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Root what does it mean and do?

D

digitalspirit

Lurker
Hi all having got used to my Blaze U8510 android phone now, I see words like root, what does that mean exactly? what does it do?

Would it be worth while to do it to my phone?

TIA,

Mike.
 
digitalspirit said:
Hi all having got used to my Blaze U8510 android phone now, I see words like root, what does that mean exactly? what does it do?

Would it be worth while to do it to my phone?

TIA,

Mike.
Click to expand...

Rooting your phone is really doing nothing more than turning of Securites. You see Several partitions on your phone are shipped as "Read Only" so what rooting does is change that to "Read Write" so that you can do things like install a recovery or Flash a different ROM / Kernel. Along with rooting you will need to get a superuser file to flash unless you flash a custom rom. That will let you change things in the system.

Unless you are having serious issues with the phone or you are very technologically sound I would have to agree with Saltine713. While you can open up the phone to be more what you want you can also seriously mess it up and end up with a "Brick"
 
Root is, for simplicity's sake, administrator access on your phone. It allows you to do things that you can't do normally. Yes, this is defeating some of your phone's security to do it. But with the right tools, you can shore up your security even tighter than the OEM's security measures.

With a bit of experience and playing around, and installing the right ROM / Kernel mix, you can increase your performance and battery life. You can create full backups of your phone. You can remove apps you don't want. You can block most, if not all, ads. There are all sorts of things you can do. But it's generally not recommended for Android newbies. If you've been playing with your phone for a couple of months, then I can give you some more specific info.
 
digitalspirit said:
Hmm well I think its best left alone then. It does what I want it to do so as they say "if it aint broke then don't fix it"

Mike.
Click to expand...

I would recommend visiting the All Things Root subforum for your phone and read some of the threads (if it isn't very active, try a thread for a similar phone) and see what people are doing. When I got my OG Droid it did all I needed and I thought I was all set. It wasn't broken, the battery lasted, and it ran fast.

Then I poked around the forums and saw screenshots of themed roms, people over clocking, having updated versions of Android sooner, and I thought, maybe there is something to this.

So I rooted, stretched the life of my D1 until I got a Gnex, and I haven't looked back. That was a personal decision I made, and I am glad I did it. That may not be the decision best for you, but I don't want to see you dismiss it out of hand.

BTW, if you do decide to root, especially the first time, check multiple forums for instructions (sometimes it is explained in a way that is easier for you to understand), and make sure you are comfortable with the instructions, process, rollback, etc. before you do it.
 
pupkact said:
BTW, if you do decide to root, especially the first time, check multiple forums for instructions (sometimes it is explained in a way that is easier for you to understand), and make sure you are comfortable with the instructions, process, rollback, etc. before you do it.
Click to expand...

+1

I was going to post this same thing. I read about rooting for a couple months before rooting. Ask lost of question to be sure you are sure of the process. Also, stick to the forums for your phone. A process that works on one phone model may not (usually will not) work for your phone.
 
valorian said:
Also, stick to the forums for your phone. A process that works on one phone model may not (usually will not) work for your phone.
Click to expand...

I only mentioned visiting other forums with regards to understanding what can be done with root access. I +1 your clarification that one should only follow a root guide specific for their phone.

BTW valorian, you following me around the forums today, thats the second on of my comments you followed up on ;)
 
Also, if you are getting a new phone soon, keep your old one. The practice on that one and root it. That way if you brick it, no real harm done.
 
Saltine713 said:
Also, if you are getting a new phone soon, keep your old one. The practice on that one and root it. That way if you brick it, no real harm done.
Click to expand...

To follow up on and expand on this, read all of the replies in the thread with for the Root Guide. If you do run into an issue I can almost guarantee (unless it is a newly released device) that someone else has had the same problem and there is a resolution.

You should do this before you try, so if you do run into an issue, you don't take a subsequent step that makes the problem worse. Examples:

  • On my OG Droid I rooted by flashing a custom rom with root already installed (I would recommend applying root to current config so you can back stuff up) and the forums mentioned that it could take up to ten minutes on first boot. So, after installing, I put the phone down, ran a quick few errands (nature call, get coffee, blah, blah, blah) so I wouldn't be stressed out too much. FWIW, I stressed anyway, but at least I wasn't staring at my phone:).
  • When I rooted my Gnex I had read that the script to install root may freeze, however, if I did a battery pull and rebooted it would be fine and root would stick, so when it froze, I didn't panic

If you don't find a solution, ask.

Regarding "bricking" your device, I have six Android devices (mine and wife and kids, only four rooted) that I support and barring hardware failures, its damn near impossible to "brick" them. Just that resuscitation may be more difficult. I have found the term bricking on the forums has evolved more into "I'm stuck and I need help fixing my phone" than physically creating a very expensive paperweight.
 
All of my phones are rooted, all of them. Rooting has tons of benefits and very little drawbacks. It's hard to brick most phones through rooting.

Rooting allows you to back up your entire phone, which to me is critical and a life saver. It also allows you other benefits such as enabling screenshots if it's not natively enabled, as well as removing carrier bloatware.

Rooting is hard and should be done with care, but after you've done it a couple of times, you start to get the hang of it and it's relatively easy.
 
If you get an ACE hack kit from XDA and FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS, it is pretty easy. Just brush up on the terminology.
 
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