Restore Backup on Different Architecture

garrison · June 14, 2020 at 4:08 PM

Hello. What special considerations need to be made when backing up LibreELEC on one architecture (e.g., an old x86_64 netbook) and restoring it on another (e.g., a new Raspberry Pi 4)? I've tried two methods: replacing the .kodi folder manually, and using the LibreELEC backup/restore functionality. However, a few things seem broken, regardless of method. For instance, the rsync binary does not work in the network-tools addon. Also, I cannot get inputstream.adaptive to work. Using the LibreELEC backup/restore functionality, I am able to uninstall it, but I cannot install it again. Looking at the log suggests it is not even trying to install it for the correct architecture (instead it is using the old one, x86_64).

Code

2020-06-14 10:55:08.472 T:2345644912   ERROR: Requested path https://addons.libreelec.tv/9.2.0/Generic/x86_64/inputstream.adaptive/inputstream.adaptive-2.4.5.1.zip not found in known repository directories

EDIT: I tried again from a fresh sdcard image, then restoring a LibreELEC backup on the new machine. The binary add-ons are broken as before, and once I uninstall them I am not able to install them again. Platform-independent add-ons install just fine.

**chewitt** · June 17, 2020 at 4:33 PM Official Post

There are some audio/video config items in Kodi settings (guisettings.xml) that will be different due to hardware differences, but as you discovered the main problem will be binary add-ons, which must be removed before taking the backup that you want to migrate to the new device. Once you've restored you can reinstall them. When removing an add-on you can choose to completely remove or leave data behind. In theory if you leave behind your config(s) will be resumed on reinstall.

garrison · June 18, 2020 at 1:31 AM

Thank you for the reply. Is there a simple way of identifying which add-ons have binary components? (or do I need to do this from memory and hope that I have identified them all before saving a backup?) I would have hoped that I could simply uninstall and then reinstall any addons I have missed, after migrating to the new architecture. In any case, your suggestion already gives me something to work with, and I greatly appreciate it.

**chewitt** · June 18, 2020 at 5:55 AM Official Post

If I were doing it myself I would unpack the backup tar file on a clean install, stop Kodi, move sources, guisettings, thumbnail chaches and the userdata addon_data folders over, then restart Kodi and simply reinstall all add-ons. It probably takes longer to investigate each add-on and work out whether it's binary or not, than it takes to blindly do all of them. If you're familiar with copy/move Linux commands this is no more than 10 mins effort.

garrison · June 18, 2020 at 10:28 PM

Thank you, this was a good plan, and everything now works.

Elicity · March 28, 2025 at 10:46 PM

I tried doing this and there were some issues. I just unpacked the .kodi/userdata folder. That seemed to have worked fine. However the guisettings.xml caused my 4k screen to display as 1080p, leaving me with 25% to work with. I fixed that with:

Code

systemctl stop kodi
cd /storage/.kodi/userdata
mv guisettings.xml guisettings.xml.bak
awk '/<resolutions>/ {print "    <resolutions />"; next} /<\/resolutions>/ {next} {print}' guisettings.xml.bak > guisettings.xml
cd $OLDPWD
systemctl start kodi

Oh, and don't forget to extract your .ssh folder, almost locked myself out

Also deleted the Addons33.db, to prevent x86 plugins to reinstall.

That was it for me

Restore Backup on Different Architecture

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