Data Recovery, but its my laptop this time. - General Questions and Answers

Laptop - Dell Inspiron 15 3567, i3 6th gen, 4GB RAM (later upgraded to 8 GB) 1TB HDD (with only one partition, OS C: ), Windows 10 Home Single Language.
Background - I was using my laptop 4 days ago to read my notes for my upcoming exams. The built-in keyboard started behaving weirdly all of a sudden. Apparently, all the other keys on the keyboard somehow got attached to the Enter key. As soon as I pressed a key it shifted me to a new line with the simultaneous press of the Enter key. It made it so difficult to even type my password that I decided to detach it from the back. This mishap has been faced by my keyboard previously as well. But back then only a specific set of keys stopped working or they combined with each other. This time though, the entire keyboard got attached to my Enter key, even the NumPad on the right side. This problem almost always gets fixed when I perform a system restore, which I've set up a trigger for in my laptop that makes automatic restore points every Wednesday [Task Scheduler]. The keyboard thing happened on 25th Sep and luckily, I had a restore point from 3 days back i.e. 22nd Sep. So as always, I did the system restore, waited for an hour+, and the system restore was done. The laptop opened up and displayed the message, "System has been successfully restored to Sep 22 2021. Your files and documents were not affected". Now my laptop lags a lot after a system restore so I quickly did a hard reboot and that's when it happened. When the laptop initiated booting it got stuck in the Bitlocker Auto Recovery Loop. It asked me to type in the Bitlocker Recovery Key which I am dead sure, I never set up by myself. I rebooted it quite a lot of times but to no avail, which made sure that something had gone wrong. Since then I have attempted quite a lot of fixes for it, despite knowing the fact that Bitlocker is prolly one of the most secure and powerful drive encryption systems in the world. The fixes have yielded me no good but have provided me with quite a lot of info about the issue.
Fixes I have already tried/didn't work -
1. I have tried looking up my Microsoft account for any Bitlocker keys as suggested by a few on the web. The Bitlocker section in my account shows the message, "There are no Bitlocker Keys uploaded to your Microsoft account.".
2. I have tried various cmd commands in the Command Prompt interface the Recovery Advanced Options provide. I found these commands from different sources on the web but none of them did any good to my situation or even helped me out with something in that relation. Here are some commands that I tried-
Code:
bcdedit /set {default} safeboot minimal
bcdedit /deletevalue {default} safeboot
bcdedit /set {default} bootmenupolicy legacy
bcdedit /set {default} safebootalternateshell yes
Code:
manage-bde -off C:
manage-bde -protectors -get C:
manage-bde -unlock C: -pw
Code:
BOOTREC /FIXMBR
BOOTREC /FIXBOOT
BOOTREC /RebuildBcd
There were a lot more commands I tried but these are some I remember.
3. I have tried making a bootable USB drive with the Hiren's Boot CD/DVD PE. As soon as the laptop powers on, I spam the F12 key which takes me to the Boot Menu. From there I select my USB drive as the booting device and it loads me into the HBCD environment as expected. But since the environment is working in the system itself, it does not have access to anything that the system contains. So all the above mentioned commands don't work in the same as well.
4. I have tried using the WinImage tool in the HBCD environment to at least create an image of my original drive into an external 1TB drive that I own. But again, since HBCD lacks system access, it does not let me install any third party softwares into it.
Fixes I have researched/am willing to try/have given thoughts to -
1. I was suggested by some Microsoft chat support agents, the use of a bootable installation media USB drive to install a temporary copy of Windows. This, according to them, won't get my files deleted and would be helpful. However during my researches of the same, I found out that there is quite a good chance of data loss from my PC which, in any case whatsoever, I don't want.
2. I have thought of physically removing the original affected drive, using it with another computer and then making an image out of it. Now this image can be used for any Bitlocker cracking purposes by any agency that would be willing to do so. The only concern I have is that the original data shouldn't be lost, instead an image could be used for all purposes related to the cracking of the Bitlocker. I am not sure if this is gonna work though.
I need help, urgent help!
Please contact me in my pm here if anyone has knowledge about cracking bitlockers and is willing to help me out.​

Use another PC to access the data, copy.
Stop screwing around before you lose the data!
Reload the OS... possible malware or hardware failure.
Always redundantly backup critical data to at least 2 hdds that are physically or electronically isolated from each other and the PC.
Do this or you will lose data, sooner or latter.
You can never have too many backup drives....
Use Acronis to make a clone copy of the OS disk after configured but before loading antivirus or crapware. Learn how to do this.
Whenever possible use a separate data drive ie a dual drive setup. All critical data goes on data drive. Only the OS and apps go on the OS drive.
You see why now...

blackhawk said:
Use another PC to access the data, copy.
Stop screwing around before you lose the data!
Reload the OS... possible malware or hardware failure.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
@blackhawk I'm sorry but I don't quite get what you mean by reloading the OS. As I mentioned, I had only one drive partition which was C:. It had my Windows and all my files and data. Since I have been locked out of that, I can't even get into the computer's OS. As soon as the laptop boots up it displays the message, "Preparing to Recover". It then asks me for the Bitlocker key, which, since I don't have it, I am not able to input. The only option it gives me next is to skip the drive. It then shows the message, "Diagnosing for problems" and then brings me back to the recovery options. There is nothing I can do in those recovery advanced options.

