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There is apparently no way to restore a Nandroid backup under OOS 9.0.4...???

So I did what I thought was a routine thing, trying to restore system, boot, and data like I have on many phones before only to ended up in a bootloop or bootloader only not even able to boot a TWRP from fastboot.
After several hours of trying just about everything I finally faced the fact that I was not going to be able to restore any NANDROID backup I had do to A/B, encryption or the latest Android security patch?
However, you can get you phone running again quite easily with this thread: https://forum.xda-developers.com/oneplus-6/how-to/rom-stock-fastboot-roms-oneplus-6-t3796665 and using the flash-all option from a WIndows 10 VM (I am a Mac/Linux guy, but this does work from a Windows VM and is quick).
Before I re-installed anything I wanted to just verify that I could do a simple NANDROID backup of an empty phone with twrp / blu_spark and I can't under any case. Here's what I tried (with latest stock TWRP and latest Blu_Spark TWRP):
1) simple restore of data, system, boot -- > boots only to fastboot, need to recover with thread above
2) Recover with thread above, re-root (Magisk 18.1) and reinstall TWRP, boot ROM, then try restoring just data -- > same as #1
3) Recover using thread above, re-install TWRP, restore NANDROID, and re-run Magisk (suggest by a few) --> same as #1
My device is encrypted, and I could turn off encryption, but that is somewhat scary on a daily driver.
So has anyone successfully restored a NANDROID on a 9.0.4 rooted phone with the latest Android security patch and if so, what's the trick?
Thanks,
MW

MetroWestMA said:
So I did what I thought was a routine thing, trying to restore system, boot, and data like I have on many phones before only to ended up in a bootloop or bootloader only not even able to boot a TWRP from fastboot.
After several hours of trying just about everything I finally faced the fact that I was not going to be able to restore any NANDROID backup I had do to A/B, encryption or the latest Android security patch?
However, you can get you phone running again quite easily with this thread: https://forum.xda-developers.com/oneplus-6/how-to/rom-stock-fastboot-roms-oneplus-6-t3796665 and using the flash-all option from a WIndows 10 VM (I am a Mac/Linux guy, but this does work from a Windows VM and is quick).
Before I re-installed anything I wanted to just verify that I could do a simple NANDROID backup of an empty phone with twrp / blu_spark and I can't under any case. Here's what I tried (with latest stock TWRP and latest Blu_Spark TWRP):
1) simple restore of data, system, boot -- > boots only to fastboot, need to recover with thread above
2) Recover with thread above, re-root (Magisk 18.1) and reinstall TWRP, boot ROM, then try restoring just data -- > same as #1
3) Recover using thread above, re-install TWRP, restore NANDROID, and re-run Magisk (suggest by a few) --> same as #1
My device is encrypted, and I could turn off encryption, but that is somewhat scary on a daily driver.
So has anyone successfully restored a NANDROID on a 9.0.4 rooted phone with the latest Android security patch and if so, what's the trick?
Thanks,
MW
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
apparently is not matter of factly, i do nandroids and have restored from them various times with only 2-3 settings that i had to reset my way thereafter, hence it's apparently worth to retry, it works.
sometimes it helps to know that things are possible to put some more effort into something, knowing it can be worth it in case of success.
perhaps some remarks:
if your' phone is "empty" as you stated i recommend to first install factory image / stock rom latest OOS, i.e. 9.0.4
make nandroids of each partiton speparately and also restore them separately while don't nandroid the images, and cerrtainly don't restore those, only common partitions like system, boot, vendor, data.
system and vendor are present as normal partition as well as image partition, don't touch the later in any way.
all this only works if you restore on a phone that was bootable before you restore, for restoring to empty phones there are other procedures via fastboot commands and or stock rom via stock recovery if it's on device, else ADB comes in handy.
last but not least if you restore you have to restore everything, not only one partition especially not only system partition, won't work well or not at all depending.
1. Modem if corrupted, else not needed
2. EFS if corrupted, else not needed
3. Vendor start here if the previous rom was running well and make sure it's not been altered or you have to correct vendor backup in case you have more than one
4. System
5. Boot
6. Data
good luck

magnamentis said:
apparently is not matter of factly, i do nandroids and have restored from them various times with only 2-3 settings that i had to reset my way thereafter, hence it's apparently worth to retry, it works.
sometimes it helps to know that things are possible to put some more effort into something, knowing it can be worth it in case of success.
good luck
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OK -- do tell, what settings did you use? And you have done this on OOS 9.0.4 with encryption, or did you disable decryption?
I'll happily delete or edit the post...it seems many are having problems with few solutions starting with 9.0.4...
Thanks,
MW

