Rooting HTC Hero

Onecoolcookie

Ok guys, I've had my Hero for about 2 months and I'm finally ready to attempt to root it but I'm a complete noob at anything like this, whats the best way to save all my apps, photos, messages, music etc before I start to root the phone and what custom ROM would you recommend ? Thanks

Onecoolcookie

Actually the phone is a G2 which was locked to t-mobile but I got it unlocked with a code, does this affect how I go about rooting it ?

steve_

Think you can use astro to back up your apps to the SD card. You can get that in the marketplace. As for custom ROMs i think MoCaDos Rom is the best going.

As for rooting check here:

http://androidforums.com/all-things-root-hero/

Also just out of curiosity have your been getting 3g/HSDPA on your handset?

Onecoolcookie

Thanks mate, I'm on o2 and the 3g has been grand

godskitchen

Having just got a hero myself, switched from my iphone, the difference is huge, in favor of the Hero.

I wont get into why I prefer it. I dont think my Hero is rootable though......

Has anyone else been unable to root their Hero because of a newer FW or version? Mine was a meteor unit, factory unlocked.

Bob_Harris

Your Tmobile Hero (edit: and any brand new Hero) probably has firmware version 2.73.xxxx

You will need to downgrade it to firmware version 1.76.xxxx world wide edition before you can install a recovery ROM. Once the recovery ROM is installed you can use it to flash rooted custom roms.

Here is a list of self installing official roms. You are looking for the 1.76.xxx WWE.

If you attempt to install a ROM which is not branded for the Tmobile, i.e. the WW edititon you will get an error message about IDs not matching.

You need to create a Gold Card to circumvent the ID checking. Once you've made your Gold Card, attempt to install the 1.76.xxx ROM again. It should run fully through the installation, if not try creating the Gold card again. It can take a few attempts. The tutorial suggests at one stage you take the SD card out of the phone and use the USB adapter to plug it into the PC. I found that the only way it worked was if the card remained in the phone the whole time, and instead of plugging it in and out I simply used the mount and unmount options on the phone.

Once you have downgraded the official firmware, you can use this method to flash a recovery ROM. Instead of the recovery ROM linked to in that tutorial use the latest version found here.

When the recovery ROM is installed, download your preferred custom ROM, place the ZIP file onto your SD card, turn off your phone, start your phone with the HOME key pressed to start the recovery ROM, then flash the custom ROM.

mossie

I have a Meteor Hero and have been completely unable to root it. It's possible the goldcard might work but so far I've tried 4 different cards but all have failed, every time when I test the card I get the format message. Is there any other way of doing it without the goldcard?

Bob_Harris

mossie wrote: »

I have a Meteor Hero and have been completely unable to root it. It's possible the goldcard might work but so far I've tried 4 different cards but all have failed, every time when I test the card I get the format message. Is there any other way of doing it without the goldcard?

The SD card which came with the Hero should work fine as a Gold Card. You can try fastbooting a recovery ROM but I'm not sure that works on the latest firmware.

Where do you get a format message? If you paste the HEX of the Gold Card in the wrong place on the SD card it will confuse Windows into thinking it is a different file system. Are you using a USB adapter to write to the card or are you keeping the SD card in the phone?

mossie

Bob_Harris wrote: »

The SD card which came with the Hero should work fine as a Gold Card. You can try fastbooting a recovery ROM but I'm not sure that works on the latest firmware.

Where do you get a format message? If you paste the HEX of the Gold Card in the wrong place on the SD card it will confuse Windows into thinking it is a different file system. Are you using a USB adapter to write to the card or are you keeping the SD card in the phone?

I have tried both in the phone and the usb adapter. Either way when I do this the phone won't accept the card after pasting the goldcard hex in the SD. I followed the instructions exactly as to where to paste this. If I put the card in the computer I get a message that I must format the card and the phone won't mount it. Fastbooting doesn't work either. Guess I'll try the goldcard again.

Edit: Tried again and failed, kept card in phone. Phone says the SD card is blank or an unsupported format.

Saadyst

mossie wrote: »

I have tried both in the phone and the usb adapter. Either way when I do this the phone won't accept the card after pasting the goldcard hex in the SD. I followed the instructions exactly as to where to paste this. If I put the card in the computer I get a message that I must format the card and the phone won't mount it. Fastbooting doesn't work either. Guess I'll try the goldcard again.

Edit: Tried again and failed, kept card in phone. Phone says the SD card is blank or an unsupported format.

Make sure you choose the physical drive and not the logical drive in the hex editor when you are selecting the sd card to open.

mossie

Saadyst wrote: »

Make sure you choose the physical drive and not the logical drive in the hex editor when you are selecting the sd card to open.

I've done that. I've followed the goldcard guide to the letter but nothing works. Tried 4 cards, even bought one specially but always fails. I will try again now see what happens. Thanks anyway.

Saadyst

mossie wrote: »

I've done that. I've followed the goldcard guide to the letter but nothing works. Tried 4 cards, even bought one specially but always fails. I will try again now see what happens. Thanks anyway.

I was having the exact problem you mentioned and read that in one of the comments.... it then worked for me (with the card you get with the Hero). If that doesn't work, I've no clue

On an aside: just managed to root/upgrade a Hero today. Pain in the ass, but it was a fun learning experience. I'm on the BeHero ROM. It's quite popular... but it does have its bugs and it certainly feels slower. I'm not sure what exactly I was missing out on by not doing any of this... I wouldn't mind going back to the default (but keeping the root/recovery in place).

mossie

Saadyst wrote: »

I was having the exact problem you mentioned and read that in one of the comments.... it then worked for me (with the card you get with the Hero). If that doesn't work, I've no clue

I have tried the card that came with it and 3 others, all to no avail. I do seem to have made some progress in that the phone doesn't reject the card. However when I try to downgrade I get an "Error [140]: Bootloader version error" message and can't get past that. Maybe one more try and that's it.

R28

Saadyst wrote: »

I was having the exact problem you mentioned and read that in one of the comments.... it then worked for me (with the card you get with the Hero). If that doesn't work, I've no clue

On an aside: just managed to root/upgrade a Hero today. Pain in the ass, but it was a fun learning experience. I'm on the BeHero ROM. It's quite popular... but it does have its bugs and it certainly feels slower. I'm not sure what exactly I was missing out on by not doing any of this... I wouldn't mind going back to the default (but keeping the root/recovery in place).

If you can find the BeHero 1.2.6 update I'd try and use that. I've found it to be much more stable and faster then the later 1.3.x releases which are based on the Legend ROM.

yop

godskitchen wrote: »

Having just got a hero myself, switched from my iphone, the difference is huge, in favor of the Hero.

I wont get into why I prefer it. I dont think my Hero is rootable though......

Has anyone else been unable to root their Hero because of a newer FW or version? Mine was a meteor unit, factory unlocked.

Thats interesting, why do u prefer the Hero over the iPhone?

Saadyst

mossie wrote: »

I have tried the card that came with it and 3 others, all to no avail. I do seem to have made some progress in that the phone doesn't reject the card. However when I try to downgrade I get an "Error [140]: Bootloader version error" message and can't get past that. Maybe one more try and that's it.

Had all these problems and many more

I had to try different RUU versions before the correct one worked: the one that had the same version number as the one on the phone. After that's done, you can try instantroot (which will say you already have root access).


Thanks R28, I'll take a look at it

mossie

Saadyst wrote: »

Had all these problems and many more

I had to try different RUU versions before the correct one worked: the one that had the same version number as the one on the phone. After that's done, you can try instantroot (which will say you already have root access).


Thanks R28, I'll take a look at it

This works up to a point. Instant root says the phone is already rooted but I cannot install a custom rom or recovery rom

Saadyst

Ok, well it sounds like it's progressing along the same path mine did.

Most places will suggest to use FlashRec to load up the recovery image, but that never worked for me at all - never tried the older version. Try it and see if it does for yourself now. Otherwise, I ended up using command prompt (I don't remember the commands exactly but hopefully it won't be too difficult to find again).


I used the 1.2 Hero Recovery zip that's floating around as the recovery.

Once that's installed, you can then load up your chosen custom ROM pretty easily.

mossie

Finally got there. Installed Ra recovery image from terminal on phone and then installed Villain rom. Heading away for weekend now so will see how it goes...

dloob

I used the flashrec method with my meteor hero a while back.
Steps are here

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=559613

I used flashrec-1.1.2-20090909 and the 1.1-hero-recovery

I haven't upgraded the ROM only used the root for market enabler.