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Root ROOTING For Dummies

Hello! Since I got my phone, I've avoided all of the OTA updates because I kept thinking I'd get around to trying to understand rooting. Now that I'm finally trying to understand it, there have been a few versions released, so I'm finding it more confusing than ever! I have Andrioid 2.2, and my HBOOT is 2.10.0001. It seems that all of the info in the first post of this thread still applies to me. Is that correct?

Also, would accepting the most recent update save me any head-scratching and/or frustration, or am I better off keeping what I have and working from there?

Thanks so much for all of the info you've provided so far!
 
zerofill said:
Hello! Since I got my phone, I've avoided all of the OTA updates because I kept thinking I'd get around to trying to understand rooting. Now that I'm finally trying to understand it, there have been a few versions released, so I'm finding it more confusing than ever! I have Andrioid 2.2, and my HBOOT is 2.10.0001. It seems that all of the info in the first post of this thread still applies to me. Is that correct?

Also, would accepting the most recent update save me any head-scratching and/or frustration, or am I better off keeping what I have and working from there?

Thanks so much for all of the info you've provided so far!
Click to expand...

no i would not do any updates. and yes this guide will get you rooted. you need to use unrevoked to root your phone and this guide will show you how to do it.
 
Thanks for the guide! Everything went like clockwork...well Amon Ra now Ha! Rooted, partitioned, flashed MikG 3.1. Was a piece of cake. Makes me wonder why it took me so long to root! Now I'm looking at radios and kernels.

A question about nandroids though. What should I include in a nandroid if I'm really happy with my setup, but want to try flashing other stuff without having to reinstall apps/sms/settings?

Thanks again. This community is awesome!:)
 
nullspace said:
Thanks for the guide! Everything went like clockwork...well Amon Ra now Ha! Rooted, partitioned, flashed MikG 3.1. Was a piece of cake. Makes me wonder why it took me so long to root! Now I'm looking at radios and kernels.

A question about nandroids though. What should I include in a nandroid if I'm really happy with my setup, but want to try flashing other stuff without having to reinstall apps/sms/settings?

Thanks again. This community is awesome!:)
Click to expand...

Keep the first three checked and then check wimax and SD-EXT since your card is partitioned


Also, when flashing radios..... never pull the battery. If your phone loses power while flashing radios you WILL end up bricked
 
nullspace said:
Thanks for the guide! Everything went like clockwork...well Amon Ra now Ha! Rooted, partitioned, flashed MikG 3.1. Was a piece of cake. Makes me wonder why it took me so long to root! Now I'm looking at radios and kernels.

A question about nandroids though. What should I include in a nandroid if I'm really happy with my setup, but want to try flashing other stuff without having to reinstall apps/sms/settings?

Thanks again. This community is awesome!:)
Click to expand...

Welcome to the Flash-A-Holics Anonymous!!! :D

Titanium Backup will save your apps and the app data, so all you have to do is restore after you flash a new rom.

The sms's can be saved using an app like sms backup and restore, etc.

The settings are going to be the hard part. To get a fully successful flash you really need to start from scratch with the system settings. There are a few rom developers who will post updates to their roms that will just be flashed over the existing setup, but you need to be sure that is part of the rom in question. This isn't possible when flashing say MikG over the Xplode rom.

Rxpert83 said:
Keep the first three checked and then check wimax and SD-EXT since your card is partitioned


Also, when flashing radios..... never pull the battery. If your phone loses power while flashing radios you WILL end up bricked
Click to expand...

+1 ;)

Battery pulls while flashing radios = Bad Juju :eek:
 
nullspace said:
Thanks for the guide! Everything went like clockwork...well Amon Ra now Ha! Rooted, partitioned, flashed MikG 3.1. Was a piece of cake. Makes me wonder why it took me so long to root! Now I'm looking at radios and kernels.

A question about nandroids though. What should I include in a nandroid if I'm really happy with my setup, but want to try flashing other stuff without having to reinstall apps/sms/settings?

Thanks again. This community is awesome!:)
Click to expand...


