Develop Bugs

[Q] Replacement EVO here / need advice on avoiding loosing RSA keys (4G) again

History :
Was running Fresh 3.2.00 and all was good.
Updated to 3.3.0.1 without wiping *as was instructed* and lost 4G connectivity
alltogether.
Did some investigation and found my 4G Mac to be hosed so after reading the forums I used the adb method to manually correct the mac address.
The correction was successful but 4G never came back and thanks to the knowledgeable people on this forum I narrowed it down to missing RSA keys.
I did have two nandroid backups from when the 4G was working but restoring either of them didnt solve the problem.
So, the new EVO is here (insurance) and its ready for rooting and I would love to avoid bricking my 4G again.
Please advise me on how to proceed:
1. I already found a thread on how to root the phone with stock 2.2
2. How do I take precautions - how do I backup the rsa keys as to not get into the
same situation again?
The new EVO's stats are the following:
Android version 2.2
Baseband version 2.15.00.07.28
Kernel version 2.6.32.15-g746f4f0
[email protected] #58
Build number 3.26.651.6 cl218634 release-keys
Software number 3.26.651.6
Browser version Webkit 3.1
PRI : 1.71_003
PRL: 60671
All help and feedback is much appreciated

What exactly is "loose" on the phone?

m4rk0358 said:
What exactly is "loose" on the phone?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The "old" phone after the fresh rom update somehow lost its RSA authentication keys so
I was never able to connect - authenticate with sprint again for 4G connectivity.

when you make a nand backup using amon ra 1.8.0 it will save a wimax.img, this should keep your keys intact so if you lose them again flashing this file should restore them

After rooting your EVO, flash Amon Ra's custom recovery 1.8 and make a NAND back up.
The NAND copy an image of your rom+wimax partition will retain most everything.
If you ever run into a problem like losing your rsa keys for w/e reason then you can NAND back to the copied image.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

shawnathan9 said:
After rooting your EVO, flash Amon Ra's custom recovery 1.8 and make a NAND back up.
The NAND copy an image of your rom+wimax partition will retain most everything.
If you ever run into a problem like losing your rsa keys for w/e reason then you can NAND back to the copied image.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So the correct sequence will be:
1. Root the phone
2. Flash Amon Ra's custom recovery 1.8 and make a NAND back up.
3. Install custom rom.
Am I correct ?
PS: By the way, which rooting process would you use for a stock EVO that already came with 2.2 ?

aj74 said:
So the correct sequence will be:
1. Root the phone
2. Flash Amon Ra's custom recovery 1.8 and make a NAND back up.
3. Install custom rom.
Am I correct ?
PS: By the way, which rooting process would you use for a stock EVO that already came with 2.2 ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
youre also going to want to keep a copy of that first nand on your computer or somewhere super safe so you never lose your backed up keys
you can use unrevoked 3.21 and you can set it to install amon ra as it roots and s-off your phone, i just went through exactly the same thing.

Thanks for the help !
I just installed Unrevoked - smooth ride-
Installeld Rom Manager (Clockwork) and used it to install AR 1.8 Recovery
Doing my first Nandroid backup now.
After that, I will give Fresh 3.3.1 a try.

Awesome!!!!
Everything worked
ROM installed, I already had the latest radio and wimax on the phone when it arrived...and guess what...I am posting this while waiting on my car at the wash...over 4G!!!!!
http://www.speedtest.net/android/14239386.png
Thanks for all the help !!!!
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

Assuming RSA Private Keys are stored in the wimax.img (from nanadroid backup), use ARMON RA to backup your keys, ClockWorkMod does NOT backup wimax.img.
Now, best advice, DONT DO THE SAME THING, i.e., do not flash radio, wimax, nv, etc., until we ALL have a better idea of the pro/cons. Albeit the cons are plenty at this point. Root/Nand-unlock, flash away, Roms, Themes, whatever else but these.
Also, don't just do a nandroid-backup, turn right around and do a nandroid-restore, make friggin sure your backup is good BEFORE you need it.
EVO on...

Thanks for the advice, ....and I did.
After installing clockwork/ Rom Manager the first thing I did was to set it to install
AR 1.8 as alternative recovery and immediately tested it and did a full nandroid backup.
I checked the backup and the wimax.img is there.

o n o!
so your saying i need a new EVO?

[Q] Clockwork And Amon

Question. I currently have Clockwork for my recovery but now when I try to boot into it via vol up and power it vibrates 3 times and I have to pull the battery and reboot the other way. I think the recovery is broken. Can this be fixed? If I flash Clockwork again will it destroy my recovery images and nand back up? Also, if i switch to Amon can it use clockworks files to back up the phone or do you need to start over? I dont want to lose my original recovery and back up since I rooted. Can anyone help? Also, my Market icon isn't changing anymore with Riptides theme since the new flash. Thanks.
EVO 2.2
Unrevoked Forever
Fresh 3.4.0.1
Netarchy 4.1.9.1 cfs
Riptide 9 Glass Theme v8

It's vol down+power. I think vol up may have worked with an earlier bootloader or firmware, but it definitely doesn't work now.

