(I recommend you look at Post #2 before undertaking the process in this post.)

This guide* is straightforward. It offers almost no options. The advantage is that it can be done step-by-step and get you to the desired result. It's like when you ask for directions and you can be told the shortest route or the route that is easiest to follow. These are the directions for people who don't know the neighborhood (including Newbies).

Some steps may not be necessary for most users, but by including everything, it makes a one-size-fits-all program to follow. It does not use SSH or or even your Tablet's WiFi connection, which I suggest you leave off for this entire process. It assumes you are using Windows, but Linux and Mac users can make most adjustments easily.

The directions do not apply to the N770.

If you want more options or understanding, see especially this thread Post #1 and Post #292. This may help too. But the point of this post is so that you don't have to go to those other posts or anywhere else at all. This is also a very fast process (esp. if you skip optional Steps #2 and #3) since you download only one (zipped) file and don't need multiple repositories, wget, etc.

A note of thanks and attribution: This is just a simplification and consolidation of the work done by people who, unlike me, actually understand what they're doing, above all, by far, fanoush and Milhouse. Thanks guys! I could not clone without you! Thanks also to ProNuke, Dan, and Bunanson.


1. SD Card (miniSD card)

A. Use an SD Card that is 2GB or larger; at least up to 8GB works, probably up to 16GB or even 32GB will work. If you are using an SDHC Card (and all SD cards > 2GB are SDHC) and a card reader for optional Step 2, make sure you use a reader that can read SDHC cards. (For the N810, you would use a mini-SD card for N810; I'll just call it SD Card after this. Also, I will refer to both the N800 and the N810 as N800 or NIT.)

2. [Optional] Formatting the card

A. In most instances this step is unnecessary; so, at least if you don't have a card reader or Windows, skip it and see if the process turns out OK anyway.
B. Download and install the Panasonic SD Memory Card Formatting Software into your Windows computer.
C. Place your SD Card in a card reader.
D. Use the Panasonic formatter to format the card. Select the options for FULL Erase ON and for Format Size Adjustment OFF. (It doesn't matter if the formatter reports that it can't use the Erase function.) This low-level formatting takes about 10 minutes.

3. [Optional] Flash your NIT

A. This step is not usually necessary. If you really want to keep what you've already done on your Flash memory, skip this step. Not doing this step could cause problems caused by your having problematic catalogues or software installations. If you don't do this step, I believe you should at least turn off your virtual memory (if you had set it up before).
B. Using your Windows computer get the Nokia Internet Tablet Software Update Wizard. Use it to flash your NIT to OS2008.
C. Do the initial set-up stuff, like choosing your language.

4. Download the necessary software

A. I have uploaded all the necessary files to a zip file on RapidShare.**
B. Download it from here into your computer (not into your NIT).
C. Unzip it. Create a new folder, name it clonegk, and put the eleven unzipped files into it.
D. With an SD card in a slot on your NIT, turn on your NIT and connect it to your computer by USB. On your computer desktop, copy the folder clonegk into Documents on the NIT's Flash drive.
a. You may be able to do this directly. More likely you will need to copy it first to the SD Card. Then open File Manager (Desktop Applications Icon > Utilities > File Manager) and move it to Documents on the Flash drive.
E. Disconnect your NIT from the USB connection.
F. Disconnect from WiFi: On your NIT, go to the WiFi icon in the Status Indicator Area and disconnect from WiFi (if you aren't already disconnected).

5. Install flashing software

A. Go into Red Pill Mode.
a. Open Application Manager on the NIT (Desktop Applications Icon > Settings > Application Manager). From the pulldown menu, select Tools > Application catalogue.
b. Click New.
c. For web address, enter the following word (not followed by a space): matrix
d. Click Cancel, and choose Red Pill.
e. NOTE WELL: Red Pill Mode is considered dangerous to your NIT. If you don't know what you're doing, keep out of it except for this brief episode; and make sure you return to Blue Pill Mode when done.
B. Close Catalog window. Leave Application Manager open.
C. Open File Manager.
D. Navigate to, and open, clonegk, within Documents.
E. Click, or double-click, becomeroot. Install? OK. Not from Nokia, continue anyway? OK.
F. Return to File Manager, leaving Application Manager open. Install these files from clonegk in the following order: e2fslibs, libblkid, libcomerr, libss, libuuid, e2fsprogs.

6. Return to Blue Pill Mode.

A. In Application Manager on the NIT, from the pulldown menu, select Tools > Application catalogue.
B. Click New.
C. For web address, enter: matrix
D. Click Cancel; choose Blue Pill.
E. Close the Application Manager.
F. Close any other open apps.

7. Partition SD card.

A. If the SD card that you are going to use for dual-booting is not in your internal slot on the N800 (or in your sole slot in the N810), turn off your NIT and insert your SD card; then reboot.
B. Launch Xterm (Desktop Applications Icon > Utilities > Xterm). Type the following (except what is in brackets), clicking Enter (Return) after each line.

sudo gainroot
umount /media/mmc2 [someone with an N810 … is this mmc2? If not, please PM me and I'll make a change here]
sfdisk /dev/mmcblk0 -uM [note: that's a zero, not a capital letter O]
[you should now see a prompt that ends with mmcblk0p1 and a colon]
[the following is for an 8GB card; for a 2GB card use 1100 instead of 7100; for a 4GB card, use 3100; for a 16GB card, use 15100]
[If you want to understand this better, see this post.]
0,7100,0C [after entering this, the new prompt should end in p2]
,,, [that's right, you type three commas and click enter]
[leave blank, and press enter; this will be for p3]
[leave blank, and press enter; this will be for p4]
[you will be asked if you want to write this to disk; answer yes] y
reboot [at the # prompt, just type in the word "reboot" (no quotation marks) and wait a little bit ... your NIT will reboot]

8. Install the flasher

A.Upon rebooting, the NIT may say that you have an unformatted or corrupted card; that's OK, don't worry about it.
B. Disconnect from WiFi: On your NIT, go to the WiFi icon in the Status Indicator Area and disconnect from WiFi (if you aren't already disconnected).
C. Launch Xterm. Type the following (except what is in brackets), clicking Enter after each line.

sudo gainroot
cd /home/user/MyDocs/.documents/clonegk/ [your prompt should now end with clonegk #]
tar zxvf initfs_flasher.tgz
cd initfs_flasher/
./initfs_flash
[continue?] yes
[backup?] yes
[Remove extra stuff?] yes
[Install telnet?] yes
[install dropbear?] yes [then there is a pause for some seconds]
[ready for flashing?] yes
[press enter to reboot when it tells you to]

D. If you are given a choice of where to boot from, use your D-Pad to select Boot from Flash.

9. Flash for dual-booting

A.Upon rebooting, the NIT may say that you have an unformatted or corrupted card; don't worry about it.
B. Disconnect from WiF, if you aren't already disconnected.
C. Launch Xterm. Enter the following (except what is in brackets):

mkdir ~/bin
cp /home/user/MyDocs/.documents/clonegk/nupgrade.sh ~/bin
cp /home/user/MyDocs/.documents/clonegk/tar ~/bin
cd ~/bin
chmod +x nupgrade.sh tar
sudo gainroot
./nupgrade.sh wipe
[You may be asked if you want Ext2fs, do you want to continue ...]
YES [not just y, you have to type YES]
[Now watch in amazement as the NIT copies your system ... takes 5 minutes or so. Ends with: Committing updates and Unmounting filesystems ... Done ... then: /home/user/bin # ]
reboot
D. This time when your NIT starts up, select that you want to boot from Flash. (It may boot to Flash automatically without asking.)

10. The Finale, Formatting Your FAT Partition

A.Upon rebooting, the NIT may say that you have an unformatted or corrupted card; that's OK, don't worry about it.
B. Launch Xterm. Enter the following (except what is in brackets):

sudo gainroot
mkdosfs /dev/mmcblk0p1 [it will pause after a string of ###, then get back to a # prompt]
shutdown -r now

C. Watch for when you need to hold down the Menu key button. Select that you want to boot from the MMC.


Congratulations!

*I hope soon to make this a Wiki, but having never made a wiki, I'd be glad if anyone else did this before me.

**This link will expire in 30 days. If someone has a more permanent place to keep it, please upload it there, PM me the URL, and I will edit this link. If I have done something illegal or otherwise wrong in posting these debs and other files in a place other than a repository, please notify me.

