[Hero, G2 Touch General] akuma24:
I have finally managed to root my phone. after trying for a rather long time, i did it yesterday and am running modaco custom ROM which is superb. I have listed the instructions I followed in case anyone else is having the same issues as i had

(unable to backup via amon RA image - backup failed)

Text in Bold indicates something you need to type

(Instructions taken from various sites - for XP only - Credits to Unlocker & Modaco)

If your current build number is 2.73.405.5 you can skip the Goldcard section

Phone Details:

Model Number

T-Mobile G2 Touch

Firmware Version

1.5

Baseband Version

63.18.55.06FU_6.35.07.08

Kernel Version

2.6.27-0078c992

Build Number

2.73.110.26 CL#69351 release-keys

Software Version

1.0.0.A6288

In order to root the phone, I had to downgrade the build number from 2.73.110.26 to 2.73.405.66.

Setting UP ADB on XP

First things first, we need to download and setup android SDK,

1) sdk can be downloaded from developer.android.com/sdk/

2) Extract the file to c:\AndroidSDK

3) Plug your phone in to the pc via USB cable. Windows should automatically find the drivers and you should get a message in the bottom right corner saying "device is setup and ready to use" (or something similiar).

Any issues here, google is your friend, find the drivers for your device ;)

4) Now that windows can "see" your hero, click on Start, Run, type cmd and hit enter.

5) on this screen we need to check if adb is working so change the directory to where we extracted the sdk folder:

cd\ press enter

cd\ AndroidSDK\tools press enter

adb devices press enter

You should get something similiar to:

List of devices attached

HT9BTL900210 device

6) If you see this number, all is ok so far.

Now that adb is setup and we can communicate with our phone from the pc we need to create a Goldcard

Create Goldcard

( I tried with a 8GB ScanDisk and it worked)

Take a bakup of your sd card data, copy the files to your pc, before creating

a Goldcard as we need to format the card.

1) Ensure SD card is in your phone, click on Menu | Settings | SD Card & Phone Storage | Unmount SD card, wait a few ticks, then click on Format SD Card

2) Press back a few times and go to Settings | Application | Development and put a tick in USB Debugging

3) Connect the phone to the pc, then click on Start | Run | enter cmd and hit enter, we get the same command window as before

4) Now we need to obtain a code so that we can create the gold card. in the command prompt enter the following:

cd\ press enter

cd\ AndroidSDK\tools press enter

adb devices press enter

you should see a serial number displayed

5) Now type the following

adb shell press enter

cat /sys/class/mmc_host/mmc1/mmc1:*/cid press enter

You should get something similiar to this:

045354535230384780705c3088008a10

Make a note of this code.

6) Next go to this website >> http://hexrev.soaa.me/ , enter your code and click on Submit and make a note of the new code

7) Now go to http://revskills.de/pages/goldcard.html, fill in your details and paste the code, click on submit and check your e-mail. The godcard will be e-mailed to you, save this to your desktop.

8) Now we need to download and install a HexEditor so click the following link, download and install

http://download.cnet.com/HxD-Hex-Ed...068.html?part=dl-HxDHexEdi&subj=uo&tag=button

9) On your phone, pull down the notification bar and click to copy files to your computer, Click on Mount

10) Open the HexEditor and click on Extras | Open Disk | Under Physical Disk select Removable disk, uncheck "Open as Read Only" and click OK

11) Click on Extras | Open disk image | select the goldcard.img file (sent to you via email) Click ok when prompted for the disk size (512 Hard Disk/Floppy Disk)

12) You should have 2 tabs, one is your sd card and the other the goldcard. click on the goldcard, click on Edit | Select All, then Edit | Copy.

13) Click on the sdcard (removable disk) tab, highlight from offset 00000000 to 00000170, click on Edit | Paste Write. The highlighted cells should go red.

14) Click on File | Save and close the HexEditor

15) On your phone, pull down the notification bar and select to turn of USB storage. Pull down the notification bar again and click to copy files to your computer, Click on Mount. If XP opens the SD card all has worked ok.

16) On your phone, pull down the notification bar and select to turn of USB storage. Reboot your phone with the goldcard (sdcard) still inside.

