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Root Question

P

Papa_zit

Lurker
I have a Verizon Droid X and would like to remove Bloatware. There's a lot of crap I'll never use. Rooted my phone today, Yippee Skippie!
Purchased Root Explorer, but haven't figured out how to use it yet. Anyone know of an online or down-loadable manual / instructions for this app? I've been doing a lot of reading in a lot of different forums, but I still don't have the hang of it. I do like the idea of renaming the apps instead of deleting them. my trouble is that everything I've read so far seems to be fragmented and incomplete. Maybe I'm reading the wrong posts, I don't know, One thing I do know is I have Patience, I'm in no rush to mess things up. I'm just looking for someplace that will explain start to finish how to use root explorer.
 
Papa_zit said:
I have a Verizon Droid X and would like to remove Bloatware. There's a lot of crap I'll never use. Rooted my phone today, Yippee Skippie!
Purchased Root Explorer, but haven't figured out how to use it yet. Anyone know of an online or down-loadable manual / instructions for this app? I've been doing a lot of reading in a lot of different forums, but I still don't have the hang of it. I do like the idea of renaming the apps instead of deleting them. my trouble is that everything I've read so far seems to be fragmented and incomplete. Maybe I'm reading the wrong posts, I don't know, One thing I do know is I have Patience, I'm in no rush to mess things up. I'm just looking for someplace that will explain start to finish how to use root explorer.
Click to expand...

You can find a list of the removable apps on here (don't have link on hand sorry) and just change the .api to .bak so if needed you can just change it back to .api if you so need to. I personally enjoy titanium backup it cost a few bucks and you can easily freeze any apps you don't want
 
Ummm... that'd be rename the .apk to .bak.... .bak back to .apk. :D

I think it's much easier to just install a custom rom than to mess with removing a couple apps.
 
althepal1984 said:
You can find a list of the removable apps on here (don't have link on hand sorry) and just change the .api to .bak so if needed you can just change it back to .api if you so need to. I personally enjoy titanium backup it cost a few bucks and you can easily freeze any apps you don't want
Click to expand...

The only thing with freezing apps is they sometimes still start and run (My Verizon for example). Renaming them from a .apk file to a .bak file keeps them from starting at all.
 
Airmaxx23 said:
The only thing with freezing apps is they sometimes still start and run (My Verizon for example). Renaming them from a .apk file to a .bak file keeps them from starting at all.
Click to expand...

that is true....MyVerizon seems to still run even though its frozen...

HOWEVER...i will say that freezing in Titanium is an overall MUCH easier experience...
 
Metfanant said:
that is true....MyVerizon seems to still run even though its frozen...

HOWEVER...i will say that freezing in Titanium is an overall MUCH easier experience...
Click to expand...

I agree. I advise newbies to go with the Titanium Backup (TiBu) freeze method to begin with. It's an important root app to have anyway.

Edit: welcome PZ!
 
Airmaxx23 said:
The only thing with freezing apps is they sometimes still start and run (My Verizon for example). Renaming them from a .apk file to a .bak file keeps them from starting at all.
Click to expand...

Really? I thought freezing apps stopped that completely. I've never seen an app I've frozen show up in my app drawer or in any list of running apps.


Papa zit.... can I call you Papa? Or do your prefer 'Mr. Zit'?

:D

...... anywho, patience is always a good trait. As Colchiro pointed out, most custom ROMs have most of the undesirable apps already removed from them, making it unnecessary for you to do it yourself. However if you're no wanting to make the leap to flashing ROMs just yet (it took me about 6 months before I started), then experimenting with removing bloat apps and the like can be educational.

I recomment first getting 'Droid X Bootstrapper' (or Droid 2 Bootstrapper if you're on the new Gingerbread leak) and making a nandroid first so if something goes haywire, you can flash back to it. Then either go into Root Explorer like you were saying and change the names, or get Titanium Backup as was recommended. That's the way I prefer to do it, freezing them. Makes it much easier to bring them back (simply run a batch unfreeze) if you need to. Like when a new update is available.

Good luck.
 
Thanks guys / gals, I figured it out. I went out and got the PRO version of Titanium Backup, Very nice app I might add. And went back into Root Explorer and just figured out what I was doing wrong:
1 I wasn't holding the app, just tapping it.
2 Had to put it into R/W NOT R/O.
Damn I like this phone.
 
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