Will ROOTing my phone void my warranty if I do not add a custom ROM?

[Mobilation]

The title pretty much says it all. With the addition of KNOX I don't know if I can still ROOT my device without voiding my warranty. The only thing stopping me was I didn't think that there was anything I could really do to my phone if I couldn't add a ROM. But I recently just learned about Xposed Framework, and now I got my hopes up again!

Posted via Android Central App

 

[Paul627g]

Yes while any device is in the " rooted " state your warranty is voided. So if you took it into your store/carrier for warranty service or repair you would be turned away.

 

[Mobilation]

There was a way to ROOT your phone that was called "SafeRoot" and it was said that it wouldn't void your warranty. I wouldn't believe that unless every comment said that it was true. Will this work?

Posted via Android Central App

 

[sp0r412]

Are you referring to rooting your phone then using xposed framework and mods instead of flashing a rom into recovery?
In theory this can be done without voiding your warranty because there are xposed mods that can hide the fact that your phone was ever rooted and you can then uproot. This was the case with my Epic? 4g touch, I dropped it and shattered the screen so I followed the above procedure and my monthly insurance gave me a new lg optimus f7 without problem. I GUESS it varies from carrier to carrier, warranty to warranty, and situation to situation

LG OPTIMUS F7 4.1.2 w/ Xposed framework -_- posted using tapatalk pro

 

[Harry Balsagna]

I'm not sure why everyone thinks this is the case.

A warranty is something which is guaranteed my statute in most states. It warrants that a device must be free from defects. If your phone breaks for a reason which has nothing to do with it being rooted, a company cannot deny you a warranty repair because you installed your own software on it. Well, they can, but you can sue them and likely win. I've been to small claims three times in the past five years, and have won each time.

Imagine if a computer maker denied you warranty repairs because you installed Firefox, or obtained Administrative rights on your machine. You'd have a pretty strong case in court, and a phone is just a computer you can hold in your hand.

There's a bit of "POW" syndrome in us all lately, where we've come to believe the lies we've been fed for years.

Your hardware is yours. You own it. If you muck up the software, I doubt a warranty will help you, but if the hardware goes bad, you're well within most statutory warranties.

 

[jeepmanjr]

I'm not sure why everyone thinks this is the case.

A warranty is something which is guaranteed my statute in most states. It warrants that a device must be free from defects. If your phone breaks for a reason which has nothing to do with it being rooted, a company cannot deny you a warranty repair because you installed your own software on it. Well, they can, but you can sue them and likely win. I've been to small claims three times in the past five years, and have won each time.

Imagine if a computer maker denied you warranty repairs because you installed Firefox, or obtained Administrative rights on your machine. You'd have a pretty strong case in court, and a phone is just a computer you can hold in your hand.

There's a bit of "POW" syndrome in us all lately, where we've come to believe the lies we've been fed for years.

Your hardware is yours. You own it. If you muck up the software, I doubt a warranty will help you, but if the hardware goes bad, you're well within most statutory warranties.

Something I found to back up Harry's statements. For what it's worth, your mileage may vary:

Your Warranty is Not Void - XDA TV - xda-developersxda-developers

 

[Shazamm]

Rooting does not void your warranty. I rooted my phone and bricked it. i have a Metro Pcs galaxy mega 6.3. I called Samsung and informed them that i bout it second hand like this and i want it back to normal. They told me it is still under warranty and they will email me shipping labels. They fixed everything for free. I complained before they sent it back that Samsung's website says my Phone should have Kit Kat and everyone on the internet says they only have gingerbread. Metro Pcs is the red headed step child of the mobile industry so they didnt get the over the air update. I complained about this to Samsung and they informed me that they will be upgrading my Mega with Kit Kat. Dont believe everything you see on the internet.

 

[emad1995]

I've sent my rooted s3 for repair with rogers and they never turned me away so idk

Posted via Android Central App on my Note 3

 

[ToinCoss]

WRONG WRONG WRONG! First, you have to look at the carrier agreement! A warranty on a device can be broken, just as a warranty on replacing a PC can be voided if you, for example, installed Linux on a PC. Most phone carriers (stores) will overlook it because of sheer numbers, but a service like VERIZON will use that ROOT to void any credit for a replacement phone and NOT RETURN THE PHONE! As many stories as you hear about people who get away with it, many do not. Particularly those who prepaid and within 14 days want a replacement

 

[Harry Balsagna]

Come on brother man, you can make a valid point without doing the WRONG WRONG WRONG thing. Go downstairs, unlock your door, stand on the sidewalk, and look at all of those people walking past you.

Those are anonymous internet commenters. Every one of them is convinced that they know it all, but take another look at them.

Like most things, you will get a different answer about this depending on who you ask. Me, well, I've had to go to court three times over very similar things, and I will tell you that the law is on your side. Even if you take a PC home and install Linux on it, if the hard drive craps out, and they fail to replace it because you have Linux on it, your odds are really good in court that you're going to get a new drive. It's your machine, and in most states, you have an implied warrant of merchantability, meaning the goods must be fit for purpose. Since Linux is a "fit purpose", and the hard drive should not die if you install it, your states laws give you protection.

Similarly, if the "Agreement" states you have to name your first child after AT&T, guess what ... it won't be upheld either.

And while they may use the "Agreement" as a guideline, it is far from the last word on the subject. Those "agreements" are what is known as a "contract of adhesion", meaning they are take-it-or-leave-it with unequal bargaining power. Especially when most all carriers/vendors have the same "agreements", they aren't taken in the manner you might think. Not to mention, preventing someone from installing Linux on the PC they purchased is downright uncompetitive. Sure, you won't get software support, but if you blow a CPU, your chances are excellent before a judge.

So, in most states, the simple act of gaining administrator rights on a phone you own will not void the implied law of merchantability.

Don't expect them to tell you this, though. You may have to push the issue. But technically, gaining admin rights to your own computer, one you've purchased with your own money, doesn't void your hardware warranty unless it can be shown that the act of gaining root killed the hardware.

The world is a complicated place and your mileage may very, but I've got three judgements that say I'm right, while you have three capitalized "WRONG"s.

Capitulate if you'd like, but I'll fight if I'm denied hardware coverage on my own device. The reason these draconian things exist in the first place is because the majority of people knuckle under to the corporate machine on-demand. Stand up for yourself for crying out loud.

 

[Mark 89]

Has no one simply thought of just restoring the phone to it's original unrooted state? If you just restore the device using the device reset option or the hard reset option, no one will know you rooted it, the only problem here is the very slight chance that you brick your phone.

 

[ToolmakerSteve]

If someone is talking about taking phone in for warranty repairs while it is rooted, I would presume the problem is that the phone is broken, and can't be reset.

 

[haydo86]

In Australia, consumer law protects you against defects in manufacturing. Therefore, if your device breaks due to a hardware issue you are entitled to a refund. If you root your device and brick it, then you are on your own.

 

[extraclass]

This is a moot argument. As far as I can tell there is no way to root a Galaxy S-4 running Android 5.02.

 

[fhusky91]

i unlocked my phone and its rooted. im worried now the warranty is void? i have a lg g styloms631

 

[tube517]

i unlocked my phone and its rooted. im worried now the warranty is void? i have a lg g styloms631

Why? Is something wrong with the phone?

 

[Harry Balsagna]

"You were right, I was wrong, and I apologize."

You want to know what that was?

That's the only sentence that has never before been, and never will again, be posted on the Internet. Ever.

Every day, I stand outside, look around me, and wonder "Where are all the perfect know-it-alls I meet on the Internet? After all, the only people I see are the imperfect. The flawed. The people without perfect credit scores, supermodel girlfriends, and awesome seven-figure-paying jobs."

Then, it hits me.

"Well, of course I never see the perfect know-it-alls. They're all at home on the Internet, duh! You can't go outside AND tell people they're wrong all day. You have to pick one or the other. And so they do. Only people who are occasionally wrong venture outside, which explains why they're the only ones we ever see."

But I've gotten off topic.

Allow me to steer back on-course.

Read it and weep, mi amigo:

How Sony, Microsoft, and Other Gadget Makers Violate Federal Warranty Law | Motherboard

They can print it in their 27-page "Agreement" (which they can in bad faith allow you to click through in 1.5 seconds, then claim they thought you read it ... hey maybe you read really fast?), write it on their kid's birthday cake, or tattoo it on their taint ... but guess what. It wouldn't hold up because it would violate federal law.

Um, did I hear you say "doh?"

It's alright, brother, it happens to all of us. Read it and weep (or rejoice):

How Sony, Microsoft, and Other Gadget Makers Violate Federal Warranty Law | Motherboard

Bottom line, if you live in the USA, 99% of what you've been told over the course of your lifetime is a lie. Conventional wisdom exists to benefit someone, but that someone is rarely you. Don't shoot the messenger, it's true. The schools don't teach students about consumer law, how to go to court, or anything else that discourages them from becoming purchasing units. It benefits nobody for you to know these things. Nobody except for you, that is.

So, if I were you, and I'm not, but if I were, I would question what I'm told by Corporate America, the media, people on the Internet, and heck, even me. Question it all. Every bit of it.

Don't take someone else's word for what is, figure out what is on your own.

A half-truth or outright misinformation does not become truth just because it's repeated 800 times by everyone you know. Once upon a time, just over 99.99% of people thought the world was flat, and the burned alive anyone that thought otherwise.

Well, guess what. The earth is round, and not only can you root your phone without voiding the warrantee, you take it apart and put it back together again too.

Free your mind, and the rest will follow. Root or don't root, because rooting or not rooting is best for you. Once you paid your money, the manufacturer of the phone ceased having a say in the matter, and as much as they would love for you to believe that it voids your warrantee ... unless you break something ... it doesn't.

