Database Users

To be Root, or not to be......

As an Android user, and all the world on apk's made for android, i'm just curious on a point.
Why is there too many applications that need a rooted android phone out there, considering that all firmware after 2.3.2 is non rootable with an apk like gingerbreak?. I know that gingerbrak just breaked an exploit in android to do that, but at thas time, it seems that they patched very well that exploit, so, gingerbreak doesn't work anymore.
Assuming that for the masses is not possible to root phones "on the fly", why are all those companies making a lot of applications just for rooted phones?.
On the other hand, all people knows that an integrated Service pack in a windows installation DVD is more powerful (clean), that one upgraded to SP(x). What about Android OS?. Does a latest IMG firmware pre rooted is more "clean" than a updated (OTA) firmware?...
Just my thinking....

caqo71 said:
Why is there too many applications that need a rooted android phone out there, considering that all firmware after 2.3.2 is non rootable with an apk like gingerbreak?. I know that gingerbrak just breaked an exploit in android to do that, but at thas time, it seems that they patched very well that exploit, so, gingerbreak doesn't work anymore.
Assuming that for the masses is not possible to root phones "on the fly", why are all those companies making a lot of applications just for rooted phones?.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You have to keep into account that :
1/ It's a question of choice. As long as you can get root access on a phone, it's only logical to have apps that benefit that, seeing as they give you control over the phone you wouldn't normally have...
Besides, apps that require root access are not developed for a specific phone, i.e. Arc. It's not the developer's problem if a phone can be easily rooted or not, they just want to give you apps that take advantage of this change.
2/ Obtaining root access on the Arc is not impossible by any means. You can unlock your bootloader and easily root it no matter which 2.3.x you are using. Again, it's a question of choice.
On the other hand, all people knows that an integrated Service pack in a windows installation DVD is more powerful (clean), that one upgraded to SP(x). What about Android OS?. Does a latest IMG firmware pre rooted is more "clean" than a updated (OTA) firmware?...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
FOTAs are more or less branded by your carrier with loads of bloatware, so yes, a generic global ftf or img is cleaner than those.
The cleanest though is CM7, as it's based on vanilla Android.
Hope this makes it clearer.

[Q] trying to update

hey everyone im very new and i would really appreciate if you could help me with this little problem. I got a old s5 from my sister and i noticed it hadn't been updated since she got it. Now, here is where the problem starts, she was using Verizon and i have T-mobile the phone is unlocked but it wont update the os normally... I have no idea how this all works but i think its not updating because its trying to update through Verizon....
so is there a way i can change this phone to t mobile or do i need to self install the os updates myself?
if so then i know that i need to towel root it and i have the program downloaded and installed my device info is blow if you need other information please let me know and i will provide it asap ....plz and thank you
MODEL NUMBER: SM-G900V
ANDROID VERSION: 4.4.2
BASE BAND VERSION: G900VVRU1ANG
KERNEL VERSION:3.4.0

Blaze-209 said:
hey everyone im very new and i would really appreciate if you could help me with this little problem. I got a old s5 from my sister and i noticed it hadn't been updated since she got it. Now, here is where the problem starts, she was using Verizon and i have T-mobile the phone is unlocked but it wont update the os normally... I have no idea how this all works but i think its not updating because its trying to update through Verizon....
so is there a way i can change this phone to t mobile or do i need to self install the os updates myself?
if so then i know that i need to
Are root it and i have the program downloaded and installed my device info is blow if you need other information please let me know and i will provide it asap ....plz and thank you
MODEL NUMBER: SM-G900V
ANDROID VERSION: 4.4.2
BASE BAND VERSION: G900VVRU1ANG
KERNEL VERSION:3.4.0
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you wanting to root it or just upgrade the firmware? Have you ever used Odin?
Try connecting to kies if you just want to upgrade firmware.

Tulsadiver said:
Are you wanting to root it or just upgrade the firmware? Have you ever used Odin?
Try connecting to kies if you just want to upgrade firmware.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I:silly:'ve only done that stuff on my old iPhone, but when i switched to android it was like coming from north korea to china. Its just so much freedom I've never experienced before and i'm super happy i'm here( china i guess) but i couldn't imagine what america freedom feels like...and i'm guessing having it rooted and flashing custom Kernel would be like coming to america. I doubt ill ever get around to using those things to there full potential, so i guess ill just upgrade the firmware... unless you have movies or stories of the freedom im missing i doubt ill venture out to go find it. thank you for your info and looking forward to your reply

Blaze-209 said:
I:silly:'ve only done that stuff on my old iPhone, but when i switched to android it was like coming from north korea to china. Its just so much freedom I've never experienced before and i'm super happy i'm here( china i guess) but i couldn't imagine what america freedom feels like...and i'm guessing having it rooted and flashing custom Kernel would be like coming to america. I doubt ill ever get around to using those things to there full potential, so i guess ill just upgrade the firmware... unless you have movies or stories of the freedom im missing i doubt ill venture out to go find it. thank you for your info and looking forward to your reply
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No custom kernel for us. We have a locked bootloader. We do have custom Roms. I would root but that is just me. I dislike all the bloatware if nothing else. You don't have to use your phone any differently but you never know when you will come across a great app or something and it requires root.
You are on the right firmware for root. Install towelroot, make it rain, download SuperSU from the playstore, install and update the binaries (it will ask you to) choose the normal method. Reboot your phone and you are rooted. I would go a step further and download busybox from the play store, install the app then install busybox, then install safestrap which is our custom recovery.
You can still just run a stock ROM if you wish but you now have the ability to change your phone to a certain degree. At least get rid of some bloatware. Otherwise, I'd try kies first and see if it will update your phone.
http://www.samsung.com/us/kies/

HTCIR gone Android 6.0

Hi,
Working quite for sometimes on an APP ( not published for the moment ) to make your own remote control.
I started it first with Samsung GS4 and purchased last year the ONE M8 for its TRUE IR leaning capability ( love truly the device )
Now since the update to Android 6.0 ( I use T-MOBILE NL ) HTCIR blasting/learning is gone, the standard Android IR CONSUMER still working.
It's a pity and I have sent a message toHTC but doubt this will go anywhere.
I believe the problem is not the SDK (HTCIR.JAR) but the ROM / KERNEL somehow removed that feature.
My question being, is anyone aware of that issue. Not sure if there is any solution? anyone an idea? (rooting changing ROM etc..but what's the point) or the reason from HTC why this got removed ( voluntary or not )
I guess I will purchase a second hand HTC ONE M7 as I believe it will never receive Android 6 update and from what I believe it has learning capability like the M8 right ?
THANKS
If you are curious about the APP you can see this thread
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2290996
It is no longer upated but lot happened since in the APP and I really wanted to post the APP for HTC one user.
Here video on last version including learning capability when it worked fine/

I can confirm IR Recording is not working on MM. Tried several apps without success.

cant you just downgrade to lollipop ? or is that just a dumb idea.

Thanks for the answer and sorry for late reply.
About downgrading, yes this is what I will do, truly that learning capability was great and just don't understand why they removed ( if intentional ) this say I know IR start to go away even blaster IE Samsung EDGE 7. So only half surprised but when you compare the usefulness of a very un-precise HR monitor VS IR blaster/leaning IMO it does no make sense...
Now my HTC ONE M8 is from T-MOBILE NL and is not s-off.... So RUU is not possible AFAIK. So will have to ROOT it, this is no issue ( I did once) but not sure if I can flash IE HTC_One_M8_Lollipop_5.1_LMY47O.H9.zip (ORIGINAL from HTC) via TWRP without issues...I say this because when I got the HTC one M8 not knowing much about it I broke WIFI ( no longer switched on ) and T-MOBILE wad nice enough to replace the phone. So if anyone can confirm I can do this of course at my own risk...
Thanks

questionmark said:
Thanks for the answer and sorry for late reply.
About downgrading, yes this is what I will do, truly that learning capability was great and just don't understand why they removed ( if intentional ) this say I know IR start to go away even blaster IE Samsung EDGE 7. So only half surprised but when you compare the usefulness of a very un-precise HR monitor VS IR blaster/leaning IMO it does no make sense...
Now my HTC ONE M8 is from T-MOBILE NL and is not s-off.... So RUU is not possible AFAIK. So will have to ROOT it, this is no issue ( I did once) but not sure if I can flash IE HTC_One_M8_Lollipop_5.1_LMY47O.H9.zip (ORIGINAL from HTC) via TWRP without issues...I say this because when I got the HTC one M8 not knowing much about it I broke WIFI ( no longer switched on ) and T-MOBILE wad nice enough to replace the phone. So if anyone can confirm I can do this of course at my own risk...
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You don't need s-off to flash roms, only for ruu's
If you restore the nandroid from this thread you should be fine http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2701376

