Develop Bugs

pim.vol create/repair/restore/extract on desktop

Please post all utilites for handling/copying/extracting/repairing/
restoring/upgrading etc for pim.vol
I have backed up a pim.vol and changed my device with same OS WM 5.0 however when the pim.vol is restored the contacts do not appear.
1)Is there any software to read pim.vol and extract it in txt,csv file.
2)Is there any software to rewrite pim.vol to fit in newer roms.
3)Is there any software to upgrade or repair pim.vol files.
4)Is there any way to add data from pim.vol to Outlook .
5)I have two pim.vol files both of different devices but WM5,
Is their way to interchange data between them so that each other device
has data of the other device. (One is empty in my case)
Thank You
girish Kadel

Same problem
I have a similar problem. I would like to fix a failing pim.vol. If I put it on my device I get "no service" on the phone and can't access my calendar or contacts.
I found a perl script that parses pim.vol for contacts, but it only extracted about 20 out of over 100.

I have exactly the same problem as drkosse except that my contact list is around 4000 and I just updated like 5% of it last week without sync. So I really need it back up. Any tools to fix it?

Hey,
I am also urgently needing some application to read or extract my contacts from a pim.vol.
Any suggestions>?

I thought there is an answer for this...

I would also be highly interested in something that could do that.

yes im having the same problem! i went froma moto Q to HTC Mogul 6.1
i copied the pim file from the storage card after renaming the first one.
the soft reset. then clicked contacts and it just shuts out!
im not sure what to do now. i need those numbers!
lol

I had the same problem, flashed my Omnia with a new rom, forgotten to extract all contacts appointments etcpp, so had searched for a tool to extract the information from the pim.vol (which i saved wisly before)
had found this:
http://www.phatware.com/index.php?q=product/details/dbexplorer
looks like it works, doing now an extract of the data and restore into the systems pim.vol (else it won't work, the pim.vol's are incompatible through different roms ): )

I also really do need a tool for repairing my pim.vol DB. Isn't there any solution available yet? Calendar and Contacts won't start anymore, also I get shown thet there is no Service available, if I use my broken pim.vol. If I rename it and it gots replaced with a newone, everthing is working fine again, but all my data is lost, of course. Also DBExplorer isn't working for me, it says that file is no valid database or broken. :-( Can anyone help me pleaze! Greetz, BKC

Migrating SMS and MMS to Windows Mobile 6.1

Hello Folks!
About 10 days ago, I got myself the brand new HTC Touch Pro 2 as - as a birthday present and to replace my old P3300 (Artemis) which was becoming more and more defective.
Some of you probably share the opinion that the Touch Pro 2 is a great piece of technical art - both the hardware and the software. I think HTC made a terrific job by inventing the appealing and intuitive TouchFlo 3D surface (TF3D) and knitting it so deeply into the Operating System (OS) of Windows Mobile (WM) that you will hardly get in touch with WM itself anymore.
As I eagerly startet to play with the device and to migrate my data from the old P3300, I got into deeeeeeep trouble: SMS were there and threaded, but only visible in the Messaging application of WM (Pocket Outlook) - no SMS visible neither in the Messages tab of a contact nor when tapping on the SMS in the basic Messages tab of TF3D. MMS not visible at all. As I wanted my MMS back and my messages to show up in the contacts, I started to investigate and looking for a solution.
I can assure you that I spent a lot of hours looking for solutions, in this forum as well as on the whole Web. I tried and learned a lot (I'm not a developer), but couldn't find a working approach. I called HTC, wrote to HTC and wrote to Arcsoft (the manufacturer of the MMS Composer on HTC devices) about a solution to correctly migrate all kind of messages to higher versions of WM. HTC replied pretty quickly, but did not have a solution for the issue: "[...] We have indeed been asking Microsoft for this for quite some time, and as far as we know, they are working on it. Indeed, there appear to be rumours that they have been working on adding SMS to PC backup to the next version of their Activesync/WMDC software for WIndows Mobile 6.5. [...]"
Therefore, I had to figure out how I could help myself. I found a way, and because it took me sooooooooo much time (!!!!), I would like to share this with you and possibly help to save your time. If you don't want all the background information, you can skip the sections "Starting position" and "Findings" in the next message and go to message 3.