Also to add on, if you made a backup with ClockworkMod recovery, you cannot restore it with RA recovery.

idk if im rite o no but i dnt thnk ur gona lose thngs if u re install clockwork cuz theres on ur sdcard. idk if im rite o wrng

m3xicanprid3 said:
idk if im rite o no but i dnt thnk ur gona lose thngs if u re install clockwork cuz theres on ur sdcard. idk if im rite o wrng
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wow that was painful to read...but yes, you are correct. Nandroid backups are stored on the SD card (in different formats for AmonRA or Clockwork, depending on what you used to perform the backup). You do need to use the same recovery to restore a backup that you used to back it up in the first place, but wiping your recovery won't kill any backups you made. Repartitioning or wiping your sd card, however...

thecodemonk said:
Wow that was painful to read...but yes, you are correct. Nandroid backups are stored on the SD card (in different formats for AmonRA or Clockwork, depending on what you used to perform the backup). You do need to use the same recovery to restore a backup that you used to back it up in the first place, but wiping your recovery won't kill any backups you made. Repartitioning or wiping your sd card, however...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did something change recently? Because I could have sworn that I've used them interchangeably. I've had to move the backups to different locations depending on the recovery, but usually I can get them to restore. If I'm not mistaken, they both use Nandroid to perform the backup. I think the biggest difference is ClockworkMod does an MD5 checksum, and Amon doesn't, which can cause problems if you don't disable MD5 check.

Vol down plus power.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

Thanks everyone for the quick responses. Anyone have any idea about the Riptide9 theme not changing all the images though? I cleared it and flashed the theme three times now. Maybe it's the new update...
I still don't think Clockwork wipes the Dalvik/cache/battery

clockwork definitely has problems with dalvik. i use amon. adb is a bit touchy with it, but it is all around better. and also nand backups backup wimax images.

[Q] Restoring to a different Phone using CWM

I know that I have seen this question asked before but I can't find the post. I broke my evo (let's call it #1) and I am trying to restore evo#1 CWM backup onto evo #2 the new phone that I just got. I have put the sdcard from evo#1 with its latest backup into evo#2 and have booted into recovery.
I remember seeing that you can't do a full restore but rather to use Advance Restore but I don't remember which components to restore and which not. I think that I restore all but WIMAX bacause WIMAX is different for each phone.
Anyone know ??

ChadH42 said:
I know that I have seen this question asked before but I can't find the post. I broke my evo (let's call it #1) and I am trying to restore evo#1 CWM backup onto evo #2 the new phone that I just got. I have put the sdcard from evo#1 with its latest backup into evo#2 and have booted into recovery.
I remember seeing that you can't do a full restore but rather to use Advance Restore but I don't remember which components to restore and which not. I think that I restore all but WIMAX bacause WIMAX is different for each phone.
Anyone know ??
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Generally, I don't believe it's recommended to restore a backup from one phone to another. However, I've seen reports that it it can be done. As you assumed, you are correct by NOT restoring the wimax. If you were to do that, it would restore the RSA keys of your old phone, overwriting your NEW RSA keys. You don't want to do that. So remove the wimax.img from your nandroid backup before you restore.
Also, I'm not positive on this, but I do believe that if your old backup was made on a certain hboot version, that you need to be on the same hboot version when restoring that backup. (lets say you when you created the backup, your hboot version was 2.10, then when you restore your backup, be sure the hboot version on the new phone is also 2.10). The reason I believe taht to be true, is because I had always had hboot .93 on my phone, and all backups I had ever made were when I was running .93 hboot. I then downgraded to the ENG .76 hboot, (to use fastboot), and I tried to restore a backup that had been created when I was on .93 hboot, and it did not go well. After the backup restored and I rebooted, it booted straight to fastboot, and that was the only place I could get. None of my old backups would restore. I then switched back to hboot .93, and my backups restore perfectly fine. So that is what led me to my conclusion. Good luck with your quest. ( i personally recommend just starting fresh, and not restoring an old backup, just to be safe)

k2buckley got you covered, but restoring a backup from an old phone to a new one WILL cause you problems, and the easiest way to avoid it is to not do it.
The best you can do is backup your apps via titanium backup and your launcher settings, transfer those folders to your new phone. When restoring the apps, do only app and data, NOT system settings.

Thank you both for the reply. Based upon your feedback I decided to do a clean install of everything.

You're welcome; just trying to make it smooth as possible.

Wimax.img file size?

Through help on another thread, I was able to locate a wimax.img from a prior nandroid backup made with amon's recovery. I was also able to open terminal and flash it back to the system making the Wimax keychecker say my keys were now ok. Question is this. Why would directly flashing the wimax.img recover the key but when I tried nandroid restoring the whole folder, the keys still wouldn't be present even though the wimax.img was in the folder?
Also, someone please check your nandroid folders and let me know how large the wimax.img is. The one I got to flash successfully is just over 2,000kb. I also found an old clockwork recovery on my sd card with a backup that has a wimax image file of nearly 12,000kb! Restoring that backup still showed my keys missing with keychecker though. When I tried to directly flash the 12,000kb wimax file, i received a bad block error.
My problem is that even though my mac address checks out and keys are present, I still cannot connect to Sprint 4g, it scans and finds the service, but connects and disconnects repeatedly without ever making a good connection. Is there a way my keys show up but aren't correct? Does the radio version at the time of backup make a difference when you are trying to recover?

legasus233 said:
Through help on another thread, I was able to locate a wimax.img from a prior nandroid backup made with amon's recovery. I was also able to open terminal and flash it back to the system making the Wimax keychecker say my keys were now ok. Question is this. Why would directly flashing the wimax.img recover the key but when I tried nandroid restoring the whole folder, the keys still wouldn't be present even though the wimax.img was in the folder?
Also, someone please check your nandroid folders and let me know how large the wimax.img is. The one I got to flash successfully is just over 2,000kb. I also found an old clockwork recovery on my sd card with a backup that has a wimax image file of nearly 12,000kb! Restoring that backup still showed my keys missing with keychecker though. When I tried to directly flash the 12,000kb wimax file, i received a bad block error.
My problem is that even though my mac address checks out and keys are present, I still cannot connect to Sprint 4g, it scans and finds the service, but connects and disconnects repeatedly without ever making a good connection. Is there a way my keys show up but aren't correct? Does the radio version at the time of backup make a difference when you are trying to recover?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am not 100pct sure about this but I thought only Amon had the proper ability to backup wimax keys and restore without a problem. I could be wrong since I was not a fan of Clockwork just for that reason. My Wimax backup is 12 megs

wimax for me are always 12000 if you are trying to restore with clockwork you need to select advanced restore so that it restores your wimax too,because clockwork backs up your wimax by default but doesnt restore on a normal restore just on advanced

Well, I think what the real question is though is just because keychecker says my rsa key is present, doesn't necessarily mean the whole thing is present? I appears my backup with the 2,000kb wimax.img may not complete? I will look for advanced restore in clockwork to see if that restores the image.
At some point I wiped my sd card (copied all files first to pc) and reformated it for ext 1 and ext 2. My guess is this occurred somewhere between having wimax keys and temporarily losing them. Would this have screwed something up with my wimax partition where the wimax was originally stored?

thats a good question, because i have 2 sd cards one partitioned and one that's not, and i have never tried restoring a partition back up on the non partition card and the other way around.

What are your thoughts on the actually size of the wimax.img and the fact that keychecker says the key is present??

why dont you try getting a stock rom like sprint lover and doing a full wipe with something like caulkins wipe all and flashing the rom to see if its your rom not playing well with your wimax. also where did you get your wimax backup from?
edit: better yet why dont you flash clockwork and do an advance restore from the one that has the 12000, then if your 4g gets fixed, go back to amon and reflash to what ever you have now, i would suggets that if 4g gets fixed you dont restore, instead redo everything from scratch and then back up

What are your thoughts on the actually size of the wimax.img and the fact that keychecker says the key is present??

I got the 2,000kb wimax.img from one of my nandroid backup folders. Just this morning, I flashed the pc36100 sprint lovers rom and it said the keys were missing. Plus, the 4g wouldn't even turn on, it just stayed at turning on before finally saying unable to start 4g. The 4g doesn't work on any roms I have tried (currently on Fresh 3.5) I have tried Myns, Kings, CM7, and a couple others, to no avail.

emcp422 said:
why dont you try getting a stock rom like sprint lover and doing a full wipe with something like caulkins wipe all and flashing the rom to see if its your rom not playing well with your wimax. also where did you get your wimax backup from?
edit: better yet why dont you flash clockwork and do an advance restore from the one that has the 12000, then if your 4g gets fixed, go back to amon and reflash to what ever you have now, i would suggets that if 4g gets fixed you dont restore, instead redo everything from scratch and then back up
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Good info. Will it work if I just do an advanced restore of the wimax? Or do I need to advance restore the system and everything for it to work. I am currently on my favorite fresh 3.5 setup and just switched to Clockwork and was hoping I could just do the advanced wimax restore. Or will that backup no play nicely on it's own?

