Storage protection, OEM lock and flashing - Samsung Galaxy A3, A5, A7 (2017) Questions & Answe

Hi all, I got a question related to the Data storage protection, OEM unlock and flashing.
I have a rooted stock rom with custom recovery. I still have the data storage protection. So it is not possible to backup or flash the Data storage, but only System in custom recovery.
Now I know I can patch the storage protection to have full root access and make full nandroid backups, but I see this storage protection also as a protection for when I loose my phone and someone for some reasons wants access to my files.
Now my question is IF I have OEM unlock option disabled in OS, will this prevent someone else from removing the storage protection, while I still keep the possibility to flash a stock rom with Odin and does this always result in wiping internal storage (not just apps) or is there a way to keep internal storage data like pictures.

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[Q] What data on mass storage gets erased during wipes?

Given the "new" mass storage system set up on our Galaxy Nexi, what is kept and what is erased when we wipe data and/or other 'partitions'?
When I fastboot oem unlock'ed, everything on the mass storage was wiped out. I was kind of expecting it, so no problems.
EDIT: read that SDcards also get wiped when fastboot oem unlock is executed. Okay, that's a parallel.
I'm wondering because when lots of ROMs start appearing ripe for flashing, will we have to transfer all the contents of the mass storage over to a hard drive, flash the ROM, etc., and then transfer all the contents back? In particular, our titanium backup backups.
Whereas with other Androids with SDcards, provided you didn't specifically wipe sd-ext or format the SD, that was regarded as safe.
After the bootloader is unlocked CWM acts the same as any other device. The "sd card" isn't wiped when flashing.

[Q] Using factory restore and erasing sd card contents within a custom rom

I am curious what the results will be if I use the factory restore within a custom rom . I'm currently running AOKP M5.1 . I am wondering if there are any unsightly ramifications to booting into TWRP and doing a factory restore and erasing the SD card contents? I would like to do this to free up as much space as possible and remove the left over remnants of over 20 flashes and a plethora of app installs. One question I have is will TWRP wipe its own directories?
Would this be better from a stock perspective? The only time I wiped my SD card I was on stock and I really don't care to experience any directory malfunctions or card mounting issues. Doing this within a custom rom will my device still know its a kindle lol?
Edit: I know that this will not restore to 6.3.1 I'm just looking to run AOKP in a clean fresh environment including the SD card thanks for any input
Reserved
Thepooch said:
I am curious what the results will be if I use the factory restore within a custom rom . I'm currently running AOKP M5.1 . I am wondering if there are any unsightly ramifications to booting into TWRP and doing a factory restore and erasing the SD card contents? I would like to do this to free up as much space as possible and remove the left over remnants of over 20 flashes and a plethora of app installs. One question I have is will TWRP wipe its own directories?
Would this be better from a stock perspective? The only time I wiped my SD card I was on stock and I really don't care to experience any directory malfunctions or card mounting issues. Doing this within a custom rom will my device still know its a kindle lol?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You cannot wipe recovery from inside recovery, only the TWRP backups on your sdcard will be lost. The sdcard is on its own partition apart from recovery and system files.
Backups are backed up on my pc also the only time I have used factory restore is when I was going to flash something new. The idea of this seems simple I just don't want it to be problematic since I won't be doing a new flash.
Thepooch said:
I am curious what the results will be if I use the factory restore within a custom rom . I'm currently running AOKP M5.1 . I am wondering if there are any unsightly ramifications to booting into TWRP and doing a factory restore and erasing the SD card contents? I would like to do this to free up as much space as possible and remove the left over remnants of over 20 flashes and a plethora of app installs. One question I have is will TWRP wipe its own directories?
Would this be better from a stock perspective? The only time I wiped my SD card I was on stock and I really don't care to experience any directory malfunctions or card mounting issues. Doing this within a custom rom will my device still know its a kindle lol?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Factory data reset from a ROM will wipe the /data partition. It's effectively the same as "Wipe -> Factory Reset" from TWRP.
On the other hand, if you do the equivalent from the stock software, it too will wipe the /data partition, but it will also take the SD Card contents along with it. I learned this the hard way.
kinfauns said:
Factory data reset from a ROM will wipe the /data partition. It's effectively the same as "Wipe -> Factory Reset" from TWRP.
On the other hand, if you do the equivalent from the stock software, it too will wipe the /data partition, but it will also take the SD Card contents along with it. I learned this the hard way.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would like to flush the SD for a clean start music video and apps can all be restored before I stick both feet in I want to make sure that it just gives me the spring cleaning that I'm looking for
Well here's what I decided to do I figured since I had a working rom on I would do it all from the factory restore in the rom. So I clicked factory restore and erase SD card after rebooting it prompted me to set up my Google account. After it restored my account and all my apps downloaded and installed, I moved some files to my SD that I wanted back on and did a backup through twrp. All said and done I was very excited to see that I had 4 gigs of remaining space on my SD card so I managed to clear out 2 gigs of excess clutter from what I have done on my kindle. The only downside I have noticed so far is when hooking my kindle to my computer it shows G: removable disk . ADB drivers are good but its no longer listed as kindle under my computer which isn't the first time I've seen this.The way I figure no big deal adb works and I can access my SD card contents on my computer how its listed is irrelevant.
Drivers driver drivers windows sucks lol at this point they are functioning so I will not be trying to reinstall them. Later I will try another restore and wipe my SD through twrp to see if that changes probably won't make a difference I'm just gonna do it for kicks and giggles
On a device that only has 5 gigs of storage regaining 2 more gigs of play room is substantial. There was more clutter than what I anticipated I was only hoping for a half a gig and I'm certainly thrilled by 2

