SD Booting Experiment, Testers Needed!

albertwertz · Apr 19, 2012

So we are all confused with the tablets that boot straight to SD from power button and others that boot from usb cable put in. Everyone wants to see the tablets boot straight to sd when they hit the power button.

As seen in the below video, I was able to turn a usb only boot tablet into an always boot to sd from power tablet by forcing my tablet to brick and then recovering it. this got me thinking... maybe Barnes and Noble isnt as inconsistent as I thought... maybe they made all tablets to boot from usb and something some of us have done caused them to now always boot without usb.

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HC9XL_9aXk

So, I need some tester. I am not responsible for the loss of your tablet, you do this at your own risk.

Requirements: You need to have an 8gb or 16gb nook tablet that can currently only boot to SD from usb. This means that with bootable sd in, you can not boot to sd by hitting the power button from an off state and you require the usb cable to be connected from an off state to boot to SD.

File you must download: We are going to test this with the CWM bootable SD cards I have made: File here: http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1439630

FIRST Make the SD card and then make sure you cant boot to it from the power button, and then make sure that you can boot to it from the usb

Second Make sure you make a backup of your tablet, I am not going to tell you to do anything that will brick you, but I am not going to be responsible for lost data... or atleast not bricks that I dont know how to get out of

Stop testing at any point that you become successful

Third TEST 1 Perform an 8 failed boots
With the SD card in and the tablet off, I want you to hold the power button down until you see the black N appear and maybe a white screen and the tablet turn off. This is one failed boot. Do this 7 more times and then let it boot the 9th time and allow it to factory restore. Now test to see if you can boot to sd with power button, if not, test with usb.

Fourth TEST 2 Unrooter http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1380235
Root your tablet, then install the unrooter app, and then run the unroot script from the app
Test power and usb boot again

Fifth Test 3 Brick (8gb only)
Install cm7 rom, should brick on bootup, then flash back your recovered rom that you should have made before you started all this crap. Then test boot again for power or usb.

Fifth Test 3 brick (16gb only- Warning, I have not tried this)
Install my recovery rom for the 8gb NT, I think it might brick, then restore back with the recovery you should have made before starting all this.

Sixth Test 4: CWM, after installing CM7, clear cache, factory restore and clear devlic. Then restore back to your recovery and test.

Make sure you post as soon as something becomes successful. Do not proceed if something started working.

Please report back in this thread your findings.

lost101 · Apr 26, 2012

Sorry Albert, I just noticed this thread. I will get a hold of an 8gb nt this weekend that I'm fairly sure only boots with usb.

PlacidCat · Apr 26, 2012

albertwertz said:
So we are all confused with the tablets that boot straight to usb from power button and others that boot from usb cable put in. Everyone wants to see the tablets boot straight to sd when they hit the power button.

Albert - thank you for looking into this. Bless you if this can be resolved. Just a quick note about your post, however: I think there are several places you talk about "boot to usb" when you meant "boot to sd". I've made the same typo lots of times myself.

I am one of the people who can only boot with USB attached. I will be HAPPY to try this out as soon as I can.

DemonicPhantasm · Apr 26, 2012

So interesting thing here, my nook tablet behaves differently depending exactly how long I hold down the power button and the home button.
If I hold it down for ~1 second after the "boot flash" (screen flashes)
it will boot to the sd card
if I hold it down much longer and it either turns off, or reboots (or tries recovery)
an odd thing is if I turn off the power, let it power off completely, wait an hour and turn it back on, it almost always boots SD and then any further reboot boots to stock.

PlacidCat · Apr 26, 2012

DemonicPhantasm said:
So interesting thing here, my nook tablet behaves differently depending exactly how long I hold down the power button and the home button.
If I hold it down for ~1 second after the "boot flash" (screen flashes)
it will boot to the sd card
if I hold it down much longer and it either turns off, or reboots (or tries recovery)
an odd thing is if I turn off the power, let it power off completely, wait an hour and turn it back on, it almost always boots SD and then any further reboot boots to stock.

