I want to upgrade my non-rooted phone to a new model (specifically, from an HTC M8 to a M10), but I would like to try to transfer as much as the settings/data from my old phone as I can.
It's not rooted (though I plan to root the new one immediately) so that really limits my options.
First of all, would restoring an adb backup to the new phone be a bad idea? Obviously I wouldn't use the -system switch, but would even restoring general data and/or apks this way be a bad idea? If so, are there any better methods one can recommend to backup my app/settings data and restore it to a new phone? I don't mean just stuff like contacts or SMS.
And second, I always use a SD card to store my photos, but after it being in this phone for a few years there are a lot of deleted photos, which results in situations where I would have files like photo0012 photo0013 photo0016 with "gaps" between the file numbers. Since most camera software writes to the first available "number" my photos are going to be a scramble of new and old once I start using them on my new phone. Any good (preferably on PC) apps or recommendations on how I can rename them all in order based on the date they were taken so there won't be any "gaps"?
Should this have been posted on a specific phone's forum? It seemed like a general question to me.
Related
So now that we are close to having S-Off I'm pretty sure I'll be flashing a custom ROM. I've always had issues on prior HTC devices with shoddy looking contact photos when flashing a new ROM. Do we have a way of keeping the High Res photos for our contacts? I'm curious if those Hi Res photos are stored somewhere on the phones internal memory. If that is the case, would there be a way to back them up to the internal SD card using a program like root explorer and then replace the ones that are populated with the new ROM when the phone syncs google account? If so, I believe there is a method that gives temp root. Could we not use that temp root method even though we don't have S-Off at the moment to be able to utilize Root Explorer to back those files up before we S-Off and wipe phone memory? Or maybe HTC has fixed that issue with this device and the photos that sync from google will be the hi res photos we've assigned. Any help would be appreciated.
Well in terms of copying files, system is RO so you should be able to read, or copy, files from it without root. The rest I'll let someone else address as I've never cared about the pictures for contacts, that's all they are. Side note, though, the contacts I've assigned local pics to have stayed the same quality after syncing a fresh flash while the crappy ones stayed crappy from phones long past. It seems to stay at the same quality as its set, now.
Tapatalked from my HTC DNA - ReVolt
Quick Question regarding remote wipes and overall security of the phone's data in case of a loss/theft
Background story:
On New Year's Eve my good friend's iPhone 5S got stolen out of his pocket in a crowded club.
So I lent him my phone and we logged into iCloud using the Chrome Browser and triggered the wipe of the iPhone.
I offered him to call the credit card company and such if he had delicate data stored on the phone. But he refused...he trusts Apple's iCloud wipe routine and said he tested it at home and the phone was completely empty after that.
And he was surprisingly calm during the whole situation.
Okay he pays for insurance that covers a stolen phone, but I would have totally freaked out about my data...account logins, stored files and pictures, evernote notes, dropbox files etc.
My experience with the Android remote wipe:
Last evening I wanted to give it a try on my Android phone. So I pulled all the data that was on my phone and performed a nandroid-Backup of the system-files within TWRP and backed up my apps and data using TitaniumBackup.
And then I tried the Android Device Manager, which I had activated since it got released somewhen 2013, but never really tested more than the "localize" and "ring phone" functions.
Just yesterday I noticed the new "lock screen" function. Which is great, but I have always been using pattern locks anyway (triggered by Tasker, if my Wifi is not near). It's still nice to have and works like a charm (if the phone is connected to the internet).
So in addition I ordered my phone to get wiped. And it did what it said...it booted into Recovery and performed a factory reset / full-wipe.
But still all the data on the virtual sdcard was accessible after entering the SIM's pin code (I assume switching SIMs wouldn't change that) and setting up a new user profile. I know that it displays a warning that sdcards might not be wiped, during the process, but I thought this was referring to additional physical "microSD" storage. How wrong I was.
So all my pictures and stored files were fully accessible from the new user account.
If you store your unencrypted TitaniumBackup files on there the thief could easily restore them.
So encrypt them!
I was a bit shocked, to be honest.
And especially the fact that someone can access my phone's files without even knowing the lockscreen pattern/pin by simply booting into recovery bugs me.
Does encrypting the phone help in this situation?
Are there any drawbacks? I guess the speed and overall performance will decrease?
How can I protect the Recovery (I've got a HTC ONE, which is S-OFF'd and the bootloader unlocked via htcdev.com)?
Should I reflash the stock-recovery after flashing a CustomROM to at least make the thief require to reinstall the custom-recovery?
What other ways are there to protect the phone's data?
I don't let ADB turned on. (But this doesn't affect getting into recovery by rebooting.)