[Q] Wiping ALL data?

Galaxy s3 T999 tmobile phone.
Liquid Smooth ROM. - Amazing rom btw. I cant thank those folks enough for their brilliant work
TWRP for recovery
Ive done numerous dalvic/system/cache/data wipes through twrp in preparation for new roms. But my INTERNAL 16 gb SD card always shows that i have around 12GB USED. thats with no personal apps installed
Heres my question. How do i remove all unnecessary data thats hogging up space. I want a CLEAN space to work with!
I do have 4 twrp recovery files (4gb worth of data?) stored in there. Im assuming the system uses about 3 gb's. plus the gapps and liquid rom are only 194 mb combined. So that accounts for maybe 7 or 8 gb
So how do i do a totally clean wipe without losing twrp, recovery files AND root!
the only wipe option ive never used is USB-OTG. (USB On The Go?) No idea what it is or what it does. so i never messed with it. Ive read that it acts like a driver of some sort to allow usb devices to communicate with each other..
Ive also never gone into the Format data section of twrp out of fear that i might wipe the wrong things and render my phone useless
One article i read said that i might have to revert back to stock? im hoping thats not so. And do a factory wipe. Is that different from TWRP's functions? Im assuming that i would lose root.
they said din flash to stock
Odin master clear (or wipe SD from settings)
*2767*3855# on the phones keypad ...(i think codes in general only work on stock TW)
Do i have to format the sd card? would i lose important partitions that would delete the recovery system?
any ideas? i considered opening a partition wizard app to see the different partions on the internal sd card.
I'm no expert on this, but I think that Liquid Smooth has a place in Settings to let you view the space allocation of the storage in your phone and external SD card.
Go to Settings > Storage (or something similar) and take a look at how much space is being allocated of each of the different types of data. It might give you a better idea on what might be taking up that additional ~4GB of space.
If you can, provide us with a screenshot of the Storage screen. If not, you can just type them here so we can better understand what might be going on.
Back up internal sdcard to your computer.
Wipe data/factory reset.
Wipe /data/media.
You can do this through TWRP. Won't lose anything except contents of your internal sdcard. Which is why you back it up first.
Don't forget the formatting of the filesystem does this. Just like windows a 100gig hard drive formats to a smaller amount.
Sent from my SGH-T999 using Tapatalk 2

