[Galaxy S 4 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] pbrauer:
After many hours googling and searching here, I have finally successfully rooted my new Verizon Galaxy S4 (SGH-i545), and it had nothing to do with the root process itself, but it was the basic setup that was giving me fits.

Googling and searching has shown that this is actually a common enough problem with some Samsung devices, and there is a fix for it. Since I had to combine several different processes, I thought I would add a note here on how to get the device connected. I will leave the rooting and other discussions to the others. I am also going to give credit to arpruss, most of the steps here come from his work on the Epic. I have trimmed down to only what is necessary to get ADB working properly.

This assumes that you have already tried the various processes to install or update drivers, and that has not worked. Also assumes mid- to advanced user skills:

1. Install KIES. (Downloading the separate driver package didn't work--the driver package refused to install.)

2. Set device in USB Debug mode (Settings | Applications | Development | USB debugging(x)).

3. Plug device into computer.

4. Run Device Manager

5. Look for SAMSUNG_Android. You shoud see it in the Other devices section.

6. Right-click on "SAMSUNG_Android".

7. Choose "Update driver software" | "Browse my computer for driver software" | "Let me pick from a list".

8. Make sure "Show All Devices" is selected and click on "Next".

9. Click on "Have Disk" and type in "C:\Program Files (x86)\Samsung\USB Drivers\25_escape" (auto complete made it easier to type; if you have 32-bit windows, the " (x86)" should be omitted).

10. You will get a two-pane selection of the drivers. Selecting one of the two "SAMSUNG Electronics Co., Ltd." listings (you may need to look through both) in the left pane gives an option list on the right that includes two "SAMSUNG Android ADB Interface".

11. Choose the first "SAMSUNG Android ADB Interface" and click on "Next". You will get a warning that Windows cannot verify compatibility. Accept this. Windows will install the driver and once it's done you'll click on "Close".

12. Windows installed the driver and ADB started working. (If it didn't start working, I would now have gone back to the Device Manager, right clicked on "SAMSUNG Android ADB Interface", and then redid steps 7-11, but this time with the other "SAMSUNG Android ADB Interface" driver.)

This is enough to get adb working. But it's still probably worth fixing the CDC Serial device.

13. Repeat steps 7-11 in the Device Manager with the "CDC Serial" device now, except that instead of the ADB driver you will look for and install "Samsung Mobile USB CDC Composite Device" in the right pane in steps 10-11.

If all goes well, you will get more spinning stuff in the task bar, and eventually Device Manager doesn't show any devices in "Other devices" with yellow triangles. But if things go for you like they did for me, you'll have "CDC Abstract Control Model (ACM) in "Other devices".

14. Repeat steps 7-9 in the Device Manager with the "CDC Abstract Control Model (ACM)" device now. (You may have some USB Modem options showing up in some places, but I ignored those, and did the same "Have Disk" move as before.)

15. I got a single-pane display showing only "SAMSUNG Mobile USB Modem". (Maybe you'll have two-pane display and you'll have to find it as in steps 10-11.) Select it and click "Next". I didn't get any warnings. Windows will install the driver and once it's done you'll click on "Close".

At this point, Device Manager showed all devices correctly functioning. And "adb shell" worked fine.

16. If you don't want KIES, just uninstall it, but make sure not to uninstall the drivers (the KIES uninstaller will ask).