A quick note about this tutorial. Lots of people are reporting issues with getting the drivers set up. This could occur because of a variety of reason. Since each person has a different home computer set up, I suggest if you run into any problems, please feel free to ask questions but I also urge you to review this thread in its entirety - there are a lot of solutions to the many issues people were encountering. Thanks in advance!
I have personally tested the method below and can confirm that it worked for me.
A lot of people are asking about unlocking the bootloader and rooting the Verizon Galaxy Nexus and there's a bit of confusion over the different methods used with the GMS version. I'll try to keep this as simple as possible and noob friendly. No ADB is needed with this tutorial. If anything changes between now and once the device is released, I'll update accordingly. Feel free to submit changes to me.
Disclaimer: This tutorial is Windows only at this point (I may update for Mac and Linux at a later time). Use the following methods at your own risk. I am not responsible if you brick your phone. I did not develop these methods. This will void your manufacturer warranty. Good luck!
This entire process is based on Paul O'Brien's Superboot.
What is Superboot?
Via Paul:
What do I need?
Drivers:
Root file:
The Process:
1. Read the directions completely.
2. Read the directions again. Okay, now you're ready.
3. Download all (only download the Pdanet file for your type of computer; i.e. 32 or 64 bit) the above files to your home computer.
4. Install driver 1 from above. Plug your phone it and verify that the drivers are working.
5. Enable USB Debugging on the Nexus. (This is found by going to Settings > Developer options)
6. Install driver 2 from above. This will install Pdanet on both your phone and your computer. Follow the install wizard closely and choose the option for a Samsung device. (A quick note about Pdanet; when you unlock the device, it will be wiped from the device - so don't worry about uninstalling; On your computer, feel free to uninstall Pdanet if you want - the drivers will remain installed - so don't worry)
7. Follow this part of the tutorial exactly. Extract the contents of Superboot and rename the extracted folder "root." This extracted root folder will contain 12 files.
8. Place the renamed root folder from step 7 onto the root (or base) of your computer's C drive (it should be here: C:\). It has to be renamed and placed in this specific location for this tutorial to work.
9. Power down the phone.
10. Connect the phone to your computer via usb.
11. On your computer, from the control panel, open device manager. With the device manager, we will visually verify that we have correctly installed the Android 1.0 driver.
12. Boot the phone into the bootloader by simultaneously holding Volume Up + Volume Down + Power. Check the device manager window. You should see something appear that mentions Android 1.0. If you see that, you're good to go.
13. Open up the command prompt in Windows:
16. Your bootloader will now say: Lock State - Unlocked (near the bottom) as well as "Fastboot Status - Okay"
17. Now, to root your device, simply double click: install-superboot-windows.bat that you originally placed in the root folder in steps 7 & 8 above.
18. You will now see the black Google screen with the lock icon at the bottom.
19. Your phone should reboot automatically after a couple minutes on the Google screen. If, and only if your phone doesn't reboot automatically after 5 minutes, unplug the usb cable and perform a battery pull. (Mine did not reboot automatically - so I had to pull the battery.)
20. Put your battery back in and power on your device.
21. Be patient while it boots up, and don't worry - first boot may take up to 5 minutes. Breath....breath some more.
22. After phone set up, confirm Superuser app in your app tray.
23. Open Superuser, go into settings (top right, wrench icon), scroll down and "tap to check for updates." Tap "update anyway." You should get a red warning for busybox, but everything else should be green.
24. Open up the market and download BusyBox installer.
25. Run the BusyBox installer.
26. You are now unlocked and rooted and armed with Superuser privileges. Enjoy your limitless device.
27. Flip Verizon the bird.
All credit for this tutorial goes to:
Evostance and
Paul O'Brien
Useful root apps:
Busybox
Rom Manager
Titanium Backup
Root Explorer
Questions?
I have personally tested the method below and can confirm that it worked for me.
