Root Trying to understand SPRecovery vs Clockworkmod Recovery

[crankerchick]

I have read through the guides referenced in the sticky but I'm still a bit lost on this sprecovery and clockworkmod recovery or whatever. I've rooted my FRG22 and have the superuser permissions and have installed titanium backup. I will backup my SMS/call log/apps/etc before flashing any ROMs.

I want to now do the nandroid backup business, but I'm lost on whether to use sprecovery or clockworkmod recovery. One of the guides says clockworkmod recovery is easier. I'm not about the 1-click stuff, I'd rather understand what it is i'm doing. Where do I get either of these utilities? Which one is "better" to use?

The concept is that the utility lives on my sdcard and creates a backup image that can then be loaded if manage to flub things up going back and forth between ROMs? Is this the utility that would run when I boot the phone and press X? (Right now if I do that, I just get the phone and exclamation point, i take it because I have no recovery utility installed?) Sorry if this has been covered, I've been reading all evening, just need someone to break it down for me.

Thanks in advance.

 

[istolvampire]

You do need to load one of the recovery options on the phone. Most people use Clockwork but I use Sprecovery. It doesn't really matter but some roms require one or the other depending on how you want to install the rom. If you are going to use Rom Manager to load roms then Clockwork is the one you want. Oh and yes then it will get to the recovery when you hold X on power up.

You can load either recovery easily with rom manager app and switch back and forth as often as you like.

 

[Lock-N-Load]

Both are types of recovery tools found in ROM Manager. Clockwork is most often used to make a ROM backup but sometimes you can loose your clockwork recovery app so instead you find people sill flash an 'alternate' recovery method .. SPREcovery. But most then just reflash clockwork and proceed to backup. Again both are accessible in ROM Manager. Of course you could also boot right into recovery & do a nandroid backup... which is like clockwork but done at recovery level.

Get it?

 

[Trofn8er]

Both are types of recovery tools found in ROM Manager. Clockwork is most often used to make a ROM backup but sometimes you can loose your clockwork recovery app so instead you find people sill flash an 'alternate' recovery method .. SPREcovery. But most then just reflash clockwork and proceed to backup. Again both are accessible in ROM Manager. Of course you could also boot right into recovery & do a nandroid backup... which is like clockwork but done at recovery level.

Get it?

Should you always have a nandroid backup in case you get hung up in a bootloop? I have never done a nandroid just clockwork.....

Thanks

 

[JoseyWales]

I flashed my phone too many times without wiping the data and made my phone useless. I was using Clockwork as my default recovery so when my phone become crap, I love my ability to back up anything. If I had kept SPRecovery as the default recovery then regardless of what I did to my phone, I would have been able to backup back to the latest working nanroid backup.

Its basically a matter of if you care about worst case scenarios IMO

 

[The_Chief]

Should you always have a nandroid backup in case you get hung up in a bootloop? I have never done a nandroid just clockwork.....

Thanks

ALWAYS have a nandroid backup of your phone's current good state in case something goes wrong. I tend to backup weekly or before any major changes.

 

[OMJ]

http://androidforums.com/droid-all-things-root/103231-sprecovery-vs-clockwork-poll-added.html

This thread lists a lot of pros/cons of both recoveries.

 

[crankerchick]

Thanks everyone i've got my nandroid backup which i made using clockworkmod recovery. i "flashed" that CWMR utility (is flashing what I call it?) using ROM manager but I would like to know how else do you get either that or sprecovery to be the recovery utility that comes up when one holds X at power-on? I found where to download SPR and CWMR but I couldn't figure out how to load the image so I just ended up using ROM manager but would still like to know how to do it without ROM manager. Just another detail I want to know to make sure I know what I'm doing and not just letting things 1-click for me.

 

[crankerchick]

Never mind, the answer was staring me in the face the whole time. I didn't realize I was just changing the recovery utility from the default. Use terminal or ADB. Makes more sense now.