Tinkering With The Motorola RAZR V3
Note: This has only been tested on my RAZR V3. I can't guarantee this will work for you. Attempt at your own risk.
I was recently tweaking some things on my RAZR and ran into a couple of troublesome spots, so thought I'd share some tips with you.
I use the software moto4lin which can read and write to the phone's storage. You can use the tool to set new ringtones or back up existing ones, download your photos, and add or tweak the menu skins. It's a powerful tool so you shouldn't mess with it if you're not sure what it all means. In other words, you can delete system files if you're not careful. Moto4lin is for the GNU/Linux system but there may be similar tools available for Windows or Mac OS users.
Here are some tips:
- Use moto4lin to backup everything on your phone. Save all the phone contents to your computer. Make that backup read-only. Burn it to CD-R just in case. Or, have a friend with a RAZR who's brave enough to let you touch theirs after you fubar yours.
- Some of the icons in your pictures folder are necessary for your phone menus. Don't delete everything in there blindly to free up room (the amount of room you can free up isn't really worth it anyway). Some apps will lock up your phone if they can't find their icons, forcing you to reboot.
- Do not remove the Moto skin. More on this below.
Downloading Photos
Downloading your photos is simple with moto4lin. Once your phone is connected to moto4lin, click "Update List" to show the phone's Directory tree. Browse to the /a/mobile/picture/ folder. Unless you rename your photos (most people don't), your photos will be labeled with a date-time stamp (eg. 09-12-06_1747.jpg). These will typically appear at the top of your file list in moto4lin. Select all of the photos and click Download. You can then choose which folder to save the photos to.
Creating New Ringtones
If you have a correctly-configured MP3 file, you can upload it to your phone to use as a ringtone. Here are the settings required:
- Bitrate of 24, 32, or 64kbps (other values may work, I've only seen ringtones with these)
- 44.1 kHz
- Both mono and stereo output work?
- Limit the duration of the ringtone to about 30 seconds. There may not be a hard upper limit but it's best if you keep your filesize small.
You can use a program like Audacity to create these ringtones from existing music files. Trim the audio file to just the part you want as a ringtone and save with the above options.
Connect to your phone with moto4lin. Use "Update List" to show the phone's Directory tree. Navigate to /a/mobile/audio/ (make sure that is your Upload path) and click Upload. Choose the ringtone MP3 file you created and upload it to your phone.
Before your phone will recognize the new ringtone it has to rebuild the MyToneDB.db file. First, in moto4lin open the /a/mobile/audio/ folder and delete the MyToneDB.db and TempToneDB.db files. Through your phone interface, set your Preferences->Audio->Style to Silent. Turn off and restart your phone. Choose an Audio->Style other than Silent or Vibrate and your new ringtone should be available.
Master Reset, Master Clear
Master Reset changes all of your configurations back to the factory default. It will not restore missing files. Master Clear will remove files (like downloads and the address book) that didn't exist when the phone was brand new. By default, the password to do a Master Reset or Clear is '000000'. (This is stated in your phone's user manual). If some default files are missing after a Master Reset you may encounter problems with the phone. See below for some ways to recover from these errors.
Deleting Unnecessary Files
Perform at your own risk
I've found that the only picture files I really need in /a/mobile/picture/ folder are the *_mm_*.gif files. I think these are the Main Menu images. I don't use the phone's IM features so I don't need all of the emoticons or the splashscreens. Back up your entire /a/mobile/picture/ directory first (download the files to your computer) and then delete any file you don't want, except for the *_mm_*.gif files. You can free up nearly a megabyte by cleaning up this folder.
In your root folder /a/ are images specific to your phone carrier. I'm with Cingular and they have a custom startup and shutdown animation (custwakeup.gif and custgoodbye.gif). If you want fast startups and shutdowns you can delete these two. Or you can replace them with your own .gif files. If you delete a skin (not the Moto skin, see below) you can delete its .tcf file and the copy of its screensaver and wallpaper here. Remember as always to back up this folder before tinkering with anything.
I haven't had success deleting the default ringtones. It seems that some are necessary, at least if they're already part of an Audio Style setting. If you attempt to delete from the /a/mobile/audio/ folder, be sure to have the phone rebuild the MyToneDB.db file (see the Creating New Ringtones section above). After trying to remove some ringtones that were already part of some Audio Styles I couldn't access those styles. You may be able to set all your styles to only use the ringtones you want to keep and then delete the ones you don't want. These styles may revert to defaults after a Master Reset, so be sure you have your original /a/mobile/audio/ folder in a backup.
