[HD2 Android SD Development] Learning Never Ends team:
NativeSD WM #2 Setup Partition

NativeSD WM #2 Setup Partition

Requirements: To get started you need an HTC HD2 phone (either European or T-Mobile US), and SD card – which you presumably have if you are reading this – and ideally a personal computer. You will need to download a “Recovery” program to run on your mobile – 4EXT is recommended. Since you will be changing your SD Card you are strongly advised to back it up first. The next step is to partition or split your SD card into two which can be done using a Windows program Mini Tool Partition Wizard Home Edition. (Apparently the partition can be done with 4EXT Recovery on the phone but the PC is easier). Of course you will also need to choose a NativeSD ROM from the XDA website.

HTC HD2 Windows Mobile 6.5 Requirements

In order to run Android, your HTC HD2 will need to have:

Radio: 2.08 or higher - download from [RADIO] The HTC HD2 Master Radio Thread

The following three somewhat old threads have more information about Android on HD2:

[REF] The Definitve Guide To Android On HTC HD2

[REF] A Brief guide to Installing and Maintaining Android [SD/RAM] on HD2

[HSPL/HSPL2] HowTo flash everything

Bear in mind that they do not refer to NativeSD.

The steps to take on your PC are:

A) Backup your SD Card - for example copy all of it to your PC or use a new SD card. This step is optional but strongly advised.

B) Format your SD Card to make sure it is in good shape and has a primary FAT32 partition. Cards that are larger than 32 GB will not necessarily have a FAT32 format. For example a 64 GB card will usually be formatted to have an "exFat" partition and needs to be reformatted to FAT32. At the same time you can also choose a cluster size but the default should be fine for now. See the thread [GUIDE] [INFO] All about SD CARDS - which one, why and how!. If you format your SD Card, then restore the data from the backup. These steps are optional but strongly advised. Recommended Windows program for formatting your SD Card as it does not format the "Protected Area":

https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter_3/

C) Create an EXT4 partition on your SD card. There are two methods.

i) On your PC using MiniTool Partition Wizard Home Edition (MTPW)

This is a video showing how to use the program but note that we need EXT4 NOT EXT2 shown in the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cygl0qZnbaM

Note that you can use other partition managers but Minitool Partition Wizard works and is the method recommended by Xylograph

ii) On your HD2 using the 4EXT Recovery Classic program by madmaxx82 mentioned in the next post #3 Install Recovery. Check in the thread for your chosen NativeSD ROM to see if it supports automatic creation of EXT4 partition using Recovery. If it does, then install 4EXT Recovery, copy the unzipped Android Native SD build to this folder and execute CLRCAD.exe and HaRET.exe from the recovery folder and the card will be partitioned and the Native SD will be installed automatically. Caution though as these ROMs may not install to NativeSD folder and as a result you may not be able to use some of the other items in this guide. Always backup your SD card before trying this.

D) The size of the EXT4 partition is up to you. The minimum is probably 500 kb but 1 GB is advised and it does depend on the size of ROM you are using. If you have a larger SD card then 2 GB is recommended. Larger than 2 GB may be difficult to backup in one go. A rule of thumb is 0.5GB for NativeSD and 0.5 GB for each ROM you want to have available in EXT4. So the minimum advised is 1 GB. Another rule of thumb could be no more than 25% (one quarter) of your SD Card for EXT4. I only use half of the FAT32, leaving half the card free to backup either FAT32 or EXT4. For example I have a 32 GB card with 24 GB for FAT32 and 8 GB for EXT4 with 14 ROMs (14 * 0.5 = 7GB +0.5).

D) Double check that the first FAT32 and second EXT4 partitions are both 'primary' and that FAT32 is first and EXT4 last partition.

More details can also be found in the XDA Wiki:

xdaforums.com/wiki/HTC_HD2/NativeSD#Format_EXT4_Partition

Please see the next post for the next step which is done on the mobile phone. This is a good time to check that Windows Mobile still works properly for you:

Recovery