[Solved - 3.1 OTA update working!] Back to stock and backup for newbies TUTORIAL

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This tutorial is made to help those getting an Iconia for the first time as well as those who lost/didn't backup before going to custom ROMs.
We will try to help you using more than one variant #1, #2 etc to backup and restore your tablet. If you're new stick to the #1s in the first post. If you know a little Android and a little Linux, head to the second post.
Acer does not provide any full-restore ROMs at the moment so your best option is to create your own backup in case something goes wrong.
The ultimate goal is to help users restore their OTA (over the air) update function, aka. get the OS as fresh and clean as it was the day it came out of the factory.

Help us help you! The parts of the tutorial that aren't ready or require your attention are marked in RED. If you got:

• A new tablet, never flashed with a custom rom, share your original backup with US, you will need it anyway once you decide to experiment!
• A new tablet, never updated, share your Firmware and "Operated Countries" (on the back of the box) so we know what stock ROM belongs to which countries or continent.
• Knowledge and the will to share it!

Before you start!

• Don't be afraid of rooting, it will not break your OTA (un-rooting is a piece of cake) updates and it is essential to do a proper backup!
• Back up your user files from music to documents and save games or you might lose them!
• When everything fails > Privacy > data reset is a good way to start fresh. Best to use it when trying something new.
• Always unfreeze/restore system APKs like telephony etc before formatting/soft resetting (not to be confused with turning on and off again) your tablet.
• Any .zip on the micro-sd card will be automatically flashed on POWER & VOL-
• Save Acer Recovery Installer, Root, your favorite file explorer on your desktop
• Droid Explorer (PC app) can be a great tool to install apps from your PC
• Before attempting to OTA update: un-root, make sure all system apps are in place, remove micro-sd, factory reset (some have reported success after these)

Unbricking

Get the right firmware (Full Package, thanks Vache), for your tablet, decrypt it and extract the update.zip
Put it on your micro-sd card. Shut down. Boot with power and VOL - pressed and it will automatically get flashed.


What firmware is right for my country?

1. Full Package Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.016.01_COM_GEN1
2. CWM Backup Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.016.05_COM_GEN1 - Provided by flyinghighaero
3. Update zip Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.105.01_EMEA_GEN3 - Provided by bpivk
   • EU: AT, BE, CY, CZ, DK, EE, FI, FR, DE, GR, HU, IE, IT, LV, LT, LY, MT, NL, PL, PT, SK, SI, ES, SE, GB, IS, LI, NO, CH, BG, RO, TR.
4. Full Package Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.104.02_COM_GEN1:
   • USA
5. Full Package Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.104.05_COM_GEN1
   • Canada
6. Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.112.01_EMEA_CUS7 - Not available
   • Germany
7. Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.016.04_COM_GEN1 - Not available
   • Thailand - Probably Asia, needs confirmation
8. Full Package Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.104.03_COM_GEN1
   • Taiwan - Probably Asia, needs confirmation
9. Acer_A500_1.105.01_EMEA_GEN3 - Not available
   • reports of Netherlands and Mexico - hard to tell what EMEA means to Acer
10. Acer_A501_1.309.02_COM_GEN1 - Warning, this is an European ROM for A501 !!! - thanks captainpaella
11. Did your tablet come with one of the following firmwares or maybe another one? (Settings > About tablet), tell us what countries/continent it is for by checking the back of the box for the "Operated Countries" label and posting it below:
    
    • Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.013.01_EMEA_GEN1
    • Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.104.04_COM_GEN1
    • Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.016.02_COM_GEN1

Creating a backup with Acer Recovery Installer #1

1. Root
2. Acer Recovery Installer
3. Install clockwork mod:
   • select "ClockworkMod Recovery rev1.3.4 by thor2002ro"
   • click "Install Recovery Image"
   • click "Yes" when asked to backup the current image!!!
4. Reboot into CW recovery from the app or with VOL- & POWER
5. Create a full backup: "backup and restore" -> "Full Backup"
6. If your backup is a fresh stock-only (no previous custom roms flashed) one, please share it. It's located on your micro SD in clockworkmod/backup/[current date] <= This is the CWM folder we need!
7. Don't forget to restore the original recovery image to be able to install futher updates. Unrooting might be necesary depending on Acer.
   

