So I've never done any ROM flashing or anything associated with that before and the instructions that I've found for installing Steel Droid aren't as descriptive as I would like. If anyone out there could please provide me with a step-by-step procedure for installing Steel Droid 4.5 on a stock Droid 3 I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you very much in advance.
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Root Installing Steel Droid on Droid 3
- Thread starter bigtj1
- Start date
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- Tags
- motorola droid 3
Z
ZeroOne
Guest
i know about the droid x you need to get into the bootloader recovery
place the rom on your phone's sd card in cwm recovery wipe data
factory reset always do this,wipe cache, and in advance wipe dalivik
choose install zip get to your rom select install rom and reboot.
now i need the droid 2 boot strap recovery to flash roms
the droid 3 i do not know? and you need to understand a boot loop if the
rom does not install you could use a sbf file and i do not know much about
the droid 3.
place the rom on your phone's sd card in cwm recovery wipe data
factory reset always do this,wipe cache, and in advance wipe dalivik
choose install zip get to your rom select install rom and reboot.
now i need the droid 2 boot strap recovery to flash roms
the droid 3 i do not know? and you need to understand a boot loop if the
rom does not install you could use a sbf file and i do not know much about
the droid 3.
First, make sure that your battery is fully charged, or at least very well charged.
To root and get ready to install Steel Droid, you can follow the good steps in this thread - the "Rooting the Droid 3" and "Installing Safestrap/Recovery": http://androidforums.com/droid-3-all-things-root/408712-root-ultimate-droid3-root-rom-thread.html
You'll also want to download Steel Droid from here: [ROM] Steel Droid: 4.5 Gingerbread - 5.7.894 - DEODEXED - 1-3-2012 - xda-developers and copy the zip file (do not unzip it) to your phone's internal storage (or to an SD card, if you prefer and have one). Steel Droid has the basic steps, starting with step 14 and 15, though with Safestrap it's a little different. That information is here: Hash of Codes: HOW-TO Safestrap but, to copy it a bit:
So, after you install Safestrap, when you restart the phone, you will notice that a new display pops up. If you read it, it says to press the Menu button to start Recovery. (You can also press Search to continue booting normally.) To install Steel Droid on the system, you will need to press Menu. This will start a text menu (green text on a black background.) You use the Volume up and down buttons to move the highlight up and down, and press power to select the highlighted option.
So, what makes Safestrap safe is that it stows away a copy of the stock Droid 3 system to an area on your internal storage - so make sure that you have some space there available - and then allows you to flash new custom ROMs so that the original system is protected.
Before you toggle, you should make a backup of the original system. So, go down to Backup and Restore, choose Backup, and wait for it to finish. It takes a few minutes.
Then, go down to Safe boot menu, select it, then select Toggle safe system. This will bring a screen where you need to move down to Yes - enable system - do that, wait for it to back up again. Then select the option "Go back".
Ok, now on to the bottom set of instructions - how to install Steel Droid:
As JJT211 said, root first, then install safestrap.
But, as I said in my post, the steps to root and install safestrap are in this existing thread: http://androidforums.com/droid-3-all-things-root/408712-root-ultimate-droid3-root-rom-thread.html
Just ignore the section on Unrooting your Droid 3 - obviously, you don't want to do that.
Also, after reading through those instructions, it says "Install safestrap after you download the .apk file" without explaining that at all. Basically, .apk files are android applications. You usually get them from the market, but you can also download them and install them directly on the phone using a method that is called "sideloading". In order to that the easiest way, you need to do two things:
- allow the installation of third party apps on the phone. From home, menu->settings->applications. Check the box next to "unknown sources".
- use an app that allows you to install third party apps. I use the free app Astro File Manager: https://market.android.com/details?...?t=W251bGwsMSwxLDEsImNvbS5tZXRhZ28uYXN0cm8iXQ..