Part 2: Starting Position and Findings
Starting position:
I had a Sprite backup of my messages (SMS, MMS, emails) from my old P3300 which was running on WM 6.0. As the P3300 was not working anymore, I had no other option than using this backup on my new Touch Pro 2. So, I tried to restore all mail-related items from this backup using Sprite - which created the above and below mentioned problems.
Until and including WM 6.0, MMS were saved in a separate account called "MMS". In WM 6.1, MMS are stored in the same account as the SMS ("SMS/MMS"). An existing MMS account in a cemail.vol file from WM 6.0 or earlier that is restored on WM 6.1 is not visible.
WM 6.1 introduces the new "Messages Threading" feature. Threading organizes received and sent text messages (and MMS because they're in the same account now) into threaded conversations.
Findings:
I have no clue why my SMS did not show up in the contacts of TF3D. I tried some approaches that I found on the Web and that might have been able to solve my problem, e.g. clearing all SMS/MMS and restore the messages with PIM Backup (link to proposal), or renaming cemail.vol resp. deleting it by placing a shortcut in the startup folder (link to proposal). None of these worked.
The cemail.vol file (container of all messages of all types) cannot be renamed or copied or moved. The only possibility I found is MortScript that can copy/backup the file during startup of the device before WM gets hold of the file. You can find the script itsself below.
In Pocket Outlook (Messaging), the MMS folder was gone. However, the folder showed up as an account in the email-tab of TF3D with sender, date and headline, but tapping on the message had no effect. PIM Backup (with action "Backup") also showed the MMS folder with all the subfolders and the correct number of MMS.
I could not find a solution or registry tweak to make the MMS account show up in Outlook.
The hidden WM6-MMS-account might look like corrupt to WM 6.1. If so, there could be a relation between the MMS issue and the problem of not having messages in a contact's messages tab because of old, "corrupt" data in the cemail.vol file. I have no proof that this assumption is true.
It is also possible that restoring an entire cemail.vol file somehow confuses the threading process in WM 6.1. I have no proof that this assumption is true.
PIM Backup is currently (V 2.8) not able to backup and restore MMS due to proprietary binary saving by Arcsoft's MMS Composer.
If you try to restore MMS with PIM Backup, the MMS shows up as MMS, but has no content when you open it. It seems as using PIM Backup on MMS makes the reference to the MMS content (each MMS has a dat-file in \My Documents\UAContents\MMS UA\) being lost. Backing up and restoring cemail.vol as a whole keeps these references.
As far as I understand, PIM Backup backs up/restores messaging by reading/writing them via Outlook interface. This is a different approach to just copying/replacing the entire cemail.vol and might be the reason for the above mentioned loss of MMS reference: Using the Outlook interface, each restored MMS might look like a new incoming MMS to MMS Composer, so it creates a new reference number for the dat-file.
I found that the binary Arcsoft-MMS data in cemail.vol could be considered as irrelevant: If you rename an existing dat-file with the new reference number that is created for a MMS restored with PIM Backup, the content of the MMS is shown as it should. This even works with text-mode based PIM Backups where there is no binary data included at all.
The binary backup mode of PIM Backup is faster than the text mode, but the text mode has 2 advantages: 1) The backup file is a zip-file containing csv-text-files which you can extract, read and edit. 2) From my point of view, the text mode is more reliable, particularly in backing up and restoring emails' contents.
Using Pocket dbExplorer, I tried to have a look into the cemail.vol file and extracted some content. I judged it as not feasible to figure out the layouts and contents of the various databases and records in order to alter cemail.vol directly.

