you can do about it.

Well, I'll give that whirl today. I actually have another back up app that I forgot what it's called. My Backup Pro I think? I use it on my DNA and it works well. Will probably just use that for the game data. I plan to get the KatKiss multi window rom after this fiasco is taken care of. Thanks for the tip!

Successfully got around bootloader sprint g900p s5 Bog1 firmware

Hello I'm sending this post now because I'm going to need somebody's assistance. A quick story I have been doing this for about 3 months as far as my first root to a flashaholic. I have successfully got around my bootloader. The problem is I'm not 100% sure how. I have a good idea of what I did but I don't know exactly as I am NOT a dev and I am new to this. I catch on rather quickly though and have found a passion for modifying my android and this site has been my number one contributor. My goal is to give back and help others out as well. I started off by editing permissions in my system file along with floating feature, csc, features and the customer XML. It was somewhere right in one of those files that I did this.. I simply changed the permission or function and immediately when I did I was prompted by super user to let boot animations by JRummy apps creator of the toolbox to allow permission which I did. The problem is as I didn't realize what I did at the time until I reset it as I changed about 10 different things. About a week prior I tried installing the boot animation into different file folders which was the two options that they suggest. Nothing happened of course my bootloader is locked and i wasn't surprised. Well I changed the permissions that shouldn't have in the calling feature section and I got stuck with force close force close so I hard reset into the factory recovery and trief to clear the cache partition which was unsuccessful. I then decided to install philz custom recovery so I could do a good clean out because obviously the factory recovery is garbage but every time I tried to change it it would stick me in a boot loop after being successfully flashed and in use for at least 24 hours. After I wiped the dalvik cache and the cache partition with Phils I then decided to try one last flash with a custom ROM and everything flashed fine. But once it rebooted I noticed a completely different boot animation and to my amazement it ended up booting and upgrading all my apps it started up normal. The rom I installed was real rwilco's mostly stock version 1.2 G900PVPU3BOG1. After that I decided I was going to take another chance and flash a few modification files. Once again succesfull. This morning I decided I was going to try to do a backup and restore. I backed it up with Phil's recovery and then I restored it. Restoring gave me a bit of a problem as I had to delete the cache and the dalvik cache. I then restarted the system the first time it didn't work or I didn't wait long enough I'm not sure. The second time I hard reset it introduced a normal boot and it started back up and was upgrading all 590 something after they have. Before I did any of this I was working away at a stock rom that I managed to modify a file in. This would be the aboot.mdn i believe. I was able to open it up into a notepad and replace it with the older version in the text part only so the file name itself stayed the same. I don't know if that played a major part to it or not. But I have sense flash recovery and files without getting stuck into a bootloop and with this new firmware almost every time I turned it off and on it would put me in a boot loop just because I was rooted. I attempted to simply change a new battery that I ordered powered off replace battery powered back on and was stuck in a boot loop. I have been making it my goal to somehow crack this thing. This is where I need help because I am still a noob I always just happened to poke in the right places I could care less about reaching 10 posts so I can post links if you like after I upload my information you can go ahead and reset that. I am here because I can seriously help and this website has been a major contributor to me becoming a flashaholic. I am at work right now and have already attempted but I'll go down to a 3G signal if that. I have absolutely no reliable internet here but within 5 hours I will be home uploading to my Google Drive a copy of my manifest and CSC, permissions, and features files. I have also created a clockwork recovery which I am going to upload as well I need somebody to help me go through these and pinpoint exactly what I did so we can get a legit thread with the fix. I somehow basically flashed a new boot animation which i think is blocking my other boot. I have confirm this working I have 2 screenshots I'm going to upload. Anybody with real experience and actually knows what they're doing I would appreciate your help in this matter.. And actually knows what they're doing I would appreciate your help in this matter. I just need to get home to my laptop to upload. Thanks xda you guys are awesome and I hope this is finally my opportunity to contribute and give back.
i ran out of time and couldnt proofread. sorry about that lol'
in my drive account i have a 1) factory rom that i modded aboot.mbn. 2) The backup "philz" cwm recovery. its my full backup apps and all down to the boot image that replaced the sprint yellow screen and the samgsung boot logo. 3) The system files that i have modified.. csc, features, floating feature, customer xml... 3) screenshots of rom info and adding others of some of the mods as we speak. still need 15 mins to finish uploading the sys files
if someone can figure out exactly what i did we have a fix. i have since flashed 30+ mods with no bootloop. email is [email protected] just incase for contact purposes
h t t p s: // drive. google. com / drive / folders / 0B5AfudcH1XDQMVFZdFhVTFdYQ0U---has many spaces only way to fit link
the system files have been diificult to et into my drive. most did not want to copy and the size themself. the full custom restore is in my drive already along with some screens. i have also set my boot animations to random and have about 20 or so cycling. also after restore make sure to wipe dalvick cache and cache. also some of the apps might fc i didnt have them fully restored when i created backup. i added a backup file in drive that has full copy.

TWRP takes 5+ minutes to start up

Hello!
I've been using LineageOS on my Moto G 4G for quite a few months, it's all going well right now but when I have to boot to recovery, which in my case is TWRP, it now takes long time, i estimated around 5 minutes. Other than that, the rest of the operations, both in recovery and in normal mode, don't seem to be slow.
I've updated LOS multiple times throughout these months, and I noticed TWRP had slower and slower bootup times with each reboot/flash... The only thing that fixed it so far was a *full* storage wipe, I always wipe cache and dalvik after a flash so that isn't the problem, but that's really not a good fix for me, I'd like to not have to full wipe, lose all my data just for TWRP to boot faster.
I also tried reflashing TWRP and that did nothing to hasten the process. Do you have any idea on what I can try to fix this?
Thank you for taking your time to read through this! Hope to hear your ideas soon

I am experiencing this on well with AOSP ROM. I think it's just the way the latest version of TWRP 3.1.1 is working.

F2FS is known to have bad performance for the "stat" system call. TWRP scans the data partition at startup to calculate the backup size. The time is proportional to the number of files.
Do you have a lot of files on /data, like a full Linux distribution?

You just taught me something _that, thank you! I actually happen to have GNURoot installed on my SD card, will attempt to uninstall it (as it's there just as a fun app for me) and will update my reply with the outcome.
Update: heyy, apparently the boot time went from 5 to 2 minutes by removing any trace of gnuroot. Doubt we can make it faster but I'm happy as it is already. Though I noticed my wallpaper reverted to stock... I think opening a new thread just for this question is redundant, so i'll ask here, do you know why that happens and if it's fixable?

FabTheZen said:
Though I noticed my wallpaper reverted to stock... I think opening a new thread just for this question is redundant, so i'll ask here, do you know why that happens and if it's fixable?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No idea, but that seems to be unrelated to TWRP.

Help, out of ideas. Possible mother/logic board going bad?

I have a well and heavily used Galaxy S5 (GM-900P) and about 2 months ago it started accting up pretty hard. Becoming very very slow so I decided to update to the latest sprint firmware and install a new(er) rom ([ROM][QD1][6.0.1]14Dec2017] Stock-ish Plus Tidbits and Magisk) and all was good for about 5 days and the phone started having apps crash/force close like crazy and most the time just reinstalling them would fix it but a bunch of google play services would crash and would have to uninstall the updates then it would work again for a day or so, sometimes it would randomly restart and get stuck at the boot screen and the phone would get crazy hot and the only way out of it was to boot into the recovery and then reflash the stock firmware in odin again then reinstall the rom. Then I had my phone all of a sudden act like there was no sim card in it and originally though it was a sim card issue but turns out it wasnt, I had to boot into the recovery and do a full wipe of everything reflash the stock firmware yet again and then reinstall the rom again. That happened twice in a matter of a week. At my wits end I decided to give LineageOS v16 a try so I boot into recovery, do a full wipe, boot into download mode, flash the latest stock firmware in odin, then boot right to recovery, flash LineageOS 16.0 then latest Magisk and all was great, for about a week, then Google services start crashing again and random apps crash over and over and even times the phone would slow down and reboot, get stuck at the boot screen and then eventually just reboot back into recovery by itself after failing to boot. But with LineageOS at least just reflashing the rom in the recovery will let it boot right back up sometimes and work as it should for another few days, other times too much stuff will just keep crashing so I do a full wipe and reflash LineageOS and all will be great for another few days to a week and it starts all over again. Its like stuff just randomly gets corrupted on the device and the only way out of it is to reflash the whole thing and start over and enjoy it until it does it again. Sometimes it will go days, sometimes a day later its all screwy again.
Also, TWRP always fails when I try to do a back up and it seems to always fail when in the data or data/private-app part of the system and its never at the same point.
I guess my question here is, could the onboard flash (the motherboard/logic board) be taking a crap on me? I really really dont want to give up on this phone just yet as it has everything I want in a phone and frankly, I just really really like it. I can get a new (used) motherboard for like $20 but even that kind of worries me cause I dont want to possibly be in this same position 3 months later again. I have a Galaxy S8+ (unlocked AT&T phone) that I refuse to use yet just cause I can not root it or unlock the bootloader.
Any help or ideas would be much appreciated and sorry for the long winded post.

could be wrong, on this one, But.....
If it was mew, I would go to stock . run that for a day, maybe 3... if all it well, then flash over what ever Rom you would like.
"KNOWING IT Work" is the key. Oh, another thing, that may help too . seen this on one of the LineageOS 15.1 or 16 is when you wipe ... System and Data, can be Reformatted, they have had some major success by also formatting it, (YES EXT4) but this will help to ensure nothing left over....
May even help with others Android 8.0, 8.1, 9.0....

Well, I have a new motherboard on the way so we'll see how that goes but I did manage to get the stock firmware on there and booted then I reflashed TWRP and then Magisk and going to just run it that way for a bit and see what happens.
I initially went in to TWRP, wiped data,system, etc... then flashed the stock firmware in Odin, then rebooted, got stuck at the Samsung boot logo so pulled the battery, booted to stock recovery, did a factory reset (Wiped everything, internal sd card included), then got it to boot, set the phone up, then rebooted to download mode, flashed TWRP, then rebooted again, set the phone up a bit more then decided to flash Magisk so I have root, and so far its working. 100% stock with magisk. Fingers crossed.
I still think there is an issue with the internal flash memory though as I can not get a TWRP backup to actually complete without failing. It always fails when backing up stuff in the data partition/section and never at the same point like its having read errors or something. I'll grab a TWRP log and post it up in a bit.

Well, that didnt last long. Within an hour, apps started crashing. I will make this thing work! LoL