Chinmay47 said:
I'm sorry but I don't quite get what you mean by reloading the OS. As I mentioned, I had only one drive partition which was C:. It had my Windows and all my files and data. Since I have been locked out of that, I can't even get into the computer's OS. As soon as the laptop boots up it displays the message, "Preparing to Recover". It then asks me for the Bitlocker key, which, since I don't have it, I am not able to input. The only option it gives me next is to skip the drive. It then shows the message, "Diagnosing for problems" and then brings me back to the recovery options. There is nothing I can do in those recovery advanced options.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I mean reload from scratch.
You should have made a clone image when you first got it if you don't have a installable Windows OS image. I normally upgrade from the hdd the laptop comes with to a better one. I then clobe the old hdd image to the new one. The old hdd is my backup.
First things first, before your critical data gets corrupted, overwritten, whatever... copy it off that disk!
Windows crash and burn, it a traditional
Be ready for it next time.

Chinmay47 said:
As I mentioned, I had only one drive partition which was C:. It had my Windows and all my files and data.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Serious Windows OS user always at least have these 2 drives /partitions:
C: -> Windows OS
D: -> User data incl. user installed apps
Keep this in mind when it comes to re-install Windows OS.

blackhawk said:
I mean reload from scratch.
You should have made a clone image when you first got it if you don't have a installable Windows OS image. I normally upgrade from the hdd the laptop comes with to a better one. I then clobe the old hdd image to the new one. The old hdd is my backup.
First things first, before your critical data gets corrupted, overwritten, whatever... copy it off that disk!
Windows crash and burn, it a traditional
Be ready for it next time.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That essentially means a data loss doesn't it?

jwoegerbauer said:
Serious Windows OS user always at least have these 2 drives /partitions:
C: -> Windows OS
D: -> User data incl. user installed apps
Keep this in mind when it comes to re-install Windows OS.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know what you mean by a serious Windows OS user, but when I boot up into the HBCD environment, I do see some extra drives such as a D: drive, an E: drive called IMAGE and an F: drive called Dell. Could this be related?

Chinmay47 said:
That essentially means a data loss doesn't it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes... completely.
You should zero fill at least the boot sector before a reload.
That's one reason why you use a data drive(s) and always redundantly backup critical data.

@blackhawk Would you be having in your knowledge, any person here on the forums, or a service that owns expertise in Bitlocker recoveries? Or should I consider my case a game-over now?

Chinmay47 said:
@blackhawk Would you be having in your knowledge, any person here on the forums, or a service that owns expertise in Bitlocker recoveries? Or should I consider my case a game-over now?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you saying the data is encrypted and that you lost the encryption key?
If so you got gigantic problems.
No encryption key means no chance of access.
Stop messing with it and find a certified MS tech to try to repair the load.

Chinmay47 said:
I don't know what you mean by a serious Windows OS user, but when I boot up into the HBCD environment, I do see some extra drives such as a D: drive, an E: drive called IMAGE and an F: drive called Dell. Could this be related?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When you boot into Hiren ( what simply is a rudimentary Windows 10 OS bloated with tons of tools ) then the Windows computer is mapped as drive X:. All other drives you might see are partitions the Windows PE is divided into.

blackhawk said:
Are you saying the data is encrypted and that you lost the encryption key?
If so you got gigantic problems.
No encryption key means no chance of access.
Stop messing with it and find a certified MS tech to try to repair the load.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My laptop had only one partition, the OS C:. which ran the windows and had all my files. When I rebooted after that system restore, the C: drive itself got locked and the system asked me for its Bitlocker Recovery Key. Now if I never setup the bitlocker myself, why would I have the recovery key on me? Theoretically, while setting up a bitlocker manually, there is an option to "Backup Bitlocker Keys" which, upon clicking, uploads the recovery key to your Microsoft account as well as gives you a notepad file of the same. But before this happening I had absolutely no knowledge of the Bitlocker's mere existence! So if the system set it up itself, shouldn't it have uploaded the bitlocker keys to my account itself too? In my knowledge, I had not even received the slightest of warnings related to bitlocker mishaps in the past. That's what makes this experience feel like hell.

jwoegerbauer said:
When you boot into Hiren ( what simply is a rudimentary Windows 10 OS bloated with tons of tools ) then the Windows computer is mapped as drive X:. All other drives you might see are partitions the Windows PE is divided into.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That sounds just about right, cause when the PC was "alive" and usable, I never saw any other partitions other than the C: drive itself. It surprised me too to see 5 other drive partitions accompanying the C: in the HBCD environment, but I guess all those were useless. I am not sure though; could they be holding some important data?

Also, just my own thought but, could there be any way to brute force the bitlocker recovery key? I mean its a heck lot of combinations but, is it even possible? I do have access to some info that might help in reducing the number of combinations greatly and make the work easier, but I just want to confirm if started, it would bring out some result.

