[Solved] Can I root the E4GT without flashing a stock or custom ROM? (Camera shutter noise issue)

[Dark Penguin]

Until yesterday I had rooted stock JB 4.1 on my phone, which I like to have rooted so I can use Titanium Backup, SD Maid, Root Tools, etc. As most people undoubtedly know, OEMs are making it increasingly difficult to eliminate the annoyingly loud beeping, whirring, and clicking noises made by the shutter when you use the camera. For this device in rooted condition, it is possible to reinstate the shutter mute option by editing /system/csc/feature.xml, but given my history of occasional soft brick incidents, I'd really prefer not to attempt this. I do have some experience with adb shells, and have worked with Unix (mostly kornshell) in the past, but I shrink before the prospect of pulling a major system file onto my PC, editing it in Notepad, and finally pushing it back--and hoping that nothing went wrong in the transfer process. Sure, it should work and almost certainly would, but there are no guarantees here for me to stand on. And I'm certainly not going to try this using the vi editor. I used to use that too, but it was long ago.

So using Odin One Click I flashed this file, hoping it would, in effect, carry out the feature.xml modification but not change anything else about the phone. It did indeed restore the mute option, but it also removed root. I don't know if it re-flashed the entire stock ROM, because on one hand all the Sprint apps I had previously frozen in Titanium are still absent from the app drawer, as they should be. OTOH, it's possible it did flash the stock ROM without affecting the active or frozen status of any apps.

I can't go back and flash a rooted version of the stock ROM, because that'll disable the shutter mute option.

Is there any way I can re-root this phone through adb shell, or any other method that doesn't involve a large tar file that will result in additional changes I don't want?

 

[riggerman]

Re: Can I root the E4GT without flashing a stock or custom ROM? (Camera shutter noise issue)

You can always use a root explorer to delete unwanted camera sounds. You'll find them in system/media/ui. Just delete anything with camera or shutter in the name. Remember to make a backup before making any changes, just in case.

 

[srkmagnus]

Re: Can I root the E4GT without flashing a stock or custom ROM? (Camera shutter noise issue)

Hey Dark Penguin, see this post: http://forums.androidcentral.com/sp...era-shutter-sound-silenced-2.html#post2916417

Hopefully this helps.

 

[Dark Penguin]

Re: Can I root the E4GT without flashing a stock or custom ROM? (Camera shutter noise issue)

See my remarks near the end of the first paragraph in the OP. I'm chicken about editing feature.xml as I'm unclear as to the procedure. Are the following steps approximately what I need to do?

(1) Go back to rooted ROM

(2) Fire up PC, start a cmd session, and and navigate to the location of the adb shell

(3) using adb shell pull /system/csc/feature.xml

(4) exit adb shell and use Windows Notepad to modify feature.xml

(5) back in adb shell, push modified feature.xml back to /system/csc

(6) close windows, disconnect device, go forth enjoying silent camera on rooted phone

Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk 2

 

[Dark Penguin]

Re: Can I root the E4GT without flashing a stock or custom ROM? (Camera shutter noise issue)

Got this fixed! I followed these instructions (thanks go out to rwilco12!) to reinstall the kernel, do the usual wiping and clearing, and flash SuperSU. When I had finished all the steps, I was rooted and all my apps were still in place. Even better: the process did NOT overwrite feature.xml, so the shutter mute option is still enabled!

Since everything was left in place I'm not sure if I really needed to re-flash the kernel; I suspect I might achieved the desired outcome by pay putting the SuperSU.exe file on my external SD card and then following only the last part of rwilco12's directions -

• 
  [7] After the phone has completely rebooted power off.
  [8] Hold down Power and Volume Up to boot into Recovery.
  [9] Scroll down to "wipe cache partition" and press power.
  [10] Scroll down to "Yes - Wipe Cache" and press power.
  [11] Scroll down to "advanced" and press power.
  [12] Scroll down to "Wipe Dalvik Cache" and press power.
  [13] Scroll down to "Yes - Wipe Dalvik Cache" and press power.
  [14] Scroll down to "+++++Go Back+++++" and press power.
  [15] Select either "choose zip from sdcard" or "choose zip from internal sdcard" (depending on where you've saved the SuperSU.zip).
  [17] Navigate to where the SuperSU ZIP is saved and select it.
  [18] Scroll down to "Yes - Install .zip" and press power.
  [19] Scroll down to "+++++Go Back+++++" and press power.
  [20] Verify "reboot system now" is highlighted and press power.

But regardless of the internal workings, I now have my phone exactly as I wish. I don't have to explain to anyone who uses Titanium Backup how great it is to be rooted.