Part 3: The solution and tools
Solution:
Based on my investigations and the findings above, I tried the following steps which finally worked and solved all my problems regarding the migration of messaging data. However, especially the MMS part is quite some work, so maybe someone has ideas on how to speed this up.
If you can't access your old device anymore, goto step 2. If you still can use your old device, you're luckier than I was and have a much easier process: Install PIM Backup on both your old and new device and create a text-mode based (deselect the 'Binary backup' option) backup of all your messages on the old device. Copy the following files to your storage card and goto step 5 after:
PIM Backup file
Folder "\My Documents\UAContents\" (dat-files with MMS content)
Folder "\Windows\Messaging\" (text and attachments of emails)
If you can't use your old device anymore, but you have a text-mode based PIM Backup file as well as the 2 folders mentioned in step 1 on your storage card, then you can skip the next steps and goto step 5.
If you have a backup of a backup software (like Sprite Backup), including the cemail.vol as well as the 2 folders mentioned in step 1, then do restore this backup on your new device now.
(Note: If you don't have access to your old device and no backup file, there's nothing to restore and you can start your life with your new device free of history . If you have a binary PIM Backup file, you can restore your SMS, but you won't be able to restore your MMS as described in this approach.)
Only if you have executed step 3: Install/start PIM Backup on your new device and create a text-mode based (deselect the 'Binary backup' option) backup of all your messages on your new device.
In WM 6.1 MMS are stored in the same account as SMS, so we need to alter the PIM Backup file a little to make sure that PIM Backup does not restore the MMS into a hidden account again:
Open the PIM Backup file like a ZIP file and extract the msgs_<date>.csm.
Open the csm file with any text editor.
To redirect your MMS in the MMS-Inbox to the Inbox of the SMS, replace all occurrences of the string "\\%MDF1";"MMS";"IPM.MMS1" by "\\MMS\\in";"SMS";"IPM.MMS".
To redirect your MMS in the MMS-Sent Items to the Sent Items of the SMS, replace all occurrences of the string "\\%MDF3";"MMS";"IPM.MMS1" by "\\MMS\\out";"SMS";"IPM.MMS".
(Note: If there are no occurrences of the above search strings, you can delete the "1" from "IPM.MMS1" and try again.)
Save the csm-file, place it back into the PIM Backup-ZIP-file and copy the backup-file to your storage card.
If your new device is not "fresh" and contains messages, then you need to delete the existing cemail.vol file in order to start with a fresh messaging-file that has no "legacy pollution" on your new device. As the file is locked during operation of the PPC, MortScript helps you to perform the deletion on startup:
Install MortScript on your new device.
Copy and extract the attached script (cemail.vol_backup-restore-delete.mscr in ZIP-file) to your computer. This script is based on hercule18's work (Thank you!). It didn't work on my device, so I fixed it and added two more options that we need for our purpose here.
The script backs up to and restores from the storage card. In the script, you find 3 occurrences of the word "Speicherkarte" which is the german translation of storage card. Open the script with any text editor and replace these 3 occurrences with the name of your storage card exactly as it shows up in the explorer on your new device.
Save the altered script, copy it to your new device and run it. Choose "Backup & Delete" or "Delete" (we won't need the old cemail.vol anymore, but maybe you feel better with a backup) and Reset Yes. When your device restarts, MortScript deletes the messaging file and WM replaces it with a fresh, empty one.
If you've manually copied the necessary directories with the MMS- and email-content (unlike step 3), you can copy these folders from your storage card to your device now:
Folder "\My Documents\UAContents\"
Folder "\Windows\Messaging\"
Now you are ready to start restoring all the messages. First you only restore the Inbox and Sent Items of SMS (text messages) in order to allow WM 6.1 the threading process (organizing received and sent items into conversation threads). Start PIM Backup, choose action "Restore" and load the text-mode based PIM Backup file that you've created before. Choose ONLY messages, and in the messages' options, only Inbox and Sent Items of the SMS/MMS-account. Go!
On completion of the restore, open Messaging (Start --> Messaging) and choose your SMS/MMS account. In the Inbox, you can watch WM now threading the messages. Give WM the time to complete this process until you feel that it's done and your device is reacting at normal speed again.
Check if TF3D shows the threaded messages if you click on a text message in the Messages tab or if you choose the Messages tab in a contact.
Start PIM Backup again, choose "Restore" and load your PIM Backup file again. Select ONLY messages, and in the messages' options, select all other folders of the SMS/MMS-account, EXCEPT Inbox and Sent Items. In the last dialogue, choose "Add messages..." Go!
If you want to restore email-accounts, you have to create this accounts in Messaging/Outlook first, because PIM Backup does not restore to accounts that don't exist. After creating the corresponding accounts, you can restart PIM Backup, "Restore", load your PIM Backup file and select all the folders of the email-accounts you want. Make sure you choose "Add..." instead of "Delete..." in the last dialogue!
Finally, we need to recreate the reference between the restored MMS and the MMS-dat-files in "\My Documents\UAContents\". This is how I did it:
Create a list of your dat-files with name, date and size, using the attached Excel-Sheet (MMS-Renaming.xls in ZIP-file). To populate the sheet with your data, you can access your storage card (where you have a copy of the above mentioned directory) with your computer and create a text-file by --> Start --> Execute --> "cmd" --> navigate to the drive and directory with your dat-files (e.g. E:\My Documents\UAContents\MMS UA\) --> "dir >list.txt". Copy the content of the list.txt into the xls-sheet and put the data into the right columns (yellow columns). Order by date (descending).
Connect your device to your computer via ActiveSync and open an explorer window showing the content of \My Documents\UAContents\MMS UA\ on your device (not on the storage card!).
Now you have to find out the new reference number that MMS Composer is looking for when you open an MMS. If you did the above steps (altering and restoring the PIM Backup file) correctly, you can find your MMS in the subfolders MMS\in and MMS\out in your SMS/MMS account. Navigate into these folders in Messaging/Outlook, order by date (descending) and do the following steps for each MMS:
Open the MMS (it doesn't show any content).
While leaving the MMS open, refresh the explorer window on your pc, showing the content of the MMS UA folder.
Now you will see that a new folder appeared - the name of this folder is the new reference number we are looking for.
Find the right row in the xls-sheet (same date and size as the open MMS) and note the new reference number in the green column (only number, no ".dat"-suffix).
When your xls-sheet is complete, you have a list of MortScript-commands in column F. These commands will rename your dat-files with the correct number so that MMS Composer will find its targets. Put the content of column F (without the title in row 1) into a normal text file and save it as "mms-renaming.mscr".
Close Messaging/Outlook.
Copy the mms-renaming.mscr to your device and start it. The script runs only a few milliseconds and does not inform you about completion.
You're DONE! When you open an MMS now, you should see its content as it used to be.
Mentioned tools for the solution:
PIM Backup (Freeware)
MortScript (Freeware)
Other tools mentioned:
Sprite Backup (Commercial)
Pocket dbExplorer (Commercial)

