Develop Bugs

[Q] Xperia Play Flashing to stock ROM?

Ok I've been using Cyanogenmod 7 on the Xperia Play and I want to flash back to the stock ROM, do I just simply flash with Flash tool or there are precautions to be made.
Does the stock ROM need a specific baseband, etc

You should be fine, flashtool really takes care of everything, obviously the one thing you do need to do is back up your apps and data (as I would reccommend not carrying over old data/settings). If you wanted to be really safe you can go into CWM and clear your cache, davlik, etc. just to be sure any incompatiable settings arent brought over. But take a nandroid backup before, so if something does fail you can just fastboot a kernel and restore to try again.

[Q] Looking to Edumacate my Rooting ABCs

Hello All,
About to be first time rooter and want to ensure I have a complete understanding of how things work before I fully commit. I’ve been trying to piece together information from various threads and I think I have a basic understanding of how things work. Can you please help me verify?
1. When you flash a ROM, the ROM automatically comes with a kernel. The kernel can be stock or custom, but regardless, all ROMS have a kernel automatically bundled when you flash the ROM. Correct?
2. Once you flash a new ROM and the corresponding kernel it comes with, you can swap out the kernel with something else, as long as it says it’s compatible with that ROM version. For instance, if the ROM says it’s built from 4.0.4, as long as the kernel you want to swap says that it’s compatible with anything 4.0.4, then you are good to go. Correct?
3. Radios need to be updated manually. Most ROMs and kernels do not update the Radio in most cases (or do not have radios bundled)…. With one of the exceptions being the Official Google ROMs. If I were to flash a leaked Stock 4.0.4 OTA Verizon ROM, I would actually get a new ROM, Kernel, and Radio. Correct? If I were to flash AKOP (or another popular ROM), I would get the ROM, bundled kernel, but NO radio. Correct?
4. A Nandroid backup backs up the ROM, Kernel, all applications installed, app user configurations/preferences…… basically everything EXCEPT the radio. If I were to restore a Nandroid backup, there is no need to restore apps and reconfigure apps/preferences…. It’s a snap shot in time (or whenever the last backup was made). Correct?
5. Using Titanium to batch backup apps/preferences is really only necessary when you want to flash a new completely different ROM and want to restore your apps from a previous completely different ROM. Correct?
6. Let's say I'm rooted and unlocked boot loader and on a custom ROM..... Verizon pushes out a new OTA update Stock ROM (let's say 4.0.4). What do I need to do? Restore 4.0.2 Stock from Google's developer website? If I were to restore the Google developer Website 4.0.2 version, my assumption is that I lose root (boot loader still remains unlocked). Do I need to re-lock the boot loader for Verizon OTA updates?
7. When I install a new ROM, do I loose root unless the ROM specifically says it comes with Root?
****** additional questions/verification added after sean and artvandelay responded ***************
8. Nandroid backups do not back up the SD card folder. This should be done manually (copy directory to Computer every once in a while). Correct?
9. When I installed space heavy games, I should have installed the game data portion (when it prompted to store at App level or SD Card Level) in the SD Card directory. Now if I Nandroid, It will be unnecessarily larger because it’s taking the game data stored at the app layer correct?
10. When you flash new ROMs or restore Nandroid backups, the sdcard directory remains unaffected. Correct?
11. Only when the boot loader is unlocked/re-locked is when the SD Card directory gets wiped. Correct?
12. Let’s say I need to restore to factory (back to stock – original ROM, Kernel and Radio, no traces of root, locked boot loader, etc.)…. All I do is go to Google’s DEV download ROM site, download the latest official ROM. It will restore the ROM/kernel combination and the original radio associated with the stock ROM, gets rid of all traces of root (since stock does not have root access). I will have to manually re-lock the boot loader (which will in turn wipe the SD Card directory). Correct?
13. Can someone shed some light on "GAPPS". I realize they are a bundle of Google Apps, but once I install, will I still get updates from Google Play when updates occur? Do GAPPS just save time from having to manually download? If I restore from titanium backup (after ROM and GAPP install), I need to ensure that I do not restore any app that falls into the GAPP category correct?
So did I pass? Is my understanding there? Am I missing any essential basics? Thank you all for your input!

1)correct
2)correct
3)correct
4)correct......it also backs up radio too
5)usually a good rule with tb is to only restore apps and app data, and not system setting an prefs so things dont bug out going from rom to rom
6)usually best to wait until dev updates their custom rom to new firmware(devs update rather quickly) better than unrooting then rooting stock rom only later to flash a custom rom that has been updated to latest firmware
7)most if not all custom roms are already pre-rooted
YOU PASSED!!!
Research is Key

Thanks sean.... especially for elaborating on bullet point #5. I think I've read that somewhere regarding only doing the user apps/apps data, but forgot to ask. I'm pretty excited about doing this.