Rxpert83 said:
Keep the first three checked and then check wimax and SD-EXT since your card is partitioned


Also, when flashing radios..... never pull the battery. If your phone loses power while flashing radios you WILL end up bricked
Click to expand...

I'm jumping in the middle of 60+ pages but with recent ROM/phone issues I have been dealing with have caused me to nand-backup like a MADMAN :eek::eek: and also caused me to cull and label and keep track of a bunch of nand backups.

One suggestion that I heard a while ago, somewhere, that I adhere to now is for SAFETY sake, make a nand of only your wimax. That will serve two purposes: (1) you'll have a backup of your wimax keys in case there is ever a problem with your phone because they are phone-specific and you CANNOT flash some else's wimax keys and (2) whenever you do a subsequent nand backup, you do NOT have to choose "wimax"....just the first three checked plus sd-ext and you're good to go.

I don't know if (2) above saves much space but, for whatever reason, that was what was suggested to me and that's what I do.

In any event, having a copy of your wimax keys in a standalone flashable nand backup is good practice!
 
Hmm, so I flashed my radios from 2.15.00.11.19 using the combo pack for 2.15.00.12.19 and now my 3G is almost half of what i was getting from before I flashed the update. I'm running MikG 3.11 on stock kernel. Flashing the radios went smoothly except the slower data rates (I haven't been able to test 4G).

So, what's the best way to proceed from here? Flash back to the old version from Radio updates then flash updates in between to find the best speeds? Is it better to flash each individual radio (radio, wimax, pri, nv) separately? Can you mix radios with different pri/nv or do they all need to be from the same update? Also, do the update zips need to be in the root directory or can I stuff them in another directory to flash them from?

(I do have several nandroids on and off the phone with wimax backups just in case!:eek:)

Thanks!
 
mikem0269 said:
Im on mikg 3.11 also and have noticed that the 4g will slow down but wiping cashe and dalvik cashe will speed it back up not shure why. Im mostly on 4g or wifi not 3g so much.
Click to expand...
I wish I was on 4G more, but Sprint's 4G coverage around here is not what I had hoped. You'd think they would want better coverage around a college campus like UC Berkeley. :(
 
Hey again!

So...I'm VERY confused. I used this guide over a year ago to root my EVO, everything was great. Then I used these forums to get an "OTA" and now my phone says:

Android Version 2.3.3
Kernel Version 2.6.35.10-g13578ee
Software number 4.53.651.1

So....I have Gingerbread now I guess. Should I have NOT done that? Can I remove it? Do I need new OTAs as they come out? I bookmarked this tutorial for myself and it says now "if you have Gingerbread use a different thread."

But I didn't *start* with Gingerbread and I for sure used unrEVOked to root, not Revolutionary. I'm very confused. For the past year I've been downloading OTAs with no problems and now I'm just so lost as to what I SHOULD HAVE been doing or what I did wrong etc.

Help?
 
batness said:
Hey again!

So...I'm VERY confused. I used this guide over a year ago to root my EVO, everything was great. Then I used these forums to get an "OTA" and now my phone says:

Android Version 2.3.3
Kernel Version 2.6.35.10-g13578ee
Software number 4.53.651.1

So....I have Gingerbread now I guess. Should I have NOT done that? Can I remove it? Do I need new OTAs as they come out? I bookmarked this tutorial for myself and it says now "if you have Gingerbread use a different thread."

But I didn't *start* with Gingerbread and I for sure used unrEVOked to root, not Revolutionary. I'm very confused. For the past year I've been downloading OTAs with no problems and now I'm just so lost as to what I SHOULD HAVE been doing or what I did wrong etc.

Help?
Click to expand...

frenchy714 said:
First off Batness, never accept OTA's! You'll most likely lose root, possibly have to wait for another exploit to become available (in your case you're running GB which already has an exploit), and accepting an OTA may have a negative impact on your Evo. At this point, are you still rooted? Do you have S-ON or S-OFF? If you ended up losing root, you can re-root using Revolutionary.

http://androidforums.com/evo-4g-all...ooting-dummies-guide-gingerbread-edition.html
Click to expand...

+1 to what Frenchy said. Never accept OTA's while rooted.

When you load a custom recovery on the phone you loose the ability for the phone to properly flash an OTA. The stock recovery's only purpose is to flash OTA's, so with a custom recovery weird things can happen.
Very weird that you were able to properly apply an OTA, then apply others afterward. :confused:

No matter, lets see where you stand. Pull the battery, then put it back in. Hold the volume down button then press and hold the power button simultaneously until the white screen with Andy riding a skateboard appears. This is Hboot, or bootloader. :)

If you see S-OFF on this screen you still have your securities turned off, and most likely will only need to flash a custom recovery and a rooted ROM to gain full root. If you have S-ON, you'll need to follow the guide for Revolutionary that Frenchy posted above.

Post back where you stand and if you need help, we're here. :)
 
OMG sorry guys, I wasn't clear at all! When I said "I use these forums to get OTAs" I meant that I bookmarked this specific thread (since it's the one I used to root in the first place) to view the "Updating to the Latest OTA" section.

I've never accepted an OTA THROUGH the phone itself, just downloading the Odexed updates and installing that way.

My phone still says "S-OFF" and I use all my rooted programs just fine. I just can't seem to figure out if I should still be downloading the latest OTAs, if I should be using this guide even though I have Gingerbread...should I REMOVE Gingerbread? I just don't know what the best course of action is. Thanks guys!
 
batness said:
OMG sorry guys, I wasn't clear at all! When I said "I use these forums to get OTAs" I meant that I bookmarked this specific thread (since it's the one I used to root in the first place) to view the "Updating to the Latest OTA" section.

I've never accepted an OTA THROUGH the phone itself, just downloading the Odexed updates and installing that way.

My phone still says "S-OFF" and I use all my rooted programs just fine. I just can't seem to figure out if I should still be downloading the latest OTAs, if I should be using this guide even though I have Gingerbread...should I REMOVE Gingerbread? I just don't know what the best course of action is. Thanks guys!
Click to expand...

ok thanx for clearing that up. not sure what you mean though. this guide here is mainly for rooting and unrooting. if you used unrevoked to root your phone then you will need to use this guide to unroot your phone.

froyo and gingerbread are just software updates really. so if you are on gingerbread then you are fine. the latest software version is now 4.67. there are plenty of great roms that have 4.67 cooked in. i would try mikg3.1 it is waaaaaaay better then stock.
 
ocnbrze said:
ok thanx for clearing that up. not sure what you mean though. this guide here is mainly for rooting and unrooting. if you used unrevoked to root your phone then you will need to use this guide to unroot your phone.

froyo and gingerbread are just software updates really. so if you are on gingerbread then you are fine. the latest software version is now 4.67. there are plenty of great roms that have 4.67 cooked in. i would try mikg3.1 it is waaaaaaay better then stock.
Click to expand...

I'm just confused because I'm kinda tech-derpy and I have to bookmark things to look back and remember how I did something. I check back every so often to make sure I'm making a nandroid backup correctly and to see what OTA is current. (I use After Rooting section 4: Updating to the latest OTA)

The first page now says
For those of you who have Gingerbread 2.3.3 on your phone stop now. this guide is for those who have Froyo 2.2 on their phone still. please read this
Guide to Rooting Gingerbread with Revolutionary if you want to root your Gingerbread phone.

this guide can still be used if you had hboot 2.18 that came with the latest 4.67 OTA. you will need to use this guide if you used Captain Throwback's guide to get s-off with no watermark.

I'm not sure what/if that applies to me; I have Gingerbread right? But I didn't use Revolutionary to root the phone. Do I use this guide still or the Gingerbread Root thread?

For 4.67, is there a good Odexed link I should be using? Does it come with radios? Do I need to update both? That's the kind of stuff I get messed up on. :P
 
batness said:
I'm just confused because I'm kinda tech-derpy and I have to bookmark things to look back and remember how I did something. I check back every so often to make sure I'm making a nandroid backup correctly and to see what OTA is current. (I use After Rooting section 4: Updating to the latest OTA)

The first page now says
For those of you who have Gingerbread 2.3.3 on your phone stop now. this guide is for those who have Froyo 2.2 on their phone still. please read this
Guide to Rooting Gingerbread with Revolutionary if you want to root your Gingerbread phone.

this guide can still be used if you had hboot 2.18 that came with the latest 4.67 OTA. you will need to use this guide if you used Captain Throwback's guide to get s-off with no watermark.