MetroWestMA said:
OK -- do tell, what settings did you use? And you have done this on OOS 9.0.4 with encryption, or did you disable decryption?
I'll happily delete or edit the post...it seems many are having problems with few solutions starting with 9.0.4...
Thanks,
MW
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
the last restore i did on 9.0.3, since then i gave up on custom roms since OOS rooted + a few useful apps make OOS close to perfect for me
i'd not delete the thread, many reported issues with nandroids because the normal procedure to take one single backup and restore from twrp to an empty device does not work, one always need to first flash stock OOS to a clean slate before installing anything else or restoring anything.
and backups should be in increments not one single backup like it was possible on single slot devices.
restoring one single partition usuelly ends up in a mess except boot partition, boot, efs and modem can be restored as standalone restores without issues in most cases while flashing a kernel + magisk is still easier and safer than restoring a boot partition.
as to setttings i dunno what you mean, exactly and as to encryption, my device is and has bee encrypted at all times.
it's most important to use twrp- recovery by blue_spark, official standard recovery has issues ( at least always had as long as i tried using it) especially with verification in TWRP on encrypted devices. there is a risk to end up encrypted without any way to boot back into system or into twrp menu, hence use blue_spark's and all is well, user error exempt of course

Since reinstalling everything is going to take forever (at least another 4 hours)...I am going to disable encryption and do some more testing. I am now more certain than ever, no-one has successfully restored a NANDROID on an encrypted OOS 9.0.4 phone ever.
I am going to disable Force Encryption and AVB 2.0/dm-verity and try my restore again -- maybe then I can use one of my NANDROIDS. But doing this on an encrypted phone seems impossible. I guess if you use a screen PIN you files are still vulnerable to someone that knows bootloader and / or recovery, but I'll have to live with that.... Not being able to NANDRIOD restore is a killer...

I know is an old discussion but I believe we still have this issue. I have a 6T, oos10.3.6 and neve succeeded to restore a nandroid backup. Does anyone found a working solution?
Thanks

Messed up upgrading to 10.3.4 - can't do anything now

Spent about 1 entire day now and I think am in worse shape than when started.
Rooted with Magisk went from 10.3.3 to 10.3.4, and the phone was working, but didn't have TWRP recovery.
So, putting that back on is when the trouble started. Got TWRP on, and all the phone would do was boot to recovery.
Have since tried lots of things, and learned, apparently a TWRP backup is of no use whatsoever - can't restore the phone from the backup. (Restore "restores" but it doesn't boot.)
As I tried different things (flashing the full 10.3.3 and/or 10.3.4 OTA), at one point I got the phone back booted, but wifi wouldn't turn on and the cell signal didn't work - and now, I'm at a point where with TWRP in either slot A or slot B, cannot mount Data partition.
Really stuck now - don't know what to do.
I have TWRP backup of 10.3.3 before I did the upgrade - but doesn't seem like it can be restored, and now I don't know if there's anything I can do to mount Data partition again?
What can I do?
Do I have to basically factory reset the phone? Any suggestions?
TIA!

relaxable said:
Spent about 1 entire day now and I think am in worse shape than when started.
Rooted with Magisk went from 10.3.3 to 10.3.4, and the phone was working, but didn't have TWRP recovery.
So, putting that back on is when the trouble started. Got TWRP on, and all the phone would do was boot to recovery.
Have since tried lots of things, and learned, apparently a TWRP backup is of no use whatsoever - can't restore the phone from the backup. (Restore "restores" but it doesn't boot.)
As I tried different things (flashing the full 10.3.3 and/or 10.3.4 OTA), at one point I got the phone back booted, but wifi wouldn't turn on and the cell signal didn't work - and now, I'm at a point where with TWRP in either slot A or slot B, cannot mount Data partition.
Really stuck now - don't know what to do.
I have TWRP backup of 10.3.3 before I did the upgrade - but doesn't seem like it can be restored, and now I don't know if there's anything I can do to mount Data partition again?
What can I do?
Do I have to basically factory reset the phone? Any suggestions?
TIA!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you still have the cellular and wifi problem then you are not alone. Simply flashing android 9 image via edl mode and installing update to android 10 locally fixed for me. As you boot to 9 don't turn on wifi or cellular just download the update packages via pc, copy to internal storage then local update via system updates. Once you are on android 10 then install TWRP and root. TWRP backup only work if your data partition is decrypted.