With regards to BitLocker:
The BitLocker recovery key is a unique 48-digit numerical password.
How to obtain the BitLocker recovery key is described here:
Finding your BitLocker recovery key in Windows - Microsoft Support
Learn different ways to locate your BitLocker recovery key in Windows, and learn about how BitLocker might have been activated on your system.
support.microsoft.com

jwoegerbauer said:
With regards to BitLocker:
The BitLocker recovery key is a unique 48-digit numerical password.
How to obtain the BitLocker recovery key is described here:
Finding your BitLocker recovery key in Windows - Microsoft Support
Learn different ways to locate your BitLocker recovery key in Windows, and learn about how BitLocker might have been activated on your system.
support.microsoft.com
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That article is probably what everyone suggests when mentioned the term Bitlocker Recovery. I have of course read it thoroughly and found nothing of relevance to my case. The key is not in my Microsoft account as I stated before. I have not printed out a single sheet of paper in the past 2 years. I have checked every single USB drive I have at home for even the slightest mentions of a recovery key. I don't have an Azure account. And lastly, I am the only administrator if that system, there are no other users attached to my laptop. Would you be having any other suggestions?

Chinmay47 said:
My laptop had only one partition, the OS C:. which ran the windows and had all my files. When I rebooted after that system restore, the C: drive itself got locked and the system asked me for its Bitlocker Recovery Key. Now if I never setup the bitlocker myself, why would I have the recovery key on me? Theoretically, while setting up a bitlocker manually, there is an option to "Backup Bitlocker Keys" which, upon clicking, uploads the recovery key to your Microsoft account as well as gives you a notepad file of the same. But before this happening I had absolutely no knowledge of the Bitlocker's mere existence! So if the system set it up itself, shouldn't it have uploaded the bitlocker keys to my account itself too? In my knowledge, I had not even received the slightest of warnings related to bitlocker mishaps in the past. That's what makes this experience feel like hell.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Do you have a MS account? You may have inadvertently setup bitlocker when you opened that account. If so you might be able to retrieve through your MS account.
I turn off system restore because it slows the machine down and it has failed me more than once. My clone copies have not.
Keep the OS and data on different drives whenever possible. I set up my Androids like this too; the SD card is the data drive.
Learn and come back stronger.

@Chinmay47
My final post here:
Whether Bitlocker is enabled or not is steared by an entry in Windows' registry
Subkey: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\BitLocker
Value: PreventDeviceEncryption equal to True (1|0)
Type: REG_DWORD
Hence try to reset this registry setting to 1
You may use HIREN to achieve this.

There's no way to access the registry on a locked encrypted volume...

blackhawk said:
There's no way to access the registry on a locked encrypted volume...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The official Windows PE allows you to load / edit offline Windows' registry hives by means of REGEDIT
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}