Part 4: A looot of questionmarks!
Open Questions:
Maybe someone has an idea on how to speed up this process, particularly step 13?
Could Arcsoft save the reference number as a normal field in cemail.vol instead of in binary blobs? This would allow PIM Backup to backup and restore this reference and would save us all the renaming hassle.
Why the heck do I have to do this? I pay to buy a working phone, I'm not paid to make the phone working!!! My job is in IT, too, and I learned so far that migration is a very important part of producing software. Why does migration apparently not count for upgrades in PPC-software/-OS? Why do I as a customer have to spent so much time to find a workaround for this bloody problem? In this case, 3 companies are involved: HTC, Microsoft and Arcsoft. It would be fairly easy for these people to implement a migration mechanism that stores the customer's important data in a file format of the current OS's/software's specification and restores the data on the new version considering the changes in the new version. So, why don't they do it??? I have no understanding at all for this!!!
As a loyal customer who buys products from the same manufacturer again (HTC in this case), can I expect to have support and solutions that help me to migrate my data when buying a new device? Or is that a completely weird expectation?
Remark:
I really have already lost a lot of time on this issue. I've created this thread to maybe save you some time in case you have the same problems, but for me, the issue is now closed. I won't spend more time and ask you for your understanding that I will not be able to give any support or answer questions. In case of further questions, please search the forum and the Web. All I can say is that the manufacturers should take the bait and do their homework. Migration counts - life (and life is a lot about communication and interaction) is not a game that restarts from scratch only because I buy a new PPC or upgrade my software!

Thanks
This post was really helpfull. I was not migrating from wm5 to wm 6, but was just looking for a solution to restore my MMSs after a rom upgrade.

What a neglected Problem
Thanks Vivalis !!! I stopped looking for a "quick fix" once your post was read.
I could not believe HTC, MicroSoft and/or ArcSoft didn't provide for backing up/restoring important user data when migrating or performing an OS upgrade or firmware update, etc.
Not only is MMS not restored, but all the MicroSoft One-Note files are lost (not backed up by ActiveSync - my wife nearly beat me to death - and I got the phone to make her happy). I later found these are saved in the Windows directory on the mobile device (HTC XV6900) and not with other MicroSoft documents for some reason.
MicroSoft/ActiveSync needs to get up to speed with these mobile phones. Messaging is what it is all about! People like to have their messages!

Dear Vivalis,
I can not describe how I thank you for your thread. I was seeking for days to find a solution to move my MMS from my ORBIT to the DIAMOND. I succesfully moved them with your "guide". But it was a bit complicated to me to understand all steps because English is not my native language. I spent some hours (every day a few) and today I finished with success. Now my memories which are very important to me are on my DIAMOND.
THANK YOU SO MUCH!
Best regards from Bremen (Germany)!

Reason why MortScript probably didn't restore and the fix
I was migrating from a failed HTC Touch Pro (Mobile 6.1) to a second one (keyboard when out on the first) and wanted to get the cemail.vol to the new phone. The MortScript backed up my 5meg cemail.vol from the old phone with no problem. BUT when I went to restore it on the second phone, I got xcopy errors. Looking at the script I noticed there "Restore" / Case 2 scripting the second line did not have double quotes around the root directory back slash. I edited it to read:
rest = "XCopy (""Storage Card\cemail.vol"" , ""\"" , 1)"
Storage Card being the part that needs to match the name of your flash disk name.
I ran this script and all my sms and mms messages now show up on my new phone.
I had previously copied the folders
Folder "\My Documents\UAContents\" (dat-files with MMS content)
Folder "\Windows\Messaging\" (text and attachments of emails)
to this device, so I"m sure that is why the MMS messages still have their photos attached to those messages.
I hope this helps people out!
Cheers!

Cool trick!
V useful post. Thanks a bunch for the info.
I was looking for a way to get the images out of the .dat files from a backup when I found this post. After reading this I was able to recover some images I wanted from just the back up of UA Contents\MMS UA .dat files with no MMS/PIM backup or folders available.
Step 1 Send yourself an MMS with an image attached. (This is because you can only save the image from an MMS you have received, not from a draft copy!)
Step 2 Open up the MMS you've just received from yourself!
Step 3 Peek at the MMS UA folder on your device - look for the folder made of numbers that matches that of a .dat file. (Neat trick that helped me find the dat file I needed out of all the files in that folder! Cheers Vivalis.)
Step 4 Close the MMS
Step 5 Rename the .dat file you want to recover to the numbers of the magic folder you just spotted and copy it over the top of the .dat file of the same name.
Step 6 Open the MMS with hey presto your recovered image.
Step 7 Save your image from the MMS.
Repeat steps 4 to 7 for as many .dat files you need to get your precious pics from and viola! Now I no longer use MMS to store my pics - I always save the attachment to the Storage Card as soon as I get them and delete the mms. Ya never know when that phone is gonna crash next..