Is this after any of Albert's experiments or just as you have it now? What root method did you use? 8GB or 16GB?

lost101 · Apr 26, 2012

Ok, so I managed to pick up the 8gb NT today. It has been previously rooted. Here are the results of TEST 1:

First try, I must have miscounted because on what I thought was the 9th time, it loaded normally, and did not try to factory restore.

On the second attempt, @ power-on no.5, CWM loaded.

Third attempt, CWM loaded @ power-on no.2

Forth attempt, CWM loaded @ power-on no.4

At no point was the usb lead attached. Also I was only using the power button, never touching 'n'.

Will I remove the card, do a factory restore and proceed to TEST 2?

DemonicPhantasm · May 1, 2012

pretence ryiutte

PlacidCat said:
Is this after any of Albert's experiments or just as you have it now? What root method did you use? 8GB or 16GB?

16 GB root through the SD card, I've since done a complete factory restore from the 8 boot recovery partition and the behavior persists this way.
I haven't had a chance to mess with it, since my wife sold her nook which I used for reading books while I messed with mine...

PlacidCat · May 2, 2012

I got a new 16GB class 4 card on which I've backed up my apps with TB. I hope I will have some time to do some tests in the next few days. I have a bootable 32GB card (SanDisk class 4) with CM7 alpha final on it that I'll use as my test card for booting.

My Tablet is a 16GB model, so I'll likely have to try the "brick" with the 8GB image of CM7.

albertwertz · May 3, 2012

los101, so I am confused, did it work with just powering it on to start? or just doing 8 failed boots got it to boot to sd with just power and not usb?

PlacidCat · May 3, 2012

FWIW... Just got my wife a n 8GB Nook Tablet for our anniversary. I used my MacBook to image your root card from this thread:
http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1439630

I imaged it to a 2GB Kingston card. No idea what class it is because I haven't tested it. Stuck it into the 8GB NT, booted it *without* the power cable and it boots to SD just fine.

I then stuck in the 32GB Sandisk class-4 card onto which I installed CM7 alpha final... and it booted to stock.

It would seem we still might have a card issue, not just an internal issue. Tried turning off the 8GB NT, ejected the 32GB card, re-inserted it, still booted to stock. Turned the tablet off, removed the 32GB card, replaced the 2GB card and it immediately booted into the CWM recovery tool.

I then rooted by applying the zip using CWM from the 2GB card. Rooted successfully and asked CWM to reboot. Tablet rebooted to the (rooted) stock. I turned off the Tablet, turned it back on with the 2GB card still inserted and it, again, booted immediately to the CWM menu.

ALL BOOTS (except from CWM menu) WERE DONE WITH JUST THE POWER BUTTON. No finagling with the "N" button required.

I don't know if this helps, Albert. I'll still plan on eventually testing on my 16GB model. Also, when I have a free moment, I'll see if the 2GB card boots on my 16GB NT. If it does, what I would find interesting is if there is a way to get cards in general to boot more reliably across the board.

Edit: BTW - the 32GB Sandisk does boot to CM7 using the power cable.

Edit 2: Yes, indeed, the 2GB CWM root utility card boots great on my 32GB tablet without using the power cable (just pressing power).

lost101 · May 3, 2012

albertwertz said:
los101, so I am confused, did it work with just powering it on to start? or just doing 8 failed boots got it to boot to sd with just power and not usb?

Booted off SD just by powering on. '8 failed boots' was not required.

PlacidCat · May 4, 2012

You know, just had a thought. I can try writing the CWM root image to the 32GB Sandisk SD card to see if it truly is the card at fault or how the partitions are set up. I'll also expand the last partition to fill the entire card as a test.

Is there anything fundamentally different in how the boot partition is set up for your root image over the CM7 (external SD) image, Albert? I want to make sure my tests actually are valid for comparison's sake and that I'm not just making the proverbial comparison between two dissimilar fruits...

