[Q] backup stock boot partition before flashing with CWM

Hi erveryone,



First of all, thank you for reading my post and trying to help me.
My cell is a Samsung Galaxy Ace II x (GT-S7560M); I didn't found more appropriate place to post this thread. It is a new cellphone : I bought it 3 weeks ago.
I would like to "play" a bit with my phone (change the ROM, root it and everything. It is mainly because I want the Universal Storage Mode back on my cell). But if I do so, I would void the warranty. Since I will probably sell back this phone in few months, I may cause me some problem to explain people that there is no warranty anymore. So, I need to do a complete backup of the phone, including the part which is erased by ClockWorkMod recovery! (once this backup is done, I have found pretty much everything I need on Internet).

My question is - how do I do a backup of the boot partition knowing that:

• this cell doesn't work on mtd.
• the file /dev/block/bml5 (or /dev/bml5) doesn't exist (so what is said in this page http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1335548 can't be applied)
• neither does the file /dev/emmc

So it seems to be a bit more complicated to do a dd backup as found at some place on the net.

Also, since I want to backup the ROM after all these operation, I didn't root my cellphone (It would have voided the warranty) and of course, didn't change my ROM.

For the sake of accuracy, there is the complete answer to the mtd:
It is a bit empty, I know. Samsung seems to prefer a proprietary format "bml".

I also looked into the partitions file:
So I got some information, but I can't use them. But all these files can be found in /dev/block. I also checked: it seems that adb knows the dd command (I think not all cells do have it right now).
I think I have said pretty much anything I think is important.

Do you have any idea to help me? :fingers-crossed: Or any questions?

By the way, I have seen there are some cellphones that have an embedded flag, that counts the number of time we flash the boot partition. I have not seen such information on this device, so there shouldn't have any, should it?

Thank you for your help and sorry if I miss anything that coulb be on the net/other post. I think I have done a quite wide range of them, but we are never sure we didn't miss anything.
Also, it is my first post on xda, so sorry if I miss any important rule of the forum, but you are welcome to let me know what they are.

It's not an easy one

I still did not manage to solve my problem. It's not an easy question...

Do not hesitate to ask questions (if you need some precisions) or add something in this post. I feel a bit alone on this post! And since it isn't the hottest device with brand new fesature, not much persons are interested in it!

But it seems I'm not the only one to face this problem... All major new Samsung cellphones seems to have that kind of nice proprietary "feature" (or bug) that hide the partitions and prevent to do whatever it is necessary to backup the boot partition... Soooo, it would be nice to find a workaround. But I did not find any solution.

Have you any idea, even a slicest possibility that might maybe, in a fantastic world, work? I'm willing to hear any suggestions, or even clue that may help me to understand how to pass over that. :fingers-crossed:

Thank you!

The solution

Thank you Codename13 that helped me a lot on this problem! It seems that we can get the original firmwares on http://www.sammobile.com/firmwares/ (I didn't tried it myself). So it seems there is no point to bother with the rom and boot backup. Keep doing it for the sake of precaution, in case there were a corrupted downoad, wrong firmware or whatever, but at least, there seems to be a way to get the stock ROM and stock boot (and even more).

Also, for those that might be interested and can't or don't want to use Odin, there is Heimdall http://glassechidna.com.au/heimdall/ that can do the trick. (it is useful for people following http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=2265803 tutorial for instance.

For the rest, we just need to follow http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=2265803 or http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=2451967


Have a nice one!