Vivalis said:
Solution:
If you can't access your old device anymore, goto step 2. If you still can use your old device, you're luckier than I was and have a much easier process: Install PIM Backup on both your old and new device and create a text-mode based (deselect the 'Binary backup' option) backup of all your messages on the old device. Copy the following files to your storage card and goto step 5 after:
PIM Backup file
Folder "\My Documents\UAContents\" (dat-files with MMS content)
Folder "\Windows\Messaging\" (text and attachments of emails)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
hello i need to migrate sms and mms from windows mobile 6 to 6.1, the same problem you describe in your guide, but i have a great problem, i can't find the dir UAContents with the data of my mms. I have a lot of mms but My Documents folder does not contain a folder UAContents... Why ? Thanks in advance for your help....

I'm in deep doudou, I backed up my phone using PIM backup (binary) then gave the phone to somebody. Then I restored my stuff into my new phone, the sms were there and so were the emails (that's what I thought) but then later during the day I tried opening my email and to my surprise the emails were there but when I opened them they were blank. Every single email that was restored was blank so I'm stressing I got the phone back and copied the folders specified here but the person I gave the phone to had already deleted a lot of the emails. What are my options?... I tried doing the instructions above and couldn't get it to work. plzz help!
Folder "\My Documents\UAContents\" (dat-files with MMS content)
Folder "\Windows\Messaging\" (text and attachments of emails)

THanks for the good tips in the thread really useful
I have another qn, currently am trying to migrate a HTC Tytn2 on WM6 to HTC HD2 - WM6.5
i find the phone cannot complete the copying of sms and typically dies halfway..
i have about 6000 sms in the inbox and 1800sms in the sent box and about 10 mms
will this consitute any problem for WM6.5? Anyone with experience of handling such large number of sms ?
will the threaded sms feature impact my transfer?
thanks!

I wish I've looked around and found this thread sooner ..M$ is such a capitalist.. why don't they let people make free stuff to take care of problems that people went through everyday because of their lack of customer service?

how can transfer Windows Mobile SMS - MMS from windows mobile 6.1 to iPhone iOS 6?

[Q] Recovering SMS...

Hi.
OK, this is my story...
I had a TP2, dropped the phone, cracked the screen. Sent it away to my insurance, and they tell me it's beyond economical repair. How that works, I dunno, as from what I've seen, it's less than £100 to repair. Anyway, they told me that they're gonna give me a cash settlement of £350.
Now, I'm looking at swapping over to an android phone. But, I wanted to know whether there was any way of recovering my SMS to transfer to the android phone...
I took a backup of the phone using SPB Backup. Have an unpacker tool that should allow me to extract the contents of my backup... Now, the problem I've had, is that most programs to save SMS from Windows Mobile require you to have the phone. Now, I don't have the phone, I just have the contents of the phone. But, it should be possible from these files to retrieve the SMS, should it not (I've not found anything, hence my questionning... But my search was probably rubbish keywords?!)...
Then, what would be the best software to transfer this retrieval on to an android phone?! I've found a few which import from xml, txt, csv, but not sure which is best, etc...
Any help appreciated

You can try the following solution:
1. Run Spb Backup Unpack tool in PC to retrieve and export your text message.
Link: [spb.com/pocketpc-software/backup/unpack.html]
2. Run SMS Backup & Restore in your Android phone to import text message (from file created by Spb Backup Unpack tool)
Link: [android.riteshsahu.com/apps/sms-backup-restore]
Hope it can help you.

merci_vn said:
You can try the following solution:
1. Run Spb Backup Unpack tool in PC to retrieve and export your text message.
Link: [spb.com/pocketpc-software/backup/unpack.html]
2. Run SMS Backup & Restore in your Android phone to import text message (from file created by Spb Backup Unpack tool)
Link: [android.riteshsahu.com/apps/sms-backup-restore]
Hope it can help you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Many thanks for the reply... Didn't realise that the SPK Unpacker tool allows you to save the sms... Haven't had chance to play with it yet, but when I get back home from work, intend to do just that!
Thanks again for the reply... Just need to hope that the Desire Z is released soon!!! lol

Just to keep this thread updated...
Used the SPB Backup Unpack tool, to get my sms inbox and sent items... In my android device, used SMS Importer Lite program. This program can only import 100 messages per file. My sms csv file fromthe SPB backup contained over 1000 sms. So, what I did was to edit the csv file in notepad (in windows), and take 100 sms at a time (ctrl+g to go to line 100, and cut all files above this), and then past it to a new csv file. Then, edit the settingsin SMS import lite, so match the same csv file structure as the csv I Had. I then imported each file 1 by 1. This way, I managed to get all sms files
Just missing the mms messages. But am happy enough to get all the other messages
Hopefully this will help anyone else who wants help in this matter!