PJLLB · May 4, 2012

I have CM 7 and have tested booting on two NTs that I have. I also have 32GB, 16GB and 8GB SD cards (each created from the same image and then increasing the 4th partition to full capacity for the card), and each behaves the same as the other depending on which NT I use. One NT always boots directly to CM7 using any of the cards, the other does not. However, if I first tether the one that doesn't normally boot to CM7, and immediately remove the tether when the first screen comes on, the unit will boot to CM7 (as expected) but will the always boot to CM7 again without tethering (even after a reboot to NT mode, a shutdown and then a new power on) until the unit is charged. After a charge I then have to re-tether the NT once, removing the tether quickly at power on, and from then on tethering is not required (again, until the next charge) just like before.
This behavior is fully repeatable for me and has been checked over the course of several weeks. It's magic I'm sure.

PlacidCat · May 4, 2012

PJLLB said:
... It's magic I'm sure.

My vote is Leprechauns.

digixmax · May 26, 2012

PJLLB said:
...
However, if I first tether the one that doesn't normally boot to CM7, and immediately remove the tether when the first screen comes on, the unit will boot to CM7 (as expected) but will the always boot to CM7 again without tethering (even after a reboot to NT mode, a shutdown and then a new power on) until the unit is charged. After a charge I then have to re-tether the NT once, removing the tether quickly at power on, and from then on tethering is not required (again, until the next charge) just like before.
This behavior is fully repeatable for me and has been checked over the course of several weeks. It's magic I'm sure.

This has been working for me when using the CelticWebSolutions' CM7 SD, but I found that it does not work for the Succulent "CM9 SD" (created using the method posted here).

leapinlar · May 26, 2012

digixmax said:
This has been working for me when using the CelticWebSolutions' CM7 SD, but I found that it does not work for the Succulent "CM9 SD" (created using the method posted here).

I had trouble getting succulents dual boot setup to boot at all. Neither from power button nor usb cable. I finally got it to work by burning celticwebsolutions cm7 image to sd (which booted perfectly from the power button), and modifying it with MiniTool Partition Manager per succulents instructions. It worked perfectly. Now I have stock rooted 1.4.2 on emmc and cm7/cm9 on sd. See my description here.

wbickler007 · May 31, 2012

Perhaps this is not the place for this oddity/question, but I am attempting to root my 16GB NT and it will not boot to SD by *any* method. Neither Power, nor Power+N work, and when I try USB method, it will boot to stock after about 2-3 minutes, whether I've left the cable plugged in or not. Ideas?

digixmax · May 31, 2012

wbickler007 said:
Perhaps this is not the place for this oddity/question, but I am attempting to root my 16GB NT and it will not boot to SD by *any* method. Neither Power, nor Power+N work, and when I try USB method, it will boot to stock after about 2-3 minutes, whether I've left the cable plugged in or not. Ideas?

In my experience, if the NT cannot boot off an SD card with powered USB then the problem lies with that SD card's format and/or content. You would be better off researching & asking your question in the forum thread that covers the SD-card rooting method you're using.

wbickler007 · May 31, 2012

I am using Albert's R3 SD card (4.6 I think) method, one I created from his video instructions not one received from Albert. But I did locate Albert's troubleshooting thread and will try reposting the issue there, thanks. Otherwise, I'd be happy to help with the experiment!

digixmax · Jun 1, 2012

wbickler007 said:
I am using Albert's R3 SD card (4.6 I think) method, one I created from his video instructions not one received from Albert. But I did locate Albert's troubleshooting thread and will try reposting the issue there, thanks. Otherwise, I'd be happy to help with the experiment!

I too was not able to create a bootable R3 card, until I abandoned using PowerISO to assemble files for the R3 disk image -- see my post here re: the alternative method suggested by Albert.

SD Booting Experiment, Testers Needed!

Senior Member

Inactive Recognized Contributor

Senior Member

Member

Senior Member

Inactive Recognized Contributor

Member

Senior Member

Senior Member

Senior Member

Inactive Recognized Contributor

Senior Member

Senior Member

Senior Member

Senior Member

Senior Member

Member

Senior Member

Member

Senior Member

Similar threads

Top Liked Posts