MileStone rooting IDIOTS guide (only for non-experienced people like me)

[indiacam]

@All
Based on Shatanu and GR8s help I am putting following rooting procedure as step-by-step IDIOTS guide in SIMPLE WORDS for newbies like me, so Experts please do not mind. I am still learning. I am assuming that you have already installed necessary motorola milestone usb drivers. The device I have tested is Android 2.1-update1

STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE FOR...
NANDROID BACKUP/RESTORE of system WITH OpenRecovery 1.14
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Nandroid Backup and Restore is something similar to SystemRestore of XP/Vista. Taking and system backup image to keep safely to use in future, if you crash or mess-up your phone. YOU MUST TAKE THIS NANDROID BACKUP BEFORE YOU DO ANY FURTHER EXPERIMENTS ON YOUR MILESTONE.

1) For some technical reasons you cannot directly install any UPDATE.zip file to your Milestone without flashing Vulnerable Recovery SBF file in RSDLite software. Hence Download and extract vulnerable_recovery_only_RAMDLD90_78.sbf somewhere on your pc.

Download and Install RSDLite4.6,if it was not installed.

2) Also Download OpenRecovery1.14.zip and extract somewhere on your pc. When you open zip file, you will find a file named "update.zip" and a folder named "OpenRecovery". Copy it to root location of your SDCard. Power Off the phone

Now you are ready to start...

3) Run RSDLite4.6 on your pc and wait...

4) Start Milestone in BOOTLOADER mode by pressing UP-key on D-Pad and POWER key until you see some white text on blackscreen showing "Bootloader 90.73, Battery Ok, Ok to Install, Connect USB, Data cable." Now connect USB Cable to phone and on RSDLite window you will see the message as "Connected".

5) On your computer in RSDLite, browse and select saved Vulnerable Recovery SBF file and press Start button. RSDLite will quickly process the SBF file and will show "Phone is rebooting" ****THIS IS TRICKY PART**** When phone restarts, you should quickly press Up-key on D-pad when phone screen is blank, so you again get BOOTLOADER mode screen. Now RSDLite will show "PASS" message on window. SBF flashing is done. Now switch off phone. And remove USB Cable. RSDLite is no more required.

6) Now start phone in Original ADBrecovery mode by pressing CAMERA KEY and then POWER KEY both together until you get Exclamation Icon inside Triangle. Release buttons and now Press VOLUME-UP key with Camera key. Now you will see Original ADBrecovery menu where you should select Install Update.zip option by d-pad arrow keys and d-pad center key to install.

(Remember: Because firstly you will have to process Vulnerable Recovery SBF file in RSDLite, before installing update.zip, so you will not get any error now while installing update.zip.
IN OTHER SIMPLE WORDS, everytime you must process SBF file in RSDLite, before you want flash/install any new UPDATE.ZIP)

When done switch off phone.

7) Now do NOT start phone in normal mode. Again start phone in ADBrecovery mode as exactly shown in step-6, but this time you will not get Original ADBrecovery menu, YOU WILL GET NEW OPENRECOVERY 1.14 MENU, where you will see many options like NANDROID BACKUP and RESTORE and etc. YOU ARE DONE! You got OpenRecovery Menu.

(IMPORTANT: Everytime you want OPENRECOVERY 1.14 menu you must flash SBF first)

Now you can take NANDROID backup which will take some time to copy SYSTEM IMAGE (around 142mb) in /nandroid/adbrecovery/ folder which you should copy and keep safe in your pc or cd for future reference.

STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE FOR...
ROOTING YOUR MOTOROLA MILESTONE
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Rooting does not changes your system files or does not installs anything, it only gives you superuser access level to access system root area. Why root? Because system root is locked by some bad money-minded manufacturers who do not want you to give chance to modify your device which used OPEN-SOURCE operating system. Unrooted devices will not allowe you to do many things like CPU Overclocking, flash Custom ROMS, system or theme modificationsm, etc. You must...READ 5 GREAT REASONS TO ROOT

LETS START

1) Download and extract vulnerable_recovery_only_RAMDLD90_78.sbf somewhere on your pc. Also Install RSDLite4.6,if already not installed.

2) Download MOTOROLA_ROOT.ZIP somewhere on your pc, rename it to "UPDATE.ZIP" and copy on root folder of SDCard. Delete any old update.zip before copying and be sure you copied new file.

Power Off the phone

Now you are ready to start...

2) Run RSDLite4.6 on your pc and wait...

3) Start Milestone in BOOTLOADER mode by pressing UP-key on D-Pad and POWER key until you see some white text on blackscreen showing "Bootloader 90.73, Battery Ok, Ok to Install, Connect USB, Data cable." Now connect USB Cable to phone and on RSDLite window you will see the message as "Connected".