The Moto Skin
The RAZR skins are stored on the phone under /a/mobile/skins/, and then a folder for each skin. The skins consist of two file types: a .ski file (a plaintext file which defines colors and style options) and .dat files (binary image files). On my phone there is also a {skin name}.tcf file and a copy of the screen saver and wall paper on the /a/ root folder. A skin will remain in the preferences/skin option as long as that .tcf file exists.
You'll notice that the skins Scarlet and Silver have four files each, while Moto has many more (16 total). This is because Moto has the default style information for when other skins don't specify their own. Example: the Silver skin doesn't set its own style for the system icons, so the phone looks in the Moto folder instead for that style. If the Moto folder is wiped out, and your other skin doesn't have all the styles set, your phone will be almost unusable (menus will display incorrectly or not at all). Also, whenever you do a Master Reset it changes the skin back to Moto -- and if you've deleted that skin, all your menus will be completely black.
Recovering From Black Menus (deleted Moto skin + Master Reset)
If you've deleted your Moto skin and performed a Master Reset, your phone will display nothing but black on all the menus (black text on black background). This can also happen if you delete your Moto skin while your phone is set to use the Moto skin. On my phone I could still see the startup and shutdown animations and the status bar at the top (reception meter, batter meter, etc). I could still dial numbers and use the camera but I couldn't really see any of the controls to know which options I was choosing.
The reason this happens is that a Master Reset changes all of your configurations back to default. This includes changing back to the default Moto skin. Because your Moto skin is completely gone, all the menu icons, backgrounds, and colors revert to default -- all black.
If you have another working RAZR phone available or a backup of your phone files, you can skip right to the solution for "Recovering From Half-Working Menus" below. Only do the following if you don't have another RAZR handy and don't have a backup of your phone files.
If you kept the Scarlet or Silver skins on your phone, you could change to one of those skins and the menus will half-work again. The trouble is, you can't see the menus to get to those skin settings! Now the menus still work, so after a Master Reset you should be able to change to your existing skin by pressing these exact buttons. Dash is the /--\ button on the top-center of your phone pad. Dot is the button in the center of the navigation circle, and the arrows are for the navigation circle. From the Home Screen (press the red button several times to make sure you're there) :
dash, right, down, dot (Settings), down, dot (Personalize), down down dot (Skin). Press down once for Scarlet or down twice for Silver (if you have no other skins) and dot.
Here's another way to recover it using moto4lin. I personally deleted the Moto and Scarlet skins thinking I didn't need either. I still had the Silver skin. If you kept either the Scarlet or Silver skin, here's a way to get your phone back to half-working menus (see below for fixing that). I used moto4lin to download the contents of my existing skin. I renamed the .ski file to Moto.ski (the filename must match the skin folder it's in) and uploaded the skin files into the Moto folder. The Moto folder may not show up in moto4lin because it's empty; set the upload path to where the Moto folder was (/a/mobileskins/Moto) and upload your renamed skin there.
Reboot your phone and the menus should be half-working (no longer black on black). Your phone will be somewhat usable until you get access to a working RAZR to perform the following.
Recovering From Half-Working Menus (deleted Moto skin)
If your original Moto skin files are gone, most of your menus won't work (unless you have a custom skin that defines all of the menu styles, not just the few styles used in Scarlet and Silver). Many of your icons will be missing and some of the menus will act funny (the text won't clear properly in some places or will disappear in others).
What you'll need is moto4lin and either your phone's backup files (if you saved them using moto4lin) or another working RAZR phone with the Moto skin. Take the 16 files (1 .ski file and 15 .dat files) and load them back into your /a/mobile/skins/Moto/ folder. Reboot your phone and the skin should be working properly.
Recovering Icons
If you've deleted some of the icons you needed from the /a/mobile/pictures/ photo, you can restore them from your phone backup files or from another RAZR. Follow the same procedure as Recovering From Half-Working Menus, above. Upload the recovered files to the /a/mobile/picture/ folder using moto4lin. It's easiest to just restore the entire picture folder, but you may optionally just restore the *_mm_*.gif files (the Main Menu icon files).
Note that by default the system icons have the Attributes "System" and "Hidden". When you restore the icon files using moto4lin they will lose the Hidden attribute. This means that anytime you're scrolling through your photos on the phone, all these other icons will also appear (which can be tedious). Use the moto4lin tool to change the files back to Hidden. Choose the system files you want to hide in the moto4lin File Manager. Under Attributes, choose Hidden and click Change. You may optionally also set them back to Read Only.