relaxable said:
Spent about 1 entire day now and I think am in worse shape than when started.
Rooted with Magisk went from 10.3.3 to 10.3.4, and the phone was working, but didn't have TWRP recovery.
So, putting that back on is when the trouble started. Got TWRP on, and all the phone would do was boot to recovery.
Have since tried lots of things, and learned, apparently a TWRP backup is of no use whatsoever - can't restore the phone from the backup. (Restore "restores" but it doesn't boot.)
As I tried different things (flashing the full 10.3.3 and/or 10.3.4 OTA), at one point I got the phone back booted, but wifi wouldn't turn on and the cell signal didn't work - and now, I'm at a point where with TWRP in either slot A or slot B, cannot mount Data partition.
Really stuck now - don't know what to do.
I have TWRP backup of 10.3.3 before I did the upgrade - but doesn't seem like it can be restored, and now I don't know if there's anything I can do to mount Data partition again?
What can I do?
Do I have to basically factory reset the phone? Any suggestions?
TIA!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi,
Just a suggestion, was in this predicament before and the the thing that save me was my OTG USB stick with a USB C adapter, moved the latest rom(full rom 2.4gig) to it with TWRP installer , wiped( factory reset in twrp and installed the full update followed by TWRP installer. Reboot into recovery and did the same steps,
Reboot system,
Could never get MSM to work always param preload nonsense.... LOL.

relaxable said:
Spent about 1 entire day now and I think am in worse shape than when started.
Rooted with Magisk went from 10.3.3 to 10.3.4, and the phone was working, but didn't have TWRP recovery.
So, putting that back on is when the trouble started. Got TWRP on, and all the phone would do was boot to recovery.
Have since tried lots of things, and learned, apparently a TWRP backup is of no use whatsoever - can't restore the phone from the backup. (Restore "restores" but it doesn't boot.)
As I tried different things (flashing the full 10.3.3 and/or 10.3.4 OTA), at one point I got the phone back booted, but wifi wouldn't turn on and the cell signal didn't work - and now, I'm at a point where with TWRP in either slot A or slot B, cannot mount Data partition.
Really stuck now - don't know what to do.
I have TWRP backup of 10.3.3 before I did the upgrade - but doesn't seem like it can be restored, and now I don't know if there's anything I can do to mount Data partition again?
What can I do?
Do I have to basically factory reset the phone? Any suggestions?
TIA!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not sure what you did.
How I normally upgrade is:
1. Local install
2. Install Magisk after OTA option
3. Reboot
4. Local install again, the other slot
5. TWRP zip install from Magic (do not reboot)
6. YOU ARE NOW UNROOTED.
7. Use Magisk Manager to do direct install (do not reboot)
8. Use Magisk Manager to do OTA install
9. Now reboot.
You have same firmware, TWRP and root on both slots.
If you can flash the stock boot image from 10.3.4 you can recover.

Thanks for all the replies.
I wish I could have done what Tech_Head wrote, but it wasn't happening for me.
I couldn't flash using OTG either as I couldn't mount USB with TWRP.
In the end, I was able to get back to life using the Fastboot flash method from This Thread, but, also not without complication

Can't recover TWRP backup - any ideas?

I had to send in my Galaxy S9+ (Android 9) for repair and backed to all partitions with TWRP. Then I factory reset it. After I got my repaired phone back I thought now it's time to update Android. I flashed to Android 10 with a new bootloader. Then I wanted to get my apps and data back from the backup from Android 9. I wanted to restore my full TWRP Android 9 backup. I could restore the backup, but the phone does not boot up.
Meanwhile I read that once updated a new bootloader one can't go back to a lower Android version. Can anyone tell me why? When I back up my PC (linux) partitions with dd and restore them, everything is as at the time the backup was done. Where is the difference between phone and PC? This is just for my understanding.
The main questions is what I can do to recover my TWRP backup done in Android 9:
Is there any way to recover my data from my backup images?
Do I have to buy another S9+ with Android 8 or 9 to be able to recover my backup and access my data?

Any backup created by TWRP is a TAR archive you can extract by Windows / Linux command line.

You can't rollback after updating the bootloader, because flashing the bootloader to a lower version isn't done in the usual ways.
Think of it as PC's BIOS, they both have similar functions. Can you update a BIOS normally?
So to answer your questions:
You can try a different version of TWRP, specifically v3.5.0+ as it supports dynamic/logical partitions of android 10.
You can also extract any backup done by TWRP.
Finally, you can always just flash a custom ROM and restore your backup.

Thanks a lot for your answers so far.
When I did the backup I chose all partitions to be backed up. When in my situation I cannot restore all partitions to not to soft-brick the phone, can you please tell me, which partitions of my Android 9 backup I have to choose in TWRP to restore in my Android 10 system?