Restoring to defaults via CWM #1

1. Full restore in CWM: "backup and restore" -> "Full Backup"
2. Enter Acer Recovery Installer and restore recovery.img!

Aditional restoring info

Remember: un-root, remove micro-sd, factory reset if it doesn't work.
Also don't have modified, removed or frozen system apps, wi-fi module, build.prop or any other OS file!
"dd" method in the second post is practical if you'll want to downgrade from a FW that has no root yet - still needs testing (eg. if you update to a future 3.2 you won't be able to go back to 3.1 or 3.0.1 until 3.2 is rooted, because CWM needs root, here's where ADB and "dd" can really come in handy!)


Available backups:

1. Updates of original Acer_A500_1.016.01_COM_GEN1
   • CWM backup successfully used by me, containing: Stock 1.016.01_COM_GEN1 OTA updated to 1.139.02. 1.139.02 is a "dud" - a FW update taken down by ACER that breaks updates; to solve this issue flash the update.zip(1.139.05) with the default acer bootloader (restore the original recovery.img from Acer Recovery Installer to get the default acer bootloader)
   • 1.141.05 provided by Thor - Restore with "dd", see post 2!
2. Please provide your own CWM folder or flexrom, boot, recovery and system.img, full dumps (p1, p2, p3... description for this method below)
   
3. Do not provide
   
   • system.zip containing system/app files
   • 3.1 ROMs - the purpose here is to know if OTA is working
     

What worked for me:

Done with CWM!
Un-root, restore to stock, remove micro-sd - probably not all necesary but it worked for me.

1. First of all I flashed to my default rom: Acer_A500_0.000.00_1.016.01_COM_GEN1 from Acer's server, didn't have a backup.
2. I installed acer recovery installer, rooted and then CWM restored 1.139.02. This firmware is probably Acer's mistake as it is not available anymore, nor can you OTA update from it.
3. Then I entered Acer Recovery Installer, restored the original recovery.img, un-rooted and restored to factory defaults.
4. Placed Acer_A500_1.016.01_1.139.05_COM_GEN1 on my micro SD and rebooted into Acer's recovery (PWR&VOL-) installed with no issues.

After the reboot 4.010.22 was available! Started the download, removed the micro-sd(probably wasn't necessary) and the tablet rebooted and installed the update properly!

Voila, 3.1 (4.010.22, kernel 2.6.36.3) with the help of CWM!

This is all the Info I was able to gather about a full restore. Put it to good use and be productive - tell us your results!

Additional backup and recovery methods

Creating a backup via ADB #2
If you're uncomfortable with ADB, this should work with Terminal Emulator +/- Busybox too. Just skip to step 4.
Or you can try the automatic backup tool, just fire it up and follow the instructions. Root and 1GB on the external SD required.

1. Get ADB + Java both for x32 even if you have windows on 64 bit!
2. Get the Iconia A500 USB drivers
3. Run SDK Manager from "C:\Program Files (x86)\Android\android-sdk" and let it download it's junk. I've no idea how much of it you'll need.
   • Go to "C:\Program Files (x86)\Android\android-sdk\platform-tools"
   • Create a text file that will contain "cmd" and save it.
   • Rename your text file ADB.bat and create a shortcut on the desktop for convenience
4. Root then go to Settings > Applications > Development > USB debugging
5. Open your adb shortcut, connect the tablet and type "adb shell"
   • "$" will show up, meaning that you are logged in as an User
   • type "su", accept the superuser request on your tab
   • "#" you're now Admin and can issue backup commands.
6. Backup the first 0x680000 bytes of mmcblk0 and all partitions (except cache + data) with dd:
   • dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0 bs=512 count=13312 of=/mnt/external_sd/dumps/mmcblk0_start
   • dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p1 of=/mnt/external_sd/dumps/p1
   • dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p2 of=/mnt/external_sd/dumps/p2
   • dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p3 of=/mnt/external_sd/dumps/p3
   • dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p5 of=/mnt/external_sd/dumps/p5
   • dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p6 of=/mnt/external_sd/dumps/p6
   • dd if=/dev/block/mmcblk0p7 of=/mnt/external_sd/dumps/p7
7. Thanks sc2k!

