For all of you HTC Vivid users out there who have flashed the official Ice Cream Sandwich firmware to your devices, now is your time to rejoice as you can now finally root your device. This is all possible thanks to XDA Developers member cruzin_cruzing.
One of the most common problems among rooted phones and tablets has to be flashing official firmware releases. In almost all cases, flashing firmware updates also tend to lose previous root access. Thankfully, cruzin_cruzing has provided a way for owners of the HTC Vivid to root their phones and install ClockworkMod Recovery after upgrading to Android 4.0.3 Ice Cream Sandwich and HTC Sense 3.6.
If you are dying to know how you can root your HTC Vivid, continue reading the rest of the guide below to learn more on how you can root your phone.
Warning
- The instructions in this guide are intended for use with the HTC Vivid. Applying these instructions on another device or model may produce undesired outcomes.
- The information in this guide is provided for instructional and educational purposes only. There is no guarantee that these instructions will work under your specific and unique circumstances.
- Use these instructions at your own risk. We shall not hold any responsibility or liability for whatever happens to you or your device arising from your use of the info in this guide.
- Read and understand the whole guide first before actually performing the instructions
Requirements
- HTC Vivid with unlocked bootloader
- If you have not yet unlocked your phone’s bootloader, you may do so with the help of the instructions at HTCDev.com.
- A Windows PC
- USB Device drivers installed on your PC. Download and install the HTC Drivers (HTCDriver3.0.0.007.exe, 13.1 MB) if you need to. Or, you may install HTC Sync, which also installs the drivers in the process.
- Make sure HTC Sync is not running in the background while you perform the procedure in this guide.
- Enable USB Debugging on your phone. You can do this by going to Settings > Developer Options > USB Debugging. Make sure that there is a check mark beside that option.
- Charge your phone’s battery to 70% or more.
- Backup all personal data on your phone to make sure you have a copy of your personal data (e.g., contacts, SMS, MMS, Internet settings, Wi-Fi passwords, and the like) in case the procedure in this guide erases such data.
Instructions
- Download the following files and save them to your PC:
- Copy Superuser-3.0.7-efghi-signed.zip to your phone’s SD card.
- Extract the Fastboot.zip file to your PC and place the extracted files inside a folder. Name that folder “Fastboot” for easy referencing. You should acquire four files namely:
- adb.exe
- AdbWinAni.dll
- AdbWinUsbApi.dll
- fastboot.exe
- Extract the PH39IMG.zip file using any extracting software such as 7-Zip or WinZip. You should be able to extract a file called recovery.img. Copy the extracted recovery.img file into the Fastboot folder. You should have five files inside the Fastboot folder by now.
- Switch off your phone.
- Boot your phone into Bootloader mode. You can do that by pressing and holding down the Volume Down and Power button keys together.
- From the bootloader menu, select Fastboot by using the Volume keys to navigate and the Power button to select it.
- Once in Fastboot Mode, connect your phone to your PC via USB cable. The bootloader screen should say “FASTBOOT USB.”
- On your computer, open a command prompt window and navigate to the Fastboot Folder.
- NOTE: For Windows 7 users, you can easily open a command prompt from within a selected folder. Open the desired folder. Press Shift and right mouse button in any vacant part in the folder. A menu will appear. Select Open Command Window Here and a command prompt will appear with the location of the selected folder.
- Inside the command prompt window, type the command
fastboot devices to check that ADB/Fastboot properly detects your phone.
- NOTE: Entering this command will display your phone’s serial number. This will indicate that you have successfully installed the appropriate USB device drivers on your PC. If not, reinstall the HTC drivers and try again.
- Enter this code to flash the recovery.img on your phone:
fastboot flash recovery recovery.img
- If you are successful, you will get a “Finished/Okay” message once the recovery image has been flashed. Select “BOOTLOADER” on your phone to go back to the main bootloader menu. Select “Recovery” to boot your phone into ClockworkMod Recovery.
- Select Install ZIP From SD Card.
- Select Choose ZIP From SD Card then browse for the Superuser-3.0.7-efghi-signed.zip file and select it. Confirm the installation by selecting Yes on the next screen that follows.
- Head back to the main menu by selecting Go Back.
- Select Reboot System Now to reboot your phone.
- Download and install the Root Checker app to verify whether your phone has root access.
Congratulations! You have successfully rooted your HTC Vivid and installed ClockworkMod Recovery.
