What's the easiest way to backup and restore a SGS?

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I friend of mine is having problems with her SGS, and she took it back to the shop that she bought it from and they said that a backup and restore should fix it.

Unfortunately she's not very technically minded, so she's asked me to do it.

What's the easiest way of doing this, bearing in mind I cannot lose the contacts, messages, etc. on the phone.

I've tried looking on google, and there seems to be 3rd party utilities such as SGS Kernel Flashers, and an official Samsung app called KIES.

The only other phones I've done this to are older Nokia's and iPhones, so I need something that just works, the less fiddling the better, thanks. :)
 
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You could try titanium backup and flash a whole new firmware but that requires root.

or backup SMS using an app from the market and go to settings > privacy > factory data reset. Contacts should be synced to her gmail account.
 
Contacts should already been synced with whatever google account the phone was set up with. Emails obviously the same. Messages and phone log you can sort out with SMS Backup+ from the market (dumps them to the google account under different lables such as SMS, MMS, and then syncs them back afterwards, I always leave this app running so if I were to switch phones I can always sync them back).

You can back up apps to SD card using ADAO file manager, but it's probably just as easy to only reinstall the ones that are actually of some use ;)

So long as her media (music, images, etc) are all on the SD card, then you're golden to just perform a factory reset.
 
You could try titanium backup and flash a whole new firmware but that requires root.

or backup SMS using an app from the market and go to settings > privacy > factory data reset. Contacts should be synced to her gmail account.
I don't want to root the phone as after looking up guides on how to do it, it

a) voids the warranty
b) there is a possiblity that I will lose all the data on the phone

I'll see if I can back up SMS thru an app though, just to be on the safe side.

Contacts should already been synced with whatever google account the phone was set up with. Emails obviously the same. Messages and phone log you can sort out with SMS Backup+ from the market (dumps them to the google account under different lables such as SMS, MMS, and then syncs them back afterwards, I always leave this app running so if I were to switch phones I can always sync them back).

You can back up apps to SD card using ADAO file manager, but it's probably just as easy to only reinstall the ones that are actually of some use ;)

So long as her media (music, images, etc) are all on the SD card, then you're golden to just perform a factory reset.
Ok, I'm trying to get SMS Backup+ on to it now.

As for the SD card, on the summary page it says that there is an Internal SD card which is around 6gb, and an External SD card which is 500Mb. I'm guessing I need to copy everything on to the External card?

Finally, is there nothing like iTunes where I can just hook up a USB cable, click 'backup/restore' and just be done with it? This seems to be much more hassle than it needs to be... :(
 
My phone explorer supports android, dead simple to use this will back up contacts sms media photos etc
Ok, thanks, I'll check this out.

Unfotunatly the phone now seems to have stopped working, all I did was reboot it as it was stuck in flight mode, so I turned it off and now it won't urn back on! :mad:

It just flashes up a spinny circle once every 10 seconds or so...

... and yes, I have tried removing the battery and it has made no difference.

Is this phone dead?
 
Try leaving the battery out for longer, say thirty mins. Worth a shot
Ok, I tried leaving the battery out for around 10 mins, then I plugged in the USB cable and that seemed to bring it to life.

The battery is fully charged however, so I guess that there must be something wrong with this phone, so I'm hoping a backup/restore will fix it.

I managed to find SMS Backup+ on the market, I clicked install, and the phone has now crashed... and now it has started to do the "black screen with occasional spinny circle" thing. :(

I'm guessing something is wrong somewhere, anyone know why it's crashing?
 
You can factory reset it from the recovery mode, a sort of BIOS setup for phones. This will nuke the handset though so you may want to consider carefully if you want to do it. To access it you turn the handset off (yank battery if unsure) then hold Home+Vol UP+Power (easiest method is hold home+volup then press power) until the handset shows a bit of life then a new menu will appear. In there should be an option to factory reset IIRC.
 
You can factory reset it from the recovery mode, a sort of BIOS setup for phones. This will nuke the handset though so you may want to consider carefully if you want to do it. To access it you turn the handset off (yank battery if unsure) then hold Home+Vol UP+Power (easiest method is hold home+volup then press power) until the handset shows a bit of life then a new menu will appear. In there should be an option to factory reset IIRC.
Thanks, I really want to use that as a last resort really. For now I can hook up a USB cable up to my PC, and that seems to get it to boot up if it crashes.


