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Root desire re-flash / new roms and other issues

S

solomonhill

Lurker
HTC Desire (Original)

I Rooted my handset with Unrevoked about 3 months back. It's been working fine since. I can now install some apps on my SD card that I couldn't previously.

However I can't remove the stock apps that came with the phone like you-tube and twitter etc. If I use a root browser (like titanium backup) and delete the APK it crashes my phone, and nothing changes.

Also I can't update or change my supperuser privileges without a crash

So I'm considering re-flashing my phone and un-rooting but HTC sync has never worked for me. So - any advice on the above would be great. Ideal is like to re glad to froyo 2.2 and start over, but I can't get the installer to see my phone.

Cheers
 
solomonhill said:
HTC Desire (Original)
I can now install some apps on my SD card that I couldn't previously.
Click to expand...

You're missing the biggest advantage of rooting. What youve doen can be done easily without rooting. Did you ever read any of our FAQ's here?
Go to the "All things root" sub forum here (where this thread should have been posted). Then go into the "All things root guide" Sticky thread.

There are lots of faq's here for you. The root memory FAQ should be read. As should the rooting FAQ

solomonhill said:
However I can't remove the stock apps that came with the phone like you-tube and twitter etc.
Click to expand...

No you can't do this without being s-off. It also does not reclaim you any space as these are in the /system partition. "Internal Storage" is the /data partition. See the root memory faq as mentioned before.

solomonhill said:
If I use a root browser (like titanium backup) and delete the APK it crashes my phone, and nothing changes.
Click to expand...

Because you're not s-off. You cannot alter the /system partition whilst android is running. This is what S-on does.

solomonhill said:
Also I can't update or change my supperuser privileges without a crash
Click to expand...

It needs s-off

solomonhill said:
So I'm considering re-flashing my phone and un-rooting but HTC sync has never worked for me. So - any advice on the above would be great. Ideal is like to re glad to froyo 2.2 and start over, but I can't get the installer to see my phone.
Click to expand...

I really wouldnt bother, you've missed so much good information so far already. It would be a shame to give up now when I know there is a solution to your space issues.
 
I have been on the all things root, and on XDA forums similar guides. I'm getting tired of reading the word noobproof. I havnt seen a guide that actually tells you what rooting does or why you should follow it over the masses of conflicting info out there. Or what else you need to do to make a desire work in any usable way

I figured I had done something wrong with all the crashing so was going to start again but this (despite apparently being noobproof) isn't as simple as its made out to be.

I'll check out S - Off, I'm figuring this is something to do with the partition?
 
Our FAQ's do not say noob proof. There is no such thing. They need to be read and re-read to be understood, but all the answers are there.

You do not need to s-off as the reason you want it is not actually going to solve all your problems.

Essentially what I recommend is choose a custom ROM (with a2sd+) and partition your SD card.

Without knowing what you want or which version of teh desire you have, I cannot recommend.

But seriously, those guides on XDA do nothing but hand hold you through things that it dopesnt let you understand. You NEED to understand. Read those two FAQ's I mentioned first and foremost. Then read them again. Why else are ours better? They're up to date and are the effort of many experienced users here. Not just 1.
 
Ok cheers, I will read (and re-read)

What I want is to install the OS where it fits and all apps on my 16gb SD card. If my stock apps update fully it cripples my phone to the point where no apps (SD or otherwise) can update and the phone becomes useless. If I could do this it would be a start.
 
solomonhill said:
Ok cheers, I will read (and re-read)

What I want is to install the OS where it fits and all apps on my 16gb SD card. If my stock apps update fully it cripples my phone to the point where no apps (SD or otherwise) can update and the phone becomes useless. If I could do this it would be a start.
Click to expand...


yes. This can (realtively) easily be done with a2sd+. Your internal memory still shows as 147, but you will have a partition on sd card where the apps are symlinked to (meaning they are actually on the SD card, but a shorcut remains on internal memory)

Its not infinite, but it massively slows down the filling up of memory
 
Hi solomonhill

I was where you are a few days ago and have now got my desire with 250+ apps installed and 80MB still free. My post of 3rd April gives my summary of the process needed (details are in the FAQs and Guides) All credit to the Guides on this forum which enabled me to complete the process and are very clear, but a lot to take in at one go!

Good luck
 
The other reason I was going to flash and start over was clockwork recovery mod. I get:

E:Can't find MISC
E:Can't mount CACHE:/recovery/command

ETC...
when I go into it from the boot menu, I have yet to do anything with it but I thought this looked bad?
 
It may be that you have a PVT4 device which isn't compatible with the old version of clockwork mod.

I'll be honest, there are a fair few steps between where you are now and where you want to be. There's a lot of work involved but we will helps you through.

going back on what I said earlier, I think s-off IS the first step.

Step 1 objectives; s-off, flash 4ext touch recovery.

