Sunday, February 3, 2013

My experiements with rooting wildfire!



Method 1: Only unrevoked3
Steps followed: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=788776
Result: Failure

First I tried with unrevoked3

It didn't work out.
The reflash_package.exe program gave the message "Error: unable to get root. Is your firmware too new?"
The same issue is mentioned in comments to this page. I saw it after I got the error :(



Method 2: Revolutionary (also uses GoldCard and unrevoked3)
Steps followed: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1145035
and http://www.aritrasen.com/2011/09/17/how-to-root-htc-wildfire-2-2-1-and-install-cyanogenmod/

Result: Success!

Revolutionary does not work with HBOOT 1.02.0000 that my Wildfire has. I need to downgrade it to HBOOT 1.01.0001 :(

Followed mainly the link (http://www.aritrasen.com/2011/09/17/how-to-root-htc-wildfire-2-2-1-and-install-cyanogenmod/) and was able to do these:
a) Downgrade HBOOT from 1.02.0000 to 1.01.0001
b) Getting S-OFF

One note here: The above links may tell you to format your SD card before proceeding with the GoldCard generation. But that is not required! I was able to proceed without any formatting with all my SD card data intact.

There can be little scare sometimes, such as when a particular step gets stuck. But do not be afraid. Just google it out. There is good help over the net! One thing, ensure that USB debugging is always turned on.

While running step2.bat of buzzdowngrade, the script exited with an error for me:
FAILED (remote: 90 hboot pre-update! please flush image again immediately)
*** Rom downgrade finished, rebooting to bootloader. ***
rebooting into bootloader... FAILED (status read failed (Too many links))


I opened up step2.bat. Found these lines:
echo *** Starting the ROM downgrade ***
fastboot flash zip rom.zip

echo *** Rom downgrade finished, rebooting to bootloader. ***
fastboot reboot-bootloader


Surely the script's error was asking me to re-run the command "fastboot flash zip rom.zip".
It succeeded! Then I ran the last command from the step2.bat: "fastboot reboot-bootloader ".
Bingo! Done! :)

Specially, after your HBOOT is downgraded, it took quite sometime for the phone to boot (with the HTC white screen showing for long). But eventually it booted. But since, HBOOT was downgraded or perhaps because of running GoldCard, all settings and accounts on my phone were gone. Never mind, I had already backed my contact, messages, apps :P

Downgrade to Eclair

Now the next step is to downgrade OS to Eclair (Android 2.1) and then install Unrevoked3. I think after this, Unrevoked should succeed. (It does not work on Wildfire on Froyo (Android 2.1)).

Oh yeah, it did!

Now, my Wildfire has Eclair (Android 2.1), S-OFF, and rooted. Since my phone is rooted, I can see SuperUser app in my app drawer. :)

Install Gingerbread


Now I need to install Cyanogenmod 7 (Gingerbread).
I downloaded the cm-7.2.0-buzz.zip from http://download.cyanogenmod.org/?type=stable&device=buzz, instead of the older update-cm-7.0.3-buzz-signed.zip mentioned on the blog I followed.
I have chosen to go for unsigned archive. Finger crossed! Lets see if this works...

Yayy!! I have Gingerbread now on my Wildfire! :)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Install Google Apps

Now I am missing the Google's propitiatory apps, such as gmail, play, etc. I am also unable to add my gmail account :(
Found that I need to install gapps separately using the gapps-gb-20110828-signed.zip.
Following this page , I was able to flash the gapps image.

When I rebooted, the phone asked me to add a gmail account. Once I did that, it took me to Market Place (which soon got updated to Google Play Store) :)

Yahoo!

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Screenshots finally! (ADW launcher on top of Cyanogenmod 7.2 (Gingerbread fork))