[Q] Blank SD card

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S.Nahid

Senior Member
Feb 20, 2012
108
5
Dhaka
I've decided to root. can anyone kindly answer some questions please:

1. what is the benefit of rooting,other than solving my problem? by googling,I found that the foremost benefit is installing custom Rom. but I'm not interested in custom Rom. I love sense interface. will rooting exclude me from any coming system update i.e. ICS?
2. why do s-off. is s-offing a prerequisite for rooting?
3. I'm only an average user and I've no intention of being "superuser" by being rooted. so if I want then is it possible to get back to exactly the same unrooted, s-on position,as if nothing happened!? I have heard about gold card. is it the only solution?
4. and finally how wood rooting help me soling my Blank SD card problem?

***please answer the questions considering the my phone is NOT supporting micro SD card.
 

xxmorph3u5xx

Senior Member
Jun 29, 2011
94
31
Bucuresti
DISCLAIMER: The following answers reflect my own knowledge and might not be 100% accurate. I am no dev or expert, just ur usual user.

1a. The prime benefit of rooting is having access to all the system partitions and files from within the rom (for both yourself and the applications you run). Thus you are enabled to make changes to the files that are normally locked for your personal use. This enables some applications to function which would normally not. (take titanium backup for example which is allowed (by rooting) to copy your system files and then restore them to a previous state if you encounter a file corruption or whatever). You can then via various apps overclock, uv, gps-fix and other system tweaks.
1b. by rooting and installing custom rom you indeed lose the ability to receive OTA updates from htc BUT you can find those roms on xda more probably before they would be available to you due to carrier specific delays and can install them manually. More than that most OTA updates are preceded by releases from the developers here on xda that are either leaked from htc, ported from other devices or built from scratch by our developers. For example, the desire S never received a sense 3.5 gingerbread update officialy as far as i know but there are GB Sense 3.5 ROMS available in the development section that were ported from other devices and which work flawlessly, IMHO better than stock ones being more stable, customizable, and packing huge functionality and aesthetic upgrades from the official ROM.
2. S-OFF: this unlocks your bootloader allowing you to flash a custom recovery like 4-EXT or CWM which allows you to do sub-rom operations (writing to the phones system partitions thus being alble to flash custom roms or restore a previous backup of your rom or do adb or in-recovery operations, all of these without loading the rom - it's like working in ms-dos for PC's). The advantages of a custom recovery are enormous. For example your situation: you can check whether your onboard microsd reader is hardware damaged or your rom encountered a corruption and can no longer handle the sdcard. Moreover you can rebuild the filesystem of your sdcard if it became corrupted in a way that is 100% android-compatible!
3. Yes you can. It is detailed in numerous threads in the general section of the forum.
4. Answered above and in previous posts in your thread: first it will enable you to test if it's a hardware or software failure, if it's software it will fix it via recovery.

If you understand these and wish to go on rooting and s-off read here:
GENERAL GIUDE
You can find guides for s-offing both higher and lower than 2.0 hboot. If you are on >2.0 HBOOT i recommend the downgrade method.
BE AWARE: There are risks involved so be sure to read twice and follow the instructions to the word! I also recommend doing this process at 100% charged phone battery and on a laptop or on a UPS powered PC to avoid power blackouts. If you follow these rules you are 99.99% safe from bricking your phone.
PS: you do not need your sdcard to perform the s-off or root
PPS: it might be a good idea to post your hboot information here so i can provide further help.

Have fun and be safe!
 
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S.Nahid

Senior Member
Feb 20, 2012
108
5
Dhaka
DISCLAIMER: The following answers reflect my own knowledge and might not be 100% accurate. I am no dev or expert, just ur usual user.

