Having acquired two of these units with little documentation, I'd like to create a single point for information for them since the documentation is sparse. I will edit this information as I discover more.
From what I can tell, these two units are identical. Why the different names is beyond me.
Recovery
There is a very basic recovery menu. You can access the recovery menu via the following process:
The rooting process for this tablet is pretty much the same as any other Rockchip-based device.
Partitons
These devices have either 10 or 11 partitions, depends on if you boot normally or in recovery mode. During normal boot your partition map looks like this:
And during recovery your partition map looks like this:
Partition List:
This is extremely important and it helped me un-brick a tablet.
Boot into recovery using the method outlined in the Recovery section and execute the following commands exactly as they are shown below.
Once you have created all of these images, store copies of them in a safe place!!!
Un-bricking
Assuming you have not whacked your recovery partition you should be able to recover from just about any stupid mistake using this method.
From what I can tell, these two units are identical. Why the different names is beyond me.
Recovery
There is a very basic recovery menu. You can access the recovery menu via the following process:
- Disconnect power and turn the tablet off via the GUI or by pressing the reset button.
- Hold the power and home buttons for ~15 seconds. You will see the boot logo appear and then there will be a white triangle with a yellow exclamation point in the middle, as well as a small Android guy below the triangle.
- Hold the back and power buttons for a couple of seconds and the menu will appear. Use volume up and volume down to navigate the menus and power to select an option. You will have to hold the power button down for a second or so to switch between options. It's a bit slow. Your options are:
- reboot system now
- apply update from /sdcard (this option allows you to pick a zip file but does do verification)
- wipe data/factory reset
- wipe cache partition
- recovery system from backup (as far as I can tell, there is a partition at /dev/block/mtdblock which is a backup and this option restores from it. The partition is verified somehow but I do not know how.)
- update rkimage from /sdcard (this option looks for the file update.img at the root of /sdcard. There is some form of verification but I don't know how it works.)
The rooting process for this tablet is pretty much the same as any other Rockchip-based device.
- Go to https://spideroak.com/browse/share/gdanko/imito and download root-imito-am801-ics.tgz
- Extract root-imito-am801-ics.tgz
- Install SuperUser https://market.android.com/details?id=com.noshufou.android.su
- Execute the following commands from the terminal:
Code:
[gdanko@dolemite ~]$ cd root-imito-am801-ics
[gdanko@dolemite root-imito-am801-ics]$ adb push busybox /data/local/tmp
[gdanko@dolemite root-imito-am801-ics]$ adb push su /data/local/tmp
[gdanko@dolemite root-imito-am801-ics]$ adb shell
root@android:/ # mount -o rw,remount /dev/block/mtdblock8 /system
root@android:/ # cd /system/xbin
root@android:/system/xbin # mv su su.old
root@android:/system/xbin # dd if=/data/local/tmp/su of=/system/xbin/su
root@android:/system/xbin # dd if=/data/local/tmp/busybox of=/system/xbin/busybox
root@android:/system/xbin # chown 0:0 su busybox
root@android:/system/xbin # chown 0:0 su busybox
root@android:/system/xbin # chmod 6755 su
root@android:/system/xbin # chmod 4755 busybox
root@android:/system/xbin # mount -o ro,remount /dev/block/mtdblock8 /system
root@android:/system/xbin # rebootPartitons
These devices have either 10 or 11 partitions, depends on if you boot normally or in recovery mode. During normal boot your partition map looks like this:
Code:
dev: size erasesize name
mtd0: 00400000 00004000 "misc"
mtd1: 00800000 00004000 "kernel"
mtd2: 01000000 00004000 "boot"
mtd3: 01000000 00004000 "recovery"
mtd4: 14000000 00004000 "backup"
mtd5: 07400000 00004000 "cache"
mtd6: 20000000 00004000 "userdata"
mtd7: 00400000 00004000 "kpanic"
mtd8: 12c00000 00004000 "system"
mtd9: 9d400000 00004000 "user"And during recovery your partition map looks like this:
Code:
dev: size erasesize name
mtd0: 00400000 00004000 "parameter"
mtd1: 00400000 00004000 "misc"
mtd2: 00800000 00004000 "kernel"
mtd3: 01000000 00004000 "boot"
mtd4: 01000000 00004000 "recovery"
mtd5: 14000000 00004000 "backup"
mtd6: 07400000 00004000 "cache"
mtd7: 20000000 00004000 "userdata"
mtd8: 00400000 00004000 "kpanic"
mtd9: 12c00000 00004000 "system"
mtd10: 9d400000 00004000 "user"Partition List:
- parameter - This partition only shows up during recovery and I have no idea what this is!
- misc - This partition contains miscellaneous system settings in form of on/off switches.
- kernel - This may be a backup of the system kernel. I need to research this one more.
- boot - This partition is the kernel and ramdisk.
- recovery - This partition is supposed to be stock recovery but I have wiped it and I can still boot to it. We have not been able to figure it out.
- backup - This is a very important partition. It is the ROM your tablet shipped with and includes system, boot, and cache images. When restoring from recovery, this is what's used.
- cache - This is the partition where Android stores frequently accessed data and app components.
- userdata - This partition is where everything in /data is stored.
- system - This partition basically contains the entire operating system, other than the kernel and the bootloader.
- user - This partition appears to be the storage available to users. When I look under Settings > Storage, the amount of the partition closely matches the size of this partition.
This is extremely important and it helped me un-brick a tablet.
Boot into recovery using the method outlined in the Recovery section and execute the following commands exactly as they are shown below.
Code:
# mkdir /sdcard/backup
# dd if=/dev/block/mtd/by-name/parameter of=/sdcard/backup/parameter.img
# dd if=/dev/block/mtd/by-name/user of=/sdcard/backup/user.img
# dd if=/dev/block/mtd/by-name/system of=/sdcard/backup/system.img
# dd if=/dev/block/mtd/by-name/kpanic of=/sdcard/backup/kpanic.img
# dd if=/dev/block/mtd/by-name/userdata of=/sdcard/backup/userdata.img
# dd if=/dev/block/mtd/by-name/cache of=/sdcard/backup/cache.img
# dd if=/dev/block/mtd/by-name/backup of=/sdcard/backup/backup.img
# dd if=/dev/block/mtd/by-name/recovery of=/sdcard/backup/recovery.img
# dd if=/dev/block/mtd/by-name/boot of=/sdcard/backup/boot.img
# dd if=/dev/block/mtd/by-name/kernel of=/sdcard/backup/kernel.img
# dd if=/dev/block/mtd/by-name/misc of=/sdcard/backup/misc.imgOnce you have created all of these images, store copies of them in a safe place!!!
Un-bricking
Assuming you have not whacked your recovery partition you should be able to recover from just about any stupid mistake using this method.
- Copy the backup.img file you created in the Initial Backup section to an SD card and rename it as update.img.
- Reboot to the recovery menu as outlined in the Recovery section.
- Hold the volume down button while in the recovery menu until you are on the "update rkimage from /sdcard" option.
- Press the power button to restore from /sdcard/update.img. This process will restore system, boot, and cache, and will also update your backup partition on the tablet.
- For good measure, select "wipe data/factory" reset and do that as well.
- Reboot your device. It should come up just as you got it from the factory.
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