using another phone's backup

I played with the OEMName reg settings as posted here to tinker with the other oem apps, and it stopped all my applications from working, I had to hard reset to get any apps to function again. Luckily, I had saved my 7008 backup files and I used the method posted [url="http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1060103&highlight=backup+file+locations+zune]here[/url] to revert my locked 7392 Focus to the 7008 backup. I had saved the backup. These are some observations:
- When I updated to 7390 and created the backup, my phone was already unlocked and prevent unlock was done, when I restored my backup, the unlock was preserved
- the unlock retained through my subsequent update to 7392 (expected, but nice to know)
- The sideloaded apps on the phone at the time of the 7008 backup also installed with the backup
Even with my phone on the pin lock, as soon as I connected it to the PC, Zune opened and synced and prompted for the update. Is this new bahavior?
I was able move the saved backup files into the Windows Phone Update folder after the phone was connected and synced.
Once I was back to 7008, I hard reset the phone and updated again without setting up my Live Account info to create a "pure" 7008 backup for the purpose of posting here for others to tinker with.
If there is interest, i will post the files when I get home.

That backup could be very handy to have around! Please post it!

Backup is for one phone only, not all around. I know, you can change the DeviceId, but it will fail when you try to restore to another phone. I guess a backup is useless for others.
The best backup is the firmware itself.

I do believe this will work. There are two .xml files in the restore point. Each of these has a deviceID field. I believe that if you change these fields to your own unique device id number and wait until after the phone is connected to zune to replace the files, you may be able to use someone else's backup files on your phone.
Also, I reverted my phone to 7008, but once there, I was unable to get the chevron unlock to work. I'm not sure why this is or what I did wrong.
Later tonight, I will try to restore my wife's phone using my restore point as a proof of concept

Proof of Concept failed...
this is what I did...
1. First, I located the existing backup files on my computer.
C:\Users\#USER#\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Phone Update
In this location, there is a folder with a long name that looks like this:
B12da62f - d8d2d122 – 81d60512 - 6aaa3f12
This folder holds your restore files. This number is your unique device ID number.
2. I copied this folder and its contents to a safe place in case I needed it later. I have made it a practice to make a backup copy of all my backups so I can restore to any point. Restoring your own backups definitely works. I’ve done this several times with many old and new backups. See this thread http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1060103&highlight=backup+file+locations+zune for details on how
3. Next, I got a backup file that didn’t belong to my phone and I edited the .xml files
- in the properties folder, you’ll find properties.xml
- I opened this file using notepad and change the #’s in the DeviceUrlId field to my unique device ID number
<DeviceUrlId>zune-tuner://windowsphone/XXXXXXXX%20-%20XXXXXXXX%20-%20XXXXXXXX%20-%20XXXXXXXX</DeviceUrlId>
- in RestorePoint\5372F2DE-F333-4717-9CB8-1846BE19900E\Data there is Manifest.xml
- I alsoopened this file using notepad and change the X’s in the DeviceId field to my unique device ID number
<DeviceId>XXXXXXXX - XXXXXXXX - XXXXXXXX - XXXXXXXX</DeviceId>
4. I connected my Focus to the computer and opened and waited for Zune to open
- waited for it to finish syncing
- left my Focus connected and Zune open.
5. Then I replaced the authentic backup files with the edited files from the other phone.
- Opened the backup file location on your computer from step 1
- Delete the existing Properties and RestorePoint folders
- Copied the Properties and RestorePoint folders from step 3 into this folder
6. I returned to Zune, went into Settings, then go to Update
- Wait for Zune to finish looking for an update
- It indicated that I had a restore point
- I selected to restore and followed the prompts
- All appears to be going well
7. On Step 3: Restoring Backup, the phone restarts, the and the Backup fails
- It spits out error code 801812E0
- I can't find anything on this code anywhere
At the beginning of step 3 it must be checking something in one of the other files?
IDK...
I do think this could work if we knew what Zune was checking that gives it the fail.

A quick look at the data files suggests to me that they may be encrypted. This would make sense, since otherwise you could overwrite the OS at a very low level by modifying your backup and then "restoring" it.
I bet the encryption key is stored in the device somehow, though.

GoodDayToDie said:
A quick look at the data files suggests to me that they may be encrypted. This would make sense, since otherwise you could overwrite the OS at a very low level by modifying your backup and then "restoring" it.
I bet the encryption key is stored in the device somehow, though.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
they are encrypted and sighed against your imei and CID from the sd card.
and it could be that it is sighed online when you are downloading the update (but I don't know that for sure)
but the main problem is that you can't use another his backup because the activation email adress is stored in the backup.
and it is way to complicated to get that out because it is stored on to many parts of the backup.
so if there was a way to hack the encryption you could only use it on your own phone.