Install that app on your phone from the Android market. Copy the safestrap.apk file over to your phone's storage from your computer. Open Astro file manager, tap the top "File Manager" button, and it will show you all of the files and folders on your internal storage. Tap the Droid3Safestrap-1.0.apk file and choose the option to install the application.
From here you can run the Safestrap application from your home app drawer. Remember, you need to be rooted first. If I remember right, it should prompt you with a message to allow superuser access for the Safestrap app - make sure that you grant access. I think that you tap the button "Install Recovery". (It's been a while since I've done this - sorry.)
After you successfully install Safestrap and tap that Install Recovery button, then shut down the phone and restart it. You should then see that new menu that tells you to press the MENU button to start Recovery.
I'm busy today - I'll try to write these up in a more clear way in my post above later tonight if you can't follow this already.
Ok, I believe I understand now, I was a little lost in the lingo of everything. I thought that rooting your phone meant putting on SD or CM7 or something. So I understand now that I do the one click root program, safestrap then flash the SD ROM. Thank you very much for the detailed info for installing SD. I probably won't have time to do any rooting, strapping or flashing till next weekend. My only other question is once I have rooted, strapped and flashed, does SD provide an easy way of uninstalling or freezing apps or do I need to download a specific app?
I'm not all that sure, but I have always used Titanium Backup to freeze apps rather than delete them - it's safer, because you can thaw the apps later. Whatever way that you freeze or delete bloat, I suggest starting Safestrap first and doing a backup - that way, if the phone stops working correctly, you can always restore where you were before you did the freezing.
Sorry that I haven't made a good roadmap yet - I do want to, but I want to go through all of the steps again. People have made good resources here, but I do think that there's too much "download the safestrap apk file and install it" sort of instructions that could be made far more clear to a beginner.
Thanks for the advice on the app freezing. I do agree with your last statement that there should be a better road map for safe strapping and also like what I've asked for in this thread in terms of rooting, safestrapping and flashing for the rooting noobs out there like myself.
Many thanks to everyone for the help with rooting and everything. Definitely welcome to any advice for apps and stuff I should install after flashing.
This thread is great. Thanks for all of the above posts. I have also been thinking about flashing Steel droid to my Droid 3. I am rooted and already have clockwork installed. I have frozen a bunch of junk but I still feel I could be getting better performance.
I have never flashed a ROM before, but I generally enjoy these type of projects. I was hoping someone could weigh in on the following concerns:
I see that Safestrap is now preferred over Clockwork. Should I remove Clockwork and install safestrap? I found the following instructions to do so at this link: [HOW-TO] Remove Hashcode's tweaked D3Bootstrap
I would want to backup my apps and data since it appears that best results will be had from wiping everything prior to (or after - when is this best done?) the Rom flashing. I understand the preferred method is Titanium backup. I see some have used MyBackup Root (free!). If I were to use one of these, how much additional reconfiguration would I need to do to get things more or less like I have them currently? Can anyone speak to whether MyBackup Root will do as good a job as TiBu?
I have seen some occasional issues posted by backup users that the restored apps aren't recognized by the Market app, or that the Market app doesn't work properly in the flashed Rom. Are these isolated instances or will I have to get this sorted out once restored?
I have seen occasional reported issues regarding camera, car dock functionality, email and other things that worked fine in the stock, but do not function right in some of the ROMs. It would be quite a disappointment to go to the trouble of flashing a ROM only to find out that something that I use every day no longer works. Again, are these isolated issues or is just the price of admission in the ROM world?
Thanks for your replies.
I have never flashed a ROM before, but I generally enjoy these type of projects. I was hoping someone could weigh in on the following concerns:
I see that Safestrap is now preferred over Clockwork. Should I remove Clockwork and install safestrap? I found the following instructions to do so at this link: [HOW-TO] Remove Hashcode's tweaked D3Bootstrap
I would want to backup my apps and data since it appears that best results will be had from wiping everything prior to (or after - when is this best done?) the Rom flashing. I understand the preferred method is Titanium backup. I see some have used MyBackup Root (free!). If I were to use one of these, how much additional reconfiguration would I need to do to get things more or less like I have them currently? Can anyone speak to whether MyBackup Root will do as good a job as TiBu?
I have seen some occasional issues posted by backup users that the restored apps aren't recognized by the Market app, or that the Market app doesn't work properly in the flashed Rom. Are these isolated instances or will I have to get this sorted out once restored?
I have seen occasional reported issues regarding camera, car dock functionality, email and other things that worked fine in the stock, but do not function right in some of the ROMs. It would be quite a disappointment to go to the trouble of flashing a ROM only to find out that something that I use every day no longer works. Again, are these isolated issues or is just the price of admission in the ROM world?
Thanks for your replies.
I don't think of myself as an expert in this, but Hashcode makes it clear that you should only have one bootstrap installed at once, and I expect that if you installed Clockwork, you probably have Koush's installed. See this page, number 3: Hash of Codes: HOW-TO Safestrap
I looked at that thread - that looks right to me, but perhaps you should wait for somebody else who has actually done this to comment...
I have used both; Titanium is my preferred, but there was a point last year when it stopped running scheduled tasks on my phone.
Titanium allows you to backup data for system apps (i.e., apps that are shipped as part of the ROM). Titanium color-codes these; red you should really think twice about restoring, green are probably safe to restore (though not always ). When you are switching between ROMs, it's probably safer not to restore them, but you can always make a backup from Recovery first and restore that if things get wonky.
Anyway, there are things that generally need to be reconfigured. If you are using the launcher that comes with the ROM, you will probably need to set up your home screens again. (If you install a third-party launcher, like ADW EX or Go Launcher EX, and then restore that, it should retain settings and icons after a restart of the launcher.) You will almost surely need to set up homescreen widgets again, as they cannot be restored in almost all cases.
Many of the system settings in home->menu->settings will need to be redone. Some were probably restored from Google if you choose that during setup, but some are not changed.
Settings for stock apps, like Calendar, Contacts, Messaging, etc., will need to be reconfigured.
I know that Titanium has an option to repair market links. That may be for the paid version only, but I've seen that happen on my old phone, and Titanium fixed the problem.
You can read through the threads of each ROM to see what the known issues are before you flash. The first post *should* reliably list the known issues. Backups from recovery are your friend; you can make a snapshot of exactly how your phone is running with a particular ROM at a particular time, so if you do install a new one and it doesn't work as you wish, restart Recovery, go to Backup/Restore, choose Restore and the backup that you know is good and you'll be back with something that you know is working in a few minutes (the backups are timestamped, and Safestrap adds whether it was backed up as a safe or nonsafe system, plus you can rename the backups to add the name of the ROM, for example)
Would I be better off just using CWM and not Safestrap since it's already installed?
As I read release notes, and through the release threads, I see quite a few reported issues, but not all have confirmation or resolution.
For anyone using Steel Droid 4.5, do you have bluetooth working? Does audio play properly in the Car dock? Does the camera work properly?
Thanks!
As I read release notes, and through the release threads, I see quite a few reported issues, but not all have confirmation or resolution.
For anyone using Steel Droid 4.5, do you have bluetooth working? Does audio play properly in the Car dock? Does the camera work properly?
Thanks!
Really, if it were me, I would use CWM. Safestrap adds some cool features, but the recovery is basically exactly the same.
Check the dates of the reported issue comments and realize that they may have been fixed in a future release. I do like it when devs include a changelog with their posts, but, you know, I'm just happy that they provide the ROMs. The changelog is gravy.
