[HTC Desire 500] dummie999:
[How to]Unlock the bootloader

On HTC phones, by default, you can not replace a partition on the phone from your computer. To enable this, your phone has to be Unlocked.

There is a very good video guide about this, made by [MENTION=5662063]Fliwatt[/MENTION]: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWLK5XhsVAE

Unlocking your bootloader will wipe all your data!

Unlocking your bootloader may void your warranty!

It is, however, necessary to root your phone. Currently, there is no other way to unlock the phone or install a custom recovery.

To start, go to http://www.htcdev.com

Then in the top bar, click register. Create an account and fill in all your data. You will get an e-mail from HTC and your account will be activated.

Once you are logged in on the site, you need to go to "Unlock bootloader", and then click get started. On the right, you see a dropdown box. Click it, and select "All Other Supported Models", then click "Begin Unlock Bootloader"

Next install fastboot. I'm not gonna hold your hand here, there are 400+ tutorials on installing fastboot, for every OS you can think of. Search for one and install it.

And, if you are on windows, then install HTC sync as well, pretty basic, even a Windows user should be able to do it;)

Next, on your phone, got to Settings->Battery and scroll down. There, disable the checkbox "fast boot" (not to confuse with fastboot, that's something entirely different).

Once you have done that, shut down your phone, then hold the volume down button, and the power button. This is commonly referred to as "booting into fastboot".

To move around in the fastboot menu, you need the volume keys to go up and down, and the power keys to select an option.

If the options you can choose from are:

then you need to navigate to fastboot, and then hit the powerkey.

The option you can choose from must be:

Then, on your computer, type:

fastboot oem get_identifier_token

Your output will be something like:

...
(bootloader)
(bootloader) < Please cut following message >
(bootloader) <<<< Identifier Token Start >>>>
(bootloader) 2ADE05B9466F0DD398559C7B5A6D636F
(bootloader) 70E8FB65B9523AE73B8A22DDCD0092A2
(bootloader) D52C617B971383374332044C0D04C492
(bootloader) 707A43C4AAEC77A36DDE3060F7665574
(bootloader) 22453BF1F9FDCA6E2118385B96A3C88B
(bootloader) 4FE90D89BC086A9E9B0EA2086456D658
(bootloader) 5831DBA6ADF940D3B0DD0618B745DD18
(bootloader) AE37DC63341E4CBC66A8ACCB494E6AEE
(bootloader) 5982C1432A5C5535836953243D6B8353
(bootloader) 648EFDFD3B5F0C6D47987A0F47BC1A9F
(bootloader) 0ABF9438C059A604832ABB87696CFDD7
(bootloader) 1847D317701DC2C140294FD486109872
(bootloader) 559EE22C73E4F2F9B00AF03FB12A9F9D
(bootloader) 61DFDDD3FAB40CD8537F300078566632
(bootloader) 2142B7EC56E99DD8C4DFB1B819F9F449
(bootloader) 9B2DB0EA3E2FB18C293BD246012909ED
(bootloader) <<<<< Identifier Token End >>>>>
OKAY [ 0.076s]
finished. total time: 0.076s

Don't use this code, it won't work. Do it yourself!

Troubleshoot:

Problem: I get

...
FAILED (status malformed (1 bytes))
finished. total time: 0.000s

Solution: Select the fastboot option with the powerkey.

Copy the relevant part to the HTC dev site, and submit your token. You will (should) get an e-mail that contains your unlock code. Save the attachment (Unlock_code.bin) to a location where you can find it.

Next type:

fastboot flash unlocktoken Unlock_code.bin

If you are in the same location as your unlock code, of course.

On your phone, you will now see a screen where you have to confirm that you want to unlock your phone, and that it will wipe all your data, and may void your warranty. Use the volume buttons and the power button to choose what you want.

If you selected that you want to unlock your device, then:

Congrats, your bootloader is unlocked

But hold it, before you reboot your phone to confirm that you will have to re-type your very long wifi password, you might as well continue to installing a custom recovery: