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Root i am so lost!

S

skratch

Newbie
okay, so i've had my captivate for a little while now. when i first got it, it had eclair on it and i was able to root it and install a lagfix on it. was nice and fast, and very responsive. i've since upgraded to stock froyo and have had no luck rooting the phone. on top of that, i've been reading that oclf is actually damaging and the best route to go is to use a custom rom.

well, that all sounds really great, and while i do have some ability to read and follow directions, i am totally lost. what i would like to do is to flash one of the custom roms, but i am having no luck at all. i cannot even root this phone now!

i've read, and read, and read some more, but have succeeded only in confusing myself further. i am finding it difficult to distinguish between what used to work and what actually works now. i've tried a couple of things, and manage to get the 'signature verification failed' prompt. i've tried to download superoneclick 1.9 and am unable to open the zip file. i've read about odin, clockwork mod, aio toolbox, etc. and am confused as to what to use, and why.....

so what do i need to get started with this? all i've read sounds like flashing roms is a piece of cake, but i can't seem to get out of the starting gate! and i would also like the option to flash back to stock if possible.

thanks for helping a total noob out :D (please be gentle, lol)
 
okay, so found out one thing. on the superoneclick, the file is named wrong, it should be .rar not .zip that is one of the things that had been holding me up. changed the extension to .rar and was able to root my phone. seems we are starting to make some progress.
 
First post, but - I was in the same boat; confused as hell, despite being somewhat technologically knowledgeable. AIO Captivate Toolbox was a godsend. Kind of walks you through the process step by step. May not work for you but was great for me.
 
CrimsonPride said:
its not necessary, no, but if someone cannot root i wouldnt recommend installing a rom. thats asking for trouble
Click to expand...

i didn't have any problem when i rooted under eclair. just seems that after the update to froyo, all the old ways don't work anymore, and there is just so much information out there and it is all muxed up together.

on xda, someone had a file attachment for superoneclick, but i couldn't get that to work. come to find out, he had named the file with a .zip extension when it was really a .rar file.

i am rooted now. but in trying to flash to a custom rom, a lot of the videos/tutorials are (again) outdated and don't work properly.

i was trying to flash to serendipity 6.4 earlier this evening, and had no luck with it. i was using the free version of rom manager and following along with the video tutorial on the mobiletech website, but having no luck. as far as i can deduce, it has something to do with the 3e kernel and not having a valid sig file.....

thiswasatriumph: my phone is running stock froyo right now. do i have to use a froyo rom, or can i go with gingerbread. i really want something that is gonna be stable and responsive. are there enough gb roms out there yet?

and btw, i do appreciate the efforts in you guys trying to help. thanks....
 
skratch said:
i didn't have any problem when i rooted under eclair. just seems that after the update to froyo, all the old ways don't work anymore, and there is just so much information out there and it is all muxed up together.

on xda, someone had a file attachment for superoneclick, but i couldn't get that to work. come to find out, he had named the file with a .zip extension when it was really a .rar file.

i am rooted now. but in trying to flash to a custom rom, a lot of the videos/tutorials are (again) outdated and don't work properly.

i was trying to flash to serendipity 6.4 earlier this evening, and had no luck with it. i was using the free version of rom manager and following along with the video tutorial on the mobiletech website, but having no luck. as far as i can deduce, it has something to do with the 3e kernel and not having a valid sig file.....

thiswasatriumph: my phone is running stock froyo right now. do i have to use a froyo rom, or can i go with gingerbread. i really want something that is gonna be stable and responsive. are there enough gb roms out there yet?

and btw, i do appreciate the efforts in you guys trying to help. thanks....
Click to expand...

my first attempt at flashing serendipity 6.4, i had the same 3e signature verification.

ive attached a modded 3e file, that bypasses the verification check, i got this from the xda forums, so its legit. and it also fixed my problem, and allowed me to flash with no more problems.


check the thread on xda and follow the directions
[RECOVERY] 3e Recovery Modded w/ No Verification - xda-developers
 

Attachments

beatdroppah said:
my first attempt at flashing serendipity 6.4, i had the same 3e signature verification.

ive attached a modded 3e file, that bypasses the verification check, i got this from the xda forums, so its legit. and it also fixed my problem, and allowed me to flash with no more problems.