ceesheim said:
they are encrypted and sighed against your imei and CID from the sd card.
and it could be that it is sighed online when you are downloading the update (but I don't know that for sure)
but the main problem is that you can't use another his backup because the activation email adress is stored in the backup.
and it is way to to get that out because it is stored on to many parts of the backup.
so if there was a way to hack the encryption you could only use it on your own phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't think the email has anything to do with it.
I have tried all variables of restore files to phones with live activation set up and not set up.
With the false restore files, it fails the same regardless.
With restore files from the phone, it works the same, regardless of what live account is activated on the phone or in the restore.
Sent from my Focus using XDA Windows Phone 7 App

As I mentioned, it is not the way we can walk. One phone, one backup, another phone, another and so on. Sad but true.

well, FWIW, here are the 7008 backup files...
7008_Backup.zip
the file is 515 MB.
There is no Live account associated with the backup and I've already replaced the device ID info in the two xml files with X's

munkeyphyst said:
well, FWIW, here are the 7008 backup files...
7008_Backup.zip
the file is 515 MB.
There is no Live account associated with the backup and I've already replaced the device ID info in the two xml files with X's
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It would've spared you some time, I did it before you and it's not working. As ceesheim said, they are tied to hardware.
I'm looking now to patch Zune to bypass that.

Thanks, I didn't see that. I hope the "clean" 7008 restore files are of use.

Is there the possibility to extract specific files ie those related to SMS and use them in another backup?

efjay said:
Is there the possibility to extract specific files ie those related to SMS and use them in another backup?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not at the moment, as the backup files are encrypted. Different people (myself too) are working on various approaches, to try to access or unpack the rom files (from backups).

EnderPsp said:
Not at the moment, as the backup files are encrypted. Different people (myself too) are working on various approaches, to try to access or unpack the rom files (from backups).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the reply.

I wrote something about this topic overhere.

EnderPsp said:
It would've spared you some time, I did it before you and it's not working. As ceesheim said, they are tied to hardware.
I'm looking now to patch Zune to bypass that.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
it isn't zune that check it but the ULDR that validates it , so it doesn't bring you anywhere to patch ZUNE I think.

7008_Backup.zip
7008_Backup.zip multiuplood link please

ranya said:
7008_Backup.zip multiuplood link please
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There is no way (yet) to use another phone's backup so a link would not help you.

Sorry to resurrect this thread, but maybe all we would need to do is change the activeid and the folder, that goes 8-4-4-4-12 with random numbers. Is there another 7008 backup to compare that number with? maybe all you need is the activeid for your phone, if phones have seperate active ids.

Whatsapp doesnt restore Backups

atm im jumping between different roms while waiting for next cm release. i also use whatsapp. everywhere on the net its is said that WA is supposed to ask me to restore previously made backups. BUT IT NEVER DID!
does anyone know how to restore those backups? or better: whats the problem with ace/WA? i have tons of backups, but could never use them-.-
things i already did:
- install, then add backup
- put backup into sd, then install
- searched here and found a tool that was supposed to show the chats in browser (and it failed hard (XD), what doesnt matters, cuz it doesnt solve the problem)
these chatts dont contain highly important information, but it would be very nice to have them back
thanks in advance

hmm me use whatsapp too.. as long as i remember... i never make backups.. but after switching roms.. it always ask me to restore from backup or not.. dunno either..

there is a possibility to manually make backups of WA chats. i saved the folder, flashed, put the folder back, installed: nothing happened

CJCord said:
there is a possibility to manually make backups of WA chats. i saved the folder, flashed, put the folder back, installed: nothing happened
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i switch roms often too. and whatsapp.. well it does ask me to restore from the backup..
u could try an alternative - use titanium backup to backup the application+data.
that way when u restore from titanium, u will have ur messages back.

i dont need titanium for that. the files it rstores the chats with are at /data/data/com.whatsapp
i had an old nandroid backup (stock rom), extracted those files, copied them in their place (see above) and it "worked". i dont get asked to restore, but the chats are "just there". and you cant tell me this is normal. this is only possible if you are rooted. afaik no stock rom is usually rooted
but even the official wa help states, that ONLY the folder on SD card has to be copied to new device/new rom and it should work. WhyTF it doesnt do it for me?
€: sry fogot that: the nand-BU is old as hell. the chats i want to restore are from a rom already deleted/overwritten so restoring via titanium would be a bit hard (cuz theres no backup of that rom. there was no reason for that)

Can someone where the backup works, can tell me if you have a ".crypt" file or not?
seems that "my" WA cant read its own encrypted DBs -.-
it worked when transforming the crypted DB into an unencrypted DB

Hi
I've just encountered this problem too, lost all my messages of over 2 years! I too have ".crypt" file but it doesn't ask me to restore it. Did you find a solution? Please say yes!!
thanks
CJCord said:
Can someone where the backup works, can tell me if you have a ".crypt" file or not?
seems that "my" WA cant read its own encrypted DBs -.-
it worked when transforming the crypted DB into an unencrypted DB
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

more or less....
WA still didnt accept its own files but try this: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1583021
worked well and i have all my conversations back.
hope i could help