I don't keep nandroid/TitaniumBackup Backups on the phone. I pull them immediately onto a local computer after creation and delete them on the phone.
...what else?
To me booting the phone into recovery, hooking it up to any computer and using ADB to pull the sdcard's files is the most concerning security loop-hole. What am I saying...it's a shining and welcoming entrance with neon-signs all around it like a casino.
And exactly this is what taking my phone with me feels like, after the experience described above: GAMBLING...
Thanks in advance!
Every hint is very welcome
PS: If you want to try the wipe with the Android device manger yourself, be prepared that restoring the nandroid-Backup won't be possible! After a short while the phone will reboot itself and get wiped again.
The only way to restore the phone's former state was to restore the apps backups using TitaniumBackup in my case. Unfortunately some settings won't get restored, so I had to reenter all my mail accounts.
Just be prepared that it takes some time
PPS: I already posted this in the thread of the ROM I am currently using. Obviously no one didn't care over there So I thought the question might be to broad and ROM-unrelated. Hence the repost here. :angel:
No one? :angel:
Hi gang!
So, after a couple of years of happily(ish) using my S5, it's started to lag badly (even after wiping) and have started looking for a replacement.
It seems that this really is the only viable option for me, given that I really prefer having spare batteries especially when I'm traveling, and I really can't be bothered with having have to plug my phone in, even if it's to a portable back-up battery. It's also been nice to be able to just buy my own battery whenever the battery starts getting old and doesn't hold a charge as well as it did when new. :highfive:
Anyway, given that this phone doesn't have root yet, there are a few things I wanted to find out before I bite the bullet:
Folder locations: I've been using FolderMount to change the default save locations for some apps to SD card instead of internal storage. These apps do not allow you to change directories within the app, which is why I've been doing this. This has saved my ass whenever the phone itself became non-functional. Is there a way to do this without root on the G5? Or, at the very least, is there a way to manually copy these files from the device (i.e., browse ALL files on the device) to the SD card?
Folder locations (bonus round!): in particular, the data I care about is WhatsApp and Line backups. If any of you guys have specific experience being able to save these files to SD, I'd greatly appreciate any input!
Transfering messages, call log: I've been backing up and restoring SMS and Call Log using TiBu for years. While I also use SMS BackUp+ to also have an automatic fail safe, these apps don't handle group texts very well at all, ergo my reliance on TiBu. I noticed AT&T has an app called AT&T Mobile Transfer -- will this be able to transfer all of my texts/call log? Even if it's in the thousands of texts?
S Health data: Samsung has an S Health application that automatically backs up steps/heart rate data. Is there any way to transfer this data to an LG equivalent?
Those are all that I can think of right now, but any advice would be really appreciated, thanks! :good:
Apart from missing call logs or text messages, am trying to figure out why I need to use Samsung SmartSwitch (setting up another new S21 and have setup previously another S21 and used SmartSwitch)
All apps used are on Google Sync and contacts are all on contacts.google.com for the accounts I primarily use.
What important or essential "stuff" will be missed by non-use of SmartSwitch and just letting Google restore "it's things" ?
This is what samsung backs up
So basically there is no value in SmartSwitch for my additional phone as Google itself has the important bits. It is no trouble to connect wifi for the office, home and bluetooth for car. Old messages are not important at all. Contacts all on Google.
xdafly said:
So basically there is no value in SmartSwitch for my additional phone as Google itself has the important bits. It is no trouble to connect wifi for the office, home and bluetooth for car. Old messages are not important at all. Contacts all on Google.
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Hi. I just used yesterday to change my old A8 to my new S21. I didn't have any trouble. Even my app layout on the screen were similar. I recommend you use it. No damage and it makes migration easier. Just remember to backup you whatsapp history before changing sim to the new phone. Then, when you open wap in the new, it will say that detected a backup and ask if you want to restore it.
Goog luck!
Have setup now several new S21 phones and have *not* used SmartSwitch. Nothing went missing and nothing was missed. All apps that mattered were handled by Google Drive/Docs/Sync. Some apps needed a re-identity verification which was simply password/text or email message for 2-step-auth
Will not continue to use SmartSwitch on any tablets or phones
do you guys know how to copy existing wifi passwords from an old not Samsung device to a brand new S21? during inital setup it doesn't ask to recovery from a google backup and smartswitch copies all but wifi settings
privateer00 said:
do you guys know how to copy existing wifi passwords from an old not Samsung device to a brand new S21? during inital setup it doesn't ask to recovery from a google backup and smartswitch copies all but wifi settings
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https://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/86zkzf
Trust nothing.
Make backup hard copies of all critical data and store in at least 2 hdds that are physically and electronically isolated from each other. A flash drive can be used too but it must be backed up by hdds. Verify the copies integrity and -do not- use cloning apks to copy, especially music databases (it can and will lose needed null data).