Related

[Proof of Concept] Help for those who lost 4G

Apparently a number of folks lost their 4G keys. Kinda sucks when you are in a 4G market, and cannot take advantage since your 4G keys are hosed. Redsolar came up with a process for moving/editing your 4G key to a hobbled phone.
Further reading..
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=716694
Some discussion made that once a phone is sent into either Sprint or Insurance for replacement the 4G keywould be rendered useless by Sprint. In a way I doubt that. It would be more prudent to invalidate the MAC address than the key. Since Wimax keys are generally used to en/decrypt the data. I believe that authentication fails because the network handshake is encrypted. But the initial connection is granted via the MAC address, then validation via the encrypted handshake. It would be easier to invalidate a MAC address than it is to do that with using the actual key (MAC=96 bits vs RAS key=2048). Hence smaller/faster hash table.
What I propose is that someone who has a rooted Evo that has either "lost", or severely damaged (but still accessable via USB by fastboot) their phone that will be going back to Insurance to pull their 4G key by redsolar's process. I in turn will hexedit the key to reflect my MAC address, load it on my borked phone, and see if once Sprint deactivates the phone donor if I would still have 4G. At that point we will know if Sprint is using the MAC address, or the actual key to allow/deny access to Wimax.
The thing is if it works it will have to be one donor key, to one borked phone. Redsolar already proved that two keys operating at the same time will not work. Maybe a repository? We have alot to gain and nothing to lose.
Anyone up for this?
Discuss.
I have a smashed evo that still can be accessed via ADB, even better, I never used 4G on it because at the time there was no 4G here. I am not sure about fastboot access at this time, but as I said ADB worked so I figure fastboot prolly does too. I work 48 hours this week, so not sure when I could try it.
SteelH said:
I have a smashed evo that still can be accessed via ADB, even better, I never used 4G on it because at the time there was no 4G here. I am not sure about fastboot access at this time, but as I said ADB worked so I figure fastboot prolly does too. I work 48 hours this week, so not sure when I could try it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Awesome. If adb works so will fastboot, you just have to boot into bootloader.
Thanks!
That's easy enough then. I'll have to charge up a battery and go read that other post, unless you want to p[aste the commands I need to do in here.
Here you go!
1. Open command line window (cmd)
2. Make sure you have no PC36IMG.zip files in the root of your SD Card, or it will take a while to power your phone up
3. Power down your phone
4. Power it up while holding down the Volume Down key
5. HBOOT will attempt to scan for PC36IMG files. Let's hope you read carefully and don't have it on your SD Card root
6. Once HBOOT fails to find the file, use Vol Up/Down buttons to go into Fastboot mode
7. Connect the USB cable to your phone (and PC). You may have to install the USB drivers that come with Android SDK, but chances are if you are looking for this solution, you already have them installed and working
8. The FASTBOOT mode will switch to FASTBOOT USB (that's good)
9. Test your fastboot by typing "fastboot oem h" in command window you opened earlier (note, no adb, or adb shell anywhere, the command is "fastboot oem h". From here on all fastboot commands are issued in that window
10. If you see less than ~40 lines of output, you don't have a propertly rooted phone, and you need to do step 1 and step 2 (see above)
11. Dump your wimax data by issuing "fastboot oem saveprt2sd wimax -n wimax.bin" command (varies, anywhere between 7 to 8.5 MB, mine was 7MB)
12. Dump complete partition (~12MB) by issuing "fastboot oem saveprt2sd wimax -n wimax.bin -a" command
13. Reboot your phone
14. Pull the data files you dumped to a safe place ("adb pull /sdcard/WIMAX.BIN" and "adb pull /sdcard/WIMAXRAW.BIN"). Note the capitalization, it's important
PM me when you do it. I'll set up an account on my FTP box for you so you can upload it.
One major flaw to this attempt
0. The public/private keypair contains your phone's MAC address as part of your certificate's Common Name (CN), which is also most likely validated against the current mac on your phone
1 (corollary of 0). The phone must be an "activated and in service" phone for this to work. So if someone is keeping their broken paperweight and paying sprint the monthly fee for it - sure, this will work
2 (corollary of 1). Using a pair of keys from a deactivated phone will not allow you 4G access, sorry .
If through some miracle of Sprint's negligence the above is not true, I will tip my hat off to you
The negligence would mean that they are not checking anything but whether your public key is signed by HTC, and are happy with the actual MAC address that your phone provides them during authentication. That would be a major major flaw, since MAC address is so easy to change in fastboot.
If you read redsolar's thread, you'll see that I've tried this. It's worth it to try again, but for reference purposes, I have tried and failed.
Here's what I've tried:
I've cloned a friend's wimax certs, changed the mac to mine. It worked. Downfall, is that only one of us can be on 4G at a time. (There doesn't seem to be any checking of mac address vs wimax cert)
I actually purchased someone's wimax certs from a phone that is no longer in service, and changed the mac to mine. Didn't work. Flashed back my friend's certs, worked.
Conclusion, the certs are most likely blacklisted if the phone is not in service.
and cannot take advantage since your 4G keys are hosed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just curious as I no longer live in a 4G area. What causes this "hosing of keys"?
Most of us who lost it did it through a botched wimax update. It's believed to have originally been released by revoked and circulated for a while during the last Eclair update for evo (1.47)
When wimax was initially a pain to flash. It used a write_raw_image command which overwrote wimax partition and in most cases did so over the unrecoverable SSL key pair.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App
Hmmm.. I would be using my valid MAC address. Usually it is the MAC since like IP's only one can exist on a network. Though it is quite probable that Sprint's implementation of Wimax does do a key hash. From the original spec of Wimax, the MAC authentication is done first at connection, then an encrypted handshake follows. The only way to see that is by using a Service Monitor, and watch the transaction. But you can't see what happens after the encryption starts (but you can watch what goes on before and after). HTC can't recreate your Wimax keys because Verisign's algorithm uses a random seed generator. So even if you where to get the keys from both the proceeding, and post MAC addresses to do a compare the RSG would be different on all three keys. Verisign made it easy for makers of electronics that use key encryption, it's just a simple web interface that in the case of cellphone the engineer plugs in a starting MAC address, and the number of keys to produce, and the computer just spits them out to the flash table.
I'm still willing to try. Can't screw up my Wimax anymore than what it is.
redsolar said:
Most of us who lost it did it through a botched wimax update. It's believed to have originally been released by revoked and circulated for a while during the last Eclair update for evo (1.47)
When wimax was initially a pain to flash. It used a write_raw_image command which overwrote wimax partition and in most cases did so over the unrecoverable SSL key pair.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Very interesting. I lost mine on 1.47.651. Never used Unrevoke. Thats besides the point. I have a question which I'm sure I have asked before, but just want to make sure that the info I received was accurate.
I have backed up my Wimax partions (I have a wimax.bin that is around 8MB and another wimax.bin that is 12MB). If I ever lost or hosed my wimax, could I just push this partition backup onto the phone and I should get my wimax up and running again?
Thanks for any info!
wsantiagow said:
Very interesting. I lost mine on 1.47.651. Never used Unrevoke. Thats besides the point. I have a question which I'm sure I have asked before, but just want to make sure that the info I received was accurate.
I have backed up my Wimax partions (I have a wimax.bin that is around 8MB and another wimax.bin that is 12MB). If I ever lost or hosed my wimax, could I just push this partition backup onto the phone and I should get my wimax up and running again?
Thanks for any info!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you followed redsolar's procedure, yes.
I would guess they are using a CRL (Certificate Revoked List) that is probably added once you deactivate the phone. I really hate that they didn't store the certs in a cert8.db and key3.db file on /system or something...

