I tested adb with my phone and it's working.
I could set the usb to "virtual CD drive (read only)" and it had a single adb.rar file on it.
surprisingly, that version didn't work ! it detected my phone, but as "offline".
I downloaded the latest version from android website, and it can now connect.
I tried "backup -all -system" command, and it worked. I deleted pictures and tried again, the backup is the same size. not sure what is included in the backup. at least, not the user's data.
are there tools to browse a backup file?
I don't know the folder structure or how to browse the phone's internal file system with adb.
I guess you'll have to tell me the commands you want me to run, I don't know what I'm doing without help. I'm a newbie with android.