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So why did YOU root?

my first root was an e-reader, a nook simple touch. that gave me android market, which i wanted in a pinch, although an e-ink display isn't very good for most apps. it did give me email though, so that was cool. to this day, my nook simple touch is my favorite device. go figure.

eventually i got a galaxy s, and i rooted so i could try a custom rom. same with the galaxy nexus that followed.

then came a transformer prime. i have not rooted that. really not seeing the need anymore, as custom roms don't do it for me.
 
actually i was impressed with the response and typing accuracy as well as reading AF on my NST after i rooted it. to say nothing of the battery life. and i never did install that screen refresh hack as i heard battery life sucks with it enabled. the point was to have an e-ink tablet with Android on it. too bad it only runs 2.1, because some things won't run on it (like Facebook or Weather Channel)
 
It is always the same reason - access functions and features I can't access without rooting.

Currently I have my phone switch to airplane mode when I connect to wifi, I love Voice+ to use Google Voice through my SMS messenger (although that has more to with the Cyanogen ROM), use to use it to remove bloatware, etc, etc.

There are a lot of reasons to root that in my opinion outweigh not rooting. However everyone has different uses for their phone and if you can't think of a reason that appeals to you to root then I think you are better off not rooting.
 
Titanium backup
adblock
bloatware removal
ROMs
nandriod

these, among others, are the reasons i rooted.

and rooting does NOT open your phone up to more malware. don't get apps from sketchy sites, and don't give root permissions to apps you don't know. you don't need root privs to get malware, you don't get malware by getting root privs.
 
I have rooted every Android phone I've owned.

Originally I rooted to be able to take screenshots. Then the manufacturers realized it was stupid to not include that functionality out of the box.

I continued to root my devices mainly for access to the command line. I had the cron scheduler running on my phone before kernel developers started including it, and made a shell script to run sar to check the performance of my cpu.

I also rooted for titanium backups.
I rooted the Note II for all of the above reasons and for adding all apps to multi view.
 
Most of mine are being stated already. Titanium backup, custom system images. I just want to point out that official updates are less trustworthy than ROMs. The former contain many locked boxes with unknown contents. The latter are usually unlocked, if not wide open.
 
Ssith said:
Titanium backup
adblock
bloatware removal
ROMs
nandriod

these, among others, are the reasons i rooted.

and rooting does NOT open your phone up to more malware. don't get apps from sketchy sites, and don't give root permissions to apps you don't know. you don't need root privs to get malware, you don't get malware by getting root privs. .
Click to expand...

Of course rooting doesn't cause malware. But I've been known to be stupid enough to be baited into some crazy apps before :p
 
Right now, Android has come so far, but there are things I really wanted to do with my LG G2. While development is sluggish, I was able to root, remove the crap Verizon loads it up with, wifi tether, cache clean, create backups. So far, I'm pretty happy with that and still getting used to LG's skin.
Back in the day of the OG Droid, that puppy could be rooted and over-clocked from 550Mhz stock to over 1Ghz. Pretty nice IMO if you were trying to run Gingerbread. :)
 
breadnatty08 said:
Right now, Android has come so far, but there are things I really wanted to do with my LG G2. While development is sluggish, I was able to root, remove the crap Verizon loads it up with, wifi tether, cache clean, create backups. So far, I'm pretty happy with that and still getting used to LG's skin.
Back in the day of the OG Droid, that puppy could be rooted and over-clocked from 550Mhz stock to over 1Ghz. Pretty nice IMO if you were trying to run Gingerbread. :)
Click to expand...

id be scared overclocking to those kind of speeds LOL
 
The reason I refuse to root/over-clock is that I am not an enthusiast/oc'er and not exactly just rooting will degrade your devices hardware but oc'ing will degrade your devices hardware in a period of a year.

I just keep it simple and the way it should be for stability, I have absolutely no reason to root since the development of apps these days and Android OS is allowing us non-rooters access somewhat identical settings as those who root.

I also prefer to utilize my device for as long as I can until it is due time for an upgrade of a new device. I also don't jump on bandwagons anymore or fall for hype, both of those become quite expensive, daunting, stressful, and yea.
 
Bootlegger said:
The reason I refuse to root/over-clock is that I am not an enthusiast/oc'er and not exactly just rooting will degrade your devices hardware but oc'ing will degrade your devices hardware in a period of a year.

I just keep it simple and the way it should be for stability, I have absolutely no reason to root since the development of apps these days and Android OS is allowing us non-rooters access somewhat identical settings as those who root.

I also prefer to utilize my device for as long as I can until it is due time for an upgrade of a new device. Believe it
Click to expand...

this is how a i fee. in a much more elegant wording lol.

thanks for your input!
 
boyo1991 said:
this is how a i fee. in a much more elegant wording lol.

thanks for your input!
Click to expand...

No problem, believe it or not but I use to create Hybrid BBOS's for personal use and when I was a crackberry abuser, I fell for hype and bandwagons and now I have learned my lesson especially with messing with os's.

Also, the apps that I utilize are non-root friendly and work flawlessly without the need to be rooted. I have been lurking here since the beginning and I constantly observe a trend which is disturbing imho, that is the rooting/oc'ing trend which is attractive to new users who have absolutely no clue/knowledge of what the pros/cons and consequences are.

I would enjoy observing fellow Android Veterans educating new users on the full extent of rooting vs the simple replies like "root your device and unlock it, freedom" or "rooting will fix that" but in the end I comprehend and understand that you bought your device/s and you will do what you want to do and no one else can tell you otherwise.

I am merely an observer and not attempting to influence others choices, just stating what I have been observing for many years.
 
Right. My very first device was an HTC with group running on it. I naught into the hype as well of rooting and did it. It was okay, I could tether, but it still required a second app. Just look for tether no root. Done. Lol same with busybox. It may be a little bigger of a download, but you can get busybox if you really need it.

It's safer, and yes even for android vets. You never know where malware may lie. (Yes you can get malware while not rooted but its much easier to fix while not rooted)

You speak it more eloquently than I so I will shut up and get to why I made this thread.

I made this thread to hopefully understand the absolute best that android can offer if you are rooted. And so far I see upgrades and bloatware removal as the two main factors for anyone to truely root.

These are good reasons I will agree. But just not strong enough compellants for me to actually do it. One device was enough for me to get over the hype.

Keep them comin guys! Very interesting reasons around!

*edit

HOLY WOW! wheres a grammar nazi when you need one.

HTC with *root running on it.. I bought* into the hype
 
Rooted to make use of Link2SD. Have a Huawei phone that has a weird storage layout (4gigs of internal, only 800mb available for apps, the rest for media and stuff), and wanted to use Link2SD to work around that.

Would've liked to make the full 4 gigs available for apps, since I use a MicroSD card for my media, but oh well. Might upgrade to a Nexus 5.
 
I tried very hard to root a Droid 2 global yesterday. I spent 5 hours on it and failed absolutely. If I needed a file from the internet my PC sent them to a Google cloud site for reasons I could not comprehend. I am old school. When I find a needed file on line I expect it to ask me where ON MY PC I want to save it but every single root program I tried went to Google's cloud instead and promptly disappeared. Every '1 click' solution failed on 'step 7'...No, I will just use this old phone as an expensive iPOD for music.

I swear Google is getting as annoying as Microsoft used to be.
 
JIMV said:
I tried very hard to root a Droid 2 global yesterday. I spent 5 hours on it and failed absolutely. If I needed a file from the internet my PC sent them to a Google cloud site for reasons I could not comprehend. I am old school. When I find a needed file on line I expect it to ask me where ON MY PC I want to save it but every single root program I tried went to Google's cloud instead and promptly disappeared. Every '1 click' solution failed on 'step 7'...No, I will just use this old phone as an expensive iPOD for music.

I swear Google is getting as annoying as Microsoft used to be.
Click to expand...

What browser are you using, Google Chrome? And I assume by "PC", you don't mean Chromebook? Do you have a Google Cloud account? If you were using IE, Firefox, Safari or Opera, they shouldn't try to send stuff off to Google's cloud storage instead of saving to your local HDD. Although I've used Chrome myself, but it's never tried to save to Google's cloud services, mainly because it's blocked and censored, unless using a VPN.
 
Titanium Backup, and custom ROMs. I tend to get impatient waiting for carrier updates. Samsung quit supporting my Galaxy S a good while before I upgraded to a newer phone.
 
Wildfire S rooted for titanium backup and to get rid of Sense. Tablets rooted for titanium backup and pen testing tools. Xperia U is out of warranty now so will be rooted soon. Huawei Y300 is only a couple of months old, and as it's a comparatively new phone, I'll wait until the good folks over at XDA have a reliable root and 4.3 or 4.4 ROM available.
 
I didn't root my first Android phone, the Droid Eris, which I had for only 6 months. I owned my 2nd phone, the Droid X, for almost a year before I rooted. My original decision to root was for a now defunct app called ShootMe. A great screen capture app that required root. I used other root apps after rooting, but didn't think about installing ROMs till 6 to 8 months later.

I still don't swap ROMs too often, maybe once or twice a year. If I find something stable, I stick with it. But I do use root apps (Titanium BU, Root Browser, AdAway, and a tether app) and occasionally do a nandroid backup.
 
haha grammar is not my strong point. I'm american, what can I say :P

(jk jk about americans having bad grammar, I just so happen to have bad grammar, and I am american.)

Ive been working on gaining the super power of grammar, hasn't gone so well.

Anywho, I thought that I would add, after I rooted my htc wildfire, it went down the drains, which may be the source of me not wanting to root again. It was most likely due to the low hardware specs of the device. Nonetheless, I found everything that I want without root user access..

If theres a great enough reason to root, I may in the future. So far I've found very interesting replies! Most, however, do not apply to me or are in the "can already do.." catagory.

It's always said "if you don't have a reason to root, then you most likely shouldn't" and the closest reason I've found so far is simply "because I can" :P
 
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