[Huawei Ideos X5 U8800] qwerty12:
So, I recently recieved an unlocked U8800+ that was China Unicom branded (actually the back still carries their logo; a cover with the Google logo from the U8800'd be nice but I'm not complaining). Thanks to the posters in this thread, I was able to update my phone to this ROM and remove the branding, along with getting root and Google Apps.

This is what I did. I take no responsibility if any of this causes harm to your phone.

Prerequisites:

External microSD card

A charged phone ;)

Take out your SIM card. Why? The Android initial setup wizard, no matter how hard I tried (opening the Wireless settings etc.), wouldn't let me connect to my home Wi-Fi network to sign in to Google.

Place the gapps (easy to find - just Google it) ZIP for CyanogenMod 7 (it, like this ROM, is based on Android 2.3) onto your microSD card.

From here, download a ZIP file for "Eclair/Froyo/Gingerbread/Honeycomb (2.1 – 3.2)" onto your microSD card. Which ZIP file you download is up to you: if you want the Superuser app to reside in /system so that formatting /data won't remove the app, then get the Superuser-3.0.6-efgh-signed.zip file. If you just want the su binary (which is enough for the Superuser app downloaded from the Market to be able to gain root), then go for the "binary only" option. I opted for the latter as I don't want two Superuser.apks on my system when an update is available (although Android does do a good job of shadowing) - and the su binary will remain in my /system partition regardless.

Follow genokolar's instructions here to install CWM Recovery.

Extract the downloaded ROM from the link given in the first post of this thread.

Create a "dload" folder on your microSD and place the update.app from the step1 folder into the dload folder.

In the step2 folder, rename the UPDATE.APP that's there to UPDATE_G.APP and place it into the dload folder

Turn off the phone (if you have it enabled, turn off fastboot); hold the volume + and volume - buttons and, while holding them, start holding the power button too.

Eventually the update process will start and your phone will turn off at the end. Give it a few moments (if it's meant to come on, it didn't for me).

Hold the volume + button and the power button. The update may still need to finish so don't worry if you can't get to CWM Recovery. Keep holding volume + and power so that when it does eventually restart a few times you do get CWM Recovery.

From here, I did a "wipe data/factory reset" to clean out my /cache and /data partitions, along with a "Dalvik cache clean" (something like that in the advanced options).

Choose "install zip from sdcard" and choose the gapps ZIP and then the Superuser ZIP. They should now be installed.

Restart the phone.

You should now see an IDEOS splash screen along with a nice HUAWEI animation. This initial boot will take a little long because the cache needs to be populated.

When the android appears, choose the bottom-right option to change the language.

To get the Market to show in the launcher, sign in (connect to your home Wi-Fi network if required).

From the Market, find the Superuser application (if you haven't already installed it through CWM) and install it to root your phone.

Search for "pub:Google Inc." in the Market to find the missing Google apps.

Place your SIM card back in and remove the dload folder from your microSD card. You can also remove the ZIP files, too; as long as you don't reflash (you just use CM7's factory wipe option) the su binary and Google Apps will remain in place. Enjoy!

One quirk about this ROM: Huawei have replaced the stock Music application with their own one, which caused me confusion when looking at the LiveView application and the Simple Last.fm scrobbler. In the Unicom branded ROM, they lived side by side. I guess I need to see if I can take the Music.apk from genokolar's CM7U8800pro ROM and place it into /system.

EDIT: This also works to bring up the service menu in the 2.3.5 ROM. Nothing new there, I don't doubt, but it's for reference. The *#*#INFO#*#* code works, too.