colchiro

This only works with the B&N Nook Color. If you have a Nook Touch, this will not work.

Should your NC be unable to boot, you should have a cheap sd card devoted to just this task. A 2 or 4 gb micro sd card is cheap, usually well under $10 and makes a nice utility to have around should you need it.


What you'll need to have or buy:

• Small micro sd card. 1 gb will work.
• Adapter to plug it into your computer (usb adapter is the cheapest and works the best)

What you'll need to download:

• Win32-image-writer or WinImage
• WinRar to extract the IMG (image) file
  
• One of these images (Pick one)
  • TWRP 2.1.8: Dev-Host - TWRP-2.1.8-bootable-SD-encore.zip - The Ultimate Free File Hosting / File Sharing Service
  • CWM 6.0.1.2: http://forum.xda-developers.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=1426482&d=1351060922
  • These files can all be found at the bottom of the first post here and the description is in section A10: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=25354258#post25354258

TWRP images use the touch screen instead of volume, power and "n" buttons and can do everything CWM (clockworkmod) recovery does. For more info go here: TeamWin Projects - TWRP 2.5 - | TeamWin


Create your bootable sd card (Windows):
Install WinImage trial version (or Win32 Image Writer) and WinRar, also a trial version. Right-click on the downloaded CWM/TWRP zip file and open the image with WinRar. Click the "test" button to make sure your file is good, then extract the image.

Flashing with WinImage:
WinImage is easiest to install, but more difficult to use.

Plug your micro sd card in your computer, then open WinImage and choose "Restore virtual hard disk image" from the "Disk" menu. A list of available usb drives will pop up. Choose your sd card from the list and click "OK". A browse dialog will appear, prompting you choose your extracted image. From the drop-down menu just above the open & cancel buttons, choose "All files". The file should be named CWM-6.0.1.2-bootable_SD.img or TWRP-2.1.8-bootable-SD.img, depending on which one you downloaded. (You want the img files, not the original zip file you extracted it from.)

Flashing with Win32-Image-Writer:
Win32 Image Writer is easiest to use, but doesn't create a shortcut for your use.



Nothing to install with this program, just extract the files and double-click the Win32DiskImager.exe file. Click the blue folder icon and browse for your CWM-6.0.1.2-bootable_SD.img or TWRP-2.1.8-bootable-SD.img, depending on which one you downloaded. Under Device, make sure you have your sdcard selected. If you only have one sdcard, this should be no problem. Click the "write" button to write the image.

You should see a progress indicator while flashing your sd card, which will take several minutes. If the disk is in use, you will not be able to copy the image to the card. Close any Windows Explorer windows and try again.

Always try to safely eject the card when done using it. You can right-click on the drive from My Computer or find the "Safely remove hardware" icon by the clock (looks like a usb plug). O/w your card could develop errors.

To create your bootable sd card with a Mac computer: How to burn ISO disc images - Mac OS X Hints


Sdcard adapters:
Some people have had issues trying to flash the image from sdcard slots on their computer. A usb adapter usually works best.


Now what can you do with your new bootable CWM/TWRP sd card?

• You can flash a rom. Plug it into your computer and copy your rom file to it
• You can backup your rom. (under "backup and restore" menu.)
• You can restore a recovery backup, should your new rom never boot.

How to boot into your CWM/TWRP card?

• Power down your NC.
• Remove the existing sdcard from your NC.
• Insert your bootable sdcard and hold your power button until your NC powers on.
• If you boot into your rom instead of recovery, you didn't properly flash the sdcard. (Were there errors from WinZip?)

How to navigate those CWM recovery menus:
Up/down volume buttons are used to navigate up and down,
press the power button to go back, and
press the "n" button to do the highlighted task.

How to create a CWM backup on the sdcard of your current (stock or custom) rom.
This back will be saved to the sdcard and can only be restored after booting off the sdcard. Each backup will be about 1 gb, so might not fit on a 1 gb card. (Doesn't work with the current images, which are only 300 mb in size.)

• Boot from the bootable sdcard.
• Using the volume up/down buttons, choose "Backup/Restore", press "n".
• Choose "Backup", press "n".
• Watch for errors. It's normal to see "No sd-ext found. Skipping backup of sd-ext". That is not an error.
• Eject the sdcard.
• Choose "reboot system now" and press "n".
• Your Nook should boot into the current rom

How to restore a backup from your other sdcard while booting from the bootable sdcard?

• (This is known to work with the CWM sd card, but has not been tested with the TWRP card.)
• Boot from the bootable sdcard.
• Before doing anything else, remove the bootable sdcard and insert your normal sdcard (the one that contains your backup).
• Choose Backup/Restore and restore your backup.
• When done, choose reboot. There's no need to reinsert the bootable sdcard.

Attached Images

win32diskimager.png (28.1 KB, 1053 views)

Last edited by colchiro; June 4th, 2013 at 04:40 PM. Reason: Updated links

colchiro

I updated the original post with version 3.2.0.1 files and TWRP images. The current CWR version as of today is 3.2.0.1, which is intended to work with the new B&N 1.2 partitioning scheme.

Last edited by colchiro; January 15th, 2012 at 12:39 PM.

colchiro

Updating an older version to 3.2.0.1

I haven't seen any updated images posted so here's how to update your bootable sdcard to the latest version, 3.2.0.1.

It's assumed you already have a bootable CWM recovery sdcard as documented above. The latest version 3.2.0.1 supports the file system used by the latest NC's and you'll want to update that, especially if you have really old versions, since you'll have trouble formatting your data partition.

If you boot off your bootable CWR sdcard and it says anything less than version 3.0.2.8 (like 3.0.0.5 or 3.0.1.0), you need to update.

If it says 3.0.2.8 and you don't have a brand-spankin' new NC, updating is optional (but it's still a recommended update).

• Insert your bootable sdcard in your computer
• Download the attached zip file
• On your sdcard, right-click and create a folder called oldboot and move the following files into it:
  • mlo
  • u-boot.bin
  • uImage
  • uRamdisk
• If you have problems with the card, you can move those files back
• Unzip the contents of the attached zip file to the sdcard
• Find the "safely remove hardware" icon in the lower-right corner of your computer, by the clock. It looks like a usb connector with a green checkbox on it. Click it and find your sdcard on it and click it. When windows says it's ok to remove it, remove the card from your computer. If it says it's in use, close any explorer windows you might have open.

Insert the sdcard in your NC and power it on. Recovery should boot and it should say version 3.2.0.1, the latest recovery.


Want to use your touchscreen instead of buttons?

Most of the guide work the same way. You need to format some partitions and flash some files. It's much easier (and cooler) to do it with a touch screen. I still prefer using Rom Manager to rename my backups tho.

• You need to be on 3.2.0.1 before starting and you should test that it boots your NC ok.
• Download "TWRP ub" file from here
• Copy it to your sdcard.
• Rename the uRamdisk file on your sdcard to uRamdisk.bak
• Rename the "TWRP ub" file to uRamdisk
• Safely unmount your sdcard and boot from it.

Don't like it? You can delete the uRamdisk file and remove the ".bak" from the uRamdisk.bak file.

Attached Files

bootable_3201_files.zip (4.23 MB, 5416 views)

Last edited by colchiro; December 29th, 2011 at 09:04 PM.

Podivin

Thank you sir.

N3k0

Brilliant! Thanks so much.

jenwilly

The WinImage part isn't working. I did what it said, clicked the 'restore virtual image' or whatever and select the SD card, when it tries to find the image nothing comes up, even though it is sitting right there on my desktop. What am I doing wrong?

colchiro

I guess you got it figured out. What did you do wrong?

File needs to be extracted before flashing it?

WinImage needed to be run as Administrator?

jbrooks544

Great tutorial, thanks a ton. I think/hope I did what I should have. FYI, for noobs like me, I just found out that CWM is "clock work mod" recovery. I'd suggest you say that right at the top, so folks will know. Also, right before "How to navigate those recovery menus:" you might put something like this: "How to use this SD card with CWM recovery: 1. turn off nook 2. install this micro sd card 3 start nook and the recovery interface boots off the sd card. go to backup and restore. use the following buttons to navigate (which you do say next). Maybe I missed something, but what I did was put in the SD card, go to "backup and restore" and then I backed up the orig Nook rom that came with it. That way, I figure I can restore it if all goes wrong. Was this correct? I know you mentioned these instructions in your second update post, but I wasn't going by that, since I wasn't updating. Thanks again.

colchiro

Thanks for the feedback. I updated the original post with how to boot off the card and how to restore a backup from a different card.

steveo41733

Are there instructions anywhere to make a SD card from begining to end to have it run cm7 when you insert it into the nook?

colchiro

We don't have a link to that here, but this one is recommended by Phiredrop, dev for Phiremod rom: [CWM][CM7][HC][NOOKCOMB][PHIREMOD]CWM for Flashing Roms to SDcard + More! [6/22] - xda-developers

steveo41733

Well I think it is time to put the nook on craigslist, this is so agrivating, I followed the steps above but I just cant get it to work. Maybe I should just buy a real tablet.....

colchiro

Try changing how your sdcard is plugged into your computer (different adapter).

Also make sure your computer can actually "see" the card and gives it a drive letter before proceeding.

gadgetmonster

Hi guys, couple noob questions: I'll be making this CWM on Tuesday or Wed this week. After i make this CWM recovery card, can i just put cm7 on it and install it in the nook when i get to recovery? The caveat of course is i have to wait until the nook comes so i know if its the blue dot or older dot model...if blue dot, i have to do the partition correction first.

colchiro

Unless you somehow somehow found an old model, it really should be a blue dot.

If you read the CM7 installation from the sticky post above this one, you'll find directions that say to copy your rom and Google apps to this disk to install CM7.

gadgetmonster

ok, thanks, yes, i did find those........your right, it probably is blue dot so partition will be step2 after creating the CWM..........i will post and let y'all know how it goes.

gadgetmonster

Thanks for all your help guys, CM7 is up and running..................time to give it a few days to see what happens and then think about overclocking.........

skee572

i was wondering if i could get some help making a bootable CWM card. i've downloaded all the files and when im and the step to write the image to the sd card it fails evertime it says "error reading file" everthing else works fine up until that point. WinImage version 8.50 run as administrator do restore virtual hard disk image on physical drive from the disk tab it finds my sd card just find and i can find the image file that matches my sd card size i click on that file and a hit ok when the warning message come up just before it wirte to the sd card anyways it ok the it writes about 90-95% compelt before the error reading file message up.

colchiro

Hi skee, have you read the previous posts?

What comes to mind...
When you open the file with WinRar, did you test it to make sure it was valid?
Did you try a smaller file?
New sd card or used? Did you try to format it from your computer first (maybe it has bad blocks)?
Did you see where people that had problems used a different adapter?

skee572

OK

I have tried various files and file sizes. I've also verified all MD5sums on them all and checked to make sure they were all correct. I changed my adapter, tried a few different sd cards and formatted them all. None of those worked. I will try getting a brand new card and adapter tonight. Just to make sure I'm getting this right, you have to leave the file zipped after you download it?

colchiro

NO. See first post...
I was going to suggest that maybe you were flashing the ZIP file, but thought it was too obvious and didn't think WinImage would let you do that.

You leave files zipped to flash from recovery, but that's about the only time.

Last edited by colchiro; August 3rd, 2011 at 05:50 PM.

skee572

hey THANK YOU for your help and your time. i was able to get everthing working and now have a new rooted nook color 1.2. it was do to a user error hints (ME) i was thinking about when you flash manual nooter you leave it zipped and for some reason i wasn't thinking i guess but all in all everthing it good to go now thanks again.

colchiro

Glad you got it going.

I was impressed you checked your md5 hashes.

tanalee

Aloha...

Thanks so much. I'm a 61-year-old newbie, and managed to do this successfully (the first time) all by myself.

I would have one favor to ask: Where you wrote "Right-click on the downloaded file and open the image with WinRar," may I suggest that you specify which of the FOUR files we just downloaded it refers to? Ie, "Right-click on the downloaded bootable cwm (3.0.2.8) file and open the image with WinRar."

Nice job. MUCH appreciated!

Tana-Lee

Using: Nook Color 1.2 (Blue Dot)
Walmart San Disk 4G micro SD card (on sale for $9.88, usually $12 and change)

Last edited by tanalee; August 5th, 2011 at 10:13 PM.

colchiro

Done.

Thanks for the feedback. There was just the one file originally, but I later updated it with the 3.2.0.1 version and missed that part.

MrChetStuart

Thanks for providing the update files to 3.2.0.1 - much appreciated.

colchiro

Glad it worked for you.

hz7qnf

Thanks so much for the instructions. I loaded up the SD card and can see all the files you said to load onto it. But when I try to boot my NC, I get the 'Loading' and the skulls and then it turns off. Am I missing something?

colchiro

Sounds like somethings screwed up. I've never heard of that problem.

Try flashing w/o copying the 3.2.0.1 files. If that works, then unzip the files again (3rd post).

scotty85

great write up. not new to rooting at all,but very new to NC i just picked one up thats running cm7 from the sd card. looks like the device itself is not rooted.

just to make sure i understand this correctly,if i make a bootable CWM SD,roms i flash from it will be flashed and run from internal memory,correct? can i immeidately make a backup of stock,unrooted firmware if i need that for later?

once ive flashed a rooted rom,or rooted the stock 1.3 firmware the manualnooter way,i could then flash CWM to the internal memory correct and keep the sd card CW for emergencies?

thanks again for the awsome guide,ill definately be doing this later,as cm7 from the sd seems a lil laggy and not everything works correctly. hopefully installing it on the internal memory(like im used to with my phones) is better.

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colchiro

I can't speak for roms installed on the sdcard (they're quirky), but if you root your stock rom, or have any rom installed on your Nook, you can back it up with Rom Manager/CWM Recovery.

A roms flashed from this bootable CWM sdcard will be on your Nook (aka EMMC). If you wanted a backup, you'd want to do that first O/W it's easy to return to stock.

IMO Sdcard installs are fragile (sdcards fail), more difficult to create/update, and slower than roms on the Nook. Most of the guides here are for emmc installs so ask before trying to update your sdcard install if you don't see specific mention of that.

RJR

***Edit** I used win32diskimager and it worked!!


Alright admitted noob to this.. I've read and reread the directions and have a .img file of the 2gb_clockwork-3.0.2.8 file. I have the winimage and winrar loaded. I reformatted my 2gb sandisk mircosd card to fat32. I can copy stuff to and from the msd card. When I try to use Winimage to restore virtual image to physical drive it doesn't see my sd card or anything else as an option. I did check the box to use removable drives. I've tried extracting the uImage and uramdisk files to the msd card and boot it off the nook but the msd card does seem to be bootable. I'm pretty sure it's the restore image process that I'm missing..

BTW thanks for all the effort and time you've taken documenting everything.

Oh another stupid question.. Do you have to root the NC before you repartition and load the CM7? I figured if i didn't want anything to do with the old BN image then I could just nuke and pave.. I want to use the internal memory and then add a msd card to addition space afterwards. Thanks again

Last edited by RJR; October 29th, 2011 at 09:54 PM.

colchiro

Try w32 imager instead of winimage download link on the right: https://launchpad.net/win32-image-writer

No reason to root if you're going to blow it all away anyway.

RJR

Yeah I did use win32imager and it worked.. Now I'm backing up my BN image and then attempting to repartition. A couple of the links in the XDA article are dead but they have a couple of "automated" scripts in zip files that you can use to repartition and then format? Have you had any luck going that way?

Thanks

colchiro

When I bought my NC it was version 1.1. They didn't repartition until 1.2 came out.

Geez, that makes me sound old, doesn't it?

I assume you mean this post: xda-developers - View Single Post - Brand new NC w/ 1.2 no sd boot

I would think that works too.

RJR

Yep threw caution to the wind.. That's what back ups are for. I'm up and running on CM7!! Thanks!!

colchiro

Good deal.

Thanks for the update.

marchilopez

I've followed your instructions to the letter for a 1GB, 4GB, & 8GB uSD cards but none will boot in recovery. I have 2 NCs running stock 1.4.0.
I've tried using WinImage & Win32DiskImager. I get no errors on the PC. When I put the uSD cards in, it always boots in stock ROM.
Does this happen because I have 1.4.0 & have to root it?
I saw that you said if it boots in ROM then the install was probably faulty.
I haven't gotten to the step of installing gapps & cm_encore_full-253.
Thoughts?

colchiro

Did you say 1.4.0? That's the rom version for the Nook Tablet. This is the Nook Color forum. The NC is version 1.4.1.

These roms do not work on the Nook Tablet.

Assuming you had a typo, it sounds like a problem with your card reader.

marchilopez

Not a typo, noob move; Nook Tablet in hand. Thanks for saving me from myself!

colchiro

I think you're the 2nd person to do that.

See you in the other forum... B&N NOOK Tablet - Android Forums

colchiro

I updated the 3rd post above to make your bootable sdcard use the touchscreen (TWRP).

Now just need to figure out an easy way of installing on EMMC w/o adb.

Falcon095

If I have a new NC with 1.4.1 will this guide work without any problems?

colchiro

Sure. The bootable card still works. What you do with it may change tho.

What's your intent, installing a custom rom like CM7 or rooting?

Falcon095

I'm thinking in dual booting CM7 and stock, but since my NC updated by itself to 1.4.1 its been quite difficult since most guides dont mention if it affects the process. Do you know any tip or guide?

NightAngel79

I had 1.4.1 pushed to me, wipe to factory settings which took me to 1.0.1 and from there I used a cwm sd card to re-root and go with cyanogen.... not sure why i waited this long. This is unbelievable, definitely suggest going with cyanogen 7.1.

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colchiro

It just depends on what your main function is. If you're reading book 90% of the time and need the specialty features, then rooted stock might be ok.

OTOH, if you don't read or reading is a small % of your time or a simple reader is adequate, then installing CM7.1 is the way to go.

NightAngel79

IMO Aldiko>nook app any day of week. as long as any books you already have are epubs you are good to go. (aldiko is app in market)

stucker1224

Hey so how do i do this with a mac? i have a nook color running stock 1.4.1.

colchiro

You'll have to adapt the dd commands from this guide: [HOW-TO] Download and Install CM7 to Run Off SD Card