In response to comments and in my articles, many times I say to use SEUS(Sony Ericsson Update Service) to repair and restore your Xperia as it just takes some minutes. It is breeze.
People often ask me, “How it takes just some minutes? It is long way to download and re-flash.” Answer is very simple, when you updated your Xperia for first time the firmware files are downloaded and stored on your harddrive. However, we remove SEUS or delete update files and lose it. Then we have to download it again.
Here is very simple way to keep backup of that firmware and to save time downloading hundreds of MB. Phone flashing and custom ROM testing becomes very exciting this way.
If you haven’t touched SEUS after an update or repair, then you can go to this path:
C:\Program Files\Sony Ericsson\Update Service
Copy the whole folder “Update Service” and keep it some where safe.
This contains the “db” folder where all your firmware files are stored. Many people emphasize on saving only “db” and “blob_fs” folder but as main “exe” file is also updated every time and a log is kept by SEUS, it’s really good idea to backup everything. It will save more time during update.
If you have already deleted/uninstall SEUS, then you will need to start from scratch and update your phone. Then remember to keep backup before deleting.
Next time you brick your phone or want to restore back to original software and you don’t have firmware or SEUS then you can use this backup and get back your phone in minutes. How?
Just install SEUS and Quit after it starts. Then overwrite/replace the whole “update service” folder in “C:\Program files\Sony Ericsson” by copy paste method.
Start SEUS again and this time when all internet checks/synchro are done, it will directly move to “flashing” instead of downloading.
Handy… right?