Root [Guide]ROOTING HTC android 2.2.1 or lower with unrEVOked - Windows (updated 20th December 2012)

[Hadron]

That's good - if it will let you fastboot flash recovery you can backup, root, install ROMs. Not being able to fastboot flash radio is no biggie - radio updates are overrated, and an S-On phone can flash them from recovery if ever needed. The main loss in being S-On is that you can't repartition the internal storage (e.g. using a custom hboot), which is one of the 2 main ways of getting more space. Still a lot you can do without though.

Oh, and HTC can tell that you unlocked, whereas with community tools you can completely undo it.

Unfortunately relocking the bootloader doesn't let unrevoked or Revolutionary run. It's the bootloader version that's the problem.

 

[tobermoryboy]

Hi Hadron
I wish you wouldn't keep changing your avatar its most disturbing when you login and the image is different!
I took the phone to Fonefunshop in Sheffield, they took it into the back and brought it out 2mins later with "S-Off", relieved me of

 

[Hadron]

I did consider sticking with Eli, but people who didn't know about the Halloween costume party sometimes found her disturbing, so I figured I'd go for something more harmless (and Holly should be harmless, though probably baffling to anyone who doesn't know Red Dwarf ).

I only know 2 ways of making a Desire S-Off, Alpharev and Revolutionary, which are by the same people anyway. So my guess is that they ran one of these - you should be able to tell by looking for pink writing at the top of the HBOOT screen.

As for ROMs, if you want the minimum of "stock" stuff then dGB is the most stripped-down there is, though you want to consider using a custom hboot to get the best from it (it's very small, so you can use a small /system partition to maximise your internal storage). For other Gingerbread ROMs, MildWild (Oxygen based) has had a lot of love, and the latest version (4.5) looks much smaller than the previous one.

I can't recommend an JellyBean ROM as I've never used one, and most seem still to be somewhat work in progress. I think most are based off Evervolv sources anyway. Sandvold's ICS is supposed to be pretty full-featured and stable, though I think the dev is unable to work on it at the moment.

One thing to watch: do you have an ext4 partition on your SD card (or ext3, but these days I'd recommend ext4 and some ROMs actually require that format)? The reason I ask is that some ROMs are larger than the Desire's /system partition, and need an ext partition in addition to fit the whole ROM in. If you try to install one of these without having an ext partition it will not boot, so if you are finding that many ROMs are failing I wonder whether this is the problem. It's always a good plan to read the first post or two of a ROM thread to find out whether there are any particular requirements.

 

[tobermoryboy]

Hi Hadron - unsurprisingly I'm back!
Phone setting when returned from FoneFunShop was:
*** UNLOCKED ***
BRAVO PVT4 SHIP S-OFF
HBOOT-0.83.0001
MICROP-051d
TOUCH PANELO-SYNW0101
RADIO-4.08.00.09
Jun 10 2010, 12:12;05

So top line gives nothing away!
We tried a couple more Roms then followed your advice and flashed dGB, this worked initially so I started piling in apps, somewhere along the line it hung.
Next morning we re-flashed, it worked all day so I started loading again. Five days later - still working - then it had a paddy and went into a HTC screen, re-boot cycle, lots of Vol-up, power, menu, back, button pressing and after about 15mins something clicked and it booted and looked OK. I took it home and loaded IP Cam Viewer and Evernote and it all continued to work.
I charged it overnight and it came from a power off state (It was left on) and went into the Start-reboot loop and this time won't come round.

I have spent several days firstly following an "error message" that apparently wasn't - on HBoot it flashes up missing files we had to video and enlarge to see what was happening - apparently normal!

I have done some studying and looking at the SD, I think it is just partitioned as FAT32 (There is a folder called 4ext but I suspect this is just a recovery) my Windows laptop will read ext2/3/4 partitions so I hadn't checked the Disk Format.
Current settings are:
AlphaRev GBrSU 60
BRAVO PVT4 SHIP S-OFF
HBOOT-6.93.1002
MICROP-051d
TOUCH PANELO-SYNW0101
RADIO-5.11.05.27
Aug 10 2010, 17:52;18
I am proposing to

• do a recovery
• flash dGB
• Install 4EXT
• Do a backup
• Format and re-partition SD (4GB) as ext4
• load apps
• backup again

Is that all I should need and in the correct order?
Thanks for all the attention (we seem to have this thread to ourselves), it is very much appreciated.

 

[Hadron]

Hi Hadron - unsurprisingly I'm back!
Phone setting when returned from FoneFunShop was:
*** UNLOCKED ***
BRAVO PVT4 SHIP S-OFF
HBOOT-0.83.0001
MICROP-051d
TOUCH PANELO-SYNW0101
RADIO-4.08.00.09
Jun 10 2010, 12:12;05

So top line gives nothing away!

Odd indeed.

I have done some studying and looking at the SD, I think it is just partitioned as FAT32 (There is a folder called 4ext but I suspect this is just a recovery) my Windows laptop will read ext2/3/4 partitions so I hadn't checked the Disk Format.
Current settings are:
AlphaRev GBrSU 60
BRAVO PVT4 SHIP S-OFF
HBOOT-6.93.1002
MICROP-051d
TOUCH PANELO-SYNW0101
RADIO-5.11.05.27
Aug 10 2010, 17:52;18
I am proposing to

• do a recovery
• flash dGB
• Install 4EXT
• Do a backup
• Format and re-partition SD (4GB) as ext4
• load apps
• backup again

Is that all I should need and in the correct order?
Thanks for all the attention (we seem to have this thread to ourselves), it is very much appreciated.

dGB won't make any use of an ext4 partition, so you may as well save the effort and space and skip that.

You are already using the dGB60 hboot. I wonder whether something has pushed your system above 60MB (eg a Google update)? Though if that happened there would not be a temporary recovery from it.

You should not need to reinstall 4ext if it's already there. You could try reflashing the ROM without a wipe & see whether it starts. If it does, install Quick System Info and see how much space you have left in /system. If you have further problems you could try the dGB65 hboot instead (take a nandroid, flash hboot, restore nandroid - alpharev have a longer set of instructions, but those are the most vital steps).

 

[tobermoryboy]

Hi Hadron
I thought I'd let you know how we are doing, following your advice we re-flashed and found we had 1.5Mb of the 60 system left so I think your theory of a Google update was probably spot on! We used the dGb65 Hboot, and this give us an extra "free" 5Mb.
The biggest problem was this took us back to Google "Market" and attempts to upgrade to "Play" (I hate that name/image!) fell over, eventually we found an older play that let us upgrade.
We also had major problems with QtADB which doesn't have much in the way of "how to's" so didn't make life easier.
Now all working and generally very happy with dGb - I think it doesn't do video (correct?) and it seems to have no way of looking at photos you have taken (Gallery). I'm looking for a way just to send these straight to Skydrive / Dropbox anyway.
Strangely when we re-booted my phone it reported that it had HTC sense, and gave me the opportunity to install a very pretty wallpaper! (I think that's because it was connected to my PC which has (had) HTC sync installed on it.)
I now need a File Manager Tool, do you have any suggestions (I have Airdroid) which is OK and very (apple style)pretty, but could do with a down and dirty app which would look at "connected" devices, and of course something to manage Photos..
Really thanks loads for all your help and concern, is there a way we can repay this ? (next time we go to Yorkshire for a Curry perhaps we can buy you a beer - or the cheap option - a Bradford Curry!) or perhaps do something (not techy on Phandroid)
Thanks again
Tobermoryboy (bradfordian really!)
PS no doubt it'll fall over at some point, or the planned upgrade path (S3 32Gb - Desire inherited by Daughter!) and I'll be needing help again

 

[Hadron]

I use QuickPic instead of the Android Gallery app, so try installing that.

I use both ES File Explorer and Root Explorer. Both good, ES is free.
I literally never use video, but just tried and it seems to work.

 

[tacw]

Thank you so much for this guide!!

I just ran into one small error while running UnrEVOked.
If you are able to edit your instructions, please change Run UnrEVOked "(double click reflash_package.exe)" to instead say "(right click reflash_package.exe and click Run as administrator)" for Windows users.
Thank you again!

 

[SUroot]

Thanks to Hadron for PM'ing me this request.

Thank you so much for this guide!!

I just ran into one small error while running UnrEVOked.
If you are able to edit your instructions, please change Run UnrEVOked "(double click reflash_package.exe)" to instead say "(right click reflash_package.exe and click Run as administrator)" for Windows users.
Thank you again!

Amended to:

The Rooting process

• Boot the desire so it is running android normally. If USB is connected, disconnect it.
• Enable USB debugging (Settings > Applications > Development)
• Run UnrEVOked (double click reflash_package.exe) - Note, Windows 7 users with UAC (User Access Control) turned on, may need to right click > Run as administrator on reflash_package.exe to get it to run properly, or turn off UAC

 

[nicka3200]

At the bottom of post 1 Suroot has a link to Matt81's original Revolutionary guide. I wonder if this link could be changed to the Current guide, copied from Matt81's but maintained by Hadron?

 

[didjeridude]

Hi guys I wonder if anyone can help me out here.... I just rooted my HTC desire using the method described here. Everything went as expected and I rebooted the system and confirmed the process was successful by locating the superuser app. I then powered down, rebooted and created a backup from the black/green recovery screen which was also successful. Then I selected "reboot system" from the same screen, but now it won't boot properly. It keeps turning itself off, then tries to boot again, then turns off, then on, ad finitum.

I can still access the white Hboot screen (volume down + power).

Any suggestions?

 

[nicka3200]

Pull the battery out for a few seconds then try booting normally.

 

[didjeridude]

Tried that already and no bacon :-(

 

[nicka3200]

Ok boot into recovery and restore the back up you made earlier. Then reboot.

 

[Hadron]

Go back into recovery and restore the backup you just made.

It's an odd glitch that sometimes happens the first time you take a backup with CWM. It only happens once though.

 

[didjeridude]

Thanks nick and hadron, that worked.

Yes... odd little glitch indeed methinks!!

 

[faisal.kagadkar]

Unrevoked is showing failed to push recovery. What do i do next ? I did all the prerequisites. Only thing is that the following step didnt happen

" Android Bootloader Interface is listed under Android Phone in device manager."


Help guys...

 

[faisal.kagadkar]

I tried it again. Now it shows Internal error : Installimg package failed.

Btw i have the arab 415 version of HTC desire.

 

[Hadron]

Can you give us the full software information, and what it says on the hboot screen (boot while pressing "volume down"), hboot version in particular?

 

[marazak2417]

Reserved

I have changed my HTC Desire's ROM yesterday to
RUU_HTC Desire Android 2.3 Upgrade (Gingerbread)
and my mobile doesn't go to hboot mode when I hold down the lower volume button pressed along with power button. What should I do now?

 

[nicka3200]

The 2.3 upgrade will give you stock hboot & recovery & cannot be rooted by unrevoked.

If you wish to root it you will need to follow the guide for Revolutionary which can be found in the all things root guide.

However the initial steps are the same. Does your volume down button definitely work when booted normally? When booting into hboot make sure you continue to hold the volume down button until it starts to boot into hboot.

 

[StripyHorse]

Hi, thanks for this guide. The Unrevoked download pages seem to be down at the moment (showing a 404) and I need the Hboot drivers to root with the revolutionary method (as I have the 2.3.3 update). Does anyone know of a mirror, or have a download link?

Also, I have a question about goldcards. I followed the procedure - is there any way to know whether it has worked? It didn't add any files to the SD card, but I'm not sure if this is normal. I did receive a successful notification at the end though. Also, can I still use the SD in my phone as before after I have used it to make a goldcard, or do I need to get a spare?

Thanks!

 

[Hadron]

The only way to know if a goldcard is good is if it works.

You can use it as a normal card. Partitioning breaks the goldness IIRC. People who go S-Off don't need one these days, as the revolutionary hboot (and current alpharev hboots) also do this job.

 

[woodsytime]

Hi there,

Does anyone know what's happening with the Unrevoked site as I can't download Unrevoked 3.21 and the HBoot Drivers??? Keep getting a 404.

StripyHorse - did you get hold of any mirror links?

I've been patiently researching phone rooting for ages and now I'm ready I can't get the programs to do it! Thanks!

 

[Hadron]

Damn - those links went down the other week, then came back. They were down when I started this post, but have come back in the meanwhile. Seems pretty unstable.

Give it a go now. If it doesn't work, let me know - I've grabbed a copy of the hboot drivers, and am in the process of downloading the unrevoked for Windows (not a Windows user myself, so didn't need these previously).