TWRP for Fairphone 3

Ok, that was my question, thanks !

Hello,
I tried it last weekend and … It worked … I don’t really know why but I have been able, with your help, to backup my phone. It was the first time that TWRP asked for my unlocking code so maybe it helped to work, I don’t know what I did wrong the first time.

I also try something interesting but it worked only one time on twice (so TRY IT AT YOUR OWN RISKS) : when I unlocked my bootloader (fastboot cmd → press vol dwn → press power) right after my phone restarted, I removed the battery, left the phone for a few seconds without it and restarted (with battery plugged) and then my bootloader was unlocked and I didn’t lost any data.
I retried this process to lock it again but it didn’t worked, it bricked my phone … (maybe you need the right timing to unplug the battery … or not)

So thanks anyway, now I have all I need for my new FP3 !

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I just want to leave a heartfelt “Thank you” to @_tmp for still maintaining the archive of images Index of /stock/ . It makes updating as root so much easier.

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A user in the /e/OS forum encountered this old TWRP issue … MTP not prividing change timestamps · Issue #1065 · TeamWin/Team-Win-Recovery-Project · GitHub

I can confirm the issue on my Fairphone 3 with the current TWRP 3.6.2_9-0-FP3. It’s not ideal for backup purposes.

@k4y0z: As TWRP’s terminal can see the timestamps just fine … can something be done about this? Or could this be a fault on the computer side?

Hi guys,

I need your help. My FP3 stuck in fastboot mode. There is no way to start recovery mode. Device State is unlocked, has no OS and is in fastboot mode. Following steps I’d executed:

  • Connect Phone to USB
  • Tested reachability with fastboot devices and got back serial no.
  • Reboot with fastboot reboot
  • Check current-slot, result:
    Bildschirmfoto 2022-10-01 um 20.53.21
  • set active slot a, result:
    Bildschirmfoto 2022-10-01 um 20.54.40
  • Flashing boot with twrp, result:
    Bildschirmfoto 2022-10-01 um 20.57.14
  • restarting with fastboot reboot recovery
    But the Phone started into fastboot mode

I tried a lot. Erase both slots before, used different twrp versions and Lineage recovery, restart my mac, restart the phone without usb connection. But nothing wont help, phone starts only in fastboot mode.
If I tried to boot recovery from remote, I got this:
Bildschirmfoto 2022-10-01 um 21.16.26

What can I do now?

TWRP instructions:

“WARNING: If you accidently flash TWRP to your device using fastboot instead of temporarily booting the image, you will need to download the latest factory image for your device and reflash the boot image.”

Latest available factory image is given here:

https://support.fairphone.com/hc/en-us/articles/360048050332-FP3-Install-Fairphone-OS-offline

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Hi,

yes, that works. Thx!

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Seems like latest TWRP 3.7.0_9 is not able to handle latest OS update 0021.0. I followed my usual procedure to flash TWRP and Magisk. Unfortunately, after booting into TWRP, I only see cryptic filenames in the selection, so I can’t flash… Maybe it’s not a TWRP problem, but does anyone have the same problem and know a solution?

I got that effect when I went from /e/OS based on Android 11 to /e/OS based on Android 12. It looks like something changed with the encryption and TWRP can’t handle it yet.

I don’t know whether that’s something that would be done with a “normal” update within the same Android version. Perhaps it’s not the same issue even if it looks the same.

Anyway … TWRP can use a micro SD card set to be used as external/portable storage (always!) or you could try whether TWRP can use a USB Stick via a USB OTG adapter.

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Thank you very much, @AnotherElk! At least, that took me one step further. I have copied the necessary TWRP and Magisk files onto an SD card and I can see and choose them within TWRP. But when trying to flash them, TWRP 3.7.0_9 reports multiple Failed to mount '/system_root' errors. Apparently there were more serious changes with this OS update from 0019.2 to 0021.0.


Edit: OMG, this led to an bootloop into recovery again and again… I am not able to start the phone anymore… Any help appreciated!


Edit 2: I managed to revive the phone again by redoing the OS update to 0021.0. :sweat_smile:

Hmmm, this might be related … https://support.fairphone.com/hc/en-us/articles/360048139032

"System update improvements

Your Fairphone will be better at managing storage partitions in the background, making system updates better-prepared for years to come.

  • We retrofitted a new way of managing the system storage (dynamic partitions). This affects system partition and images only, it does not affect user data."

Assuming your bootloader is unlocked since you wanted to install TWRP:

https://support.fairphone.com/hc/en-us/articles/360048050332

According to the instructions there should be a prompt whether to erase or keep user data.
(Which is only meaningful when not unlocking or locking the bootloader which both force a factory reset for security reasons.)

Does this mean you have a backup of your data partition from before the update?
And a separate backup of the “Internal Storage” because TWRP backups don’t include it?

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Thank you very much @AnotherElk for your prompt support! In the meantime, I reapplied the OS update and was able to revive my phone again. Phew. :sweat_smile: I was already on the brink to do a factory reset…

Maybe. And that way, they maybe also killed a working root mechanism.

No and no. I basically follow the procedure of the OS manual installation above. At the end of that procedure, I reapply TWRP and Magisk:

  1. ADB push TWRP installer zip file + Magisk zip file + TWRP image file onto phone
  2. adb reboot bootloader and then fastboot boot twrp.img
  3. TWRP flash zip files (this step fails now!)

That worked for numerous OS updates without any error or data loss. The 0021.0 update is the very first one that failed there.

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Hi all,

according to the release notes:

“We retrofitted a new way of managing the system storage (dynamic partitions). This affects system partition and images only, it does not affect user data.”

This seeems to be the issue!

I have found this on AOSP Webpage about dynamic partitions

Dynamic Partitions | Android Open Source Project

The new partition layout looks like this:

Implementing Dynamic Partitions | Android Open Source Project

It seems that the TWRP needs to be aware of the dynamic (or super) partition.

There ist the point we are struggeling and need to investigate.
Maybe there is a workaround or any other way to circumvent this issue.

Hope this lead us to the right direction.

Sure.

TWRP on the Fairphone 3/3+ is currently on the Android 9 branch of TWRP (the “9_0” in the TWRP image filename).

Dynamic partitions were introduced with Android 10 … TWRP and Android 10.

My guess is that TWRP for the Fairphone 3/3+ would need to be on a branch which can handle dynamic partitions. TWRP in general is prepared to do this, apparently.

5 posts were split to a new topic: Issues rooting a FP3

Looks like something topjohnwo would want to fix – is there a Magisk bug report for this?

Same for TWRP … just talking about it in the forum isn’t going to help IMHO.

This topic was opened by the maintainer of TWRP on the Fairphone 3/3+, so in theory posts here should not be in vain, but there’s also Issues · TeamWin/android_bootable_recovery · GitHub … there’s an issue already …

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It does not look like anyone is actually working on this :confused:
So I guess this is the end of rooting on the FP3?