Downgrade to an older ROM

1)You should already have HTC Sync installed on your computer, if not head over to http://www.htc.com/www/SupportDownload.aspx?p_id=283&cat=3&dl_id=852 | download and install HTC Sync

2) Next we need to down load the ROM, RUU_Hero_HTC_WWE_2.73.405.5_WWE_..exe which can be downloaded from here http://www.megaupload.com/?d=RCQ6V92U

3) Connect your phone to the pc and ensure HTC Sync picks up your phone, any issues here, either reboot your pc or phone until the phone\pc can see each other.

4) Double click the file you downloaded RUU_Hero_HTC_WWE_2.73.405.5_WWE_..exe and follow the instructions. they are very straight forward. It can take up 10 mins to complete.

Hopefully you should now have a phone with the Build Number as 2.73.405.5

If this is the case, continue reading.

Download Custom ROM

Now would be a good time to download the ROM you want to use, I am currently using Cronos which is based on 2.1 and is super quick

http://www.cronosproject.org/forum/viewforum.php?f=16&sid=332f8bccd0147f4ee8eb093920eb428d

1) Once downloaded, rename the file to Update.zip

2) Connect your phone to your pc and pull down the notification bar again and click to copy files to your computer, Click on Mount.

3) Copy the file, Update.zip to the root of your SD card.

4) On your phone, pull down the notification bar and select to turn of USB storage

Gain ROOT access

1) On your phone, click on Menu | Settings | Applications | put a tick in "Unknown Sources"

2) Connect the phone to your pc and on your phone, pull down the notification bar and click to copy files to your computer, Click on Mount

3) Download the following 2 files and save them to your desktop

http://zenthought.org/content/project/flashrec Version 1.1.3

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=WP29CWHK recovery-RA-hero-v1.5.2.img

You can also use recovery-RA-hero-v1.5.3.img but I found version 1.5.2 worked for me.

4) Copy both of these 2 files to the root of your SDcard, should show as Removable disk\media within "My Computer"

5) On your phone, pull down the notification bar and select to turn of USB storage. Disconnect your phone from the pc

6) Go to the market place and download a file manager, I used ASTRO

7) Open ASTRO and select flashrec-1.1.3.apk (the file you copied over), if prompted select package installer. click in Install if it doesnt automatically install the app

8) Open FlashRec (click on open after install) and click on Backup Recovery Image. Should take a few seconds to backup

9) Now click on the empty text box and type the following

/sdcard/recovery-RA-hero-v1.5.2.img then click on Flash Custom Recovery Image . It should take to long doing this, 10 seconds maybe

10) Power of your phone, once shutdown, hold down the Home and Power button together until the phone boots in to recovery mode

11) On the Recovery Screen, select Backup/Restore (using the trackball) and then Nand backup, this should take a minute or so

12) Next click on Wipe and select Wipe data/factory reset

13) Now select Flash zip from sdcard, this can take up to 5-15 mins. Once this is done, it should prompt you to reboot your phone, if not select "Reboot system Now"

14) Done, hopefully if everything when according to plan your phone should boot with Cronos (whichever rom you chose), the first time it boots it can take ages.

Update Radio

Check to ensure the radio version is 63.18.55.06JU_6.35.09.26, If yes skip this section, if not you can download it from the Modaco site

http://android.modaco.com/content/h...oms-radios-in-update-zip-format-for-gsm-hero/

1) Connect the phone to your pc and on your phone, pull down the notification bar and click to copy files to your computer, Click on Mount

2) Remove the update.zip file from the SD card

3) Rename the radio from 63.18.55.06JU_6.35.09.26 to Update.zip

4) On your phone, pull down the notification bar and select to turn of USB storage. Disconnect your phone from the pc

5) Power down your phone, select HOME and POWER to boot in to Recovery mode

6) Select Flash zip from sdcard, this should take roughly 5 mins, reboot the phone.

Thats it your done, If you click on Menu | Settings and nothing shows, reboot the phone again ( I had this rather strange issue)

Setting up SD CARD to work with A2SD

Follow this guide, its very good :)

http://androidandme.com/2009/08/news/how-to-manually-partition-your-sd-card-for-android-apps2sd/

Hopefully you now have a rooted phone all setup and working. As someone on here said, Road to Freedom :cool: