Database Users

A Couple of Questions

hello guys,
here's a list of questions I have compiled which were bothering me since i bought my SGS, hope you take your time and answer these:
What is "root"-ing. How different is it from flashing a firmware on motherboard and installing an OS on to a hard drive?
Does rooting an android device kill its warranty?
Which way is the best and reliable way to root my SGS?
How do I bring back my SGS to Factory state after I root my phone?
Is there a way that I can download the AOSP off the android site and install it on my phone.
I'm with O2 (UK) and I'm required to send blank text to a number. My SGS doesnt allow me to send blank texts. How do I send blank texts? :/
How do I integrate my contacts with the ones from Facebook/Google, when I dont want all the contacts from other sources to be shown in my contacts?
regards,
emc

Quick answers:
1. Root = full control of os ( linux superuser capability) it has nothing to do with flashing firmwares
2. YES
3. search the forum or google for Galaxy s rooting (very easy 10 min max)
4. firmware reflash or
*#*#7780#*#*
This code can be used for a factory data reset. It'll remove following things:
Google account settings stored in your phone
System and application data and settings
Downloaded
5. no. that is vanilla android with no drivers. look for vanilla custom rom for SGS on forum
6. I work for a carrier in Romania so i know : IT DOESN'T MATTER IS YOU PUT TEXT IN IT (just put a letter in it and send)
7.CONTACTS->Menu-> Display options
Hope it helps. Good luck.

thanks, your answers were helpful, but raised a few more question now.
if rooting has nothing to do with flashing firmwares, why does one have to reflash fimware to return to factory state? (can you explain technically?)
I still need to figure out how to setup friends in contacts, I've already enabled contacts from facebook/google.. What I wanted to know is how do I filter people from the list so that I can see only selected of them in my contacts and not all?
-----------------------------------
edit:
just saw that my Kies asked me to upgrade to JM1. should I do it?
If I do it will *#*#7780#*#* bring my phone back to JF3 (default)? or will it bring to JM1

emclondon said:
if rooting has nothing to do with flashing firmwares, why does one have to reflash fimware to return to factory state?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You don't HAVE to reflash the firmware technically, rooting basically just overwrites a few files (generally, the kernel). Technically, it should be possible to simply revert the files to unroot the phone. But the only reason you would probably want to unroot anyway is to send the phone in for service, and first thing they'll do is reflash your phone with a firmware which is known to work anyway.. So you might as well.
In regards to the warranty status after rooting, it's actually a grey area as to whether it affects the warranty. If you flash with the I9000M rom, yes, Samsung probably wont be impressed. It is always better to reflash with clean firmware before returning it to service, but unless there is evidence that rooting messed up the hardware on your phone, it's probably unlikely they would reject warranty. But better to be safe.
I don't think Samsung encrypted the bootloader sequence, and had they been concerned, they would have probably disabled USB debugging within the firmware.

ok thanks ^_^
now a few more questions:
whats a clockworkmod recovery?
whats a samset?
whats an odin?
do you suggest me to upgrade my firmware?
how do i backup my current firmware?

If it ain't broke, don't fix it is my moto . Do you experience any problems with your handset ? Like lags , lockups or anything of that sort? If you don't, then I think its better if you leave it as it is. Just apply the lagFix if you want to, but I see no reason to flash your phone to a different version right now.
I have flashed many phones before (where it was much riskier than Galaxy flashing) But I still didn't flash my Galaxy S , because I simply dont see the need to change to another 2.1. I'm waiting for Samsung to release official froyo 2.2. I suggest you wait for that too.

my phone lags a lot

I share phonix view and motto. If you do experience problems post symptoms before doing something like reflash or factory reset.
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

Lag can be easely fixed with a patch. You get root and lag patch in one pack. Will try to post a link.
http://***forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=7587405&postcount=417
Delete the 3 stars in front of forum
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

emclondon said:
just saw that my Kies asked me to upgrade to JM1. should I do it?
If I do it will *#*#7780#*#* bring my phone back to JF3 (default)? or will it bring to JM1
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
updgraded my phone and did a factory reset, phone DOES NOT GOES BACK TO JF3!
just for your info

that's because u upgraded/flashed a complete new rom which replaced the old one there for factory reset will give u the latest firmware/upgrade that u have installed.

[Q] [i9000] Kies Firmware up-date

A few weeks ago I updated my firmware to froyo via Kies, which worked, no data loss, so great.
Today Kies offered the latest firmware, so I agreed. Selected the back up options and continued. A window popped up to say backup failed, but the firmware upgrade continued with no option to stop it. This also failed and left my phone unusable. Kies firmware recovery didn't work either. I got my phone back working with Oden3 and I9000XWJV1 firmware. So now I'm running v2.3.2. Unfortunately because the backup failed I lost all my account details, contacts and apps.
The main reason for upgrading was I wanted to use a SIP account and my friends Nexus running Gingerbread had this option, but my i9000 still does not.
To get the SIP account option, will I need to root the phone and install a custom firmware? Or are there any apps which will let me use my SIP account on the i9000.