check the thread on xda and follow the directions
[RECOVERY] 3e Recovery Modded w/ No Verification - xda-developers
Click to expand...

i am a nogo at this station. i tried using a terminal emulater and typed in the command as shown in the xda thread and that came back with a 'command not authorized' error. so then i used sgstools and ran the script for "mount_system_rw.q.txt" and that seemed to work okay but then i couldn't find the system/bin folder......

the thing that really drives me nuts is that for all intents and purposes, these are computers. so how come a procedure that works for some does not work for others?
 
hah! i think i am making some progress. in one of the thousands (well, okay slight exaggeration :D) of links/posts/tutorials/videos, i came across one that made a mention of 'droid explorer' to sideload an app. well, with a name like that, i figured it could do more so i downloaded it. after installation, clicked on the link for it to set up the sdk files for me and boom! there i see the system/bin folder.

saved a copy of the recovery file, replaced it with the one that beatdroppah sent to me and i think i should be golden now. too late to go any further tonight, but tomorrow night, i could be enjoying some new rom on the phone.

i really did not want to let this tiny little thing beat the tar outta me..... but i am not going to get too cocky just yet, still got a ways to go.

appreciate everyone's help so far.
 
oh, and quick question. firefly sounds interesting, but from what i can tell, its on rogers. i have gathered that that is the canadian version of att. does that preclude us from using that rom?
 
skratch said:
oh, and quick question. firefly sounds interesting, but from what i can tell, its on rogers. i have gathered that that is the canadian version of att. does that preclude us from using that rom?
Click to expand...

no you can use it fine, its just based off of froyo for the canadian captivates. just like most of the other roms are based off of the international galaxy s
 
yep, figures that my excitement was premature. even though i could 'see' the directory and files via droid explorer, i couldn't do anything with them. i tried to delete the recovery file, it looks like it goes through the motions, but then when looking in the directory, there sits the recovery file. i tried renaming it to recoverybak and after it refreshed, there was the recovery file again.

i did go through sgstools and run the 'mount the rw' script first, but that didn't seem to make any difference.

i swear this thing is making me feel like a friggin idiot...... my next step is gonna be to get a bigger hammer!
 
skratch said:
yep, figures that my excitement was premature. even though i could 'see' the directory and files via droid explorer, i couldn't do anything with them. i tried to delete the recovery file, it looks like it goes through the motions, but then when looking in the directory, there sits the recovery file. i tried renaming it to recoverybak and after it refreshed, there was the recovery file again.

i did go through sgstools and run the 'mount the rw' script first, but that didn't seem to make any difference.

i swear this thing is making me feel like a friggin idiot...... my next step is gonna be to get a bigger hammer!
Click to expand...

It sounds like droid explorer is giving you read only files instead of R/W. You most likely will need a program with root access to delete any important files like that.

If you're still not having any luck with the rooting process, I showed someone how to root by flashing a kernel. Here's my post, it's the last one down. If you end up getting it rooted, you can download the app "root explorer" from the market. It costs like $3, but it's worth it.

http://androidforums.com/captivate-all-things-root/293074-help-superoneclick-v1-7-a.html
 
Like I said a few post up, there is really no reason at all to mess around on stock 2.2 if youre going to flash another rom anyway. You have to go back to stock 2.1 regardless so just start from there.
 
thiswasatriumph said:
Like I said a few post up, there is really no reason at all to mess around on stock 2.2 if youre going to flash another rom anyway. You have to go back to stock 2.1 regardless so just start from there.
Click to expand...

well, going from 2.1 to 2.2 was kind of a pita, so i wanted to be able to have a backup to restore back to 2.2 if i needed to. but this whole process has been so frustrating that i just said screw it and went and did the odin back to 2.1 and then flashed from there to cognition 4.3 using the videos on the mobiletechvideo web site. went pretty smoothly and i'm now running cognition. i didn't follow the steps for backing up and restoring with titanium backup cause i didn't really have much on the phone to start with that i couldn't easily replace.

now the only question i have is on the video they show the app drawer with all the apps looking like they are 'bending' at a 90* angle and coming from way back. (if that makes sense)... how did they do that? is that custom launcher setting? i couldn't find a setting for that anywhere.....

i know, questions, questions....

but, i would like to thank y'all for taking the time to help a noob out.... :)
 
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