Restoring data from stock 11.1.1

Hi,
So it seems when i restore data via TWRP it triggers the protection which encrypts the whole sdcard, can this be avoided?
Here are the steps i did:
Full wipe
fastboot boot twrp (Nebrassy)
sideload stock 11.1.1
sideload magdisk
Finished setting up the device
Then booted twrp again
Did full backup
And then it never boot again to system... no idea why could be the twrp.
Now i'm stuck with this backup, every time i restore it, the entire sdcard gets encrypted.
I've tried flashing both stock boot and patched boot but it didn't help
Any ideas or should i do it all again and lose twrp, seems to be very buggy at v11.1.1

I managed to solve this issue myself.
Encryption is forced by default since android v10 i think so that means when you try to flash any data it has to be either the same type or it would encrypt the whole internal storage, i.e. you can backup just fine but if you restore and reboot the phone will tamper with all the data making it unreadable.
You need to disable encryption first then flash the data and then it works fine, unless you disabled it to begin with of course.
Another key point here is that when the phone encrypts the entire storage you won't be able to flash anything else until you completely erase everything.
Wasted hours on this on OP6 and OOS 11.1.1 + Unofficial Twrp,
Here is a short summary of the main points:
Full backup from TWRP works fine but copy it elsewhere or you might lose it when restoring
If you booted into encryption i used to flash lineageos recovery then boot into it and do a full wipe, then flash twrp back. i don't think it works from that twrp version
If you want to disable encryption or restore backups use this one (only one that worked) https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/...ncrypt-disk-quota-disabler-11-2-2020.3817389/
If you want OOS v11.1.1 + TWRP + Root + Backups do it in the following order: Unlock Bootloader, Boot TWRP, Install TWRP permanently, Flash Magdisk, Flash DFE
Not sure it's important but lineageos has a script for A\B slot phones like OP6 to sync slots, should be used at least once after flashing V11 just in case to avoid possible problems https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/enchilada/install
I'm also adding stock and patched boot images in case someone needs them.

Question What is the best way to recover files on OOS 12 while bricked

Hi everyone. So I am on OOS 11 and the main reason I am on OOS 11 is because of TWRP. I like to tinker and mess around with the phone. I have bricked the phone about 8 times. I have always been able to recover files via TWRP so I didn't want to move to OOS12 simply because I didn't want to back up everything every time I try a new module or tweak and etc.
However, OOS 13 is coming and I really don't want to stay on OOS 11 forever. So I am reaching out to get advice and ideas from the community on what is the next best thing to recover files if I soft brick the OP 9. Is there an alterative recovery that will give me access to files?

I've been working without twrp since my oneplus 7t, for example, and I back up my data (internal storage) on my pc and my apps with both google backup and swift backup.....
and since there is no twrp for oos 12, the only option left is to flash mods via magisl, which in turn has the advantage that if you flash a module that causes a bootloop, you can remove it when booting via adb (and even if you have a module flashes and it is not deleted in a bootloop, then you just flash the stock boot.img and can boot into the system without root and then save your data )

ChrisFeiveel84 said:
I've been working without twrp since my oneplus 7t, for example, and I back up my data (internal storage) on my pc and my apps with both google backup and swift backup.....
and since there is no twrp for oos 12, the only option left is to flash mods via magisl, which in turn has the advantage that if you flash a module that causes a bootloop, you can remove it when booting via adb (and even if you have a module flashes and it is not deleted in a bootloop, then you just flash the stock boot.img and can boot into the system without root and then save your data )
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I do use Magisk module for most parts but there has been a number of times where restoring stock boot.img or removing modules does not fix soft bricks. On the plus side, when this happens, usually it just require a factory reset (no data wipe) and it boots back up. What I am worried about is if I am forced to us MSM.

you can take precautions such as making regular backups and synchronizing your data that is in the internal memory, e.g. with your pc (as I said before, i back up my apps with google and swift backup)
I've bricked my cell phone a few times, but I have to say I've always gotten it to work with fastboot/fastbootd (tried a few things).

ChrisFeiveel84 said:
you can take precautions such as making regular backups and synchronizing your data that is in the internal memory, e.g. with your pc (as I said before, i back up my apps with google and swift backup)
I've bricked my cell phone a few times, but I have to say I've always gotten it to work with fastboot/fastbootd (tried a few things).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Looks like that is the best thing to do when we can't use TWRP, I guess I just need to me more cautious and backup anything important. I have been spoiled with TWRP for all these years. Thanks for responding.