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Restoring data from backups

I have searched the forums and I cant find out the answer.
I have several nandroid backups on my sdcard. Is there a way to restore my messages from the backups onto my phone?
Everytime I load another build I lose all my txts.
Please help.

Pretty sure it's stored in your /data partition along with your phones settings\apps.
fastboot flash userdata userdata.img

will that erase my current data?

d00m said:
Pretty sure it's stored in your /data partition along with your phones settings\apps.
fastboot flash userdata userdata.img
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Click to collapse
fastboot flash userdata data.img

when u flash data it restored whatever data u had when u made the nandroid backup....
i dont think it keeps what is on the phone after nandroid...

since nandroid backup is a complete byte by byte copy of your phone's internal flash chip, you've backed up all the data that could survive a reboot (apps, settings, etc.), so restoring it will overwrite everything you did after that point. If you used another system build and that build requires a wipe (i.e. formating /data) to run, restoring the old userdata will probably render the new system unbootable (if that's a word).
The safest way is restore the whole system (boot, system and userdata) with fastboot and backup your messages using another tool.
If you don't want to restore, you can try mounting that data.img with the android emulator in the SDK.

It's better to use applications like smsbackup or mybackup to do such a thing..

its too late now for me to use another program. but if i load it into the emulator can i back up from there? I've never used the emulator before so I don't know what all it is capable of doing.

WARNING! TWRP RESTORE Can Corrupt System

This is a psa about restoring backups with our version of TWRP. I would advise anybody who can help it NOT to do a full system restore I am on EVR_AL00.
I do not know the details of its implementation but I do know that trying to restore a full system backup from 3 days ago become a huge problem when TWRP failed to properly restore the system and system image partition and the device could not mount them because of corruption. No combination of formatting and restoring seemed to have an impact on the results, but after painfully re-writing my drive many times I saw that the results inconsistently affected /vendor, /data, /system, and /system_image. TWRP did eventually give me a bootable system after running e2fsck -fv on my system partition, BUT it managed to kill the performance of my phone. There was noticeable lag on boot up before I could get full control of my system, but I might not have known if I did not use more cpu intensive tasks, such as viewing videos inside a linux chroot environment. The affect was not small by any means, it destroyed the usability of my environment. I believe that this was do to a failure to properly restore the block information, therefore killing read/write speed. Furthermore, the system was no longer able to boot with the stock boot.img, only through magisk. When I formatted the system_root partition, not realizing it was not included in the backup, it was no longer able to do that....
This become more of a pain in the ass when after restoring the stock erecovery it failed to restore the device, and the inconsistent performance of the huawei bootloader made it at times impossible to access either recovery or the system partition as I went about trying to get a stable system back on my device without erecovery or emui flasher. After messing around flashing different recovery images, eventually erecovery was able to restore the stock rom and I was able to re root my device and restore my TWRP /data backup.
I'm not complaining, as I do appreciate these tools for what they are, but I wanted to put this out there so that somebody could be saved from this experience. Due to my previous experience with TWRP I was happy to do a full system restore, even when I didn't need to, if only just to make sure I could. Turns out that was ill-advised.
I would highly advise that you only restore the /data partition through TWRP unless you absolutely must restore other partitions to recover a device. Through all of this I probably put near a full write cycle on my disk

