How-to- Root, Hack, and Flashing your G1/Dream Read first!!

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ChrisAshton84

Senior Member
Nov 13, 2008
53
6
Saint Paul, MN
Hi everyone,

Been reading up for a bit in the forums. Hello to all and thanks for your hard work.

I have now attempted to downgrade from RC30 to 29 following the instructions. The update has/is failing:






It says 'Update Terminated' UPDATE FAIL

Now it seems it will not boot, I can continue to get to the recovery menu, but the update just fails. Any thoughts?

I get this as well :-X This being my only phone and only card reader, am I SOL until I buy a card reader and retry?
 

Koush

Retired Recognized Developer
Sep 21, 2007
917
872
no you should be able to redownload and try again. sometimes the image gets corrupted during the transfer.

I recommend mounting the SD card on your computer through the USB notification on the phone, so it shows up as a removable disk. The mounted USB transfer is much faster, and I believe it has some degree of error checking. I don't think the adb push command does.
 

Yager

Member
Jan 2, 2009
17
0
Looking for help

I have looked through this entire thread and tried a couple of the ideas within but none seem to work.

I have a newly purchased G1, when i checked the firmware it was RC 30 I followed the instruction to revert back to RC29. That went fine! I am now trying to install RC 30 Modified V1.3. I first tried the telnetd and shell steps. But could not get permissions for root. So i tried the ADB method and was able to push the recovery file to the phone, but when i tried to remount command again i do not have the permissions. Any advice or idea would be greatly appreciated. Thanks All!!

Yager

Phone Currently Says Builder number 1.0 TC4-RC29 115247
 

Sistum Id

Senior Member
Jan 2, 2009
497
26
Phoenix
Okay so I did everything as instructed (pretty easy, I did it twice just to make sure I did it right) and I'm running JF 1.3 RC30. I installed DroidSans TweakTool to allow auto rotate and it works. Which means I have root right? But now when I start Telnet app it wont let me connect anymore like it did in RC29.

I than try "Terminal Emulator" app I tried to do the Web cache to SD card mod and when I step 2 it says access is denied. It will let me do step 3 and 4 but my cache doesn't goto the SD card.

cd /data/data/com.android.browser/cache
rm -R webviewCache
mkdir /sdcard/webviewCache
ln -s /sdcard/webviewCache webviewCache

My questions is this: Do I or do I not have root acess with my modded JF1.3 RC30?
 

Sistum Id

Senior Member
Jan 2, 2009
497
26
Phoenix
Is something suppost to happen when you type telnetd and press enter on your desktop? I type it in and hit enter and nothing happens. Just the word telnetd in a black square on my contacts shows.

This has been tested and is known to work on RC19 and RC29 on the G1. Google has already promised to patch this so check your version.

Restart your phone
At your phones desktop hit the <enter> key twice and then type "telnetd" and press <enter> again
Download an Android Telnet client and connect to localhost.
you now have root!
 

Perrosky

Senior Member
Jun 23, 2007
125
0
Omg this is awsome this update to the thread means that now I can get root on my G1 RC30????? please somebody confirm this before I messed up my brand new G1. And thanks to the people that spend time to find this stuff out.

FirmWare Version 1.0
Build # killa-user 1.0 TC4-RC30 116143
 

rsfaze

Senior Member
Jan 14, 2007
1,149
59
Orlando, Fl
Omg this is awsome this update to the thread means that now I can get root on my G1 RC30????? please somebody confirm this before I messed up my brand new G1. And thanks to the people that spend time to find this stuff out.

FirmWare Version 1.0
Build # killa-user 1.0 TC4-RC30 116143

yes you can download the OTA RC30 to RC29 then go about gaining root, install the bootloader etc.
 

Mi|enko

Senior Member
Jul 15, 2006
1,558
171
Is something suppost to happen when you type telnetd and press enter on your desktop? I type it in and hit enter and nothing happens. Just the word telnetd in a black square on my contacts shows.

That's what's supposed to happen. Just hit home, then open up the telnet client and connect. Once that succeeds, you're rooted.
 

beartard

Senior Member
Jun 20, 2008
481
14
Winter Haven, Florida, USA
Oh yes, this does work...and works well if you follow the instructions carefully.