[GUIDE]: Android-IA on Surface Pro (with WiFi support)

Just noticed that the Chinese site Rerede.com has finally managed to build support for the WiFi card in the Surface Pro in a build of Android-IA.
This build seems to support everything, apart from bluetooth:
Original link: I don't have rights to place URLs in as I haven't posted enough here. If a moderator can add the link here, I would appreciate it.
Original text (from Google Translate):
Code:
All along, only heard Surface Pro can run Ubuntu and Android. But never seen someone real up and running, often took a running Live CD boot to coax interface, now Rerede.com released China's first support for Surface Pro Android system. Support the Android installed on your machine up. And it can coexist with your Windows!
Working conditions:
· Touch
· Keyboard
· Camera
· Gravity sensor · WIFI
· Other
Not supported:
· Bluetooth
Compatibility:
· Support and native dual-boot Windows 8
• The need to disable Secure Boot
Data is priceless! Please make the necessary data backup before installing! We do not assume any responsibility for loss of data!
Unzip password: rerede.com
Copy the code
Preparation:
In a hard disk to free up more than 1G unallocated space, 4GB recommended
Installation:
1, decompress, burn to use UltraISO to live.img U disk
2, disable SecureBoot
3, the use of U disk boot, select the third item, manually install Android4, tips Choose disk to install Android, select the disk you want to install, I chose Surface of SSD (1),
Tips Do you want to preserve Windows and dual boot (if dual boot Windows), press Y
5 Tips Do you want to resize Windows to make more space (whether android resized), press N
6 Tips Install GummiBoot BootLoader (using gummiboot), press Y
7, when prompted Enter boot menu timeout (boot menu wait time), I chose 5
8, press Enter to install, the installation process approximately less than 1 minute.
9 After the installation is complete, unplug the U disk, enter the restart to complete the installation reproduced or quoted, please indicate from the hot community , Rerede.com
Pictures attached
That looks really nice. Hope they figure out the bluetooth as well.
JLIT99 said:
Just noticed that the Chinese site Rerede.com has finally managed to build support for the WiFi card in the Surface Pro in a build of Android-IA.
This build seems to support everything, apart from bluetooth:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for this, it's really working, although far from perfect. Fastest touch response on android =))
Here's the direct link to download: http://rerede.com/surface.android-ia.rerede.com.vPRC2.zip
Could you get the front Cam working?
Turns out that front cam doesn't run by default. I fixed it along with some other things like youtube playback, play store etc. It's almost perfect now
Surface 2 Pro
Has someone tested these instructions on a Surface 2 Pro ? Working ?
Unfortunatly, I have a Surface 1 Pro and encounter the following error:
FATAL: ASERTION FAILED bootable/iago/plugins/gummiboot.c:gummiboot_execute:154 'efibootmgr' encountered an error (status 100)
Gummiboot the EFI bootmgr does not install. Maybe it would be possible to install it manually.
Secure Boot is disabled, and I also tried different USB sticks and the original unmodifed Android-IA image. No success.
Current progress: managed to boot into Android-IA using Refined, which itselfs loads Gummiboot.
However the overall stability of Android-IA on the Surface Pro is not good:
- Wifi most of the time does not work. Turning it on/off does not help. Neither does it help to disable power saving features. Maybe we could try a different driver
- Sometimes when the device is not used for about 2 minutes and goes black, it cannot be turned on again. I have to hold the power button to force a shutdown.
ToniSoft said:
Current progress: managed to boot into Android-IA using Refined, which itselfs loads Gummiboot.
However the overall stability of Android-IA on the Surface Pro is not good:
- Wifi most of the time does not work. Turning it on/off does not help. Neither does it help to disable power saving features. Maybe we could try a different driver
- Sometimes when the device is not used for about 2 minutes and goes black, it cannot be turned on again. I have to hold the power button to force a shutdown.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What do you mean by using Refined?
how do you get this installed? When i reach the instructions to press Y if to save dual boot my type keyboard does not work. How did you proceed? Thank you.
zcrugby,
How do you get this installed? When i reach the instructions to press Y if to save dual boot my type keyboard does not work. How did you proceed? Thank you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You need to use a USB hub, so that you can have you USB stick and USB keyboard attached simultaneously. This installation program does not recognize the Surface keyboard, but it does recognize a standard USB keyboard.
I, however am having a different problem. I get (almost) to the end of the whole process, after it says press enter to continue with the installation and does a bunch of stuff, but then give the following error:
FATAL: ASERTION FAILED bootable/iago/plugins/gummiboot.c:gummiboot_execute:154 'efibootmgr' encountered an error (status 100)
It was mentioned earlier in this thread, but no one seemed to shed any light on the subject. In other forums some have suggested that it was just an incompatible memory stick, but I have not tried multiple memory stick by different manufactures...
Others have suggested that you need to disable AHCI and instead run in IDE mode, but with the Surface Pro 2's woefully underwhelming BIOS, I haven't yet figured out how to disable AHCI. There's some that say that simply changing some registry keys will do the trick, but I haven't gotten that to work yet, and I don't have extremely high hope for it when I do.
Does anyone here have any thoughts about this error??? Anyone run into it who has successfully gotten it working after seeing this error? If so, how?
Thanks!
please help: Fatal Asertion Failed... (status 100)
Does anyone have any light to shine on the follow error? Please?
FATAL: ASERTION FAILED bootable/iago/plugins/gummiboot.c:gummiboot_execute:154 'efibootmgr' encountered an error (status 100)
I've detailed some of the (failed) solutions I've found on other boards/threads regarding to how to get around this error on other devices, but none seem to be the trick for getting past this error on the surface. I'm really surprised that there don't seem to be more people trying to install Android on the MS Surface... or perhaps there are, but for most people things go more smoothly. Any help our there, please?
Thinking about returning the surface if I can't get android on it. I'm really interested in a powerful tablet that can dual boot windows/android.
Quixtrike said:
