Uninstalled system applications appear after reboot on HTC Desire X

[Igor Rybak]

I have tried a lot of things which mentioned in different forums such as:

• delete using root ES File Explorer.
• delete apk files from /system/app.
• clear Dalvik cache after uninstall (manually removing /data/dalvik-cache and /cache/dalvik-cache and using CWM recovery.
• all mentioned earlier together several times.
• Even reinstall ROM wiping data/factory reset and clearing Dalvik cache using recovery.

But no result. And I get something like this on startup if I clear Dalvik cache:

So there is a location from where OS gets these apps, isn't it? How can I get rid of these redundant apps?
Update:
Here a link to my ROM: forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2249760

 

[mikedt]

But no result. And I get something like this on startup if I clear Dalvik cache:

So there is a location from where OS gets these apps, isn't it? How can I get rid of these redundant apps?

Yeh, you will see that if you clear the Dalvik cache, because Android has to setup("optimize") all the apps again. Are these "redundant" apps system apps? If so you'll need root to remove them. Is it a carrier supplied and subsidized version Desire X you've got there?

 

[Hadron]

Are you S-Off? If not you are wasting your time with any of those methods, since you can't actually delete things from system while running android even with root (so the reason they come back is that you haven't successfully deleted them, whatever the app tells you). Guides that refer to devices without this NAND security system don't apply to HTC devices.

The simplest option is to just uninstall updates to these apps, clear their data and disable them (using system menu or freeze them with Titanium backup). Since removing them from /system won't give you more space this is practically the same as uninstalling them.

If you really want rid of them you could try removing them using adb while in (custom) recovery mode - won't work when running android, but should from recovery. Take a nandroid or have a copy of the ROM to reflash in case anything goes wrong. Or edit a copy of the ROM zip, removing unwanted apps, then flash that (something I did a lot in 2011-2, when fitting ROMs into custom partitions).

 

[Igor Rybak]

Thanks for a reply, @mikedt. I have already rooted my phone.

Are these "redundant" apps system apps?

- Yes, these unnecessary apps are system apps. Also, I tried to remove only one from /data/dalvik-cache and then on startup it prints "Optimizing apps 1 of 1"

Is it a carrier supplied and subsidized version Desire X you've got there?

- No, it is not carrier supplied. And I don't know what is subsidized version.

 

[Hadron]

Thanks for a reply, @mikedt. Also, I tried to remove only one from /data/dalvik-cache and then on startup it prints "Optimizing apps 1 of 1"

That's normal behaviour if you remove the dex file. Indeed you can wipe the dalvik cache (removing all apps from /data/dalvil-cache) and it will "optimise" all of them on the next boot, i.e. rebuild the dalvik cache. You need to remove all elements to uninstall an app, and if the phone is S-On you cannot remove stuff from /system while it is running android, only from recovery mode (as I said above).

 

[Igor Rybak]

Thank you, @Hadron very much. My device was S-ON. After I enabled S-OFF I fixed it.

 

[Hadron]

Yes, that will also do it

(I wasn't sure whether S-Off tools would stil be available for a 5 year old device - after a few years links tend to disappear, or firmware updates mean the tools no longer work).