Rooted Android - You really don't need to do this anymore

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Inspect Your Gadgets > Rooted Android - You really don't need to do this anymore

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

What practical advantages does rooting or using a custom ROM have?

# ¿ Aug 6, 2011 21:11

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# ¿ Apr 24, 2024 15:18

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

ExcessBLarg! posted:

I thought the OP covers this rather well. Do you have a more specific question?

Tamba posted:

You can get rid of preinstalled apps, over/underclock your CPU, block ads and use stuff like Titanium Backup and LBE Privacy Guard

The OP has a list, but I was wondering if there are others, since those don't really appeal to me other than the wireless tether and removing pre-installed apps, and what the user like Cyanogen mods do. I'm thinking that this isn't worth the hassle for me, but want to know if there are big advantages I might not be aware of.

# ¿ Aug 6, 2011 21:27

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

ExcessBLarg! posted:

The backup capability shouldn't be underestimated. If you have all your contacts stored with Google and don't play (or don't care about) games, then losing or having your phone die is a minor inconvenience. Others though like the idea that they can pick up a new device and restore it to exactly where they left off if they have to, or transfer their Angry Birds progress or something.

Honestly though, my primary motivation to root was to patch bugs on my phone, including the broken camcorder (back when it was broken), poorly responsive keyboard, and broken GPS; and also to restore lost functionality like using the volume rocker to set either vibrate or silent, make the bright-rear end full battery popup not wake me up at 3am, etc.

But if you have a good phone, there's little to fix.

Takes No Damage posted:

No that's pretty much it. Rooting is as much about messing around in your phone as anything else, if you're not already a computer nerd and you're happy with the way your phone works now then it's probably not worth the hassle/void warranty for you.

Thanks! I'm going to skip it for now. I'm not concerned with backup because I use Google Contacts/Voice, and use my computer instead of my phone when I'm at home.

# ¿ Aug 6, 2011 22:19

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

I'm trying to root my Incredible. One of the first steps is to boot into the HBOOT menu by turning the phone off, then holding volume down and power. This doesn't give me the menu, it simply turns the phone on. Any idea?
edit: Needed to turn off fast boot. Now I can't find "USB PLUG" in the menu.

Since I do see the "HBOOT USB PLUG" thing highlight at the top, I decided to press on, and went to the Device Manager. I don't see an Other menu with Android 1.0 device, but I do see and "Android Phone" with "Android ADB device" that shows up when I use root. I used this to install the driver, and it seems to work, and now is displayed as "android bootloader interface".

When I turned off the phone and booted it normally, Windows reverted to showing "ADB device". I'm wondering if this was even necessary: When I run Unrevoked, it does the same thing as it did before: It said "running root" before messing with the boot drivers.

Dominoes fucked around with this message at 02:51 on Nov 22, 2011

# ¿ Nov 22, 2011 02:21

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

tzirean posted:

I actually ended up following the instructions at this link for manually updating. I ran into the "not enough free space" issue, but once I resolved that, all was well (aside from two of my contacts magically no longer being "favorites" -- easily fixed). And I do have root again and was able to use Font Installer to reinstall Roboto.

Thanks for all the help!

That sounds like the Incredible already has Gingerbread installed. As far as I know, Incredibles that had not already been rooted but are running 2.3.4 can't be rooted unless they're reset to Froyo. But, obviously, I am not the best person to ask!

Maybe that's what it's now telling me ""Error: failed to get root. Is your firmware too new?" gently caress.

# ¿ Nov 22, 2011 03:06

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

Econosaurus posted:

I have an incredible that I just updated to 2.3.4, and now I keep getting the message that phone storage is low, which prevents me from doing anything besides phone and text. I have about 2 gigs of internal storage free. It's annoying enough that I'm willing to root it and hope that fixes it, was updating it a mistake? I didn't see anything about versions in the OP.

Edit: Also can I back up all my data when rooting or what?