questionmark said:
but not sure if I can flash IE HTC_One_M8_Lollipop_5.1_LMY47O.H9.zip (ORIGINAL from HTC) via TWRP without issues...I say this because when I got the HTC one M8 not knowing much about it I broke WIFI ( no longer switched on ) and T-MOBILE wad nice enough to replace the phone. So if anyone can confirm I can do this of course at my own risk...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You mean WiFi didn't work after you flashed a custom ROM? If so, this is usually due to firmware (hboot, radio, etc.) being too old, such as KK firmware, and you flashed a LP ROM.
But going "back" such as the case of what you want to do (running a LP ROM with MM firmware) is usually not an issue. Meaning, the firmware is usually backwards compatible. And in fact, there doesn't seem to be much difference between LP and MM firmware; no reports of broken WiFi that I've seen, even going forwards.
In any case, do a TWRP backup of your current setup (as you always should before flashing a ROM), and you can easily revert if you flash a ROM and run into issues.

Many thanks for the reply.
Since I have ONE M8 T-MOBILE NL it is hard if not impossible to find the RUU and anyway no s-off.
So I will go with that nandroid backup busy right now with it.
The WIFI issue I had was back one year ago or so when I unlocked the boot, installed TWRP, routed the phone and installed a marshmallow ROM and kaboom... could not get wifi back so went to T-MOBILE NL and they changed the phone no question asked this was after only couple days I got it. Thsi chilled me to play with HTC and custom ROM ( I'm more familiar with Samsung )
The fact that HTC removed learning capability somehow demotivated me on my project though I have a server for my APP that uses USB-UIRT if I need learning capability. But for sure HTC ONE M8 for me at the time was the best and the difference with the other.
So I will revert / try that ROM so to have truly universal remote control and be again motivated
Again many thanks for your reply that gives me extra confidence in proceeding AGAIN I KNOW AT MY OWN RISK, but I have nothing to loose I have another phone and intend to use now the HTC ONE M8 as a glorified remote control.
Thanks
redpoint73 said:
You mean WiFi didn't work after you flashed a custom ROM? If so, this is usually due to firmware (hboot, radio, etc.) being too old, such as KK firmware, and you flashed a LP ROM.
But going "back" such as the case of what you want to do (running a LP ROM with MM firmware) is usually not an issue. Meaning, the firmware is usually backwards compatible. And in fact, there doesn't seem to be much difference between LP and MM firmware; no reports of broken WiFi that I've seen, even going forwards.
In any case, do a TWRP backup of your current setup (as you always should before flashing a ROM), and you can easily revert if you flash a ROM and run into issues.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

I managed to flash HTC_One_M8_Lollipop_5.1_LMY47O.H9 and no wifi issue so that is good but it seems that the GPE ROM only has the blasting capability from the standard google class ConsumerIrManager and does not support ConsumerIrManagerHtc hence no learning ...
If anyone could provide me a link of a stock nandroid HTC ROM Lollipop 5.1 (not GPE) I'be be very grateful... Even if I loose phone.
Of course better would be CID T-MOB003 but I did not find...
Thanks

questionmark said:
If anyone could provide me a link of a stock nandroid HTC ROM Lollipop 5.1 (not GPE) I'be be very grateful... Even if I loose phone.
Of course better would be CID T-MOB003 but I did not find...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Stock TWRP nandroid backup (Sense LP for your CID) is posted here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/htc-one-m8/help/tutorial-how-to-stock-stock-twrp-t3086860
Note that this is not a flashable ROM zip, but rather a TWRP backup. So you'll need to unzip the folder contents, transfer to proper location on the phone, and RESTORE in TWRP (not INSTALL). See tutorial steps 4 through 9 (then reboot). You shouldn't need to do the remaining steps.

redpoint73 said:
Stock TWRP nandroid backup (Sense LP for your CID) is posted here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/htc-one-m8/help/tutorial-how-to-stock-stock-twrp-t3086860
Many many thanks for that. Was busy last 2 weeks but got it to work first finding a KitKat rom (before your post) working fine with HTCIR blast/learning and then installed fine the above all working fine as it used to be before the Marshmallow update that IMO regressed in this sense in HTC sense removing IR learning (I bought the device exactly for that unique capability). The good things is now since I did backup of both ROM I can test my APP on both and think about people using M7 that might want to keep this older device to actually have a powerful universal remote control with IR PRONTO hex learning capability. Still very busy with that APP and I hope to post / update it soon here for the M7/M8 users still on HTC sense ROM with IR learning capability.
Again many thanks for pointing me at the right link, I searched searched but missed it somehow.
Cheers
PS: M10 still kept the IR blasting for what I know, not sure about learning? anyone knows?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Hi Chaps,
Ive just noticed this post, is this definitley official then, no IR in Marshmallow??, i hope they sort it in the future then, ill be dropping back down to LP myself for now.