4) On your computer in RSDLite, browse and select saved Vulnerable Recovery SBF file and press Start button. RSDLite will quickly process the SBF file and will show "Phone is rebooting" ****THIS IS TRICKY PART**** When phone restarts, you should quickly press Up-key on D-pad while on blank screen and again get BOOTLOADER screen. Now RSDLite will show "PASS" message on window. SBF flashing is done. Now switch off phone. And remove USB Cable. RSDLite is no more required.

5) Now start phone in Original ADBrecovery mode by pressing CAMERA KEY and then POWER KEY both together until you get Exclamation Icon inside Triangle. Release buttons and now Press VOLUME-UP key with Camera key. Now you will see Original ADBrecovery menu where you should select Install Update.zip option by d-pad arrow keys and d-pad center key to install.

(Remember: Because you have flashed SBF file before installing update.zip, you will not get any error now while installing.)

THIS WILL INSTALL UPDATE.ZIP file for rooting phone and when you get message as "Update Installed Successfully", you can Reboot phone to start in NORMAL MODE.

6) Phone starts normally like nothing happened, yes nothing happened except you got the superuser access with system access and you are UNRESTRICTED to roam anywhere in your android operating system. How to check? You will see new icon as "SuperUser Whitelist" in applications list, which confirms your MileSTONE is ROOTED..

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What one must know:

1) Starting phone in Bootloader mode and in ADBRecovery Mode are two different methods of Hardware Testing, Servicing and Modification. Both explained above.

2) Everytime you want to install Update.zip with any modification, firstly you need to flash above SBF file in proper method explained above.

3) Installing update.zip does not make any changes to your data on memory card, mostly data is/should be safe.

4) Though all procedures are tested perfectly and worked on my Milestone 2.1, you must TRY EVERYTHING AT YOUR OWN RISK.

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Hope this helps newbies like me, this guide is of-course not for EXPERTS so experts, please dont mind my IDIOTS guide with simple words. I have put all this for newbies like me. Hope some more people can do rooting with more confidence.

Thanks all for reading...

[kundancool]

The guide looks good

Thanks for sharing...

[mananwala]

Awesome... This is what I was looking for...

Great work @indiacam.

[raafatrola]

thanks a lot dear.

[mananwala]

Just one question... It may be a stupid one...

Is it possible to unroot the MILESTONE after rooting it? I just wanna know, what happens if i have to take my piece to the MOTOROLA SERVICE CENTRE, and they find out that its rooted, wouldn't my warranty be VOID?

Thanks in advance.

[kundancool]

Just one question... It may be a stupid one...

Is it possible to unroot the MILESTONE after rooting it? I just wanna know, what happens if i have to take my piece to the MOTOROLA SERVICE CENTRE, and they find out that its rooted, wouldn't my warranty be VOID?

Thanks in advance.

May be flashing to generic one will solve your problem and I don't think that service center people will look that it is rooted or not

not sure may be...

[DAGr8]

Default sbf file will unroot your device (make sure you dont flash service sbf files o , and you can also manually delete the files fomr your system , because all root is really is the su binary and the Superuser.apk , if you remove them files and wipe your device nobody will ever know ...

[mananwala]

Default sbf file will unroot your device (make sure you dont flash service sbf files o , and you can also manually delete the files fomr your system , because all root is really is the su binary and the Superuser.apk , if you remove them files and wipe your device nobody will ever know ...

I dont know how to remove the Superuser.apk and su binary... But as of now i dont need to know. I am sure you will help me as and when I need to. I also dont know how to wipe my device.

Just one last question... Do i need to take the nandroid backup before rooting my device or after rooting my device?

Thanks in advance.

[mananwala]

I am not able to get into Original ADBrecovery mode. I have already completed step 5. After disconnecting the phone from USB, I press the camera key and power button together but i just cant get the Exclamation Icon inside Triangle. The phone just reboots normally. First the Motorola icon comes up and then the ANDROID screen.

Am I missing something. Please help...

Thanks in advance.

EDIT: Managed to get to the Exclamation Icon inside Triangle screen by pressing the X button on the physical keyboard along with the power button, but now cant get the Original ADBrecovery menu by pressing the volume up key and camera key. Please help.

EDIT2: DONE!!! Now ROOTED MILESTONE with OVERCLOCK!!!

THANKS ALL!!!

[DAGr8]

I dont know how to remove the Superuser.apk and su binary... But as of now i dont need to know. I am sure you will help me as and when I need to. I also dont know how to wipe my device.

Just one last question... Do i need to take the nandroid backup before rooting my device or after rooting my device?

Thanks in advance.

yes indeed very easy steps to do l sure help you if youget problems