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Root Steps to Partition?

ndh777

ndh777

Android Expert
I'm getting a new 32GB Class 10 card in a few days and I'd like to start off from scratch once I get it.

I'd like to partition it to use with my phone because of all the really cool things that can be done with it but I'd like some steps on how to partition.

From what people have told me, I will need to partition before flashing any ROMs. So I know that much but now I need more information. Any tips would be great too. And since I will have so much room, can anyone tell me what is the maximum that I can partition that can be used by the Android OS? Say, 15GBs? Or is it only limited to a few 1 or 2 GBs?

Thanks in advance! :)
 
ndh777 said:
I'm getting a new 32GB Class 10 card in a few days and I'd like to start off from scratch once I get it.

I'd like to partition it to use with my phone because of all the really cool things that can be done with it but I'd like some steps on how to partition.

From what people have told me, I will need to partition before flashing any ROMs. So I know that much but now I need more information. Any tips would be great too. And since I will have so much room, can anyone tell me what is the maximum that I can partition that can be used by the Android OS? Say, 15GBs? Or is it only limited to a few 1 or 2 GBs?

Thanks in advance! :)
Click to expand...

well first of all 1 or 2 gig is all you really need. your partition is only for your apps and maybe your dalvik cache. nothing else will get moved there. i have a 2g partition on my 16g card and i have 160 apps with dalvik cache moved on to it as well and i had still well over a 1gb left on the partition.
 
ocnbrze said:
well first of all 1 or 2 gig is all you really need. your partition is only for your apps and maybe your dalvik cache. nothing else will get moved there. i have a 2g partition on my 16g card and i have 160 apps with dalvik cache moved on to it as well and i had still well over a 1gb left on the partition.
Click to expand...

What's the max that I could go?
 
i'm not sure actually. it has been so long but i believe that it asks you the size. you do not have the option to choose higher. i could be wrong but i think it is set between 1-2gb. trying to fix my evo out tonight. i might have a definite answer later, when i get a amon ra put back in.
 
ok so just got amon ra installed. looks like there is no max. you can set it as high as you want. not sure why though. like i said this is only for apps,data, and dalvik ccahe. all of those things are very small and do not need a lot of room. save the space for other things, but that is up to you.
 
dont want to hijack the thread, but i have a question along the lines we are going.

I am planning on getting a new SD card...do I just copy and paste eveything from current card into Computer, then paste it into my new SD card?

what about when I get a new phone, is there any special process to transferring the sd card over?..just copy/paste everything from phone sd card into the new one?

is it really that easy?

Hey OCN,

is it an easy process for changing your recovery? (will my phone wipe everything?)...I am running clockworkmod, but the concensus around here seems to be Amon_RA.
 
ocnbrze said:
ok so just got amon ra installed. looks like there is no max. you can set it as high as you want. not sure why though. like i said this is only for apps,data, and dalvik ccahe. all of those things are very small and do not need a lot of room. save the space for other things, but that is up to you.
Click to expand...

Did you get your Evo fixed?
 
The extra space could be used to store sensitive documents. You would need access to a Linux to actually be able to view or edit said documents. It's a Google way to store items such as ringtones and videos you don't want to load in the gallery or ringtone picker.
 
bigbear6708 said:
dont want to hijack the thread, but i have a question along the lines we are going.

I am planning on getting a new SD card...do I just copy and paste eveything from current card into Computer, then paste it into my new SD card?

what about when I get a new phone, is there any special process to transferring the sd card over?..just copy/paste everything from phone sd card into the new one?

is it really that easy?

Hey OCN,

is it an easy process for changing your recovery? (will my phone wipe everything?)...I am running clockworkmod, but the concensus around here seems to be Amon_RA.
Click to expand...

Not at all, friend. These threads are for all of us. :)

You can copy and paste everything onto the PC from the card then to the new card that you'd like. Many people back up their cards this way by just dragging and dropping their entire card (or at least the most important of the important files to them) and keep them in case anything happens with their card.
Tip: The higher the class on your card, the faster the speeds will be of transfer to and from your computer. You can tell what class your card is by usually looking at the front of the card and searching for a number from 1-10. 10 being the highest and fastest and 1 being the slowest. Generally most cards are a Class 2 or 4. My old two were 4's and my new one will be a 10.

It's very simple to do the transfer. If you do transfers on computers from folder to folder or from computer to USB, it's the same exact principle.

ocnbrze said:
ok so just got amon ra installed. looks like there is no max. you can set it as high as you want. not sure why though. like i said this is only for apps,data, and dalvik ccahe. all of those things are very small and do not need a lot of room. save the space for other things, but that is up to you.
Click to expand...

That's really cool. Thanks for the info! I was just curious just to see how high I could go if I ever did need, say, 32GBs of "internal" storage lol

I heard that partitioning the card allows the phone to use the card as RAM. Is that true? The person that explained it to me said that if you allow 1GB of partitioning, you will have an additional 1GB of RAM or how much ever is available in free space on the card.
 
Hey Guys I just want to put this out there so hopefully you wont run into this issue. Several people after replacing a card have stated that they cant get the card to read. Put in old card and no problems new card no read. The fix so far has been for them to remove everything off the new card place it back in phone and boot up to recovery and Partition the card. (Or if you can do it from with in the GUI thats fine to) But for what ever reason the phone is not happy unless it does the Formatting of the card. After this has been done I have not seen any other issues from those users (or none that have to do with the card)
 
I had some other general questions about partitioning.

If I change ROMs, do I have to repartition my card?

If I choose to change ROMs and have data on the partition such as apps and I get a new ROM such as CM7 to MIUI, am I able to take those apps and data with me to the new ROM without having to use something like Titanium Backup?

If I have a partitioned card and I somehow turn on my phone without that particular partitioned card in it, will my phone be damaged and unable to be used?
 
ndh777 said:
I had some other general questions about partitioning.

If I change ROMs, do I have to repartition my card?
No you only need to partition it once.
If I choose to change ROMs and have data on the partition such as apps and I get a new ROM such as CM7 to MIUI, am I able to take those apps and data with me to the new ROM without having to use something like Titanium Backup?
As long as you have DT A2SD flashed I would think its possible however I have never done so. I've always gone on the advice you should wipe it all and go fresh just to prevent any problems.
If I have a partitioned card and I somehow turn on my phone without that particular partitioned card in it, will my phone be damaged and unable to be used? No it shouldn't do any "Damage to the Phone" however your apps will not be accessible.
Click to expand...

The max size I would go with a partition for the apps is 2gig. That is more than plenty of room. You do not need to worry about a swap as most kernels don't support it anyways. Also when you do a nandroid you will want to have the ext partition checked as well. If not then again you will not have your apps when you restore the nand.
 
ndh777 said:
I had some other general questions about partitioning.

If I change ROMs, do I have to repartition my card?

If I choose to change ROMs and have data on the partition such as apps and I get a new ROM such as CM7 to MIUI, am I able to take those apps and data with me to the new ROM without having to use something like Titanium Backup?

If I have a partitioned card and I somehow turn on my phone without that particular partitioned card in it, will my phone be damaged and unable to be used?
Click to expand...

1. nope you do not. once partitioned will stay partitioned. the only time you might have to do it, is if you accidentally wiped the sd card which will wipe the card's partitions.

2.i would not recommend that you do that. some roms maybe very similar and it might work but you never know and plus tb is much safer.

3.like argedion said your phone will be fine but you might get fc's for all of your apps as the sym link will be broken and your phone will get confused.
 
Sweet. Thanks guys. I've had the flu since Tuesday and haven't gotten around to playing with my new 32GB which I hope to do tonight since I feel better.

Thank you all for the help.
 
I'm having some issues with DarkTremors or whatever that thing is called...lol

I flashed some ROM of CM7 called Destroyer which is CM7 with a different theme...anyways it was crap. But I was able to successfully use a2sd on it. I did all of the steps that were included on one of the rooting Gingerbread guides and it worked just fine. At least it seemed to work fine. I was able to complete all of the steps with no issues. However...

I switched from Destroyer back to Syngery and am having a hard time getting a2sd to work.

My new 32GB card corrupted on me while uninstalling Destroyer so I had to USB-ms toggle and reformat it then repartitioned the card to 2GB and got all of my old files onto the card. I reflashed Syngery then went on to apply the datt...zip for the a2sd to work except it didn't check off any of the checks in the installation except the one that said that it completed which is the last one. Meaning that it went through the process but didn't actual install the .zip. I didn't realize that because it just said "Installation Complete" and I went ahead into the ROM and installed "Android Terminal Emulation" to begin using the "su" then "a2sd reinstall" codes. "Su" worked and granted me root access however it said that "'a2sd' is not a valid..." and therefore won't work.

What am I doing wrong?
 
Not trying to hijack the thread, but figured I would help keep my partition questions under one roof. According to titanium, a2sd is working but:
How do I find out what roms have it built in and what ones need dark tremor?
I usually run the mik Roms so i assume a2sd is built in. Am i correct or do i need to install the dark tremor script?
Is it best to just run it?
What is the advantage of putting the dalvik cache on the sd?
thanks just want to be sure its working right as it seems some internal memory goes when installing apps, but not like before.
 
ndh777 said:
I'm having some issues with DarkTremors or whatever that thing is called...lol

I flashed some ROM of CM7 called Destroyer which is CM7 with a different theme...anyways it was crap. But I was able to successfully use a2sd on it. I did all of the steps that were included on one of the rooting Gingerbread guides and it worked just fine. At least it seemed to work fine. I was able to complete all of the steps with no issues. However...

I switched from Destroyer back to Syngery and am having a hard time getting a2sd to work.

My new 32GB card corrupted on me while uninstalling Destroyer so I had to USB-ms toggle and reformat it then repartitioned the card to 2GB and got all of my old files onto the card. I reflashed Syngery then went on to apply the datt...zip for the a2sd to work except it didn't check off any of the checks in the installation except the one that said that it completed which is the last one. Meaning that it went through the process but didn't actual install the .zip. I didn't realize that because it just said "Installation Complete" and I went ahead into the ROM and installed "Android Terminal Emulation" to begin using the "su" then "a2sd reinstall" codes. "Su" worked and granted me root access however it said that "'a2sd' is not a valid..." and therefore won't work.

What am I doing wrong?
Click to expand...
have you tried to reflash darktremors?
sanity29 said:
Not trying to hijack the thread, but figured I would help keep my partition questions under one roof. According to titanium, a2sd is working but:
How do I find out what roms have it built in and what ones need dark tremor?
I usually run the mik Roms so i assume a2sd is built in. Am i correct or do i need to install the dark tremor script?
Is it best to just run it?
What is the advantage of putting the dalvik cache on the sd?
thanks just want to be sure its working right as it seems some internal memory goes when installing apps, but not like before.
Click to expand...

1.for roms you will have to read the op for that rom. anytie you flash the rom always try and go to the op and read. look for the changelog and sometimes the devs will put special instructions on how to flash the rom s well as other things. the changelog will usually list the a2sd feature if it has it. if it is like mikg3.1 which has been updated a lot then the it might be listed with the latest update. but it might be listed earlier.

2.mik has it built in i believe. i just bought my new card but i have not had the chance to partition it. but your apps should automatically be moved to the sd card.

3.putting dalvik cache on the sd card, just frees up space on the phone. there is no other reason for it really.
 
ndh777 said:
I'm having some issues with DarkTremors or whatever that thing is called...lol

I flashed some ROM of CM7 called Destroyer which is CM7 with a different theme...anyways it was crap. But I was able to successfully use a2sd on it. I did all of the steps that were included on one of the rooting Gingerbread guides and it worked just fine. At least it seemed to work fine. I was able to complete all of the steps with no issues. However...

I switched from Destroyer back to Syngery and am having a hard time getting a2sd to work.

My new 32GB card corrupted on me while uninstalling Destroyer so I had to USB-ms toggle and reformat it then repartitioned the card to 2GB and got all of my old files onto the card. I reflashed Syngery then went on to apply the datt...zip for the a2sd to work except it didn't check off any of the checks in the installation except the one that said that it completed which is the last one. Meaning that it went through the process but didn't actual install the .zip. I didn't realize that because it just said "Installation Complete" and I went ahead into the ROM and installed "Android Terminal Emulation" to begin using the "su" then "a2sd reinstall" codes. "Su" worked and granted me root access however it said that "'a2sd' is not a valid..." and therefore won't work.

What am I doing wrong?
Click to expand...

Not sure why uninstalling from the phone would corrupt the CARD thats a bit strange. When flashing DT make sure that you have wiped Cache and Dalvic. I haven't used Synergy in a while so I really don't remember. just try to reflash the dt and make sure before you do you clean cache and dalvic
 
argedion said:
Not sure why uninstalling from the phone would corrupt the CARD thats a bit strange. When flashing DT make sure that you have wiped Cache and Dalvic. I haven't used Synergy in a while so I really don't remember. just try to reflash the dt and make sure before you do you clean cache and dalvic
Click to expand...

I don't think that that actually caused my card to become corrupted, but it did corrupt randomly as Android devices have a habit of doing before I was going to repartition the card and flash darktremors.

ocnbrze said:
have you tried to reflash darktremors?
Click to expand...

In response to both, I reflashed darktremors this morning but before that I did wipe cache and dalvic except that didn't seem to solve it because it still says that "a2sd" is not a vaild function or whatever in the terminal emulator.
 
I would get a different copy of dt and flash it. Could be something wrong with the download. I haven't had any problems with it.
 
argedion said:
I would get a different copy of dt and flash it. Could be something wrong with the download. I haven't had any problems with it.
Click to expand...

I'll try that. This is the very same download that I used with the other ROM and it did work though. But I'll try redownloading it and seeing if it makes any difference.
 
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