Also, I think I may have found something strange that could be the reason why it's crashing, it seems to think that a USB cable is connected when there is nothing connected to it. I'd like to post a screenshot but I haven't figured out how...

I tried holding home and power like on the iPhone but I only got a 'power options' box. :confused: While this phone seems pretty iPhone like to use, I'm guessing that the screenshot shortcut is some other button combo?

Thanks.
 
How long is the warrenty on the SGS? If Its 1 year then I'm fairly sure mine is now out, and I may as well root it. I've got a feeling that customs roms will be more stable than the crap KIES has installed for me.
 
How long is the warrenty on the SGS? If Its 1 year then I'm fairly sure mine is now out, and I may as well root it. I've got a feeling that customs roms will be more stable than the crap KIES has installed for me.
It was bought in October last year so it's still under warranty, so I'm going to suggest a warranty replacement before rooting.

I feel stupid now as I couldn't figure out how to get a screenshot which is a pretty basic feature... :o So I had to resort to using another phone to take a photo of a phone! :D

Anyway, here you can see that the phone thinks it's charging even tho my hand is over the USB connector:
haxQhl.jpg.png


It won't even let me change the USB mode:
7xzrsl.jpg

So I'm stuck in KIES mode right now which is a bit of a pain... :(
 
Screenshot on the SGS is..... hold back then press home. It's saved in /screenshots. Samsung phone warranty is 2 months (is usually done via handset exchange). Sounds like you have a bad earth or something bad is going down with the charge circuit. is the USB port clean of crap, especially on the pins?

Could you do the following to help out? Goto the dialer ("phone app - must be the default one, not dialerOne or anything) and type in:
*#*#4636#*#*
A menu called testing will appear - goto battery information and take a screenshot and upload OR note down what the top 2 lines say and put it here.
 
Screenshot on the SGS is..... hold back then press home. It's saved in /screenshots. Samsung phone warranty is 2 months (is usually done via handset exchange). Sounds like you have a bad earth or something bad is going down with the charge circuit. is the USB port clean of crap, especially on the pins?
Ok, I tried holding back and then home, but it didn't seem to do much. I also couldn't access /screenshots, as the file manager only seemed to let me access the /sdcard/ folder. and /sdcard/screenshots/ does not appear to exist.

I'm guessing it may need a newer firmware? Anyway I'm getting to grips with using a phone to take a photo of a phone now lol. :o
Could you do the following to help out? Goto the dialer ("phone app - must be the default one, not dialerOne or anything) and type in:
*#*#4636#*#*
A menu called testing will appear - goto battery information and take a screenshot and upload OR note down what the top 2 lines say and put it here.
Sure, here we go, I took this a few minutes after unplugging the USB as I have to have a USB cable connected in order for the phone to boot:

8d50Nl.jpg


I've also used some compressed air to blow any dust out of the connector, so I'm guessing it could be a charging circuit issue?
 
Back + home has always worked for my limited time on the SGS but it doesn't matter, same result achieved (goes in /sdcard/screenshots you're right). This handset is broken though, at a guess either the charge circuit is fubar or the USB socket. USB socket is more likely, they are rated to 10000 plugins or something but failure on them is still pretty high as it gets the most abuse. You'll need to sort out an RMA sorry :(
 
Back + home has always worked for my limited time on the SGS but it doesn't matter, same result achieved (goes in /sdcard/screenshots you're right). This handset is broken though, at a guess either the charge circuit is fubar or the USB socket. USB socket is more likely, they are rated to 10000 plugins or something but failure on them is still pretty high as it gets the most abuse. You'll need to sort out an RMA sorry :(
The USB does seem fubar, I've tried plugging up to a PC, and yesterday it came up as 'Samsung_Android', but today it just says 'unrecognised USB device'...

At least I've managed to back up the important stuff, that SMS backup app is rather nice I must say and I would quite like an iOs version if there was one out there... Anyway, I'm sorting RMA right now, luckily it's (just) in warranty. Thanks for your help. :)
 
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