Does anyone have any light to shine on the follow error? Please?
FATAL: ASERTION FAILED bootable/iago/plugins/gummiboot.c:gummiboot_execute:154 'efibootmgr' encountered an error (status 100)
I've detailed some of the (failed) solutions I've found on other boards/threads regarding to how to get around this error on other devices, but none seem to be the trick for getting past this error on the surface. I'm really surprised that there don't seem to be more people trying to install Android on the MS Surface... or perhaps there are, but for most people things go more smoothly. Any help our there, please?
Thinking about returning the surface if I can't get android on it. I'm really interested in a powerful tablet that can dual boot windows/android.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When you get this error, it means that efibootmgr is unable to create the boot entry but all the files are in fact in boot partition. I also received this error, but since I also had Ubuntu (well, you kind of also need Ubuntu to access Android partitions easily anyway) I used the efibootmgr in Ubuntu to manually create Android entry. This way, I'm able to select advanced boot options under Windows (created desktop shortcut) and switch to Android really easily. You should leave the Windows as default so that you might never need a keyboard attached for boot menu. If you don't want to install Ubuntu just to solve this error, you *might* get away with a live Ubuntu CD, however I never tried that.
ozkaya said:
When you get this error, it means that efibootmgr is unable to create the boot entry but all the files are in fact in boot partition. I also received this error, but since I also had Ubuntu (well, you kind of also need Ubuntu to access Android partitions easily anyway) I used the efibootmgr in Ubuntu to manually create Android entry. This way, I'm able to select advanced boot options under Windows (created desktop shortcut) and switch to Android really easily. You should leave the Windows as default so that you might never need a keyboard attached for boot menu. If you don't want to install Ubuntu just to solve this error, you *might* get away with a live Ubuntu CD, however I never tried that.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi ozkaya, this sounds really promising, and I've even kind of gotten it installed, but it was going crazy (constant nonstop scrolling to select a boot mode as if I were holding down the arrow key; ended up being like Russian Roulette booting), so I decided to clean the slate and try again, the only problem is, I keep getting this error again... As a side note, I'm not overtly familiar with Ubuntu though I do have OSX successfully running on the Surface Pro 2, but I'm using a thumb drive to boot into it.
A few follow up questions:
-Are you saying that you use grub to boot into Android rather than gummiboot?
-Would you be willing to described "used the efibootmgr in Ubuntu to manually create Android entry" in more detail?
-How exactly to you select advanced boot options under Windows & create desktop shortcut?
*sorry if any of these questions are super basic. Back in the early XP days I was fairly savvy with dual/triple booting, but windows 8 and the Surface Pro's lackluster BIOS options are completely baffling me.
Quixtrike said:
Hi ozkaya, this sounds really promising, and I've even kind of gotten it installed, but it was going crazy (constant nonstop scrolling to select a boot mode as if I were holding down the arrow key; ended up being like Russian Roulette booting), so I decided to clean the slate and try again, the only problem is, I keep getting this error again... As a side note, I'm not overtly familiar with Ubuntu though I do have OSX successfully running on the Surface Pro 2, but I'm using a thumb drive to boot into it.
A few follow up questions:
-Are you saying that you use grub to boot into Android rather than gummiboot?
-Would you be willing to described "used the efibootmgr in Ubuntu to manually create Android entry" in more detail?
-How exactly to you select advanced boot options under Windows & create desktop shortcut?
*sorry if any of these questions are super basic. Back in the early XP days I was fairly savvy with dual/triple booting, but windows 8 and the Surface Pro's lackluster BIOS options are completely baffling me.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1- No I'm not using grub, in fact I also tried to daisy chain grub booting gummiboot booting Android and it doesn't work. I'm using native EFI entry.
2- I don't have it written up somewhere, I did it as I was reading and trying. But basically, you first need to install Ubuntu with dual boot with Windows. Have a look at the /boot partition, you will see the gummiboot files and config files there. Then research command line parameters for efimootmgr program and create the entry for the gummiboot file in /boot partition.
3- Just use google for this one, you can select advanced startup options somewhere from the settings in Windows 8 fancy menu. You can also create desktop shortcut for this. Once you completed Step 2, you will see Windows, Ubuntu and Android entries there. Since, Windows will be default, when you would like to switch to Android, you just double tap the shortcut and select Android. In Android you just power off and next restart will be Windows again. No keyboards, mouse etc needed. I also got the front cam and youtube playback working. Only bluetooth doesn't work.
Surface Pro 2
Anyone got this to work with Surface Pro 2? I am thinking of getting one, and if it could run android, im definitely getting one!
(I don't really see the point of getting Surface 1 when the 2 is out now)
I have followed the instructions and it installed fine, and then booted to android however as soon as I reboot I can no longer run android (or fastboot/recovery) without reinstalling it all over again from USB.
The error I get from gummiboot is:
HandleProtocol (DiskIoProtocol): Unsupported
Failed to start boot image 'Android': Unsupported
I would really appreciate some help from anyone who has a better understanding of this since I couldn't find anyone with a similar problem.
(I am using a 128gb Surface Pro 1/Original)
Thanks
when turning trusted platform module on and off it works sometimes
Jacob.Halsey1 said:
I have followed the instructions and it installed fine, and then booted to android however as soon as I reboot I can no longer run android (or fastboot/recovery) without reinstalling it all over again from USB.
The error I get from gummiboot is:
HandleProtocol (DiskIoProtocol): Unsupported
Failed to start boot image 'Android': Unsupported
I would really appreciate some help from anyone who has a better understanding of this since I couldn't find anyone with a similar problem.
(I am using a 128gb Surface Pro 1/Original)
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm having the same problem over and over .. still no luck

