Hello, I’m back again to request some advice on updating a Samsung Galaxy S9. I’m hoping it is a bit more straightforward on the S9 after all of the problems I experienced with my S7 ! The S9 is currently on the e-2.0-r official-starlte release and the only available updates shown are e-2.xx-s versions, the oldest being e-2.4.1-s and the newest e-2.7-s Can I go from an “r” version to an “s” version without all of the problems I experienced on my S7 moving from a “q” to an “s” ? Also, if it is possible should I update to the oldest version first or go directly to the newest version ?
Obviously I have learnt my lesson well and will be performing a full backup of everything before I attempt any update - and if it comes to the worst I now have adb and heimdall at hand to get me out of mischief !
It is not clear if you are saying that your system Updater is offering you these updates?
If yes, clearly everything with a date before about October 2024 is not available.
Your Updater will make it clear if any one download is the Android version upgrade.
Is this what you see?
Hi @aibd, I currently have 2.0-r-20240506… installed, and the system updater shows builds starting 2.4.1-s-… as available. Given my problems with the S7 I was worried that a jump from “r” to “s” could cause problems. And yes, the 2.4.1 is dated 9 Oct. and my current installation is dated 6 may.
2.7-s-20250109… is the latest version in the system update list, and all are “official-starlte” builds. All are marked (in blue) “version upgrade !”
As the phone is on R this should show on the Updater with wording as “Android version Upgrade” This is the magic of the OTA Upgrade of Android version.
So it will “Just work” … maybe all the builds show as “Android version Upgrade” … is this what you see … and it looks confusing ?
So install whichever you like … they are all full system they are not incremental so you can go for the latest.
Yes, that’s what I’m seeing:
From what you’ve written it looks like I can jump to 2.7 without any issues then.
I will do a full back-up first though - it’s my better half’s phone so can’t be too careful !
Thanks !
I did the S9 r to s OTA update when s became available. No noticeable problems but with the caveat that i don’t use my S9 for voice calls, so i can’t say if any impacts there .
Just to close out this thread I finally got round to updating my Galaxy S9 from 2.0-r to 2.7-s using the inbuilt updater - and I’m pleased to say it went without a hitch. Definitely a big thumbs-up to the guys at the e.foundation.
However, during the process I did notice a couple of minor things that I thought may be worth documenting for other /e/OS Galaxy S9 users in a similar situation:
I started by taking a full backup of all data via a USB connection and copy-pasted to a directory on my PC with no issues. Then I attempted an ADB pull of the USERDATA volume to the PC and although the file was successfully downloaded all attempts to read it failed miserably. With the S7 I just needed to “adb pull /dev/block/sda18” as this was the volume associated to /dev/block/by-name/USERDATA and once the /sda18 binary was downloaded it was possible to mount it using disk image mounter and have access to all of the user directories and files.
For the S9 it was different: the volume assigned to USERDATA was /sda25. The ADB pull worked as expected resulting in a sub 60GB binary file. However all of my attempts to extract data from the file were fruitless. As a check I performed the same action on the SYSTEM volume (sda18) and the downloaded binary could be mounted and explored with no issues. The only major difference I could see between the S7 USERDATA (on /sda18) and the S9 USERDATA (on /sda25) was the size (27GB Vs 59GB) and I probably need to investigate if this was a factor in the failure to mount. The other thing I am considering is that the Android 12 layout may differ from the Android 10 layout in some subtle way and the link to /sda25 is a red herring and it is actually symlinked to another volume that holds the data I was looking for.
The S9 has 64GB of internal memory so the size of the “pulled” file seems to correspond - but perhaps there is something else I’m missing here.
I don’t really require an answer to these questions as the migration is complete now - but answers are always appreciated for the sake of intellectual curiosity. Whatever the outcome I’m a happy bunny now with an /e/OS version of A12 installed and working on my S9 !
Apart from the ADB pull problems I experienced I noticed two other oddities on the S9 following the upgrade:
References to 4G in the Internet Configuration, Preferred network type, network preferences dialog has been replaced with LTE which threw me a bit as my S7 on A12 is still showing 4G, with 4G, 4G+ and other logos appearing in the status bar to reflect the type of connection. I’m guessing the LTE symbol in the top right hand of the S9’s status bar will also change with use but have not seen this as yet. I’ll update this post if I see anything else appear.
I swapped out the Telegram FOSS version from the App Lounge on the S9 for the official Telegram.apk from their website. As on the S7 after migration, the FOSS version of Telegram was continually showing that a new message had been received when it hadn’t. I read somewhere that the FOSS version was problematic in this area, and also when receiving confirmation SMS’s from the Telegram servers when logging in. Whatever, installing the official App resolved the problem for me.
i think android 12 USERDATA is encrypted by default, when theandroid 10 one was encrypted on demand
thank you @piero - that would explain what I saw. Definitely need to have a solid backup strategy in place going forwards then 