I ran through the same thought process recently.

1: As of the 2.3.4 update, you can no longer root the Incredible

2: You can get around this bug by clearing the cache for Facebook and HTC messaging/email apps.

# ¿ Nov 25, 2011 22:46

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

sarah synonymous posted:

Regarding point 1, this isn't true. I just rooted my Incredible a few days ago after downloading the 2.3.4 update, following this process: http://androidforums.com/incredible-all-things-root/427344-2-3-4-root-downgrade-s-off.html

It's fully rooted, S-OFF and running CyanogenMod.

Thank you! Using clockwork worked; I now have a Superuser Permission app. Android is now tell me there's a system update. Will doing it break my phone? How do I remove icons from uninstalled apps? Any Verizon apps that deleting will cause my phone to break? I tried uninstalling some unecessarya apps like Flicr, VCAST, Skype, Verizon hotspot etc, but they come back when I reboot. This is with both Titanium and Root Explorer.

Dominoes fucked around with this message at 02:53 on Nov 28, 2011

# ¿ Nov 27, 2011 20:43

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

Dominoes posted:

Thank you! Using clockwork worked; I now have a Superuser Permission app. Android is now tell me there's a system update. Will doing it break my phone? How do I remove icons from uninstalled apps? Any Verizon apps that deleting will cause my phone to break? I tried uninstalling some unecessarya apps like Flicr, VCAST, Skype, Verizon hotspot etc, but they come back when I reboot. This is with both Titanium and Root Explorer.

I've decided to get Cyanogen. I tried using it, but it's stuck on the Cyanogen load screen. I recovered my phone with Clockwork. I googled this and it's common, but without a solution. Most suggestions are to install using a different method. I used Rom Manager.

# ¿ Nov 30, 2011 00:44

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

Install Gentoo posted:

Suggestions:
1)Try temporarily clearing everything else off your SD card (if you have one)
2)Try an earlier version of Cyanogenmod first, and then upgrade it to the latest.
3) Try having recovery wipe out /system, /data, etc and then install from within clockwork recovery. Make sure you have a full backup of the working state of your phone first, of course.

Thank you; checking the "clear cache/data" box when installing Cyanogen worked!

Now I need to figure out which differences are from Cyanogen, and which are from not having HTC Sense. My first impression is that the lack of Verizon/HTC bloatware being gone rocks! I can now use my apps drawer effectively and keep the home screens simple.

Dominoes fucked around with this message at 02:10 on Nov 30, 2011

# ¿ Nov 30, 2011 01:58

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

Tethering issues on Cyanogen.

I want wifi tether. PDAnet works as it did before. I tried Android WiFi tether after rooting, but before installing Cyanogen. It worked, if and only if I enabled two options. (I think they were MSS support and alternate fix, or something) On Cyanogen, these options are not present in Android Wifi tether, and as a result, I cannot get internet over the connection. What's up with that?

Cyanogen seems to have built-in tethering, but neither the wifi nor USB tethering works.

But... I tried barnacle tether and it works, but is substantially slower than PDAnet.

So, why do Barnacle tether and PDAnet work, but the built-in Cyanogen tether, and Android Wifi tether do not? I'm using an HTC incredible.

# ¿ Dec 3, 2011 03:06

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

ExcessBLarg! posted:

I'm not certain about alternate fix, but "MSS Clamping" is likely needed for tethering to work on your wireless provider.

Some ISPs don't support fragmented packets on their networks, and so when you tether, if the tethering computer generates packets that are too large they'll get fragmented and dropped. Path MTU discovery is supposed to keep this from happening, but that doesn't always work either.

Most home routers implement MSS clamping as a fix. It modifies ("mangles") forwarded network connections so they don't generate packets that are too large (at least, not larger than the size limitation that the router knows about, which in some very rare cases may not be sufficient).

