[General Questions and Answers] SindiDoll:
[Q] Would like to root my unbranded chinese tablet. (All Winner A13 I think)

I have been contemplating for a while now, regarding possibly rooting my devices, however it isn't something I have ever attempted before, and frankly I don't want to risk bricking my expensive phones or tablets.

Recently I entered into a raffle and won a cheap tablet. I only paid £3 for my ticket so I figure, if I'm going to test this rooting thing out on anything... this is it!

I cannot find any branding whatsoever on this thing so will give you as much information as I can find on it.

The box states:

Full Blog Million gadgets.

Large capacity battery

slim and stylish body

Intelligent Andrews

Wifi

Android

(a barcode which says) 200001BL

There are no other markings on the box.

The instructions seem generic and do not completely reflect what I am able to find on the device. For example at one point it says:

Storage

Remove TF card, view of the available storage space

[ remark ] pls touch option "delete SD card", so that can safely to remove SD card

Firstly "pls"? wow, anyway... the option is actually "Erase SD card" to clear data, and "Unmount SD card" to remove it.

The entire instructions are like this and don't really make a lot of sense. There is certainly no identifying information in them.

There is a list of "basic function" as it calls it. These are:

Hardware configuration

CPU processor speed:1.2GHZ

Memory 4G-32G

RAM: 512MB-1GB

TF Card:128M-16G

Display screen: (Capacitive multi-touch) TFT capacitive touch

Battery and capacity: rechargeable Built-in type polymer battery

USB: USB 2.0OTG

G-sensor 3D

Record: built-in microphone

Operation System: Android 4.0

Video: MKV(H.254HP).AVI.RM/BMVB.FLV.MPEG-1/2

Music: MP3.WMA.APE.FLAC.AAC.AC3.WAV

Pictures: JPEG.BMP.GIF.PNG.TIF

The ebay listing which it was purchased from says the following:

Specification

• 7-inch TFT LCD capacitive touch screen

• 800x480 pixels display resolution

• Android 4.0 operating system

• CPU: Cortex A8 1.0GHz

• RAM: DDR III 512MB

• WiFi: 54Mbps 802.11B/G

• Built-in Micro-SD card slot up to 32GB

• Built-in G-Sensor

• Supports external 3G devices.

• Built-in 1.3 megapixels digital camera

• Built-in 4GB memory

• Plays AVI,RM/ RMVB,FLV,MPG4 - 1,MPEG – 2 video format files

• Plays MP3,WMA,AAC,AC3,WAV audio format files

• Picture browsing of JPEG,BMP,GIF,PNG,TIFF format files

• 3.5mm earphone socket

. 1 x Mini USB port

. Watt speakers

• Android keyboard and Google keyboard input

• Multi-language support

. Battery Life: 6-8 Hours

Whats in the box?

- 7" ALL WINNER A13 Tablet Computer with Keyboard Case

- UK Mains Charger

- User Manual

Clicking the "about tablet" area gives the following information:

Network: unknown

Mobile network type: UNKOWN:0

(the above is possibly because this is a tablet and not a phone!)

Model number: MID

Android version: 4.0.4

Baseband version: v0.4rc3

Kernel version: 3.0.8+ zhangjing @ ubuntu #171 Fri Nov 8 18:47:57 CST 2013

Build number Q8-4.0.4

When I first opened it up I realised how bad it was! The system is clearly not designed for this device as it doesn't fit correctly (for example the digital clock might show 21.01.09 (09 being the seconds) but the 9 is on a different line!) The reaction time on it is appalling, and literally can take upto 5 seconds from touching the google play button, to being able to see and use the app. It cannot handle the average live wallpapers which came pre-installed such as a bubble background as it jitters continuously, however I added netflix and it plays adequately. The internal memory is tiny, therefore I purchased a 16gb micro sd card and inserted it. It sees it, but when you try to move any apps, it says it has done it, but on closer inspection it has moved it to a 2gb area which it is calling the sd card, and it shows the actual sd card as separate, and empty.

In other words, it is a pile of unusable junk. Perfect for my first newb attempt at rooting.

Having spent the entire day and much of last night reading through various posts on this site I realise there is more to it than I thought there would be, but this is not going to stop me. I just need someone to point me in the right direction for where to begin. It seems that there are a lot of different ways of doing this, and each differs by brand of device, but as my device doesn't seem to be branded, I cannot go directly to its forum for help.

I must stress, this is my very first attempt at anything like this. I have the patience to learn, but not a single clue where to begin. I don't understand all the terms currently being used so may need things spelling out but once I get it, I've got it.

I have a tab open on my PC browser (Android SDK) which it seems I will be needing, but I haven't touched it yet as I don't know what it is for, or if it is the only one of its kind, or if there are alternatives I should be considering too.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you in advance x

Sindi