OnePLus stuck trying to encrypt

So I wanted to do the full encryption on my device. Let the device charge, and started the encryption process. The screen went blank, and then a green figure of the android came on the screen and has been there since. Its been almost three hours now? If my phone loses all its data thats ok, but I dont know if a bad encryption could brick the device?
Not sure if this is significant, but I have been on Facebook messenger since my phone was encrypting, and several msgs and text msgs have been showing on the screen?
Any ideas or advice would be great.
The encryption process may take quite a long time; it's not uncommon to see some phones take 6+ hours to encrypt, depending on the internal storage capacity.
AFAIK, Android will encrypt all of the internal storage, even the empty space. So if you have the 64GB version, that's a lot of storage space to encrypt at one go.
I would leave the phone plugged in and running the encryption for at least 24 hours if it's taking a while. It shouldn't take that long, and something might be broken, but better safe than sorry, I suppose.
Interrupting encryption will probably, if not definitely, result in data corruption or loss on the device. Depending on how far along the encryption was, you may end up with a bricked device, but it's pretty much impossible to say for certain what the outcome will be if you interrupt it.
There's a bug in CM11S 33R that broke full device encryption.
Normally, soon as you set a PIN and click encrypt, you will see a green bot, then you phone should restart into the Encryption Progress 1%, 2%, 3%, etc. screen.
As it is right now on CM11S, which is the stock software that the OnePlus One come in, you will see the green bot screen but the damn tying won't restart. OnePlus confirmed this is a bug that should be fixed in next OTA update.
In the mean time, if you unlock your bootloader, encryption will start. Or flash CM11 nightly.
Sorry, might be the wrong thread to ask, but what is the point of encryption, if there is no storage to be removed from this phone?
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Satras said:
Sorry, might be the wrong thread to ask, but what is the point of encryption, if there is no storage to be removed from this phone?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Someone could boot a stolen phone to boatloader, access the partitions (data, internal sd, etc) by adb and copy the contents of your device to an alternate location. One could also flash a custom recovery and create backups and push them over to a pc.
It also seems possible for some devices to unlock the bootloader without wiping data. So there are some unlocked doors, if device is not encrypted.
You can compare it to a WindowsPC -> Just boot from USB-Stick / CD and mount the Harddisk and you can access all of its contents, if device encryption isn't used.
Your should see a percentage indicator when it's encrypting. My 64gb took around an hour or so to finish
nsmart said:
Someone could boot a stolen phone to boatloader, access the partitions (data, internal sd, etc) by adb and copy the contents of your device to an alternate location. One could also flash a custom recovery and create backups and push them over to a pc.
It also seems possible for some devices to unlock the bootloader without wiping data. So there are some unlocked doors, if device is not encrypted.
You can compare it to a WindowsPC -> Just boot from USB-Stick / CD and mount the Harddisk and you can access all of its contents, if device encryption isn't used.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Fair Point.
So once they fixed the bug, can I do a nandroid Backup and simply test it. If it ain't my cup of tea, can I simply apply the nandroid Backup again and my phone is unencrypted again?
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No, nandroid wont apply over an encrypted partition. It requires the partition to be decrypted first.
Hm, so I need to move the Backups to my computer first.
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Yeh something like that. Worst comes to worst if you forget you can just boot the phone normally and copy SD contents across by USB. Then format and restore nandroid.
I haven't had any issues with encryption, TWRP 2801 fixed it.
Possibly off topic also, sorry, but what are the downsides to full device encryption? Reasons why every isn't doing it? Seems much more secure, although I'm not using it myself at the moment.
Sent via quantum entanglement, focused through my OnePlus One.
Lower performance, less battery life, harder to troubleshoot if it does not boot correctly.
Make sure to have off-site backups when starting the encryption
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As an addendum, on a fast device like our OPO, the performance penalty is negligible. The security benefits far outweigh the costs, as pin locks are easy to defeat and even without, data can be accessed from bootloader/recovery. Remote wipes are not always reliable and for others like me who keep sensitive emails, company info, SSH/GPG keys, it's peace of mind.
It's also rumored that Android 5 will bring by-default encryption.
Strange, you say pin locks are easy to defeat, but isn't this the default for unlocking your encrypted phone?
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I changed my decrypt password to 16+ characters, and screen unlock remains at 4 digits. That way inconvenience is minimized.
There is an app on Play Store to set separate screen unlock / decryption passwords.
SenK9 said:
I changed my decrypt password to 16+ characters, and screen unlock remains at 4 digits. That way inconvenience is minimized.
There is an app on Play Store to set separate screen unlock / decryption passwords.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Do you know if that app will work with TimePIN? I rather like the app, though it's currently removed from play store while developer works on ART issues, because it changes the screen unlock to the current time which enhances the security of the device. I've thought about doing full device encryption previously but that always made me hesitate with the amount of hassle to check it.
I dont know what TimePIN is, but it should be fine. Changing the decryption password doesn't affect the lockscreen pin/password, they are independent.
Now that I'm back on my computer, I can drop some links here.
Cryptfs password changer
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.nick.cryptfs.passwdmanager
This changes the pre-boot decryption password ONLY, not your lockscreen password. It's good for people who want a very secure encryption password, but without the hassle of typing it in each time they unlock the device (by default, Android will use the same for both, which has been a long-debated point).
Manually:
If you want to do it manually, you can configure Android's vold module (https://source.android.com/devices/tech/storage/config.html)
At prompt (with root):
Code:
vdc cryptfs enablecrypt inplace <password>
Security:
I can't find the link, but there was a Github script I ran across that was able to extract the encrypted filesystem header from an Android device in recovery mode, to an attached computer and brute force it. For a 4 digit PIN (which is what many people use), it takes less than a minute on an average home PC.
Hopefully that helps somebody ...
SenK9 said:
Yeh something like that. Worst comes to worst if you forget you can just boot the phone normally and copy SD contents across by USB. Then format and restore nandroid.
I haven't had any issues with encryption, TWRP 2801 fixed it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
twrp 2801 did allow me to encrypt, but the password will not decrypt in twrp. Color me confused.
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Error message in TWRP?
SenK9 said:
Error message in TWRP?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
"Password Failed. Please Try Again"
&
"E: Failed to decrypt data"
I have tried changing the password too, and get the same error.
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Chip Off recovery not possible due to encryption?