For some reason, Android's stock tethering doesn't do MSS clamping--perhaps they weren't aware of that problem. As a result, the necessary kernel features to support MSS clamping in third-party tethering clients isn't always available.

For the "MSS Clamping" option to show up in WiFi Tetether the kernel needs IKCONFIG and TCPMSS support. For MSS clamping to actually work the kernel also needs MANGLE support, but that's not explicitly checked. Anyways, it's quite possible that the CyanogenMod kernel isn't built with these features enabled.

Both Barnacle and PDAnet implement their own connecting-forwarding mechanism that doesn't utilize Linux's built-in IP forwarding/routing features. Their stuff either explicitly performs MSS clamping, or implementing the forwarding in such a way that no explicit clamping is needed.

So, the "solution" to your problem is to compile a CyanogenMod kernel with those features enabled, or request them to be added to whomever's kernel you're running.

But a more practical workaround is to lower the MTU of the wireless adapter of any machine you're trying to tether. Here's instructions for doing it in Vista, and I think Windows 7, but my Google-foo is failing me. In any event, the default adapter MTU is likely 1500, but I'd try dropping to 1400 or even 1300 to see if those work with built-in tethering.

Thank you! That's exactly what I was looking for.

# ¿ Dec 3, 2011 22:30

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

Found an awesome feature on Cyanogen: You can set your camera's trackball/opticstick button to unlock the phone! Now I just press it twice (once to wake phone, second to unlock) to unlock! Faster and easier than pushing a button, waiting half a second for the screen to load, then fumbling with the touch unlocker.

# ¿ Dec 7, 2011 03:09

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

Caseman posted:

That's the one linked on XDA. There is something hardcoded into the latest OTA that blocks it even on rooted phones.

Try Barnacle Tether. Android Wifi Tether doesn't work for me either.

# ¿ Dec 26, 2011 04:53

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

Hey, Cyanogen 7's awesome. I'm using it on an HTC Incredible. It's what I imagine stock Android to be, without the Verizon and HTC bloatware, and with root abilities like free wifi tethering.

# ¿ Dec 28, 2011 17:41

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

Wagonburner posted:

Once you get used to the cool extras CM7 has it makes stock gb or ics seem like BBos.

What CM settings and features should I try?

# ¿ Dec 28, 2011 20:59

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

I'm using an HTC incredible on Cyanogen 7. Is there any way to disable the popup asking about connecting as a USB drive that comes up when I unlock the phone when it's connected to a computer?

# ¿ Oct 6, 2012 16:35

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

My HTC incredible with Cyanogen is glitching out. Looking for advice.

I turned my phone off today. I turned it back on an hour later - the problems started then. Problems are as follows:

1: ROM manager force closes on bootup with an error message
2: Firefox no longer loads web pages
3: Several apps (Awful, Maps and Navigation) are gone. Under manage applications, they've been replaced with "com.google.android.apps.maps" etc
4: The Play store will no longer download or update apps; no error message, the apps just stay at 0% updated/download
5: Mint.com won't update

-Phone and Google Voice works properly
-The default internet app works
-Gmail works
-Pandora works
-Most non-internet-based apps seem to work
-It appears that only the three apps I mentioned disappeared; bizarre.
-The other apps I've tried work.
-I tried rebooting and pulling the battery.

This may be a red herring, but I think I had maps and Awful running while shutting the phone off before the problem happened.

edit: Fuckit did a clean install of cyanogen; not worth troubleshooting.

Dominoes fucked around with this message at 01:56 on Dec 22, 2012

# ¿ Dec 21, 2012 22:29

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# ¿ Apr 24, 2024 15:18

Dominoes: Sep 20, 2007

How do I disable mock locations? Ingress won't let me play because it says they're enabled and I need to go to settings, developer tools etc, but I have no developer tools under settings. Running Cyanogen 7.2. Any ideas?

edit: nvm found it; under application settings.

# ¿ Jan 16, 2013 21:00

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