How to Back Up the EFS on Samsung Devices

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How to Back Up the EFS on Samsung Devices

How to Back Up the EFS on Samsung Devices

Backing up the EFS on Samsung Devices

We learned on our previous article that the EFS folder is a very important folder to back up regardless if you plan to mess with it or not. There have been horror stories of those who simply failed at flashing their smartphones a couple of times and ended up losing their IMEI.

Before you start messing with your device in any way other than the normal operation, one must back up all the things you can back up. Today, we learn about actually backing up the EFS folder.

Preparing for Backup

Power Levels

Before you back up your EFS folder, there are some things you need to get your hands on. First is to have your Samsung smartphone on full power, making sure there would be no interruption in the process.

Backup Program

Another thing you need is an EFS Backup software. For the sake of the tutorial, we would be working with the EFS Pro application developed by lyriquidperfection of XDA Developers. You can go directly to his thread, or maybe just go to the download page from here:

From there, simply click on the download button as shown in the image below.

EFS 5

USB Debugging

On your smartphone, you need to enable it for USB Debugging mode. If you don’t know how to do that, a comprehensive guide can be found in one of our earlier blog posts:

How to Enable USB Debugging on Samsung Devices

USB Mode

We also need to make sure that your device is set up to interact with the program rather than offer up the mass storage mode. Depending on your device, you may have to set it up differently.

On some of the newer phones, this means keeping the phone on MTP connection. There would be no other option to use since both the mass storage and interactive connection has been merged using the MTP protocol.

Screenshot_2013-01-12-23-47-41

On some of the older phones, upon connecting the smartphone, it would prompt you for the type of connection you want to use. Otherwise, you need to navigate to the USB Options found on the “Wireless and Networks” settings. The appropriate connection type would usually be labeled as “Samsung Kies” for both situations.

EFS 1

PC Status

For the sake of the EFS Pro application, you should also install the Microsoft .Net 4.0 framework so that the program can run smoothly. Currently, this program runs only on Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7.

You can download the installer here:

Running EFS Pro

Extract the downloaded file into any directory you want. Open the folder and look for the “EFS Pro.exe”. Run it like you would a normal program. A reminder would tell you to enable USB Debugging in case you skipped that part of the guide. Choose “Ok” to proceed.

EFS 2

The application will go through the initialization process. Once complete, a window will fade in that looks like this:

Application Home Screen

Making a Backup

To make a backup of your EFS, you need to identify first where you plan to keep that backup image. You can either save it to the phone, the PC or both. Back-ups are best stored on both if you still have space on your smartphone. Otherwise, make sure to keep it safe within your PC.

EFS 3

Once you have decided where to save the backup, simply click the “Backup EFS” button. The process would reflect at the bottom of the window with the black background. Once completed, the last line it should say is “Operation Finished!”

EFS 4

To ensure that you always have this data ready, make other copies of the backup and make sure to have it stored in different media as well. You can download and flash a new ROM anytime, but you can’t find another copy of your phone’s EFS data anywhere. It is a unique file that should be kept safe to keep you away from Samsung repair centers.

4 Comments

  1. Gvan39says: April 5, 2014 at 1:42 pm

    I need help. have GT9305 altough my S3 is in debug mode I cannot connect PC to S3
    Message: Waiting for device… Please wait while your device connects with the ADB Server…. in red Device Not connected !!
    regards

  2. maheelsays: April 17, 2014 at 6:02 pm

    whe run EFS pro.exe it says “ADB executable is missing! cannot continue!”

  3. mohd asifsays: May 19, 2014 at 6:49 am

    the application does not initialise gives error>> unhandled exception occured.

    object refrence not set to an instance of an object

    cant backup efs help???

  4. alisays: April 26, 2015 at 6:49 pm

    my problem is that when i turn on my gt-5100 it is turning on but stuck on samsung log i try to perform wipe data then it saying unable to mount efs . what should i do to fix that problem kindly help me thanks this is my email address [email protected]

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