Rooting questions

[Jtshurtleff]

I am heavily contemplating rooting my inspire but have a few questions.
First, is it difficult?
Second, is it worth it?
Third, is it reversible?
Finally, what's the best part?

Sent from my Desire HD using Tapatalk

 

[Maliberti]

1. Some what but now the guys at XDA is making it easier.
2.Yes. remove crap ware from AT&. load different Roms
3.Yes and very easy to do. Just download the original ATT Rom and you can load it back anytime.
4. Unlocked, side loading, freedom.

 

[areakode]

I Just rooted last night. It was much easier than I thought it would be. The main things I wanted with the Inspire was tethering and sideloading. Tethering I figured out how to do without rooting, but AT&T had the sideloading locked down. Now, I can just download non-market apps and install without having to use a PC. Definitely worth it.

 

[cobra302]

you can side load without rooting using the ac wonder machine here. thats what i've done and have had no issues with it yet. i rooted my droid x, it was a one click root, no gold card madness, so it was very easy. i wanted it for the wireless tether. i never used it. rooting alone will not unlock your device either. yes rooting gives you freedom, but it also comes at a price. i love to tinker with electronics and such, but sometimes too much tinkering can be harmful. read the rom threads here and at xda about how many things can and do go wrong. radios not working, sound messing up, gps not working etc. for me, i'm happy as is. now, if a one click root comes along that is very easy, then i might jump on it. but for now, i'm good to go.

 

[pazzo02]

Excuse my ignorance, but what is sideloading?

 

[Eileen89]

Excuse my ignorance, but what is sideloading?

Because AT&T blocks the ability for customers to download apps from any where other than the Android market, many users will Root their devices in order to "download apps outside of the Android market place", which is what sideloading is.

Sent from my HTC Inspire 4G using Tapatalk.

 

[Silas0220]

Apologies for the noob question, but this seemed like the place to ask it. When I root, do I lose all my apps, settings, and home screen setups? I'd love to root my phone, but frankly I've spent three weeks getting my phone just the way I like it and I'd hate to have to go through all that again...

 

[cobra302]

no rooting in and of itself wont cause you to lose any apps or settings, it just gives you access to other parts of your phone. now if you put a new rom on the phone then you will lose all your apps and settings. you need to make sure that if you do root, the first thing to do is to make a backup of your phone without any roms or anything added. this way you can always return back to normal if you need to.

 

[Silas0220]

I've looked through the available rooting methods from a noob level, and it looks like the majority of them require "downgrading" and "upgrading," which seem to wipe the device memory, because it's essentially installing a new ROM to do something, then installing the stock one. Bubby's root in particular makes it very clear that it wipes the device.

I'm not savvy enough to do this by hand and be comfortable with it, really. And I actually haven't found a root method that seems to do it without this downgrading bit. Thoughts?

 

[cobra302]

You know what you're right. I forgot this root is different from my Droid x. Sorry. Lol

 

[Silas0220]

Ahh, okay . It sucks, my friend with an OG Droid keeps bragging about SetCPU and I want it! I'm not prepared to lose everything yet though, I'm rather anal about such things.