A lot of people are asking about unlocking the bootloader and rooting the Verizon Galaxy Nexus and there's a bit of confusion over the different methods used with the GMS version. I'll try to keep this as simple as possible and noob friendly. No ADB is needed with this tutorial. If anything changes between now and once the device is released, I'll update accordingly. Feel free to submit changes to me.
Disclaimer: This tutorial is Windows only at this point (I may update for Mac and Linux at a later time). Use the following methods at your own risk. I am not responsible if you brick your phone. I did not develop these methods. This will void your manufacturer warranty. Good luck!
This entire process is based on Paul O'Brien's Superboot.
What is Superboot?
Via Paul:
What do I need?
Drivers:
- Samsung Driver - this installs general Samsung driver
- Pdanet Driver (32 bit or 64 bit) - this installs the Android 1.0 driver (solves the "waiting for device" warning)
Root file:
The Process:
1. Read the directions completely.
2. Read the directions again. Okay, now you're ready.
3. Download all (only download the Pdanet file for your type of computer; i.e. 32 or 64 bit) the above files to your home computer.
4. Install driver 1 from above. Plug your phone it and verify that the drivers are working.
5. Enable USB Debugging on the Nexus. (This is found by going to Settings > Developer options)
6. Install driver 2 from above. This will install Pdanet on both your phone and your computer. Follow the install wizard closely and choose the option for a Samsung device. (A quick note about Pdanet; when you unlock the device, it will be wiped from the device - so don't worry about uninstalling; On your computer, feel free to uninstall Pdanet if you want - the drivers will remain installed - so don't worry)
7. Follow this part of the tutorial exactly. Extract the contents of Superboot and rename the extracted folder "root." This extracted root folder will contain 12 files.
8. Place the renamed root folder from step 7 onto the root (or base) of your computer's C drive (it should be here: C:\). It has to be renamed and placed in this specific location for this tutorial to work.
9. Power down the phone.
10. Connect the phone to your computer via usb.
11. On your computer, from the control panel, open device manager. With the device manager, we will visually verify that we have correctly installed the Android 1.0 driver.
12. Boot the phone into the bootloader by simultaneously holding Volume Up + Volume Down + Power. Check the device manager window. You should see something appear that mentions Android 1.0. If you see that, you're good to go.
13. Open up the command prompt in Windows:
- Click Start Menu, then in the search bar type: cmd (this will open the command prompt);
- Type the following: cd C:/
- Then type the following: cd root
- In the command prompt, type the followingt: fastboot-windows oem unlock
16. Your bootloader will now say: Lock State - Unlocked (near the bottom) as well as "Fastboot Status - Okay"
17. Now, to root your device, simply double click: install-superboot-windows.bat that you originally placed in the root folder in steps 7 & 8 above.
18. You will now see the black Google screen with the lock icon at the bottom.
19. Your phone should reboot automatically after a couple minutes on the Google screen. If, and only if your phone doesn't reboot automatically after 5 minutes, unplug the usb cable and perform a battery pull. (Mine did not reboot automatically - so I had to pull the battery.)
20. Put your battery back in and power on your device.
21. Be patient while it boots up, and don't worry - first boot may take up to 5 minutes. Breath....breath some more.
22. After phone set up, confirm Superuser app in your app tray.
23. Open Superuser, go into settings (top right, wrench icon), scroll down and "tap to check for updates." Tap "update anyway." You should get a red warning for busybox, but everything else should be green.
24. Open up the market and download BusyBox installer.
25. Run the BusyBox installer.
26. You are now unlocked and rooted and armed with Superuser privileges. Enjoy your limitless device.
27. Flip Verizon the bird.
All credit for this tutorial goes to:
Evostance and
Paul O'Brien
Useful root apps:
Busybox
Rom Manager
Titanium Backup
Root Explorer
Questions?
- The above method unlocks your bootloader AND roots your device.
- You do not need ADB.
- This does not put a custom recovery on your phone.
- This does not put a custom rom on your phone.
- Yes, your phone is still stock.
- Yes, you will still receive OTA's from Google/Verizon.
- This only puts Superuser on your phone, you need to install busybox yourself.
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