MasterAngler
Lurker
hey, i was gonna make a new post about the problem but since i followed the instructions here ill just post here.
basically, i rooted the phone and booted fine. i intalled the safestrap/recovery. i followed the steps showed here [ROOT] Ultimate DROID3 Root/ROM Thread BUT! i enabled safe system BEFORE doing a back up first. so undid the safe system, backed up and enabled safe system again. i probably did more bad than good. now when i boot i get the dual core screen but then goes black and stays there. i did ran back up and still same results. i held the power/x button to try a do a restore that way but i get the liitle green man with an exclamation on it. did i pretty much f***d up my phone? now im out a phone. what can i do to fix this?
basically, i rooted the phone and booted fine. i intalled the safestrap/recovery. i followed the steps showed here [ROOT] Ultimate DROID3 Root/ROM Thread BUT! i enabled safe system BEFORE doing a back up first. so undid the safe system, backed up and enabled safe system again. i probably did more bad than good. now when i boot i get the dual core screen but then goes black and stays there. i did ran back up and still same results. i held the power/x button to try a do a restore that way but i get the liitle green man with an exclamation on it. did i pretty much f***d up my phone? now im out a phone. what can i do to fix this?
hey, i was gonna make a new post about the problem but since i followed the instructions here ill just post here.
basically, i rooted the phone and booted fine. i intalled the safestrap/recovery. i followed the steps showed here [ROOT] Ultimate DROID3 Root/ROM Thread BUT! i enabled safe system BEFORE doing a back up first. so undid the safe system, backed up and enabled safe system again. i probably did more bad than good. now when i boot i get the dual core screen but then goes black and stays there. i did ran back up and still same results. i held the power/x button to try a do a restore that way but i get the liitle green man with an exclamation on it. did i pretty much f***d up my phone? now im out a phone. what can i do to fix this?
So you never see the prompt to press menu to start Safestrap?
After you enabled the safe system, did you wipe data/factory reset and then flash a ROM zip file, or just restart the phone?
MasterAngler
Lurker
yes i see the prompt start safestrap. no i never did the wipe data/factory reset. i just restarted the phone after enabling safe system so i can move this SD3_4500.zip to internal storage and install it.
EDIT: i just put the SD3_4500.zip on external sd card and install that way. ill see what happens.
installed new rom and wipe data/factory reset. rebooted into the new rom. so far so good. i forgot to back up contacts and now i need to ask for numbers again. i dont like launcher EX. will i have any problems uninstalling that?
i really like the looks of the new room. the battery indicator is quite nice.
Good news.
I'll let somebody who uses Steel Droid answer that question. If the stock Moto launcher is still there, I'd say that you can remove the launcher, but if there is only one launcher on the phone, you need to install another launcher first. There are plenty of good ones - ADW, ADW EX, Go Launcher Ex, Zeam.
As for contacts, you still have the non-safe system, so your contacts should still be there.
Start the phone in Safestrap. Go to the backup menu and make a backup of your system, just in case. Then go to the safe menu and toggle safe system off. When you restart the phone, you should have your stock system (still rooted) with all of your contacts. From there you can export your contacts so you can import them back on Steel Droid.
Once you have done that, restart into Safestrap again. Safe menu, toggle safe system back on. I think that you should still have Steel Droid ready at that point, but I would still go into the backup/restore and restore the backup you made above - it should have a time stamp of the time that you made the backup and start with "safe".
If you are going to be trying a lot of ROMs going forward, I'd suggest importing the contacts that you exported from your phone to Google Contacts - that way you will always have them after a data wipe/factory reset.
MasterAngler
Lurker
hey thanks for all the tips
this is my first time doing this and its awesome. so, for other roms i just back up, wipe data and install new rom from sd card correct?hey thanks for all the tips
Yes, that's right.
You may want to invest in the app Titanium Backup Pro. It can back up all of your user apps and data and makes reinstalling apps (with data) a lot easier if you try out other ROMs, or need to factory reset for some reason. You can use it to schedule batch backups of all user apps every night, for example, so you can be up and running with a new ROM pretty quickly.
MasterAngler
Lurker
i have found an issue with this rom (steel droid 4.5) hdmi seems not to be working or not supported?. i didnt have a problem before the rom. 