Restoring to factory defaults via Terminal #2

1. Root
2. Install Terminal Emulator, Busybox installer and Acer Recovery Installer
3. Copy system.img, flexrom.img, boot.img, recovery.img in /mnt/sdcard
4. Run (flash system.img last, it will lock down your tablet and you won't be able to flash the other .img files):
   • /data/data/com.interphaze.AcerRecoveryInstaller/files/itsmagic
   • dd if=/mnt/sdcard/flexrom.img of=/dev/block/mmcblk0p6
   • dd if=/mnt/sdcard/boot.img of=/dev/block/mmcblk0p2
   • dd if=/mnt/sdcard/recovery.img of=/dev/block/mmcblk0p1
   • dd if=/mnt/sdcard/system.img of=/dev/block/mmcblk0p3

Restoring to factory defaults via ADB #3

1. Get ADB + Java both for x32 even if you have windows on 64 bit!
2. Get the Iconia A500 USB drivers
3. Run SDK Manager from "C:\Program Files (x86)\Android\android-sdk" and let it download it's junk. I've no idea how much of it you'll need.
   • Go to "C:\Program Files (x86)\Android\android-sdk\platform-tools"
   • Create a text file that will contain "cmd" and save it.
   • Rename your text file ADB.bat and create a shortcut on the desktop for convenience
4. Root then go to Settings > Applications > Development > USB debugging
5. Open your adb shortcut, connect the tablet and type "adb shell"
   • "$" will show up, meaning that you are logged in as an User
   • type "su", accept the superuser request on your tab
   • "#" you're now Admin and can issue flashing commands.
6. Install Acer Recovery Installer
7. Copy system.img, flexrom.img, boot.img, recovery.img in /mnt/sdcard
8. Run (flash system.img last, it will lock down your tablet and you won't be able to flash the other .img files):
   • /data/data/com.interphaze.AcerRecoveryInstaller/files/itsmagic
   • dd if=/mnt/sdcard/flexrom.img of=/dev/block/mmcblk0p6
   • dd if=/mnt/sdcard/boot.img of=/dev/block/mmcblk0p2
   • dd if=/mnt/sdcard/recovery.img of=/dev/block/mmcblk0p1
   • dd if=/mnt/sdcard/system.img of=/dev/block/mmcblk0p3

I hope many people who just bought their tablet will come here and post the recovery files asap they got it...
I need to return with 01.139.04

If you use the Acer Recovery Tool from the market, would that do the same thing to take you back to stock?

link

Please, always run itsmagic BEFORE any dd operation.

@Bec07: Please swap the commands in your guide.

Restoring to factory defaults via ADB #2
In Step 7 where are the files located that I'm supposed to be copying? Can't find them?

They're supposed to be in /clockwork mod on your micro-sd car, provided you've don a backup. Or you can download them.

@haakuturi
No, I've tried even if you can download the update, it will fail installing. Tried with pre 3.1 updates.

@sc2k
Thanks, fixed. But don't the checksums change after we flash the partitions?

Originally Posted by sanaell

I hope many people who just bought their tablet will come here and post the recovery files asap they got it...
I need to return with 01.139.04

Don't you remember your initial firmware?
Could you check it when close to an iconia stocking shop?

Great tutorial... Thanks

So, a question... If the Restore function in CWM doesn't restore properly, does it backup properly? That is, if I manually restore the files that CWM made when it backed up, will it restore properly or did the backup miss something?