Saw that, and yes it works well. Obviously better than nothing, but not the same as getting them back in the phone. I've opened a support issue with WhatsApp, maybe a future release can resolve this.
cheers!

if you encrypt them with the tool, WA will restore them and you will have youre stuff "back in the phone"
if you get a response from official wa, please share =)

CJCord said:
if you encrypt them with the tool, WA will restore them and you will have youre stuff "back in the phone"
if you get a response from official wa, please share =)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You mean, if you decrypt the database file with the tool Whatsapp Xtract. Yes, that should work.
[TOOL] Whatsapp Backup Messages Extractor
Decrypt, then copy the decrypted file (msgstore.db instead of msgstore.db.crypt) onto the folder /sdcard/WhatsApp/Databases, make sure it's the only database file inside that folder and then newly install WhatsApp. It should ask you to import the backup during the process of installation.

Thanks you ztedd, that makes more sense! Are you saying that only decrypted files get restored? That's not the impression the WhatsApp website gave me.
ztedd said:
You mean, if you decrypt the database file with the tool Whatsapp Xtract. Yes, that should work.
[TOOL] Whatsapp Backup Messages Extractor
Decrypt, then copy the decrypted file (msgstore.db instead of msgstore.db.crypt) onto the folder /sdcard/WhatsApp/Databases, make sure it's the only database file inside that folder and then newly install WhatsApp. It should ask you to import the backup during the process of installation.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Backup foun but..
FrikyBCN said:
Thanks you ztedd, that makes more sense! Are you saying that only decrypted files get restored? That's not the impression the WhatsApp website gave me.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Whatsapp now detects a Backup, but when i hit "yes" to restore it, not a single chat gets restored. :/ Any suggestions?
I copied the file msgstore.db.html from the tool to the database directory and the delete the ".html" ending.
*WORKS: Copy the msgstore.plain.db file an rename it to msgstore.db, then it works!
Thanks!

Hi
i too have experienced lots of problems restoring my old chat from my old phone. I followed your advice below and it worked.
However, I have now lost my new messages that were on my new phone. How do I restore them too?
Please help...I'm totally clueless....Thanks
[Decrypt, then copy the decrypted file (msgstore.db instead of msgstore.db.crypt) onto the folder /sdcard/WhatsApp/Databases, make sure it's the only database file inside that folder and then newly install WhatsApp. It should ask you to import the backup during the process of installation.[/QUOTE]

If you have questions, ask in the Q & A thread!
Sent from my rooted microwave

why opening new thread if old one still exists?
@topic: ztedd postet in his thread a solution to merge 2 databases. i havent tried it myself yet (was posted a few days ago. (well. earlierer, but it had some...problems)) but it looks promising

Apologises if I am incorrectly posting on this forum but as my username suggests I am totally clueless to how this process works.
I do not not how to ask a question in the thread Q&A as suggested and by replying did not realise that I had posted a new thread.
Please forgive me.
Please advice how to correctly use this forum and how do I merge databases on two samsung phones or generally, after having successfully restored my old chat history following your advice, how do I add/merge the new chat on my new phone to the old chat that now appears to have replaced my new chat history.
Thanking you in advance for your help.
ztedd said:
You mean, if you decrypt the database file with the tool Whatsapp Xtract. Yes, that should work.
[TOOL] Whatsapp Backup Messages Extractor
Decrypt, then copy the decrypted file (msgstore.db instead of msgstore.db.crypt) onto the folder /sdcard/WhatsApp/Databases, make sure it's the only database file inside that folder and then newly install WhatsApp. It should ask you to import the backup during the process of installation.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Totally clueless said:
Apologises if I am incorrectly posting on this forum but as my username suggests I am totally clueless to how this process works.
I do not not how to ask a question in the thread Q&A as suggested and by replying did not realise that I had posted a new thread.
Please forgive me.
Please advice how to correctly use this forum and how do I merge databases on two samsung phones or generally, after having successfully restored my old chat history following your advice, how do I add/merge the new chat on my new phone to the old chat that now appears to have replaced my new chat history.
Thanking you in advance for your help.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's alright.
You'll soon get used to it.
And btw, welcome to xda!
Sent from my rooted microwave

Your welcome
/topic: the thread you already posted "[TOOL] Whatsapp Backup Messages Extractor" contains all neccesary information you need for your operation: Programs, knoledge, and a little how-to.
But you will have to read by yourself
and you should read most of it, as those information are a bit...fragmented and scattered around that thread^^
€: im in a helpy mood^^ there you go: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=37292158&postcount=464

guys i need help please i have the db.crypt file from the SD and only the files from the SD i backed it up while ago on my pc and now i deleted all files in the database and uninstalled whatsapp and added the backed file in database and reinstalled but i didnt get the restore msg :/ is there any way possible to restore those msgs its really important :/ i didnt know i had to back the files in root/data tho i am not rooted and the whatsapp xtracter asks for wa.db otherwise it says the file doesnt contain chat_list table >.>
please if there is any way lead me to it