[sclug] Android ROMs

[David Given]

Some people last night expressed an interest in installing a non-vendor
ROM on Android phones...

These guys produce superb ROMs, complete with root access and lots of
nice features that the vendor ROMs don't have:

http://www.cyanogenmod.com/

The documentation's a bit messy and scattered throughout a wiki, but the
executive summary is:

Back up your device:

- enable development mode
- plug into PC
- use 'adb shell' on the PC to log into the phone
- use dd on the phone to back up all your partitions

Upgrade recovery partition, if you haven't done it already:

- boot phone into FASTBOOT mode by powering on by certain keys pressed
(varies per device)
- plug into PC
- use 'fastboot' on the PC to write a new recovery partition (normally
ClockworkMod) onto the phone

Install new system ROM:

- copy ROM image onto SD card
- boot phone into recovery partition by powering on by certain different
keys pressed (varies per device)
- pick 'install ROM' from the menu on the screen

Here, for example, are the instructions for the HTC Desire:

  http://wiki.cyanogenmod.com/wiki/HTC_Desire_(GSM):_Full_Update_Guide

Life is a bit trickier on the Desire because you have to break HTC's
boot loader locks (trivially easy), but it's the same process.


If your phone is already rooted, then there's a tool on the market (ROM
Manager) that will automate all this for you; rooting the phone is
trivial but fiddly. The SuperOneClick tool is a Windows app that does it
for you:

  http://shortfuse.org/?page_id=2

Conveniently, the tool also contains the Linux stuff you need to do it
manually. But using fastboot is so easy I normally don't bother. (And of
course once you've installed Cyanogen you get root access.)

-- 
???? ?????????????? ????? http://www.cowlark.com ?????
? "I have always wished for my computer to be as easy to use as my
? telephone; my wish has come true because I can no longer figure out
? how to use my telephone." --- Bjarne Stroustrup

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