[Q] Cleaning my internal memory before ROM flash

I flash a lot of roms on my phone. Recently I noticed that there was a lot of left over programs and apps on my internal memory. I have nothing on the phone I want to keep that is not already backed up via TitaniumBackup.
What I would like to do, is wipe everything that I can without messing up partitions or Mount points or the needed stuff in ./data/media so I can flash a new room on a totally clean phone (except for the nessasary files needed like the data/media stuff and recovery stuff ect..)
Normally when I flash I do this: (in TWRP)
1. Nandroid backup
2. Wipe/factory restore
3. Wipe data and system again
4. Flash new ROM
5. Wipe devlik/cache
6. Reboot
When I finally get to the desktop I start up root explorer and look around my internal memory. This is were I still see a lot of old apps still sitting there. I want them gone. I'm afraid to wipe/format internal memory while in TWRP because I will lose everything right ? Even the stuff that is needed to boot the phone to recovery.
Any suggestions ?
Thanks
T-Mobile Samsung G S4
SGH-M919
TWRP v6.x.x.x
16 gig micro sd-card
Go in twrp and click wipe, advanced, and click everything. after wiping Mount the phone to PC via twrp and move the rom and kernel to sd card. Unmount then do the steps you usually do to install a ROM, including wipe.
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Thibor69 said:
I flash a lot of roms on my phone. Recently I noticed that there was a lot of left over programs and apps on my internal memory. I have nothing on the phone I want to keep that is not already backed up via TitaniumBackup.
What I would like to do, is wipe everything that I can without messing up partitions or Mount points or the needed stuff in ./data/media so I can flash a new room on a totally clean phone (except for the nessasary files needed like the data/media stuff and recovery stuff ect..)
Normally when I flash I do this: (in TWRP)
1. Nandroid backup
2. Wipe/factory restore
3. Wipe data and system again
4. Flash new ROM
5. Wipe devlik/cache
6. Reboot
When I finally get to the desktop I start up root explorer and look around my internal memory. This is were I still see a lot of old apps still sitting there. I want them gone. I'm afraid to wipe/format internal memory while in TWRP because I will lose everything right ? Even the stuff that is needed to boot the phone to recovery.
Any suggestions ?
Thanks
T-Mobile Samsung G S4
SGH-M919
TWRP v6.x.x.x
16 gig micro sd-card
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you have your TiBu backups, nandroids, and ROM zips, pictures, videos, etc already on your SD card; there is no harm in formatting your internal memory. You won't lose recovery, you won't have a problem with booting, nothing of that sort.
When I was running SynergyRom on my S3, wiping Internal memory was usually Always suggested because of the reasons you mentioned.
Move your Nandroid and files you want to flash to your extSdCard card for obvious reasons.
I have TWRP 2.5.0.2 as my Recovery, which has been running without issues for months.
Enter Recovery:
Press -
Wipe
Format Data
As a safety valve, you'll be asked to Type in Yes to continue this Internal wipe.
You'll retain the partitions you mentioned.
I think the above will get you to where you want to be.
You can always double check afterward as you've already done before.
Biker1 said:
When I was running SynergyRom on my S3, wiping Internal memory was usually Always suggested because of the reasons you mentioned.
Move your Nandroid and files you want to flash to your extSdCard card for obvious reasons.
I have TWRP 2.5.0.2 as my Recovery, which has been running without issues for months.
Enter Recovery:
Press -
Wipe
Format Data
As a safety valve, you'll be asked to Type in Yes to continue this Internal wipe.
You'll retain the partitions you mentioned.
I think the above will get you to where you want to be.
You can always double check afterward as you've already done before.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just wanted to say good question and responses. Helpful.

Device takes 30GB with nothing installed after decryption

How do I fix this i decrypted it and now this what do I have to do?
Solution
[/IHi! So are you saying it is mandatory to "unencrypt" (hence format int. storage) in order to be able to install this ROM?
not to flash ROM. You can flash it while encrypted. But it will ask you for a password on first boot. And after that you are ****** because you will lose access to the internal storage, rendering the recovery useless at this moment... however you will still have access to the phone via bootloader. After that, the only way to decrypt will be via fastboot command "fastboot format userdata" (in which you lose all your data).
From my understanding, because of this command you may experience issues with your partition. At least I had a problem: my internal storage was "cut" in half on windows when I connected phone and checked and after booting first time finally thinking everything was solved disk info also reported that I had some 30gb used, with about high 20's gbs free. I was like wtf.
However, luckily, after formatting internal storage via fastboot command you gain access back to your storage, as the encryption (which was blocking you) is gone. This way you can format (yes, again) your storage through recovery (format, not wipe). It corrects the partition and your phone is read as having 64gb of storage again.
Bottomline, as I understand, had I been decrypted from the start ( which means, before flashing the DU ROM) I wouldn't have had any problems at all with booting ROM first time after installing it and gapps, because it wouldn't ask me for a password. So I wouldn't have to fastboot command to format storage, and wouldn't have problems with partition requiring a new format (this time through recovery).
tip: don't forget to check my comments in the previous page. And I advise you to unencrypt before flashing this ROM. There are tutorials on youtube and xda developers forum certainly. Maybe even here. Good luck every one. And I sincerely only recommend rooting your phone and flashing custom roms if you get the basics of a few commands at least on fastboot and know how to backup your stuff before in case something goes very wrong and your recovery goes to ****
edit: you can decrypt and not lose your data if you backup, move backup to pc, and then, after decrypting, move everything back to your phone.
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