What's in the cloud isn't in your hand and can be lost forever. Let that sink in...
Plan ahead and backup now or you will lose data.
Google backup wastes a lot of battery backing things up and from there forward. Unfortunately if you have no SD card slot you lost your best backup tool.
As for SmartSwitch it probably will work but it could also drag with it issues from the old OS or fail to work. Have at least one other backup plan using hdds. Stagger doing backups between the hdds to minimize the chances of your database being compromised by malware.
$hit happens... count on it, otherwise sooner or latter the odds will catch up with your data.
Hello all,
This is my first post here. I did some searching and didn't find a direct answer to this scenario, but my apologies if I missed something.
Recently I used my PC to move files from my phone's internal storage onto a microSD card that was mounted in the device. I used the cut & paste function in Windows explorer (didn't occur to me that I could do it on the phone itself), and did this in batches. Unfortunately since that time I've discovered some of the files are corrupted--they have the appropriate size, but can't be opened. Perhaps there is a way to analyze the file structure of the JPEG to see if a byte is missing, but aside from that, I'm interested if I can run TestDisk on the internal phone storage in some way to see if the files could possibly be recovered. I found a few tutorials (example: https://roubert.name/joakim/androidfilerecovery/), but all of them require rooting, and unfortunately my phone is not rooted.
From my review of the procedures on this forum, it seems that unlocking the bootloader and/or rooting ends up requiring that the phone be wiped. Is there any way around this? And does anyone have any other suggestions on investigating whether my photos can be recovered or not?
Thanks for any help!
Lost most likely. Copy the files to the PC. There are more tools available for Windows than Android.
From now on copy/paste, verify size and readability, then delete the source files.
Check Event Viewer during the transfer time to see if errors were reported in Windows. Maybe a bad cable, port, driver issue, etc.
In the future regularly and redundantly backup critical data on at least 2 hdds that are physically and electronically isolated from each other and the PC. I keep all critical data, music, vids, docs, backups go on the SD card and use it as a data drive. Only apps, the DCIM (backed up to the SD card regularly) and download folder go on internal. Then I backup the SD card.
There can only be one folder on Android with the name dcim. So when you backup the images in the internal memory dcim folder to the SD card rename it something like Master Pics to avoid issues.
Think it through and develop a system; everything you need to do a full reload/restore should be on the SD card. Few people utilize the SD card as it should be... it shouldn't be just a random collection of files. It adds an extra layer of protection for your data. Always use a quality V30 rated card like the Sandisk Extreme.
Any chance the photos were backed up to some service online? Google Photos is free and generally present on most Android phones, Samsung has their cloud, and some carriers do as well...
In the future, like @blackhawk said, backups are FAR more important than recovery. ANYTHING important to you should be backed up ("3-2-1" is a good policy to practice). For photos, Google Photos is great because it's free (to a limit, of course) and very easy to use. I've been recommending that to everyone, even iPhone users, because recovery is harder than ever these days - SSDs and flash can fail catastrophically and without warning much more easily than the old spinny drives which usually give some warning.
Sorry there isn't much better news. You may be able to find some un-delete software and try it. There may be paid services as well, but for the most part, it's probably lost...
If you do find something that works, do let us know... always good to find out new options! Good luck.
schwinn8 said:
Any chance the photos were backed up to some service online? Google Photos is free and generally present on most Android phones, Samsung has their cloud, and some carriers do as well...
In the future, like @blackhawk said, backups are FAR more important than recovery. ANYTHING important to you should be backed up ("3-2-1" is a good policy to practice). For photos, Google Photos is great because it's free (to a limit, of course) and very easy to use. I've been recommending that to everyone, even iPhone users, because recovery is harder than ever these days - SSDs and flash can fail catastrophically and without warning much more easily than the old spinny drives which usually give some warning.
Sorry there isn't much better news. You may be able to find some un-delete software and try it. There may be paid services as well, but for the most part, it's probably lost...
If you do find something that works, do let us know... always good to find out new options! Good luck.
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Sadly, no. Didn't use a backup service online. Thanks for the advice though--I used to be pretty good about backing things up routinely, but have gotten lax. Sadly this is the consequence.
DakenSG said:
Sadly, no. Didn't use a backup service online. Thanks for the advice though--I used to be pretty good about backing things up routinely, but have gotten lax. Sadly this is the consequence.
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That's a typically error when using MTP (Media Transfer Protocol) and you shouldn't use it for transferring files whenever it's possible. MTP was developed to offer a wide range compatibility for the most storage devices but it's very buggy and very slow.
Next time you should use the internal file explorer to copy data to your SD. This is the best practice.