In the faqs, there is a link to.s-off and root using revolutionary. Follow this until you have s-off. Do NOT accept their recovery. Do nothing once s-off is achieved

Then download the 4ext touch recovery updater from 4ext.net and use that to flash the 4ext recovery.

Let me know how you get on with step 1.

Step 2 will be to backup... but one step at a time
 
ok SUroot, progress:

i have been folowing the guide S-Off and Root HTC Desire. S-Off went fine so im feeling good about that. im stuck on the recovery step.

the guide uses Amon-Ra, i had no joy with this. however upon loading this up to ask for help i noticed you recomend "4ext" which i downloaded from there site... and what do i do with it? sorry if this is a basic question. its sat on my pc at the moment.

Cheers
 
Since you have S-Off now, you have finished with Revolutionary.

If you have downloaded 4ext recovery updater, then copy the apk to your phone's SD card and install it on the phone using your favourite file manager. Then run the app and use it to install 4Ext Touch recovery. It should install just fine, but if you have a problem let us know - a lot of us use this, so there are plenty of people can advise.

Once you have 4ext touch installed you can boot into recovery and make a backup from there.
 
ok - i have supper user and S-OFF plus 4ext recovery working and a backup done (or so it says) this is looking good, id like to thank everyone here for your help so far, your stars

so... next is partitioning a SD Card and making it symlinked? i cant see a guide on that? im sure i just missed it.

but now we are getting to the realy good stuff id love to put a custom Rom on there - something like Gingerbread, different and cool so i can show off a bit :-) but realy iv not seen whats possible. id like to keep the same HTC feel (sence?) but lose the annoying pre-installed apps.

i take it i do this by putting the RUU on my SD card and installing it with 4ext?
 
Not an RUU - that would wipe the phone and undo everything except S-Off.

You install a ROM by placing the zip on sd, wiping the phone, then installing from recovery. Always take a recovery backup first, and back up user apps and data as required. See the rooting faq for info.

For partitioning see the root memory faq. SUroot also produced a guide to using GParted via a virtual machine. The All Things Root Guide sticky post has everything linked somewhere, or follow the red link in SUroot's signature.

Finally for ROMs there's a link to a list of ROMs from XDA in the ATR Guide post, and the "What ROMs are you using" sticky post can be browsed for ideas.
 
Yeah get the partitioning done first. We're nearly there. Setting up a VM takes a little bit but much easier than making bootable CD's IMHO.
 
Slow weekend on the progress front. i have GPartition on a bootable CD and have partitioned my SD card. so its time for a basic question, how do i get apps on the 4 GB i have now set aside for them? also, i have just noticed that the you-tube guide says to create a partition file system of EXT3 but i have a PTV4 device (apparantly as clockwork mod dosnt work for me) does this mean i should re-partition the SD to EXT4?
 
Pvt4 is basically a reference to the version of desire you have and has no relation to the sd card, basically when you used gparted what file type did you choose for the 4gb partition? (which is maybe too big IMHO, your wasting about 3gb) it should be ext3/4 primary.
You can use the 4ext recovery app to have a look, the most commonly used one now is ext4. And the app can change it if it is set to a different one.
As far as getting apps on the ext just make sure your chosen rom has A2SD built in and check to see if it also moves the dalvik cache to sd or if you have to move it via a terminal command,
Your almost done!
Welcome to the world of custom roms.
 
Yep, as ducky said 4GB is too big for an Ext partition. Max recommended is 1GB which will be plenty, anything bigger you're likely to have some issues.
 
Ok well I have stuck oxygen (latest version I forget the number) on my desire and its been running sweet. For about a week now. Still got my 4gb partition. I'm yet to sort that. If I copy everything off the card and re-partition then copy it back will that work? Also my internal memory is still filling up so I'm moving apps to the SD card maunaly which I didn't think I had to do.. I figure its partitioning issues?
 
Is your partition an ext?
I'm doubting it is,
How many apps do you have?
If you sort the ext out the apps should be stored on it provided it been done correctly and the rom supports it.
And yes you can copy and move everything, but i would move all your apps back to the phone first, then create the 1GB ext4 partition, then copy everything back,
See how you go on, until you do the ext you really aren't benefiting from a custom rom.
Also with your internal filling up its probably down to the dalvik cache, get terminal emulator,
type
Su
A2SD cachesd
press enter and your phone should reboot, when it does you should have plenty of space.
 
The a2sd commands only work with DarkTremor, which I don't think Oxygen uses. There was a separate patch to flash to move dalvik to the ext partition.

I'd use Ti or Quick System Info to check whether the partition is being used. If it is, the simplest thing to do when you resize is to take a nandroid, back up the fat32 partition (which includes the nandroid), repartition, restore the fat32 data, then restore the nandroid - that will refill the ext partition. It's what you do when changing cards when using a2sd+.
 
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