[Miscellaneous Android Development] Deleted member 5186178:
DISCLAIMER:

Rooting your phone and using custom Recoveries and ROMS have risks and may result in bricking your device, and has nothing to do with Google or the device manufacturers. In case of any mishap I am not responsible if you brick/ruin your phone in any way.

Basic computer skills are required and minimal knowledges about phones and phones utilities too.

Make sure that whatever you do, you are doing it at your own responsibility.

This guide may be obsolete now for the new MTK SOC's powered phones, but it will give you some ideeas about how MTK phones world works (especially if you are new to this).

Why this thread?

- Because of all those PMs I receive with questions about how to do this or how to do that.

These things aren't they covered here on XDA?

- Some of them are, some don't, or they are spread over the forum in different sections, different threads. Also I will present here my vision about how to do things, and in some parts is different than the others existent.

I tried to document all steps with images for a better understanding, and to make it easy for people who don't understand well English (also I don't claim that my English is very good, but I'm trying).

1. If you want to use your phone as you buy it, then this thread is not for you, but if you want to use a custom recovery, to install a custom ROM, or some modds, keep reading.

2. First big step in our journey is to root your phone, which most of you know that means to get root (administrator) access to your phone's OS - just a simple definition. With an unrooted phone, you can't do much, and that means you will use it pretty much as you buy it - see first point.

There are multiple methods to root your phone, through an application from your phone, with an executable software from your PC or by flashing a zip modd from recovery (only for custom recoveries).

A. The best rooting application at the moment (in my opinion), is Framaroot.apk, developed by alephzain - please stop by his thread and drop a thanks, or if you can buy his donnation app from Playstore to support his work. You can download this app from official thread.

B. For rooting with a software from PC, I know three big candidates: oneclickroot, kingoroot and srsroot. I know there are more, but I mentioned only the best known.

C. Rooting zip archives are two, to choose from: chainfire's and koush's. Although, these require to have a custom recovery installed.

Any method you choose, be sure to check the phone models reported to work for, and look for your model.

Next, I will present step by step what I call "the beginner's routine":

root the phone;

make a nvram backup;

make a stock ROM backup;

generate a custom CWM and flash it;

patch to unsecure the boot and flash it;

get a Root File explorer;

create a custom recovery by porting one.

Prerequisites:

you must have an account on XDA; if you don't, then create one - and remember, at beginning you will not be allowed to post but you can hit Thanks for people I will mention here.

use a computer with Windows XP or 7 (I don't know if it will be any problem in vista or windows 8, but I didn't tried them, so I can't tell).

a phone with MTK CPU, obviously!

these tools:

MTKDroidTools of rua1's - download it from his thread and hit Thanks or donate to him, please

SPFlashTools or MTKFlashTools.

MTK USB Drivers and your phone manufacturer's USB Drivers if they provide that.

For MTK USB Drivers, there are many sources, but I couldn't find any official source. Few known sources: here and here.

* ADDED: For windows 7 and xp I repacked all MTK needed drivers, bundled with latest google usb drivers and using windows driver installer. Some of the drivers are not digitally signed, so when the prompt window ask you if you want to install unsigned driver (it will be several times) select yes or ok. The advantage is that this method is easier than manual method and also will create an entry in installed programs, and later if you want you can uninstall them in control panel uninstall program. Before installing this you need to remove old drivers installations - use usbdeview (download it x86 or X64), and look for VendorId 0bb4 and 0e8d, and uninstall every device with these Ids. Packed drivers are attached to this post; take what corresponds to your windows version. Unpack the archive, open the folder and run dpinst.exe. More info inside: read info.txt (especially for XP).

Install all needed drivers.

A good text editor (Notepad++ or Geany) installed.

Adb installed in your computer from Android: here, here and here you can learn how.

Credits and Thanks:

[MENTION=3003427]alephzain[/MENTION] - Framaroot developer

[MENTION=5119815]rua1[/MENTION] - developer of MTKDroidTools

[MENTION=631273]Chainfire[/MENTION] - SuperSU developer

[MENTION=617884]Koush[/MENTION] - so many things!!!

[MENTION=2117836]michfood[/MENTION] - developer of Boot Recovery pack/unpack tool

and, even if it is not presented here, but because I use a lot his tools in Linux:

[MENTION=455439]bgcngm[/MENTION] - for his Unpack/Repack scripts