Root 4EXT Recovery - A How To

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4Ext Recovery is a alternative to Clockworkmod (CWM) recovery.

At the time of this writing it supports the following devices:

HTC Sensation / XE, Incredible S / 2, Desire Z / G2, Desire S, Desire, Desire HD, Inspire 4G, myTouch 4G, Nexus One, Thunderbolt, Evo 3D GSM / CDMA, Amaze

Prerequisites:

Your phone should be ROOTED and S-OFF. According to the author of the app, an alternative is a unlocked boot loader. I have only used this on a rooted phone with S-Off.

Do I recommend it? I can only speak for the HTC Desire HD. For this device I would say yes. While there is nothing wrong with CWM, some HTC Desire HD ROM's require 4Ext Recovery to get all the features.

For example, with Android Revolution HD, if you do not use 4Ext Recovery, you wont be able to enable the over clocking daemon.


Other than that it is nice, has an easy to use touch interface.

This Guide

This post on how to install 4Ext Recovery. In the following posts, you will find guides on the most common tasks will also be posted: How to create and restore backups, how to check md5sums and how to do a full wipe and flash a ROM

Installing 4Ext Recovery

You can download 4Ext Recovery Updater from this link.

Two version are available.

• 4Ext Recovery Updater
• 4Ext Recovery Control

I wont be discussing the differences. When you download 4Ext Recovery Updater you will get a fully functional 3 day preview of all features which is a lot better than I can do in writing.

Install the app

After downloading the app you will have to install it. You will have to allow installation of non-Market apps to do this. This is usually found in Settings > Security > Than scroll to "Unknown sources"

Now that is installed launch 4Ext Recovery Updater.

Installing 4Ext Recovery

When you launch the app this is what you will see:

Select Online install|upgrade. It will ask you for permission to go online and to confirm the model of your phone. If it displays the wrong model, do not proceed.

Select 4Ext Recovery Touch v.1.0.0.5 RC 6. I have used this to install four ROM's successfully, and have installed another 15 or so ROM's on v.1.0.0.5 RC 5. All good.

By the time you read this, there could be a later version. You can install a later version at your own discretion.

In you image, all the options will appear in blue. It is yellow in the picture I posted since I already have it installed.

A small window will pop up. Select Install.

Its that easy. Your done.

 

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Now that you have 4Ext Recovery installed, I am sure you are itching to flash a new ROM.

STOP - WAIT - MAKE A NANDROID BACK-UP FIRST

Why do you need this? In case the ROM you flash (or a kernel, mod or tweak) goes wrong, this will allow you to restore your phone to the way it was before you flashed the ROM (kernel/mod/tweak).

Requirements:

1. Make sure you have about 1.6 GB free on your SDCard.

• A Nandroid back-up with a few typical apps use up from 600 MB to 1.1 GB of space on your SDCard.
• The rest you will need later to install the new ROM (usually 150 MB to 500 MB in size).

These are estimates since I am not sure exactly what you are backing up. If you have games or a lot of apps installed you could need a lot more space.


Don't worry, if you try to make a back-up and there is not enough space on your SDCard, 4Ext Recovery will inform you and not make the back-up.
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2. Make sure you have enough battery life to complete the task. Making a back-up can take 5-10 minutes. The typical recommendation is that your battery level should be at, at least 70%. Okay, in the pics below you will see I did not follow the 70% thing. For now, follow the general recommendation. In the future, you will know how much power you need to complete a task.


Lets make the back-up

By now you have learned to go to recovery via Disable Quick Boot > Power Down > Volume Down > Power Up.

Since we have 4Ext Recovery installed, we will do it the easier way.

• Launch 4Ext Recovery from your app drawer.
• Select Power Menu
• Select Reboot into Recovery

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This has the same effect as booting volume down/power. You don't have to disable fastboot.

Your phone will now reboot.

Welcome to Mars. Don't worry, its a touch screen interface

Creating a backup is simple.

Select backup | restore

Select Backup and you will be ask to confirm your action.

The process should take 4-5 minutes. It could take longer if you are backing up a lot of data.

Once done, you can use the <-- button on the bottom of the screen, or the back button on your phone, to get back to the main screen.

Once the you can reboot or stay in recovery and do something else.

So Congratulations, you created your first Nandroid backup.

 

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Okay, by now your thinking all I wanted to was flash this fancy ROM I downloaded, than someone referred me to this thread and I have wound up doing everything but flashing the ROM.

Well, we are getting there. These steps are important to make sure that whatever happens you will be able to get your phone back into a fully functional state.

Verifying the ROM

Lets say you decided you want to flash is:

Ice Cold Sandwich 8.7 - The file you downloaded will be name IceColdSandwich-8.7.AOKP-signed.zip

You will also find a md5sum number for the file: b655dfd6748a247a9cc42bebe0d8b1d7

This number is used to verify that the download is good and not corrupted. 4Ext Recovery can be used to verify the md5sum.

Transferring the ROM to your phone

First lets transfer the ROM, in this example IceColdSandwich-8.7.AOKP-signed.zip into the "root" of your SDCard. Sounds technical. All it means is do not put the file in a folder. Do not unzip them.

• Plug your phone into your PC with the USB cable.
• A notification will pop up asking if you want to plug in as "Charge only" or or "Disk drive". Select the Disk drive option. This effectively makes the SDCard on your phone into a flash drive.
• Copy the file to the phones SDCard.
• When done, unmount or eject as you would do with a flash drive.
• Unplug the phone from the PC.

Okay, so lets go back into Recovery.

Select install from sdcard

On the next screen, select check md5sum of a file

The screen will now display the contents of you SDCard. The .zip file will be in the bottom so scroll down.

Pick the file and 4Ext will display the md5sum of the file. If will take a minute of so. Compare it with the one you got from the source of the ROM you downloaded.

If the numbers match, than you are good to go.

If not, it was either a bad download or the the file got corrupted when it was transferred to your phone.

 

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So the numbers match

Full wipe

Lets do a Full wipe. This prepares your phone to accept a new ROM.

Select the <--- arrow to go back, or use the back button of your phone, TWICE, to go back here:

Select the wipe | format.

A full wipe is:

a) wipe data/factory reset
b) wipe cache
c) wipe dalvik cache

You can do all three by selecting the first and third options on the screen.

Select wipe date/factory reset
Select wipe cache + dalvik

I do a full wipe a bit differently. The wipe date/factory reset +wipe cache + dalvik is the commonly recommended approach. I do a full wipe this way:

Select wipe date/factory reset
Select Format all partitions (except SDCard)

Your choice

You will be asked to confirm your actions.

When done, lets press back again to go back to the main screen, by selecting the back button.

Flash the ROM

By now you are pretty familiar with the screens so I will stop posting screenies.

1. Select - install from sdcard again.

2. Select - chose zip from the sdcard

3. Scroll to the bottom, you will see the zip file of the ROM you downloaded.

4. Select the zip file of the ROM you downloaded and confirm your action.

After that depending on the ROM, you will have to follow a set on instructions on screen or just sit and wait. Once done. Reboot the phone.

First boot on a new ROM take some time 5-10 minutes. Subsequent reboots are much faster.

If everything worked out you have a new ROM installed on your phone!

 

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I hope you are so excited with your new ROM that you stop reading here. If you have problems with it, post a request for help in the All Things Root section of your device and someone will help you sort things out.

Sometimes, everything works fine, but dang, THIS ROM SUCKS (all ROM's are good. Some just don't fit us).

Restore your backup

It will take 5-10 minutes to go back to your previous ROM.

1. Boot back into recovery.
2. Do a full wipe.
3. Select backup | restore
4. Select Restore

You will see your backup, or a list of backups if you have several.

Select the backup you want to restore and confirm your action.

Reboot, and in 5 minutes you should have your phone back just the way it was before the new ROM.

 

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Bumped up for lzwoz.