ecotack said:
A few weeks ago I updated my firmware to froyo via Kies, which worked, no data loss, so great.
Today Kies offered the latest firmware, so I agreed. Selected the back up options and continued. A window popped up to say backup failed, but the firmware upgrade continued with no option to stop it. This also failed and left my phone unusable. Kies firmware recovery didn't work either. I got my phone back working with Oden3 and I9000XWJV1 firmware. So now I'm running v2.3.2. Unfortunately because the backup failed I lost all my account details, contacts and apps.
The main reason for upgrading was I wanted to use a SIP account and my friends Nexus running Gingerbread had this option, but my i9000 still does not.
To get the SIP account option, will I need to root the phone and install a custom firmware? Or are there any apps which will let me use my SIP account on the i9000.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not surprised that after 7 hours no one has bothered to reply
1) Kies offers a firmware upgrade recovery option from the pull-down menu - its happened to me...it works
2) Why did you install JV1 via Odin? - its a GB beta release and is notoriously flakey...I can't imagine a worse option. You need to use any of the stable 2.3.3 firmwares, the latest being JVO and available from Samfirmware.com
3) Your account details are pretty easy to enter aren't they? Losing your contacts is dumb....the whole point of this technology is that you sync to your gmail account so you never need to worry about trashing your phone or losing it...just log on to another and away you go.
Sorry to sound harsh mate but your post is just a lesson to anyone else who doesn't follow some common sense rules.
Fortunately you haven't bricked your phone....recommend you do (2) above, then do some reading on here about backing up, how to use your google account properly, not saving contacts on your phone .....and generally getting the most out of your £350 piece of kit

Thanks for the reply. I installed that firmware from a quick Google (I was at work when Kies messed up my phone and very busy). I just popped over to SamFirmware and downloaded the latest firmware (XXJVO), which Odin3 installed without loosing my apps, etc (just a few settings as you would expect). All appears well, for now.
Spent some time Googling last night and I found CSipSimple, which works nicely with my SIP account.
Still Not sure why my contacts where not saved to the google account, it had 5 of them. Also loosing all my apps meant I could take a look at alternatives, which proved fruitful. Contacts now saved to my SD, but can't find a way of backing up my apps unless I root the phone...I think I'll give that a miss.

Risks using ODIN

I am tired of waiting Android 4.3 for my NOTE II and now I want to use ODIN to install it, but which are the risks of using it? Can it brick my phone? Delete my CSC code? If I use odin now, later when Android 4.4 releases can I install it with KIES or OTA update? I heard that deletes all your apps but not your files such as photos, videos, documents ecc. Is it true?
Pls explain to me everything
Thank you

The worst them of all which is deterring me from updating through odin any more is that you will lose your IMEI, hence no more connection, and that's just a pain in the arss to restore it back, no matter who and what they say, it happened twice with me and I will never update again.

Note 3 Flashing another country's rom to update

I have a rooted Note 3 SM N900 with a Pakistani android 4.4 rom. I am thinking of flashing an Indian rom to update as lollipop is still not available in my country. However I can't seem to find definite info about CSC. Should I directly flash it or do i have to change CSC?
and also How do I back up my internal storage+apps+data?

Nah, CSC doesn't mean much, if any at all, go on, flash the Indian ROM. For backup use Titanium like everyone does. However photos, music etc. won't be backed up with TB, so just use old copy method to your desktop, laptop, whatever is convenient.

What will matter is the EFS... it can get screwed up... so best thing to do is backup your current version (EFS especially - if you want to connect to your current mobile provider), and try a rom from a similar region (in your case India)... then if no baseband, etc, try flashing your backup EFS... otherwise revert back to your original rom.
Good luck!

How to backup and re-format phone?

Hi guys,
I've had my Samsung Note 3 for years but recently having some issues with it so I think I'll just start again from scratch and hope this sorts out my issues. I essentially want to do the equivalent of reformatting a PC and reinstalling the OS.
A couple questions:
1) I currently have a custom firmware - the only reason is to get around the security settings of my old work (to access emails, you need to input password to unlock phone every single time). I'm not sure if my new work requires this for my emails - how do I check if this is the case or not?
2) If I don't need to get around the custom firmware for the above reason, I will go with the genuine firmware. Otherwise, I will need a custom firmware which allows me to apply a fix for the email security settings. I don't need any other custom features - I just need a firmware which is as light as possible. Suggestions?
3) I have over 1,100 contacts in my phone. I want to ensure I don't lose any. When I go to Contacts and Select "Contacts to Display" --> "Device" there are none - so I'm assuming that if I reinstall a new firmware, there are none on the device to be lost, and as long as I re-sync with Google/Samsung/Microsoft Exchange accounts, I won't lose any. Is this correct?
4) Is there anything I need to backup aside from contacts, images/videos etc?
5) My memory card is about 5 years old and sometimes plays up so I might get a new one just to be safe. What is the fastest version available, and what is the largest size you can use with a Note 3?
6) What is the process for doing a full wipe, and reinstalling a new firmware? I installed my current firmware years ago and have forgotten the process
Thanks a lot.
PS: Below are the details of my current firmware version etc:
http://s21.postimg.org/skqvh2vaf/Screenshot_2015_11_06_18_00_57.jpg

) What is the process for doing a full wipe, and reinstalling a new firmware? I installed my current firmware years ago and have forgotten the process
Recovery mounts and storage format system data cache .
Boot to download mode flash stock rom .
http://forum.xda-developers.com/galaxy-note-3/general/samsung-galaxy-note-3-sticky-roll-t3237249