[Xoom Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] snert:
Having been a member on this forum for years I must admit it has been incredible the wealth of information I've gained from it. I've had all sorts of phones/pdas and I'ved used this site to help me get the most out of it and to help m "tame" the device and stop rubbish from the vendors being installed on there when I don't want it.

A couple of years ago I got an HTC Desire. Great phone although limited memory. I was happy with it. Didn't bother to root it or anything. I then got a Motorola Xoom. Didn't bother rooting that either. I got myself an HTC Sensation now. I decided one day that I was going to unlock/root the thing to see if I could do it.

Somehow, I think I managed it. I haven't really noticed a difference but then I haven't put a custom rom on it. On all my old Windows mobiles I always had a custom rom.

Now, going back to the Xoom. It's an original Xoom. I bought it in May 2011. It is running Android 3.2 after Motorola sent out an update. All is good.

However, I would like to have ICS on it. This is where my problems begin. I've tried following so many different how-to's on how to do this unyet none so far have worked. So, either I'm completely stupid or, the guides are not easy to follow or the process (that is always touted as easy) is not very easy.

So I am asking for help. Here is what I understand are the steps that I need to acheive.

1. I need to unlock the device

2. I need to install a recovery image

3. I need to install ICS

Questions: I *think* I have done 1. How do I check? After what I believe is a convoluted process, I have installed the Android SDK. I have the drivers for the device on the [Windows 7 64bit] PC and I can see it listed when I type adb devices.

Why do I need to unlock the device? What does the act of unlocking it do? When I followed this:

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1242241

I got to step 3. I typed in the first command:

adb reboot bootloader

After much faffing around I found out from another site I needed USB Debugging enabled. Nobody told me this. No, it isn't obvious that I need this.

The boot screen appeared and gave a message at the top and then I typed in:

fastboot oem unlock

I followed the instructions on the screen. I unlocked the device. It took a while. When it rebooted I found I had to set the device back up again as if it was the first time I'd used it. "Great!" I am thinking, I've lost everything. Thankfully I backed up what I wanted so I am not bothered. Slowly the apps appeared to come back after it synched with Google. I'm assuming stuff gets backed up somewhere.

I typed:

fastboot reboot

It rebooted.I typed:

adb reboot bootloader

It rebooted into the bootloader. Now here is where things started to go off track. I typed the next command:

fastboot flash recovery recovery-Tiamat-R4c-100611-1150-cwm.img

I get this:

unknown partition 'recovery-Tiamat-R4c-100611-1150-cwm.img'

error: cannot determine image filename for 'recovery-Tiamat-R4c-100611-1150-cwm.img'

So what now?

I cannot believe the process to unlock and flash a rom is so unbelievably convoluted. I've read dozens of walkthroughs, how-to's and forums and each one seems to be very similar unyet there is always something different on there to what I get on my screen or something doesn't happen quite the same way.

Here is what I am trying to acheive:

I have Android 3.2 on my Xoom and I would like it to be ICS.

We'll assume that I am completely stupid and need serious handholding to get to ICS. Is there anyone that can help with these seemingly simple steps?

One thing I keep reading is about the recovery image file. Is this related to Cyanogenmod? I am assuming as it is called a recovery image file it helps you get back when things go wrong.

Thanks and much love to the person that takes up the reigns and helps me out here.