Some additional, helpful add-ons and comments regarding dual-booting:


Edit as of June 2008: This Post #2 contains some useful tips for using a cloned system and is worth reviewing. However, the usefulness of the HOW TO in Post #1 has been superseded by Penguinbait's great easy-to-use .deb, which automates the whole cloning process. So first check there (and here). Good luck!

I hit the maximum post-length in Post #1, so there are comments about the guide that I put here. You can still just follow the guide as set out in Post #1, but these may be worth looking at. I've also kept this post as a place to put information about additional things you might want to do after you're successfully double-booting.

COMMENTS ON THE GUIDE IN POST #1:

Check bunanson's thread on users' experiences with different brands and types of cards. Also, after you've cloned (or failed at it ), if your experience provides information additional to (or contradictory to) what is on that thread, please take the time to add a post there and enhance the knowledge base.

In Step 8, I originally had:

[backup?] no
[Remove extra stuff?] yes
[Install telnet?] no
[install dropbear?] no

That's what I've used, with success. But I trust fanoush put these options in so that any of them would work, and qwerty12 says that there are important uses for the options I'd declined. Obviously, they remain options. But I've changed Step 8 to comply with qwerty's judgment.

ADD-ONS:

I recommend this extra tweak: Once you are dual-booting, if you have trouble "seeing" your internal card when connected to a computer by USB, see Question #1 and Answer #1 in this post. After making that change, your PC should recognize the SD cards when the Tablet is connected by USB.

I recommend this extra tweak: To get boot menu that defaults to internal card, and to set whether to ask each time or not, enter this code as root:For more info on this and other boot menu tweaks, see the ReadMe in initfs_flasher folder and this post.

If you use Windows and want to make a backup of your partitions (a real backup, not like the included Nokia backup), I suggest Acronis True Image. (Thanks, dont, for the suggestion.) Version 11 works for this; Version 9 does not; I don't know about Version 10. You can even use it to make a copy of your SD card that has the cloned system.

It may be possible to make a back-up (a copy) of your MMC (SD card) entirely within an N800 without any other software. I haven't tried it yet, but see iliaden's post.

Here's a great shortcut from nilchak so you don't have to keep typing "sudo gainroot".

Because of how the MMC works, it is subject to corruption problems. To quote Schmots, "your system can get a little off... if you notice items missing from menus or it's just not working right, reboot to the internal flash and run this command as root from the xterm
The fsck command is a file system checker, the -fy is a force run saying yes to all fixes." I learned this on Schmots's guide to dual-booting, which you might want to check out as an alternative to mine.

A nice addition -- especially for changing between a Flash and MMC boot -- is to be able to soft reboot. See fanoush's instructions. (EDIT: I have to say, I was successful with this once, but unsuccessful on another try. I can't recommend it to someone who isn't pretty comfortable with Xterm, at a minimum. At least, read fanoush's post all the way through before entering any code.)

A trivial (and, oh well, unrelated) enhancement of mine that I like is to eliminate the startup sound. Instructions here.

Hello geraldko..

I came until here

chmod +x nupgrade.sh tar

It says chmod: tar: No such file or directory.


Please help.

Yeah got it..... i think in the second line you forgot to specify the destination for the copy command. it should be

cp /home/user/MyDocs/.documents/clonegk/tar ~/bin

Definitely one to sticky in the wiki!

Thanks, sachin007! You're right. I've made the edit in Post #1, so (until someone finds my next typo!) it all ought to work. Glad to have someone who's been around the block there to check it.

registered just to say THANK YOU! Awesome easy!!!

Thanks for taking the time to do this. I went through it once in the beginning on my 770 using fanoush's original guide, and was too lazy to redo it on th N8x0...

When Diablo comes out this quarter and we (hopefully !) reflash for the last time, I'll do a clean install to MMC using your cheat sheet :-)

One addendum to the original howto:

Not all SD cards > 2GB are SDHC; I have 2 4GB SD cards in my N800 that has not been patched for SDHC cards. These non-HC cards are however more and more difficult to find and not every card will work in every device, as they rely on subtle trickery and shenanigans with the SD specs.

I somehow end up doing this for howtos...

http://www.internettablettalk.com/wi...B_Dual-Booting

All I did was copy/paste, so if you get a chance take a look to make sure I didn't mess it up.