AllanRSS said:
This is a psa about restoring backups with our version of TWRP. I would advise anybody who can help it NOT to do a full system restore I am on EVR_AL00.
I do not know the details of its implementation but I do know that trying to restore a full system backup from 3 days ago become a huge problem when TWRP failed to properly restore the system and system image partition and the device could not mount them because of corruption. No combination of formatting and restoring seemed to have an impact on the results, but after painfully re-writing my drive many times I saw that the results inconsistently affected /vendor, /data, /system, and /system_image. TWRP did eventually give me a bootable system after running e2fsck -fv on my system partition, BUT it managed to kill the performance of my phone. There was noticeable lag on boot up before I could get full control of my system, but I might not have known if I did not use more cpu intensive tasks, such as viewing videos inside a linux chroot environment. The affect was not small by any means, it destroyed the usability of my environment. I believe that this was do to a failure to properly restore the block information, therefore killing read/write speed. Furthermore, the system was no longer able to boot with the stock boot.img, only through magisk. When I formatted the system_root partition, not realizing it was not included in the backup, it was no longer able to do that....
This become more of a pain in the ass when after restoring the stock erecovery it failed to restore the device, and the inconsistent performance of the huawei bootloader made it at times impossible to access either recovery or the system partition as I went about trying to get a stable system back on my device without erecovery or emui flasher. After messing around flashing different recovery images, eventually erecovery was able to restore the stock rom and I was able to re root my device and restore my TWRP /data backup.
I'm not complaining, as I do appreciate these tools for what they are, but I wanted to put this out there so that somebody could be saved from this experience. Due to my previous experience with TWRP I was happy to do a full system restore, even when I didn't need to, if only just to make sure I could. Turns out that was ill-advised.
I would highly advise that you only restore the /data partition through TWRP unless you absolutely must restore other partitions to recover a device. Through all of this I probably put near a full write cycle on my disk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You only need to backup data and system image in TWRP. Don't mess with vendor, cust etc as they don't backup or restore properly on Huawei devices with TWRP. I've backed up and restored data and system plenty of times now.

Of course which partitions you need to backup or restore would depend entirely on the use case of the utility . I tend to 'mess with' alot of things for various purposes and it is good knowing that anything can be recovered quickly and easily if need be. I have been doing nandroid backups for a long time and it has always 'just worked' as long as you use it sensibly. Unfortunately, whatever the difference is with this device, that seems not to be the case. I'm sure if someone took a look at it it would be clear as a dd backup isn't exactly rocket science, but unfortunately I am far too preoccupied with my business and there isn't exactly a flourishing development scene for this phone

I'm bricking my device same way that you describe.... Restoring all partition that is possible to backup with TWRP. There is a way to put some files in the memory - "base folder" and something "no check ....." And seen a bunch of commands from "ADB shell" and it's restored. Will put a video of the process soon to be useful for anyone with not enough skills to bring back the device to live!

Thanks for checking in Ronin. Seeing as this is affecting multiple users it's good to get the word out so that new users don't end up messing up their device.

1. format of the "system" and "vendor" sections
2.restore only the "system" and "vendor"
3.restore only the "system image and vendor image"
4. restore the OEM
*otherwise it is a bootloop without OEM.
---------- Post added at 02:54 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:52 PM ----------
i have used this order for restoring my phone succesfully.

TWRP backup, checkboxes

what boxes should i check/tick during twrp backup. my previous phone had for about five check boxes but my mi mix 2s have alot more (like: boot, cahce,recovery, system, vendor, system image, vendor image, data excl. storage, modem, efs) So what should i check/tick if i want to create backup file that will be able to fully restore my phone? (if something gfoes wrong)

I just need to know what partitions i should restore to properly boot my phone. There is rly none who can give me advice? (Sry for bad English)

plakonn said:
I just need to know what partitions i should restore to properly boot my phone. There is rly none who can give me advice? (Sry for bad English)
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It's in you! It is always good to have a Backup from EFS.
For me I always backup system, boot and data... That's it

made-in-tirol said:
It's in you! It is always good to have a Backup from EFS.
For me I always backup system, boot and data... That's it
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
so what partitions may i restore? i remember on my previous phone there were partitions that couldn't be restored without causing bootloop. i would like to prevent bootloop or prevent damaging partitions and im not sure what partitions are safe to restore.

generally just back up system image, vendor image, data and boot. read here for a more detailed explanation about the system and vendor images, and they should be what you back up, rather than just the normal system and vendor checkboxes.
backing up modem and efs is also a good idea, though not required for every backup.