try alone first if it doenst work try the full backup

Here is the interesting part. I did the clockwork advanced restore and verified the wimax key was present on my current Fresh setup. I also refreshed the old Clockwork backup that contained the wimax originally and got the system up and running (It was Sprint lovers I believe) and verified the wimax key was present. I checked both of the backup folders and the wimax.img created in clockwork in both cases was about 12,000kb. I then switched recoveries back to amon and did a full backup (selected all options) of both the Fresh system and Sprint lovers. When I open up those nandroid files, the wimax.img is only about 2,000kb? So, either I am not backing up what I think I am, or these two recoveries back up wimax much differently resulting in various output file sizes. Can someone explain this?
Also if am running one of these with verified wimax key, then nandroid restore to another file that doesn't have the wimax.img backed up, will I still have the key in place left over from what I was running? I understand how all of this works relatively well, but this wimax stuff sure has been throwing me for a loop! Thanks again for all the help!

My 4G works, and my Amon Ra wimax.img is 12 mb (12000 kb). Perhaps you should try a fresh download and install Amon Ra again, then try only backing up wimax. I only used Clockwork to make a backup once, right after I rooted, and don't have it handy to check the size of that one if it even has a wimax.img. I originally backed up my wimax keys via terminal, it was about 4000kb if I remember correctly.
If you restore a backup made with AR that doesn't include wimax, your working 4G should remain intact.
But your situation is odd... so I can't guarantee that to be the case.
(from... Evo/MIUI/Tapatalk)

yeah you can restore,just make sue you dont select wimax, and yeah it sounds like your amon ra is bad, its should always be 12000. but good to hear you are up and running, remember always and remember to restore with the recovery you used to back up, and i would keep a copy of the working wimax backup on my pc for safe keeping

What I don't understand is why my wimax key checker says the keys are intact even after flashing the 2000 kilobytes wimax.img
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

Also, how can I safely flash a new recovery without losing anything? I have not done that in particular yet, with the exception of my original root process, but that included every step
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

legasus233 said:
Also, how can I safely flash a new recovery without losing anything? I have not done that in particular yet, with the exception of my original root process, but that included every step
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can download a PC36IMG of Amon Ra from my dropbox, here: http://db.tt/WP0beNa
Don't rename it - it's named PC36IMG.zip exactly (even if you can't see the .zip), which is what it needs to be named. Put it on the root of your SD card, then boot into the bootloader. It'll scan for the file then ask you to update. Agree with the volume up button, then when it finishes flashing, don't reboot when it asks you. Instead go into recovery and make a nandroid backup of only wimax. If you want, you can go ahead and backup the default options as well, but do them in a separate backup.
Reboot back into the rom and make sure that 4G is working properly, then check the size of the wimax.img file.
If it's still too small, then that's totally weird. Hope you get it figured out, though.

OK, I flashed the recovery and made a nandroid backup of the wimax. I then used file explorer to check the size and it still says 2.38 MB. Just to make sure, I then changed to clockwork and recovered a wimax image that was 11.88 MB and rebooted. I then changed recoveries back to amon again to make a nandroid backup of my recovered clockwork image. Again, the nandroid output image file was 2.3 MB!?!
Is there some other way to check the wimax size/files without doing a backup? I am so confused right now.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

what version of amon ra are you using i suggest 2.3, and also as long as you have a working backup even if it is from clockworkmod your safe, you can always go back and forth between recoveries if you need to, and if you need to restore a nadroid, just uncheck wimax, that way you dont touch the one you have that is working

If I recover one wimax.img over another, wont the original get overwritten? If there were any errors in flashing either of the images, wouldn't it tell me?
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

missing rsa keys

I ran wimax checker from the market and it tells me my rsa keys are missing. I don't have a backup of my stock rom. So my question is this. Is there any way to restore my RSA keys?? I'm on the newest hboot rooted with s-off. Now I don't remember what recovery I was using but I did wipe something that said wimax at one point. I am currently using amon-ra style. My 4g turns on it just never connects, I am running Alter Rom, http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1550526, which is a stock ROM. But my 4g problems happens with sense or AOSP. I didn't have any 4g problems before I did the wimax format. I have flashed the mewest radio combo which got my 4g to turn off and on again but I still can not connect. Anybody have any ideas??? Thank you.

Do you have any nandroids at all, or did you ever select Wimax backup in them?
I have a nandroid of just Wimax just for this case.

No nandroids at all.......I'm SOL huh??

Sorry, I don't know any other way... Perhaps maybe a cwm backup from originally rooting and flashing amon ra? Could always flash back to cwn and restore that? Otherwise sorry.

I think you're kinda boned on this one bud. search all of your stuff for a backup and see if you can get your WIMAX keys out of it