Rooting Motorola droid 2.1 (without a data loss

Hey guys, I know that alot of people on 2.1 are frustrated by the fact that rooting 2.1 means downgrading and upgrading.... blah blah blah.

but i found a much easier way.

just have android sdk installed and go ahead and follow these steps:

for both windows and mac you're going to want to download Superuser.apk and su which are both in the handy dandy attachment.
YOU HAVE TO PUT THE FILES INTO THE ANDROID/TOOLS SECTION OF THE SDK!!!


MAC

Code:

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./adb push su /system/bin/su
./adb push Superuser.apk /system/app/Superuser.apk

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then reboot your phone

Windows

Code:

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adb push su /system/bin/su
adb push Superuser.apk /system/app/Superuser.apk

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There's no way this could possibly work. You have to have /system mounted RW in order to push files to there, and if that's the case, your phone is already rooted.

Additionally, there's been a way to root 2.1 without dataloss via a sbf .file for months now.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by M Moogle

There's no way this could possibly work. You have to have /system mounted RW in order to push files to there, and if that's the case, your phone is already rooted.

Additionally, there's been a way to root 2.1 without dataloss via a sbf .file for months now.

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im just saying from experience dude, and no i wanted to mention that you dont actually need to be in system because when you run adb with the android sdk youre already in the system

Quote:

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Originally Posted by droidfreak1

Quote:

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Originally Posted by M Moogle

There's no way this could possibly work. You have to have /system mounted RW in order to push files to there, and if that's the case, your phone is already rooted.

Additionally, there's been a way to root 2.1 without dataloss via a sbf .file for months now.

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im just saying from experience dude, and no i wanted to mention that you dont actually need to be in system because when you run adb with the android sdk youre already in the system

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ADB on a stock phone cannot write to /system. Assuming that somehow it even was running as root (which it doesn't on a stock rom), the file system would still have to be mounted writable (which it isn't by default). Unless you're saying that every single Android developer and root hacker has somehow missed this.... doubtful. Flash a STOCK 2.01 (or 2.0) SBF and see what happens, it won't work.

[quote=M Moogle;579076]

Quote:

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Originally Posted by droidfreak1

ADB on a stock phone cannot write to /system. Assuming that somehow it even was running as root (which it doesn't on a stock rom), the file system would still have to be mounted writable (which it isn't by default). Unless you're saying that every single Android developer and root hacker has somehow missed this.... doubtful. Flash a STOCK 2.01 (or 2.0) SBF and see what happens, it won't work.

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ADB can write to /system/

adb shell
su
mount -o remount,rw -t yaffs2 /dev/block/mtdblock4 /system

And it will. I just did it last night. To flash a sprecovery.img onto a stock ese53 build to restore a backup. I will say that I don't think it worked for ese81. But saying that it doesn't run as SU or won't write to /system/ a stock rom isn't correct.

I wish people would stop with the misinformation! Can we implement a point system on here where you can hit "thumbs down" on posts that are just incorrect and have their correct to lies ratio show up under their name?

The ONLY WAY TO GET ROOT ACCESS on a stock droid running 2.1 is using RSDLite. ONLY ONLY ONLY. I can't stress this enough!

Now - if you've already RUN RSDLite and flashed a new recovery image (SPRecovery, etc). That means you already HAVE root. You've already done the hard part. In that case, the installation of the su binary and Superuser.apk is a piece of cake. I believe there are even some update.zip files floating around that install that for you even easier. Or you could install an entire rom, or whatever you want to.

This will NOT WORK ON A STOCK DROID UNLESS YOU ALREADY RAN RSDLITE TO FLASH SPRECOVERY

Quote:

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ADB can write to /system/

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Only if you are already rooted or are running ADB from the SPRecovery console (which also means you are rooted). You can't take a droid out of the box and run those commands, it just won't work. When you type "su" it will say "permission denied", and the prompt will be $ instead of #.

Add to the beginning of those instructions "flash SPRecovery to your phone using RSDLite" and you've got yourself a working set of instructions on how to get root access without losing any data

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Se7enLC

I wish people would stop with the misinformation! Can we implement a point system on here where you can hit "thumbs down" on posts that are just incorrect and have their correct to lies ratio show up under their name?

The ONLY WAY TO GET ROOT ACCESS on a stock droid running 2.1 is using RSDLite. ONLY ONLY ONLY. I can't stress this enough!

Now - if you've already RUN RSDLite and flashed a new recovery image (SPRecovery, etc). That means you already HAVE root. You've already done the hard part. In that case, the installation of the su binary and Superuser.apk is a piece of cake. I believe there are even some update.zip files floating around that install that for you even easier. Or you could install an entire rom, or whatever you want to.

This will NOT WORK ON A STOCK DROID UNLESS YOU ALREADY RAN RSDLITE TO FLASH SPRECOVERY

Quote:

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ADB can write to /system/

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Only if you are already rooted or are running ADB from the SPRecovery console (which also means you are rooted). You can't take a droid out of the box and run those commands, it just won't work.

Add to the beginning of those instructions "flash SPRecovery to your phone using RSDLite" and you've got yourself a working set of instructions on how to get root access without losing any data

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I wish people would read! I said I didn't think this worked on ese81 but it did work on all previous builds! Including ese53 which was a pre release of 2.1. Also just because you have SPRecovery that doesn't mean that you are rooted.! Really!?! You are misinformed. Just flashing SPRecovery doesn't put the su binary in the system!! Do you even use adb shell?

Edit: if you don't believe me after work ill show you. I have the .sbfs for 2.0.1 and ese53. Ill make a youtube video showing you that with a stock recovery adb shell will run as root on these builds!

Quote:

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edit: if you don't believe me after work ill show you. I have the .sbfs for 2.0.1 and ese53. Ill make a youtube video showing you that with a stock recovery adb shell will run as root on these builds!

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Yes, lets see it. You've single-handedly removed the need for RSDLite in the rooting process. Nobody before you has discovered this glaringly obvious method for attaining root access. That whole mess of carefully crafting a zip file to be signed and contain a secret payload to root in 2.0.1 was unnecessary, too - all they had to do was push the su binary.

You are now a hero to the droid community.

Oh FFS! Se7enLC is absolutely correct! ESE53 IS NOT A STOCK ROM! It's a leaked build of 2.1 that has adb root enabled, either because it was compiled that way, or whoever leaked it enabled it. I'll repeat: A STOCK (SHIPPED) ROM cannot write to /system with ADB, regardless of build or revision. You're just spreading misinformation and confusion by saying otherwise.

Edit: Se7enLC, my thoughts exactly, lol.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by M Moogle

Oh FFS! Se7enLC is absolutely correct! ESE53 IS NOT A STOCK ROM! It's a leaked build of 2.1 that has adb root enabled, either because it was compiled that way, or whoever leaked it enabled it. I'll repeat: A STOCK (SHIPPED) ROM cannot write to /system with ADB, regardless of build or revision. You're just spreading misinformation and confusion by saying otherwise.

Edit: Se7enLC, my thoughts exactly, lol.

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SHHHHH, let him make his movie!! :-P

And if you believe that, you'll love Google TV. Here are some step-by-step instructions on how to sign up for the GoogleTV Beta program:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9SK_M_nVWA