Full(!) backup via ADB

Is there a way to perform a full backup via ADB?
Like a script or a line which creates a flashable full copy of one or all of the phones filesystems to PC.
Not(!)
adb backup -all
which backups merely system settings and not a migrate app which a) does not perform a full backup as it omits random files and b) works internal and neither TWRP backup-tool which only works internal.

andy01q said:
Is there a way to perform a full backup via ADB?
Like a script or a line which creates a flashable full copy of one or all of the phones filesystems to PC.
Not(!)
adb backup -all
which backups merely system settings and not a migrate app which a) does not perform a full backup as it omits random files and b) works internal and neither TWRP backup-tool which only works internal.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It can backup/restore your data, it can not backup your ROM/firmware, if you are not rooted, you will only be able to backup/restore user data, you will not be able to backup/restore any of your system apps/system app data, or any other part of system data and system settings, that will require rooting the device.
If you want a complete backup of the operating system and everything else on the device, you will need TWRP.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk

I am rooted. I am running TWRP.
I can't copy large amounts of data from inside the phone because something is buggy; this includes TWRPs backup-function. Copying works fine if and only if controlled by connected PC.

andy01q said:
I am rooted. I am running TWRP.
I can't copy large amounts of data from inside the phone because something is buggy; this includes TWRPs backup-function. Copying works fine if and only if controlled by connected PC.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try flashing a newer or slightly older version of TWRP, it might fix the bugs that you are experiencing in TWRP. Is TWRP set to store your backups on external? Or is it set to store backups on your internal storage? Storing backups in internal takes up too much space, it's best to store backups on external.
As for adb...
https://forum.xda-developers.com/galaxy-nexus/guide-phone-backup-unlock-root-t1420351
There are several switches that can be used to be specific about what you want backed up and what you don't.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk

I updated to TWRP 3.4.0-0 (newest version) and backup from within TWRP still always fails between 20% and 30%. The last 30 to 40 backups failed and the only one that did finish to 100% is still broken and can't be read.
I would be thinking hardware-failure if not for the thing that copying anything from within the phone is super buggy, but copying when controlled from a PC works completely fine.
I guess I'll try the simple adb backup with some more parameters and then move on.

andy01q said:
I updated to TWRP 3.4.0-0 (newest version) and backup from within TWRP still always fails between 20% and 30%. The last 30 to 40 backups failed and the only one that did finish to 100% is still broken and can't be read.
I would be thinking hardware-failure if not for the thing that copying anything from within the phone is super buggy, but copying when controlled from a PC works completely fine.
I guess I'll try the simple adb backup with some more parameters and then move on.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How much free space do you have on internal storage? If there is less free space than your system, data and cache partitions combined, that may be why it is failing. Clear some space. I say this because when the backup is being created, the data that you want included in your backup is being read bit by bit from their partitions and then written into cache bit by bit and then it is read from cache bit for bit then it is written to its final storage location bit for bit. If there is not enough space to write it all into cache before writing it to its final location, it will fail.
The same rule applies when you move files from internal to external or vice versa, the same rule also applies when you are extracting files. It requires enough free space to write that data into cache before it goes where it is actually going.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk

Oh come on, I appreciate your efforts, but I felt being treated like a little child from your first answer and this tops it very much. Backup fails at 20-30% with 45GB of free internal space, external MicroSD removed and <10GB of data to backup. Aside from that I doubt that if a lack of free space causes the backup to fail, that this will not cause an error message to tell me what caused the fail.
By now I did the backups that I could backup:
That is I manually pulled all folders I deemed important.
Then I used "adb backup -apk -shared -all -system" which created a 7GB backup.
I also used the buggy migrate-app and ticked all boxes to get a 3GB backup.
And I used Googles cloud-service-backup.
In the end plenty of data and configurations were lost; worst is probably the Corona Warn App data as this can't be remedied.