I'm not sure what/if that applies to me; I have Gingerbread right? But I didn't use Revolutionary to root the phone. Do I use this guide still or the Gingerbread Root thread?

For 4.67, is there a good Odexed link I should be using? Does it come with radios? Do I need to update both? That's the kind of stuff I get messed up on. :P
Click to expand...

ok this guide is mainly to root your phone. if you have s-off and have a custom recovery then you are rooted and this guide is not really necessary any more other then if you need to unroot your phone. this guide here basically goes into how to root your phone using unrevoked. it was designed to root those phones who had a specific hboot and radio.

you can root with unrevoked and then upgrade your phone's software to gingerbread. all you need to do is flash a custom rom that has the latest ota software cooked in.

if you want to try a custom rom that has 4.67 cooked in then i would suggest that you try mikg3.11. it is waaaaaaay better then stock. but there are other roms as well. here is a list of roms that you can try. http://androidforums.com/evo-4g-all-things-root/284413-roms-kernels-download-page.html. there is a 4.67 roms section.

and as far as radios go you can update them if you wish, it is not completely necessary though. here is the latest radio combo:CM-EVO_Radio-2.15.00.12.19_PRI-2.33_WiMax_NV.zip. one thing though, i would recommend that you make sure that you backup wimax when doing a nandroid backup before flashing radios. there is a small chance that you can loose your wimax keys (which means no 4g) and they will be gone for good. there is no way of getting them back once they are gone unless you have them backed up in a nandroid backup.
 
i'm trying to root my evo. I keep getting the
error message from unrevoked that my firmware
is too new. I have preformed a factory reset
about 6 times and I keep getting the error
message, what am I doing wrong?

Also, when I go into the screen that shows
the fastboot etc., I notice it says Locked
across the top of that screen.

Thanks for any help.
 
briannae said:
i'm trying to root my evo. I keep getting the
error message from unrevoked that my firmware
is too new. I have preformed a factory reset
about 6 times and I keep getting the error
message, what am I doing wrong?

Also, when I go into the screen that shows
the fastboot etc., I notice it says Locked
across the top of that screen.

Thanks for any help.
Click to expand...
Welcome to the Forums!
Tell ya what, that screen you saw fastboot on, (the bootloader screen....the one with little green android guy at the bottom on a skateboard).. post back what everything said such as version etc. And we will go from there.:)
 
Yeah I need to update the OP to indicate that this root gain will not work for current updated phones. This will only work if you have not done any updates since froyo.

we can tell if you report back with what is on your bootloader screen.
 
ok guys and gals. i just added an update to this guide so as to not create confusion as to why unrevoked does not work any more.

here is what i added:
ROOTING For Dummies said:
Update#2
ok there has been another update that has changed the bootloader again. the latest 4.67 software update which is gingerbread 2.3.5 has now locked the bootloader. this guide will not work. however, there are several methods that can be used to downgrade the bootloader so that you can either use unrevoked (info found in this guide) or use revolutionary(http://androidforums.com/evo-4g-all...ooting-dummies-guide-gingerbread-edition.html). you can get more info about the various methods found here:http://androidforums.com/evo-4g-all...-rooting-gingerbread-2-3-5-dummies-guide.html

Update#3
ok hopefully this is the last ota our beloved evo will ever get. but there is a new software version that comes with the latest ota. the new software version is now 5.07.651.1. fortunately the revised gingerbread 2.3.5 guide will still work. htc did not add or close any exploits found previously so the guide will still work.
Click to expand...
 
i have a problem.. my charge port broke in my phone and i need to get it unrooted so i can go to the sprint store and get a new one. i seen the steps to get it done but i cant connect my phone to the pc since it isnt working.. anyway i can bypass this? thanks
 
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