For those having trouble starting telnetd, you may have sent SMS or have been doing other stuff before starting the rooting around. Make sure the last key you hit before entering the "telnetd" command is "Enter." It was stated somewhere that this clears the hidden terminal. I ran into trouble until I read this tip.
 

deprecate

Senior Member
Jan 3, 2009
608
8
honolulu
So I grabbed the image, it gave me an OK for all parts of the status and when it asked me to hit the action key, the phone rebooted, sort of.

I am now sitting at a screen with rainbow colors, and the screen reads:

DREA100 PVT 32B
HBOOT-0.95.0000
CPLD-4
RADIO-1.22.12.29


Sep 2 2008


Serial0

In order to get the phone off, I have to pull the battery.

Now, like a baboon, I did not ensure the image was named DREAMIMG as it was named DREAIMG yet still reported success. Now it will not let me get back into camera+power to reimage the phone with a renamed DREAMIMG file.

Any ideas? I have no shame and would find it entertaining to bring this to T-Mobile and ask for help if that's what it comes to :)

Edit: UPDATE

It made it beyond that wonderful color screen, to the G1 screen, and now I am at the andriod screen for the initial phone setup. Sure enough, RC29 here I am.

I am tempted though, to do this again with the correctly named dream image for sanity's sake...not like it took forever to get done.


I'll report back later if anything else goes odd!
 
Last edited:

Sistum Id

Senior Member
Jan 2, 2009
497
26
Phoenix
That's what's supposed to happen. Just hit home, then open up the telnet client and connect. Once that succeeds, you're rooted.

Okay cool thanks.

So if I can load the Terminal Emulator and type su and hit enter a message pops up saying

The following application has requested
Superuser access to the phone:

USER ID: #####
com.android.term
/system/bin/sh
/system/bin/sh


Would you like to grant it permission to run privileged commands?
Yes No Always

That means my root is secure on JF 1.3 RC30 correct?
 

Perrosky

Senior Member
Jun 23, 2007
125
0
I was thinking that after I get back to the RC29 and get root.

will my phone try to update to the RC30 again? if yes what can I do to prevent this from happening and get the RC30 Modded? follow the step on the link bellow?

Step by step how to get modify RC30

thanks
 

rsfaze

Senior Member
Jan 14, 2007
1,149
59
Orlando, Fl
from what I know the 1.3 is using test keys that are different from the OTA keys.

If I'm wrong someone should chime in soon.
 

Perrosky

Senior Member
Jun 23, 2007
125
0
ok. go that thanks:eek:
but is there any way that after I downgrade to RC29 and get root I can get RC30 modded and still have root access?
 

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  • 8
    Why should you root your Dream/G1?

    Well, hopefully one of those reasons convinced you to get root access on your phone!


    Preparing to Get Root on your Phone
    Getting root on your phone involves exploiting a security hole that existed in an early version of Android. The versions with the security holes are known as RC19, RC28, and RC29 (or RC7 or lower for UK phones). As of RC30 (RC8 on UK), Google patched the security hole so that your phone can not be rooted (don't worry, we can still root it!).
    To check your version, go to the Home Screen, click your menu button, choose "Settings", and then click "About phone". You will then see the following screen:
    RC30.png


    If you have US-RC30/UK-RC8 or higher, you will first need to downgrade your phone to a previous version. (Skip these steps otherwise)
    1. Format your phone's SD card to FAT32 mode:
      • Hook your phone up to your computer using a USB cable and then wait for the notification to show up in your title bar of your phone.
      • Click the notification, and then click "Mount".
      • A new removable disk should show up on your computer. Right click it and select Format, and select FAT32 as the file system type.
    2. Download and unzip the RC29 or RC7 image file. Copy the DREAIMG.nbh file to the SD card. (RC29 for US, RC7 is for UK)
    3. Turn the device power off.
    4. Hold Camera button, and press Power button to entry boot loader mode. You should see a gray/white screen with instructions to flash your phone with the update on your SD card. If you don't see that, make sure you followed the instructions properly.
    5. As per the on-screen instructions, press the Power button to start upgrade procedure. DO NOT DO ANYTHING TO INTERRUPT THIS PROCESS.
    6. After it is finished, perform the restart your phone.