I purchased two VS995's last year for myself and my wife from Verizon, and up until recently it worked great. Last month, I entered a boot loop that wouldn't stop and took it to a repair shop.
While looking into fixes that might work before contacting a shop, I remember reading that the V20 was encrypted by default as well as that by requiring a user to input a PIN during boot your device also was encrypted.
I assumed this would hinder recovery efforts and that I was throwing money away by taking it to a repair shop, but was assured that it wouldn't matter during a chip off recovery, since no data is stored encrypted.
I am familiar with data recovery from broken hard drives and partitions on both Linux and Windows, but I'm not sure about how the process works with encrypted file systems and chip off methods on Android devices.
If anyone could offer any information on if the above is correct regarding the encrypted file system and it not being a problem, or how to deal with it if it is, I would really appreciate it.
My thought process was to get an image of the file system and load it into either something like BlueStacks as the local file system to extract data off that wasn't backed up to the cloud (Quickmemos, current browser session on Chrome, the list goes on and on), or mount it using linux like any other partition.
I'm not sure if I can go in and ask the repair shop to specifically make a binary image of the chip so that I can recover the data myself or not and provide them with a flash drive, but I figure it's worth a shot. I used my phone in place of a computer, and had pictures of my family's social security information that my work had requested as well as internal documents I had to learn as a manager when I was promoted. I figured they were protected by the boot up password until I could back them up, and the phone died a few days before my scheduled backup. Anyone who repair phones for a living have any thoughts on how to request specific things from a phone repair place or how you want your data handled?
I appreciate all the help, and apologize for the long winded post. I wanted to try to cover everything in one shot I also forgot to mention that the phone is 100% stock. Thanks in advance!
userdata (all your actual data) certainly is encrypted by default (though rooting usually disables the encryption), requiring a pin at boot or not is just changing how the real encryption key is stored ( encryption key of the encryption key). AOSP article goes into some more detail.
No idea how shops handle it, I've just done a bit of research on it before.

Stuck in safe mode, can't access data in Samsung Notes

About a year and a half ago, most of my Google Play apps needed to update, but I've accidentally tapped to uninstall them. The most stupid idea I could got, was to restart the phone in order to revoke that miss - since than, phone can't start normally. It always boot in the safe mode, no matter what I've tried. There's always pop-up after loading that says sth alike "there is something preventing your system to start normally. Please backup your data and do factory reset, yadyyada..." I've managed to transfer most files to PC, but I can't access 2 years worth of notes saved somewhere in Samsung Notes. According to this thread, they should be saved in \data\data\com.samsung.android.app.notes but I can't access them, since Android Studio throws error "package not debuggable". I tried using ADB backup, but that will result in 1 KB file (empty), probably because Samsung Notes has parameter allowBackup="false" in its manifest. There was some effort to rewrite it, but mostly failed, since I can't use Linux commands on Windows. There is a chance, that the data is no longer here. All packages seen in Android Studio show size of 4 KB. But when i do space analysis using the files app after loading the safe mode system, it shows to house 11 GB of system data and 12 GB of apps - which I don't have access to.
Is there any way to either crack that Samsung Notes app, or to repair that corupted system? Maybe get some log to see, whats crashing the system? Last resort solution may be rooting it?
Thanks in advance for your help. Mark

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