1a. The prime benefit of rooting is having access to all the system partitions and files from within the rom (for both yourself and the applications you run). Thus you are enabled to make changes to the files that are normally locked for your personal use. This enables some applications to function which would normally not. (take titanium backup for example which is allowed (by rooting) to copy your system files and then restore them to a previous state if you encounter a file corruption or whatever). You can then via various apps overclock, uv, gps-fix and other system tweaks.
1b. by rooting and installing custom rom you indeed lose the ability to receive OTA updates from htc BUT you can find those roms on xda more probably before they would be available to you due to carrier specific delays and can install them manually. More than that most OTA updates are preceded by releases from the developers here on xda that are either leaked from htc, ported from other devices or built from scratch by our developers. For example, the desire S never received a sense 3.5 gingerbread update officialy as far as i know but there are GB Sense 3.5 ROMS available in the development section that were ported from other devices and which work flawlessly, IMHO better than stock ones being more stable, customizable, and packing huge functionality and aesthetic upgrades from the official ROM.
2. S-OFF: this unlocks your bootloader allowing you to flash a custom recovery like 4-EXT or CWM which allows you to do sub-rom operations (writing to the phones system partitions thus being alble to flash custom roms or restore a previous backup of your rom or do adb or in-recovery operations, all of these without loading the rom - it's like working in ms-dos for PC's). The advantages of a custom recovery are enormous. For example your situation: you can check whether your onboard microsd reader is hardware damaged or your rom encountered a corruption and can no longer handle the sdcard. Moreover you can rebuild the filesystem of your sdcard if it became corrupted in a way that is 100% android-compatible!
3. Yes you can. It is detailed in numerous threads in the general section of the forum.
4. Answered above and in previous posts in your thread: first it will enable you to test if it's a hardware or software failure, if it's software it will fix it via recovery.

If you understand these and wish to go on rooting and s-off read here:
GENERAL GIUDE
You can find guides for s-offing both higher and lower than 2.0 hboot. If you are on >2.0 HBOOT i recommend the downgrade method.
BE AWARE: There are risks involved so be sure to read twice and follow the instructions to the word! I also recommend doing this process at 100% charged phone battery and on a laptop or on a UPS powered PC to avoid power blackouts. If you follow these rules you are 99.99% safe from bricking your phone.
PS: you do not need your sdcard to perform the s-off or root
PPS: it might be a good idea to post your hboot information here so i can provide further help.

Have fun and be safe!

I more or less understood how to root but still not clear about repairing SD card problem. guess I will look around the forum. anyway here is my hboot version

hboot 2.00.0002
 

xxmorph3u5xx

Senior Member
Jun 29, 2011
94
31
Bucuresti
The procedure as i recommend it:

1. Downgrade HBOOT
2. S-OFF via Revoutionary
3. Install 4ext Recovery - install the touch version
4. Go into recovery and do this:
a. tools menu -> file system check
b. wipe/format menu -> format sdcard
c. tools menu -> check partition alignment

If your sdcard reader is not hardware damaged then your sdcard should now work.
If it still doesn't it's toast. In this case only solution is repair shop or trash.

If it indeed works then:

5. Install ENG HBOOT
6. Install a custom rom or revert to stock, whatever you like. you can find EVERYTHING here.
 
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S.Nahid

Senior Member
Feb 20, 2012
108
5
Dhaka
The procedure as i recommend it:

1. Downgrade HBOOT
2. S-OFF via Revoutionary
3. Install 4ext Recovery - install the touch version
4. Go into recovery and do this:
a. tools menu -> file system check
b. wipe/format menu -> format sdcard
c. tools menu -> check partition alignment

If your sdcard reader is not hardware damaged then your sdcard should now work.
If it still doesn't it's toast. In this case only solution is repair shop or trash.

If it indeed works then:

5. Install ENG HBOOT
6. Install a custom rom or revert to stock, whatever you like. you can find EVERYTHING here.



When I was 'seriously' reading about rooting
posts (after finding no other solution) on
rooting guide on general section; I found a major bindings to
root from my context.
Referring to the rooting guide, I should have 3 ways to root after being s off. I quote.

[/QUOTE] How to: Root your device
1. You can achieve root by using Gingerbreak.
Follow this link and guide: http://forum.xda-
developers.com/show....php?t=1044765
2. Or, by using SuperOneClick *recommended*
(ROOT ALMOST ALL ANDROID DEVICES): http://
xdaforums.com/showthread.php?
t=803682
3. Or, you can flash this zipfile from recovery
(Source: http://unrevoked.com/rootwiki/
doku.p.../revolutionary ).
(You can skip this if you're about to flash a
custom ROM since custom ROM are pre-
rooted. Unless you want to keep your
original ROM, use this to root your device.) [/QUOTE]

correct me if I'm wrong, 1st and 3rd methods requires SD card to be functioning
but,as you know that my phone is not detecting
micro SD card how would I be able to root? and about the 2nd method,will I be able to root in this method without SD card?

and btw, you mentioned about 4ext recovery. is it alternative to clockwork Rom? how and when should I install it?


