should i root?

[kewbwian]

I'm planning to purchase a Thunderbolt this weekend after having read people's reviews and deciding whether or not I'm comfortable with the most obvious issue with the phone (battery life). It'll be my first smartphone, unless you count an old Blackberry Bold (not-so-smart), so I'm an absolute novice with this stuff. I've played around with the phone in the VZW store and actually like the HTC Sense UI, so I don't really mind what they've overlaid on top of Android.

My questions to the forum:
- If a phone is rooted, can it still run the HTC Sense UI?
- If so, and if my primary focus is to remove the bloatware apps in a hope of running a cleaner, more efficient phone, is rooting the right move for me? (I don't foresee myself going too crazy customizing the phone with tons of apps, just want a phone that does the basic things really well and FAST.)

Apologies, in advance, if something I said doesn't make sense or sounds stupid... I'm still learning.

Thanks guy!

 

[project.in.process]

I'm planning to purchase a Thunderbolt this weekend after having read people's reviews and deciding whether or not I'm comfortable with the most obvious issue with the phone (battery life). It'll be my first smartphone, unless you count an old Blackberry Bold (not-so-smart), so I'm an absolute novice with this stuff. I've played around with the phone in the VZW store and actually like the HTC Sense UI, so I don't really mind what they've overlaid on top of Android.

My questions to the forum:
- If a phone is rooted, can it still run the HTC Sense UI?
- If so, and if my primary focus is to remove the bloatware apps in a hope of running a cleaner, more efficient phone, is rooting the right move for me? (I don't foresee myself going too crazy customizing the phone with tons of apps, just want a phone that does the basic things really well and FAST.)

Apologies, in advance, if something I said doesn't make sense or sounds stupid... I'm still learning.

Thanks guy!

- If a phone is rooted, can it still run the HTC Sense UI?
yes. you can root the phone and NOT apply any custom ROM's/Themes--basically you just have super user permissions to the framework of the phone.
and with the recent XDA release of more custom-Skins, you can apply any number of Skins and get a new look/feel of the phone without rooting.

If so, and if my primary focus is to remove the bloatware apps in a hope of running a cleaner, more efficient phone, is rooting the right move for me?
the phone itself is already blazing fast. i have not rooted this phone (i did root the Evo)--and the new snapdragon is leagues ahead of the predecessor on the Evo. i've experienced no lag and its a wonderful user experience. but yes, in order to remove bloatware you must root. However, keep those deleted apps handy in the event that you need it and always backup before applying any Roms just in case something goes wrong (nandroid backup!)

 

[want a droid]

I'm going to root once a one-click for Mac is available. I just want superuser permission so I can run certain root-only apps (AdFree Android, ShootMe, etc.).

 

[anon(3092520)]

I'm going to root eventually but I'm going to let the guys work out the bugs first. Give them some time to develop a stable one click root option and some time to come up with the perfect ROM and then I'll take the plunge. Rooting is one of those things where I never want to be first in.

 

[Upstreammiami]

I haven't rooted cuz there really isn't much mods yet