Be happy that you're wrong. It's a good thing. Unless your a device maker CEO.

 

[Harry Balsagna]

Not to beat a dead horse, but this is a very, very often discussed issue, so please forgive me for taking a particular interest in it. I've waged legal war over this issue many times in the last several years, and I have a particular time investment in it, and because of the many many hours spent researching and litigating, I've become passionate about it. I even sued the most profitable company in the world (most profitable as of last year at least), and prevailed over two of their representatives, so I'm not just yapping out of my rear end. I get NOTHING from posting this, at all. there is zero benefit to me. I already got my compensation. I'm honestly only trying to help you, and give you a little confidence since the companies certainly aren't going to do it. I have no open cases, and no financial or other interests in misleading anyone.

I hear the "Agreement" brought up often for these devices, and it's important to understand what these agreements are. They are not "contracts" in the usual sense. These are texts drafted by a team of lawyers, and presented to (often unsophisticated) consumers on a take-it or leave-it basis. Since they are boilerplate agreements, rarely do consumers have any choice, as most manufacturers have the exact same terms. Clearly, when you have only one choice for most clauses, the free market is no longer effective at reigning them in. This being the case, such agreements do not have the same definitive force of law as most true contracts.

In fact, there is a special name for these agreements. They are called "adhesion agreements" or "adhesion contracts", and to simplify the difference, they are more a wish-list on the part of the company more than a truly binding contract.

There are good reasons for this.

You can generally tell whether an agreement is reasonable or not, by considering what would happen if everyone followed it. In this case, what would happen if everyone read their 27-page agreements, which linked to 70-page agreements on other sites, which liked to 48-page privacy policies, which linked to, well, broken links quite often, and a mish-mash of oft-conflicting clauses?

What would happen, is that the U.S. economy would grind to a halt. Companies would go bankrupt practically overnight. The average person reads at, I believe, 300 words per minute with a 60% comprehension on average. They need to read each page at least twice. It would taken the typical consumer some 5 hours to complete reading the agreements for a single product, and most would never do so. It's not because they're lazy, it's because their busy paying their bills and their taxes and simply don't have the time. Furthermore, it wouldn't matter, as 100% of people get what 51% of people will accept.

Also consider this. Most companies allow you to click "I agree" after mere milliseconds. This is not "good-faith" by any definition of the term. Of course, they can't make a 5-hour timeout, though, because they would have no customers.

Well, if the existence of the company depends on people NOT reading the agreements, then what you have right there my friends is an agreement which does not meet the standard of "reasonable", and that is a standard that ALL contracts, adhesion or otherwise must meet.

Last but not least, adhesion agreements are being tossed left and right these days (see: zappos.com), because they contain unilateral modification clauses. These are statements like "we can modify this agreement at any time". Such statements render the agreements "illusory", and thus unenforceable.

What does this mean for the tl;dr crowd? It means that the "contracts" and "agreements" that you sign or click, while they do serve as guidelines that govern your transaction, and may have terms or clauses that hold water if they're clearly reasonable, are not the last word on your rights as a consumer. Oh sure, the companies will tell you that they are, but why would they tell you otherwise? If there is a particularly nefarious or unconscionable clause in your agreement, you absolutely have a chance of having it tossed. It happens every day. You're not guaranteed a win on any particular issue, but not trying because your contract says so-and-so, may cause you to do yourself a disservice. Small claims court costs $20 in some jurisdictions, and you get that back from the defendant if you win. It's not as difficult or time-consuming as you've been led to believe. Most people innately realize that it would not be physically possible to read the myriad of multi-page service terms we are presented with daily, much less understand and remember it all. Especially when most agreements state that you need to re-read the terms every 30 days to stay current. (so much for tl;dr, eh)

Regardless of what you sign or click, you likely have many more rights than you realize. There is an entire body of law dedicated to consumer issues, and many of these laws cannot be dismissed by the fine print, no matter how badly companies wish this were true. Things like the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act.

Look, the worst thing that any of you could do is take my word on all of this. Don't believe anything you read on the Internet, from me or anyone else. Take control of your interests, stand up for yourself, and when something strikes you as wrong ... fight for what's right. I'm not saying it's easy, but don't be spooked into submission because the company's lawyer says you don't have a case. That's what they depend on, and the sad thing is that in 99% of the cases, it works.

It is ghastly to think that you can pay $600 for a handheld computer, and be told that if you don't run the software the manufacturer wants you to run, they won't replace the battery if it explodes. That if you dare get root on your own property, something everyone is entitled to do, that your stuck with any and all manufacturer defects. The companies have no right to punish you for what you do with your own possessions. If you accept that slippery slope, your grandchildren will curse your name, that much I promise you. Pretty soon, nobody will own anything, the best we'll be able to do is rent from the Megalocorps while being bound by every petty whim they come up with.

That is not acceptable. So don't accept it. Please. For everyone's sake, don't accept it.

And that's all I have to say about that.