(I'm really ashamed to kill your valuable time)
 
Last edited:

xxmorph3u5xx

Senior Member
Jun 29, 2011
94
31
Bucuresti
if you carefully read my last post (#24) you shall realize that step 1 contains a temp root method to achieve hboot downgrade. That's when you need root priviledges. As i knew that you do not have access to the sdcard i have let the permanent root procedure out so as not to misguide you. if you follow my guide from steps 1-4 you will be able to access your sdcard again (i hope) so then you can permanent root via any of the methods you have discovered. after that do steps 5,6...

PS: you do not need your sdcard for any of the 1-4 steps i have indicated - the purpose of these steps is to grant you access to the sdcard check/format tool within 4ext recovery.
follow the procedure as indicated in the first post of the first link (step 1)
follow the instructions on the revolutionary website link (step 2)
install 4ext as indicated by chninkel or by adb install (step 3)
then do step 4 and you're kinda' done (i mean once you have finished step 4 you will be sure if your sdcard reader is physically damaged or if you are facing a filesystem corruption)
 
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S.Nahid

Senior Member
Feb 20, 2012
108
5
Dhaka
if you carefully read my last post (#24) you shall realize that step 1 contains a temp root method to achieve hboot downgrade. That's when you need root priviledges. As i knew that you do not have access to the sdcard i have let the permanent root procedure out so as not to misguide you. if you follow my guide from steps 1-4 you will be able to access your sdcard again (i hope) so then you can permanent root via any of the methods you have discovered. after that do steps 5,6...

PS: you do not need your sdcard for any of the 1-4 steps i have indicated - the purpose of these steps is to grant you access to the sdcard check/format tool within 4ext recovery.
follow the procedure as indicated in the first post of the first link (step 1)
follow the instructions on the revolutionary website link (step 2)
install 4ext as indicated by chninkel or by adb install (step 3)
then do step 4 and you're kinda' done (i mean once you have finished step 4 you will be sure if your sdcard reader is physically damaged or if you are facing a filesystem corruption)

I'm sorry to say but this is getting tough for me, but Idont want to give up this soon. I tried to downgrade but failed at last step. I'll be happy if you please see the atttchment.
 

xxmorph3u5xx

Senior Member
Jun 29, 2011
94
31
Bucuresti
instead of "adb shell /data/local/tmp/misc_version -s 1.27.405.6" try:

adb shell (press enter)
su (press enter)
/data/local/tmp/misc_version -s 1.27.405.6 (press enter)

this should work.
then proceed as indicated.
 

tistatos

New member
Jun 28, 2012
1
0
My Desire HD was just returned from the repair shop where they had to switch out the glas since it broke about a week ago.

I have the same issue with "Blank Sd Card" and when trying to "erase SD Card" i get the message "SD Card unexpectedly removed"

I tried formatting it via 4ext recovery but it fails, there is no error if i do a "file systems check" or "check partition alignment".
I can't mount the SD card from here either.

Since i don't have a microSD reader on my computer, I had to rely on using another phone as my reader and use its usb interface to format the card, that however works and its only when I try to put it back into my DHD i get a "blank SD Card" error.

I'm afraid that the repair shop could have been sloppy since, at the moment, my speaker doesnt work either.

Going back tomorrow to see if we can fix it.
 

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  • 1
    If you've tried multiple cards, that isn't sounding good. Does sound like a Hardware issue, warranty return an option?

    Swyped form ym Dersie S unsig XAD Permuim
    1
    did you try your SD card on other phone?
    1
    Okay.. go into recovery and try to format sd card from there. Many users have had problems with pc formatted microsd's. If you're on 4ext recovery try a file system check from tools menu first..it might help.
    PS: You can first try to mount the sd card from recovery while usb attached to pc. If windows sees it, it might be a rom or kernel issue.
    Let me know how this turns up. Best of luck!
    1
    Since warranty isn't an issue, ROOT is strongly suggested - if only for the purpose of Custom Recovery
    1
    Agree to the above. I'd recommend 4EXT recovery. . .