    Rooting your RC29 or lower phone:
    On RC29 phones and lower, anything you type into your keyboard is also being run in a hidden console with root permissions. More information regarding that at the bottom of this post. But, to get root access, do the following:

    Instructions:
    1. Download recovery.img or the new version by Amon recovery-RA-dream-v1.5.2.img and copy it to your SD card (see the previous instructions on how to copy from your computer to your Phone's SD card).
    2. Download the Hard SPL and copy the zip file to the SD card.
    3. All files must be on the root of your SD card.
    4. Restart your phone. Wait for your phone to start up fully and show the home screen.
    5. After your phone starts up, hit the enter key twice, type "telnetd" and press enter. (Yes, it will start up a contact search, don't worry. Just type it.)
    6. Download an Android "Telnet" application from the Market and connect to localhost.
    7. If you connect successfully, you will have a root prompt "#".
    8. Type the following into Telnet (these commands will give you root access easier in the future):
      • mount -o rw,remount -t yaffs2 /dev/block/mtdblock3 /system
      • cd sdcard
      • flash_image recovery recovery.img
      • cat recovery.img > /system/recovery.img
    Now you have root!

    What To Do Now That You Have Root
    Now that you have root, you will want to apply "Hard SPL" to your phone. HardSPL is what will allow you to apply flash images from other regions (like UK on US phones, and vice versa), create full backups of your phone, install the latest build from the Android source, and usually resurrect your phone if it is "bricked". You have already downloaded the file to your SD card, so now you can apply it.

    1. Power off your phone.
    2. Start up in recovery mode by holding home and pressing power.
    3. You will now enter recovery mode. You should see an exclamation.
    4. If you do not see a menu on screen, press Alt-L to show the menu.
    5. Press Alt-S to apply the update from the SD card.
    6. After the update is complete, hold Home and press Back to restart.

    And now, the last step! You are still running an old version of Android, but you want to upgrade to the latest and greatest update! You can do this, and not lose root by downloading modified versions of the updates.

    First, choose a modified image from the list below:

    ADP1.1: (md5: bacc58302e0b239d66c7bcc8db6c434b)
    http://jf.odiness.com/v1.41/JFv1.41_ADP1.1_BuildEnvironment.tar.gz
    http://android-dls.com/forum/index.php?f=24&t=241&rb_v=viewtopic
    http://andblogs.net/2009/01/jesusfrekes-14-images-are-out/

    RC33: (md5: f24b6c237775147cb4bc42efc2393973)
    http://jf.odiness.com/v1.41/JFv1.41_RC33_BuildEnvironment.tar.gz
    http://android-dls.com/forum/index.php?f=24&t=241&rb_v=viewtopic
    http://andblogs.net/2009/02/new-rc33-based-images-from-jesusfreke/

    RC8: (md5: de2d0d34adbb4015ee3aa5e4e7ca3c07)
    http://jf.odiness.com/v1.41/JFv1.41_RC8_BuildEnvironment.tar.gz
    http://android-dls.com/forum/index.php?f=24&t=241&rb_v=viewtopic
    http://andblogs.net/2009/01/jesusfrekes-14-images-are-out/


    1. Download the image.
    2. Rename it to update.zip.
    3. Copy it to your phone's SD card.
    4. Turn your phone off.
    5. Start up in recovery mode by holding Home and pressing Power.
    6. Press alt-W to wipe your device. (You need to do this, or the device may hang at the flashing Android screen)
    7. Press alt-S to apply the update.

    And that's it! Remember to check the links up top to learn how to use root to do the advanced things I mentioned.
    3
    Rooting, Hacking, and Flashing your G1/Dream

    Reserved for future posting
    1
    I have att, I cannot get to the home screen because I do not have a t-mobile data plan so my gmail gets rejected.

    Read this thread http://androidcommunity.com/forums/f41/how-to-use-your-g1-on-at-and-t-without-a-data-plan-8735/
    1
    try this: http://files.lucidrem.us/jf/ROOT/g1_root.txt

    i made some abbreviated directions that some people have found very useful

    So, I have a Dev Phone1, and stupidly let it apply an OTA update to 1.5. It appears that this (of course) didn't use the rooted version, so here I sit with a Dev phone that's not rooted on version 1.5. My question is does this procedure work with 1.5? My thoughts are to use this to downgrade it to a rooted version of RC33, then get JF's 1.5 build.

    Sound about right?
    1
    dream_devphone-userdebug 1.5 crb21 147201 test-keys



    can i root??????

    you are already 'rooted'
    you just need to read http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=831139