CMW and a MAC

[rapideyemovement]

Hello everyone. So I'm a n00b to all this android modding. I come from an Apple 3G. I've been terribly disappointed with the stability of my Fascinate until yesterday when I finally rooted it and removed the crap bloatware. I swear, Verison is shooting themself in the foot with all that crap that slows this phone down so dang much. Anyway, so far so good.

So I'm looking to get JT's Super Fast rom on my phone, but all sources are saying I need to flash CWM first. Unfortunately, every article or post that shows how to do this does so with a PC. I only own Macs. Am I missing something? Can someone shed some light on this for me please?

Also, if you feel up to it, explain what the heck CWM is and does and why its necessary to do this to my phone in order to flash custom roms? I've tried digging around but it appears that everyone is l33t and already knows, leaving me waaaaaay behind the curve. I also don't have nearly as much time as I used to to catch up as my career is very demanding of my time.

I appreciate it! Thanks!

 

[NOsquid]

CWM is an alternate recovery you can boot into. You can flash ROMs through it, it also allows for "nandroid" backups which are kind of like Time Machine on your computer. So when you do something wrong in your modding and the phone won't work, you can always boot into CWM recovery and restore a previous state.

If you are handy with Terminal and command lines, there is a very beta how-to for Mac on the XDA forums. The easiest way is to run Boot Camp and use Odin in Windows. I would recommend the latter, not for its ease but because if you're going to start modding your phone Odin is *really* handy when everything else fails. You can at least bring your phone back to stock.

 

[rapideyemovement]

Thanks for the reply. I do actually have a Windows 7 machine at home but its just not connected up. My work bought me a MBP, and along with my personal MBP I just haven't used my Win machine in days. So I should retract my statement, I DO own PC's. Actually I own about 4 of them. I just don't use them

Anyway, I have titanium backup pro. I did a lil looking and found that nandroid does bout the same thing, is this true? Or should I get nandroid for backup purposes just as well?

And to be clear, is Rom Manager completely independent from CWM in regards to referencing it in tutorials n such?

 

[NOsquid]

No, a nandroid is much more powerful. You should have Titanium also but they are different.

Hurro n00b! Rooted? Stop! Do not pass GO! No flashy-flashy! **BACK UP YOUR PHONE** - Android Forums

ROM Manager is an app from the same developer that works in tandem with CWM. ROM Manager hangs out in your app drawer, CWM is recovery, you can get there by holding the volume and power buttons even when nothing else on the phone works. You can download ROMs in RM and when you click install it will boot you into CWM. On the Fascinate RM isn't very useful right now. You need it to flash CWM in the beginning after you Odin, and it can make a couple of things easier. But I just put my ROMs/kernels on my SD, boot into recovery and flash.