Notices

I'm hoping someone can help! My USB went down sadly as many others before, I took it to a phone shop and he attempted to solder it unsuccessfully. I installed BackupMenu (version 1.1), did a back up but I can't get the device to start up anymore, when i boot with keyboard open i get the following:

I am using Backupmenu 1.10. When I select, restore a backup (Restore RootFS & OptFS) and then eMMC/Mydata, and select the appropriate files accordingly…I get a host of errors with RootFS, as well as the below message when it trys to mount (it doesn’t fix i)

Im hoping someone can provide some guidance, im desperate to get this device working. Im in Canada, please help!

If you've got Power Kernel installed, you can use the root terminal mode to see if you can't manually repair it.

To be honest, though, I'd just buy another; you need a USB port to do much of anything here.

I'd also look into various repair methods - There's some USB test pins under the battery that can be soldered to for a functional USB port(disadvantage is that there's less ESD protection on those pins, but there is /enough/). You can also contact Estel about re-soldering the port for you, but it'll cost a significant amount(though way less than a new N900).

Unfortunately, the root just takes me to a blank screen

I guess, i'll have to take your advice and just buy another n900

Yeah, blank screen means no Power Kernel. In theory, you could run commands blindly, but that's nigh impossible.

I'd either buy a new one, or if you have hard-to-replace data on it, talk to Estel. Heck, if you /do/ buy a new one, ask him if he'd want to buy the broken one cheap from you, so he can fix it up and sell it.

What is that "the root terminal mode" in PK?

Didn't find anything about it in the PK wiki page.

//edit
You mean this?
http://wiki.maemo.org/Kernel_Power#Boot_Options

Power Kernel gives you the ability to use the root terminal option (t) in BackupMenu.
It works! Before I installed PK, option t just gives you a blank scteen (after the 'instructions' screen). Installed PK & can logon to root (after setting root password).

robbieThe1st, do you remember our talk about rewriting backupmenu to fully take advantage of framebuffer module, shipped with kernel-power, instead of text2screen?

Of course, it's absolutely up to You, but - considering Your recent submission to CA awards - You may be interested in Coding Competition. It's requirements maturated and it's starting in week's time - major updates to existing programs are allowed. Time for writing programs is little less than 3 months.

I'm absolutely sure, that, given love people have for backupmenu, such rewrite would won you first award - be it N950 or N9 (as CC - up to date - haven't set up any rule, that deny former receivers of N950 getting another one).

Of course, main benefits would be code much easier for others to understand and extend (= more people contributing by code), better modularity, no conflicts with FBCon like now, after using module, and, last but not least, comaptibility with a way most power-users are doing now - i.e. framebuffer module loaded very early, including rolling text

Thus, if chance of getting device can be additional motivation for You to do such work, it's, IMO, worth consideration.

/Estel

I do have some important info on it as a matter of fact, not to make a sob story but I have a video recording of a trip to my grandmothers grave years ago in the Caribbean islands that i'd be extremely grateful to get...Estel, what say you?...Is there any hope or possibility to salvage my device/content as I've described it?

letmein, You've got it this video on MyDocs, just where camera program stores it by default? Do you remember, if backupmenu, during first try to OPTFs all partitions, said anything about errors on vfat MyDocs?

If data is here, it would be pretty straightforward to recover it, for me. As for fixing device, well, it depends - 99% of times it should be, but I've seen device, that got USB chip fried at the same time when it got broken (some bad situation of bending pins shorting randomly with themselves), so I always warn about risk.

Only one way check it, is actually spend hours on repairing it, and see if it works Hoever, if USB chip would be non-working, only low-level retrieval from oneNAND would help - You would need to give it to some specialized business, experienced on retrieving data in such cases (and, most likely, pay a lotta hell of money).

/Estel

First, thank you very much Rob!

As of today, I tried to install backupmenu for the first time on my n900 (PR1.3, stock kernel, no CSSU, no prior bootmenu).

Attempting to install backupmenu-1.2.0-1 from extras-devel did not work successfully. The install appeared to go smoothly, but upon selecting backupmenu from the bootmenu my n900 appeared to turn off.

I was successful installing backupmenu-1.1.1-1 I'd like to share how.
(assuming you have wget installed, and extras-devel enabled)
In the terminal...