andy01q said:
Oh come on, I appreciate your efforts, but I felt being treated like a little child from your first answer and this tops it very much. Backup fails at 20-30% with 45GB of free internal space, external MicroSD removed and <10GB of data to backup. Aside from that I doubt that if a lack of free space causes the backup to fail, that this will not cause an error message to tell me what caused the fail.
By now I did the backups that I could backup:
That is I manually pulled all folders I deemed important.
Then I used "adb backup -apk -shared -all -system" which created a 7GB backup.
I also used the buggy migrate-app and ticked all boxes to get a 3GB backup.
And I used Googles cloud-service-backup.
In the end plenty of data and configurations were lost; worst is probably the Corona Warn App data as this can't be remedied.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can't help how you feel and you are entitled to feel however you wantl, but, at the end of the day, it is still only how you "feel", that doesn't make anything true or false. Just saying.
I didn't post anything to make you feel any kind of way, I was merely attempting to be as informative as I could because one can never gauge what someone else knows or understands before your interaction with them.
I've seen some other issues with TWRP backups failing and/or being unreadable, the solution is not a singular solution, there are several reasons why it fails and several fixes to solve it. Have you tried doing some google searches for:
"TWRP backups fail at 40%"
That pulls up some information that might apply or may not, you'll just have to peruse what you find to see if any of seems like it might be what you are experiencing and then try some of the solutions that others have tried. You might get lucky, you might not.
I'm more interested in helping you "find" an answer than whether I "know" the answer or "tell" you the answer.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk

Droidriven said:
Have you tried doing some google searches for:
"TWRP backups fail at 40%"
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Click to collapse
Yeah, I've done that for an hour or so before starting a thread - obviously b/c that has the chance for much quicker solutions and seems less work for me.
Also I did try several solutions like update TWRP, try smaller backups (the small ones do usually work) and so on. I think I did mention that I tried this over 40 times.
Some of the solutions suggest installing another ROM first, (apparently the ROM can cause Read-errors within TWRP?) but obviously I want the full backup before I try another ROM so I tried other methods to backup my data.
Also moving data via adb has worked completely without fail so far, so I wanted to try that path.
By now I can tell that TWRP full backup doesn't work on other ROMs either.

andy01q said:
Yeah, I've done that for an hour or so before starting a thread - obviously b/c that has the chance for much quicker solutions and seems less work for me.
Also I did try several solutions like update TWRP, try smaller backups (the small ones do usually work) and so on. I think I did mention that I tried this over 40 times.
Some of the solutions suggest installing another ROM first, (apparently the ROM can cause Read-errors within TWRP?) but obviously I want the full backup before I try another ROM so I tried other methods to backup my data.
Also moving data via adb has worked completely without fail so far, so I wanted to try that path.
By now I can tell that TWRP full backup doesn't work on other ROMs either.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Flash an older version or newer version of the exact same ROM as what you have but not doing any of the wipes, just flash ROM and that's it. This is called a "dirty flash", it will not wipe any of your data unless you specifically tell it to.
Alternatively, you could just do a backup via TWRP without including system and boot, just data and maybe cache(cache isn't necessary and might even cause issues if you restore it). Then, if you need to restore, flash the ROM the backup was created from then reboot to system, then boot back into TWRP then use "advanced restore" in TWRP to restore data and cache, this "should" give the same result as including system and boot in the TWRP backup along with data then restoring everything from that backup.
Also, can you post a copy of your recovery logs to some hosting site then link it here, someone here might be able to see something in the log that needs addressing, preferably the logs from the failed backup processes, if they errored in different ways, post the differences also. You should be able to find your logs if you haven't wiped the device.
Sent from my SM-S767VL using Tapatalk

backing up/restoring roms in twrp

do i have to unencrypt my device in order to restore/backup and maybe even flash from on it? I've seen in twrp it tells me backups and restores may not work fully due to being encrypted

No, I guess.
The only partition encrypted is your internal storage and twrp can't take a backup of that.
So, you can try by yourself, just remember to take your cautious.
in old devices I always made a backup of this partitions:
Boot
System
Data
Vendor
And restored without problems, just make a factory reset before and maybe flash magisk after restoration