Does the YD-206 variant get the lollipop update natively?

With all the updating going on lately for the YotaPhone I am lost if the Chinese (YD-206) got the update? I mean without the hassle of trying to flash the RU version on it?
If not maybe could you help me find the cheapest YD-201 version? It's be greatly appreciated!
Also another question I had on my mind was how the performance is for simple VR games? I noticed it has Gyroscope and I wanted to use Riftcat and a leap motion to simulate a vive... Maybe use some freetrack with it to get some tracking so i can walk a little too! I don't wanna bore you all with the details but yeah do you guys think it can handle some of the games? I realize that riftcat just streams it from my PC but i'm not sure how intensive that is!
Thanks guys I appreciate it! Also if all works out and I get all that VR stuff going I'll keep you all updated! Again Thank You all so much

adc103 said:
With all the updating going on lately for the YotaPhone I am lost if the Chinese (YD-206) got the update? I mean without the hassle of trying to flash the RU version on it?
)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The Chinese version is unfortunately stuck on KitKat. Flashing to the RU firmware is not that hard and if it should fail you can always flash back to the Chinesae version.

Yes, I agree , it's easy , put handset in developer mode so your PC can talk to it, then install yotaflasher on the PC, 1 option to download your chosen firmware zip file then another option to flash your handset. If there is something wrong (normally adb drivers) you have not lost anything.
The problems will only start if it does not flash and you have to tinker.
But yes, I recommend that you try to update to the latest release.
Yes Yotaphone works very well with VR games, gets a little hot and uses battery , but so all handsets.
I think even if you buy the yd201 , you may not have an update selection, but I am not sure of this. They usually have a special modified retailer firmware with more languages and stopping updates. A few weeks ago when I ordered my yd206 there were plenty of international yd201s and even some white Yotaphone, but now there fewer.

Parmo100 said:
Yes, I agree , it's easy , put handset in developer mode so your PC can talk to it, then install yotaflasher on the PC, 1 option to download your chosen firmware zip file then another option to flash your handset. If there is something wrong (normally adb drivers) you have not lost anything.
The problems will only start if it does not flash and you have to tinker.
But yes, I recommend that you try to update to the latest release.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think I am convinced too take my chance with the YD-206 now, I was just a little skeptical since I saw some others on the forum having problems trying to get it too RU. But in one of the threads a saw a solution if I can't get it too work by doing it manually.

How to switch back to "factory"?

Hi,
I recently unlocked my XC to flash Sailfish. I just would like to know what's the best path to get back to the official Android? Or is it locked to AOSP definitely?
I guess flashing AOSP and then install Xperia specific apps (if present on the Play Store) should be doable, but I wonder if there is a more direct way.
Thanks.

Just found Emma. I was able to flash the factory image...except the TA partition of course, but it's not a big deal.

romut said:
Hi,
I recently unlocked my XC to flash Sailfish. I just would like to know what's the best path to get back to the official Android? Or is it locked to AOSP definitely?
I guess flashing AOSP and then install Xperia specific apps (if present on the Play Store) should be doable, but I wonder if there is a more direct way.
Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think flashing via flashtool wiping everything should bring you back to the original form (except from Bootloader remaining unlocked). Then you have to gain back root, though (if I got your point).

Sorry for this later answer. @eresac it worked...almost.
Indeed it's pretty strange. I didn't notice first, Emma didn't offer to flash Android 8 but 6 instead ! Problem is now the XC never gets the notification to upgrade. Any idea how to change this?

romut said:
Sorry for this later answer. @eresac it worked...almost.
Indeed it's pretty strange. I didn't notice first, Emma didn't offer to flash Android 8 but 6 instead ! Problem is now the XC never gets the notification to upgrade. Any idea how to change this?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think Emma might offered you a firmware for non-retail device (ex. Demo unit in store, Review unit, Exchange unit at service center) which has no update and shouldn't be use as daily driver.
Try reflashing it with different firmware. If there isn't any different firmware to select in Emma, use Androxyde's flashtool instead.

Emma offers only one firmware. And this is 6.0.1.
Ok to flash a newer firmware with another tool, but where can I get a factory image?

You can download it from flashtool (via XperiFirm plugin) following this guide. The title said Marshmallow but this method is compatible with newer firmware too.
http://www.xperiablog.net/2016/03/12/install-xperia-marshmallow-using-flashtool-and-xperifirm-guide/
Also, make sure that the firmware you download has version number starting with 34.4 if you want Android 8.0