A Nandroid will definitely not backup your radio.

Did a quick search around the interwebs.... artvandelay seems to be correct. The majority seem to say that radios will not be backed up.

[Q] Backup done, ready for root?

Hi. I backed up my phone using the backup method found here: http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/28296/full-backup-of-non-rooted-devices
This method uses CMD and creates an android backup file (.ab) I want to unlock my bootloader and add the custom clockwork recovery. Of course unlocking the bootloader wipes everything. So if i were to restore everything with the .ab file, then do the custom recovey with the superuser thing, would that give me root, and would all of my apps and data be restored as they are right now?
Probably a stupid question, but i want to be completely 100% sure i won't mess up my phone. I know its going to void warranty, which would be a problem if i dropped it of course
Thanks

It should work yes, you can also backup apps with an app called carbon. Free in the playstore.
Then unlock the bootloader,flash a custom recovery and make a backup of the stock rom in there right away too (needed when you want to go back to full stock for future updates) its called a nandroid backup.
Then root it and restore, or install a brand new custom already rooted rom

Thanks a lot
If it was a custom rom i chose to install, will it still restore? or would it need to be the original stock for the restore to work properly?

Danw20 said:
Thanks a lot
If it was a custom rom i chose to install, will it still restore? or would it need to be the original stock for the restore to work properly?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Afaik know you can restore apps on any rom with carbon. Watch out with restoring system data, it can crash the rom.
Because some custom roms have more changes and if you restore system parts it will break the rom. But apps should not be a problem. The most important thing is that you do a nandroid backup of the stock rom. The rest is easy to setup new in the worst case.

Brilliant. Thanks for the help, much apreciated.
Was half expecting an answer like that, i think i will give root stock a go, then probably when HTC stop updating i will be very tempted to give a custom a go.
Cheers

I have unlocked the bootloader, i think i have flashed the recovery, downloaded nandroid and still says i need root, so i downloaded the superuser thing and when i try to install the binary thing it says there is an error. Anything i can do?
Update: I have learnt Its all good now.

Good mate ! Have fun with your rooted phone
CASE CLOSED !

Questions about flashing custom recovery

My device is currently rooted on GB28. I was able to use a nodata version. If I want to be able to flash ROMs, from what I understand I need to flash a custom recovery, preferably EL26, before flashing the custom ROM. If I need to always flash the recovery first, then will I always end up wiping my data every time I want a new custom ROM? If so how do people easily restore the data like it was before a wipe?

Mgssidley said:
My device is currently rooted on GB28. I was able to use a nodata version. If I want to be able to flash ROMs, from what I understand I need to flash a custom recovery, preferably EL26, before flashing the custom ROM. If I need to always flash the recovery first, then will I always end up wiping my data every time I want a new custom ROM? If so how do people easily restore the data like it was before a wipe?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The preferred way to get cwm prior to flashing roms is indeed el26, due to the fact that it is a safe kernel to flash and not worry about the Emmc bug. Some roms you can do a dirty flash over, but most require a clean install to prevent conflicts that could cause you to bootloop. For restoring data, Titanium Backup is what I use to save and restore all my downloaded apps. I don't particularly if I lose text/calls, but if you are, there are apps on the play store that allow you to save those as well. Tb has that feature as well, but as I said, I don't save those, so can't speak for them. Flashing new roms gives me an excuse to clear out my old texts, calls, etc, lol. Once you flash a custom rom, you can flash build appropriate cwm kernel to go with it that has cwm so the next time you flash a mod, tweaks, etc, toy wont have to flash el26 again. Just boot into recovery, wipe cache/dalvik, flash mod, reboot, enjoy. Good luck, hope that helps.
Sent from my SPH-D710BST using xda premium

Question How does restoring work in this phone?

For context, I want to clear up a few things before trying to root so I don't end up bricking the phone.
So after reading a few threads it seems even recovering via twrp is messed up in this phone. Can someone shed some light on this matter?
Can I restore system, data, and boot partitions via twrp in case something goes wrong (while staying on official miui roms everytime, I don't intend to install custom roms) and I have to revert the phone back to the state it was in at the time of a backup?
It feels like at the very least we would be required to re-flash the entire firmware via mi flash tool and then restore whatever is needed via twrp later. Will this work?
Also I hear using twrp to install the official firmware is not a good idea, what's that about?
I know long post and a lot of questions, so please bear with me.
Thanks.

Custom ROMs and Stock ROMs differ in one aspect, which partitions are left untouched. Since stock ROM is a lot more invasive and formats all partitions, official flash method is recommended.
When you mess things up, mi flash tool is safest option. Its safe to experiment, backup, restore on boot+system+data in TWRP across ROM installs but don't mess up recovery partition. Remember to format data between ROM installs unless dirty flashing on same android version

miravision said:
Custom ROMs and Stock ROMs differ...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I see. Thank you for the reply!