Jump to content

MILESTONE 2.1 update and root guide


Guest craigcrawford1988

Recommended Posts

Guest craigcrawford1988

Intro

Here is my 2.1 update and root guide. Firstly I would like to thank the community for these files used in this guide, without them we would not have root.

I have tried this process on my UK MILESTONE using the following:

  • UK MILESTONE.
  • 2.1 UK SBF (non-service).
  • 90.73 bootloader.


    Before you start, a few points to make:
    • I am not responsible if your phone becomes bricked from this. It worked perfectly for me without a single hitch but for you it could be different.
    • Flashing a non-service SBF will WIPE the phone, so you will start from a blank slate.
    • If you don't know what root is, then read up on it first. It may not be for you. Chances are if you are happy with your phone and you don't find it lacking, then you don't need root.
    • Please read the WHOLE guide before starting, if you find yourself confused, then do NOT start. Ask first - you may break your phone.
    • It is recommended you do this on a computer that isn't going to crash or power down mid-update. A laptop plugged in with a good battery is recommended.
      • USB Drivers (4.2.0 Download: For 32-bit Windows | For 64-bit Windows).
      • RSD Lite (4.6.0 Download: For 32/64-bit Windows).
      • SBF of your choice (from here).
      • Vulnerable Recovery SBF for bootloader 90.78 and lower ONLY (from here or here).
      • Milestone root update.zip (from here or here).

        So, if you've got this far and have decided to take the plunge and downloaded all the prerequisites, then you're ready to get started!

        Follow these steps carefully and you'll have your MILESTONE with rooted 2.1!

      1. Charge your phone battery up FULL. While your phone is charging, install the USB drivers and RSD Lite.
      2. When the phone has finished charging, shut it down and unplug the USB cable from the phone.
      3. Load the phone up into bootloader mode by holding the UP direction button on the D-PAD of the phone (up as in towards the screen) and pressing the power button until you see the screen light up.
      4. You should be presented with the following text:
        Bootloader
        
        <version number>
        
        
        
        
        
        
        Battery OK
        
        OK to Program
        
        Connect USB
        
        Data Cable
      5. Connect your USB cable to the phone and the last two lines should change to:
        Transfer Mode:
        
        USB


      6. Now you can load up RSD Lite using the icon on your desktop. Follow the steps in this image, selecting the 2.1 SBF you wish to flash (not the vulnerable recovery, that is later).
        rsdlite.png
      7. Wait for RSD Lite to finish (The Status column will read Finished and the Result column should read PASS).
        If you get anything else or it seems to be taking forever, please ask here and do not interrupt the program or phone.
      8. When your phone boots up and asks you to set it up, shut it down and repeat step 3 of this guide.
      9. Once into the bootloader again, you can flash the vulnerable recovery SBF. Repeat step 6, but this time select the vulnerable recovery SBF and not the 2.1 SBF. This update should take a few seconds/minutes, and the phone will start back up once this is done with RSD Lite reading a Finished and PASS result in their respective columns.
        Again, if you experience problems as outlined in step 7, don't interrupt the phone/program. Ask in this thread.
      10. In Windows explorer, navigate to the SD card of the phone and copy the milestone_root.zip file over and rename it to update.zip.
      11. Once that has copied, shut the phone down once more and put it into recovery mode (not bootloader).
        To get into recovery mode:
        • For bootloader 90.78: X button on keypad
        • For bootloader lower than 90.78: Camera button on side of phone

        Hold the respective button as detailed above and the power button together. When the Motorola logo appears, release the power button but keep hold of the X/Camera button until this icon appears:

        recovery.jpg

        [*]Phew! If you made it this far then congrats, you nearly have root!

        Now hold the Volume Up button and press the Camera button to bring up the command menu.

        [*]Select from the menu using the D-PAD and choose apply sdcard:update.zip. If all is well it should start saying Rooting your phone..., once it is complete the command menu will re-appear. Simply choose reboot system now.

        [*]Once the phone has started back up again, go through the initial setup (or skip it) and you should have a new app called Superuser Whitelist.

        Whenever an app requests root access you will get a prompt on screen similar to

        device.png

      End

      If you made it fully through this guide then you should now be able to download apps such as Root Explorer and be able to mount the various directories as r/w and be able to start going deeper into modding your phone.

      One of the best bits of this is being able to uninstall the CRAPPY apps that come with the phone and clog up memory such as Facebook or Sim Toolkit (these are deleted from /system/app), you can find out more about modding with root by other various guides.

      Just as a final note: I recommend turning off OTA updates as they wont work for a rooted phone, you'll need to use RSD Lite from the future (unless you unroot).

      Well I hope you find this guide useful! Took me long enough to write it :)

      Known Issues

      [*]Sometimes, even when you have done everything right in RSD Lite - the start button remains greyed out. You must launch it by command line on such occasions:

      Download this batch file, copy it and the SBFs you wish to flash into the RSD Lite folder and then drag and drop the SBFs you wish to flash onto it.

      [*]Sometimes RSD Lite is unable to restart the phone as it needs (RSD Lite will read: Please manually power up this phone). If this happens you must manually assist the phone in flashing. Thanks to tazd for reporting this issue and finding the workaround.

    [*]Disconnect the USB cable and shut the phone down.

    [*]Start the phone up in bootloader mode.

    [*]Reconnect the USB cable. RSD Lite should continue now.

Edited by craigcrawford1988
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest Vivas

Thank you so much for the detailed steps. I have just did it. Now my Milestone is rooted thanks to the efforts of all the miraculous programmers, and to the very organized and explained steps.

However, It wasn't that straight forward for me. I had a couple of obstacles:

===============

(1) I couldn't of made it without the :

SBF / MBN Depacker

The latest version (1.2 ALPHA 3) is availabe for .NET 3.5 here 3): http://rapidshare.com/files/386624716/Moto...alpha3.rar.html

Supports repacking for the Milestone SBF, including the checksum recalculation.

The SPF files I have downloaded were either not acceptable by the RSD (the sholes spf) refusing to give me the start button, or failed to complete (in the vulnerable spf).

I had to extract-recompile them to be acceptable by the RSD.

===============

(2) There were some warning on the console screen on the phone that scared me, but I have decided to go on.

This was the output of the Milestone after booting in recovery mode, notice the last line (it was in Yellow color)

--------------

Android sytem recovery <2e>

Use d-pad to highlight; center to select.

reboot system now

apply sdcard:update.zip

wipe data/factory reset

wipe cache partition

--------------------------------------------------------

< Triangle graphics with warning exclamation mark>

in yellow color:

E:Can't open /cache/recovery/command

================================

Selected apply sdcard and here is the results:

=======================================

--Install from sdcard...

Finding update package...

Opening update package...

Verifying update package...

Installing update...

cannot find update_binary

Rooting your phone...

Install from sdcard complete.

==============================================

One last remark, I have a strange note regarding the downloaded firmware files (milestone_root.zip); That file was about 30 MB download size, I though I should extract it, so I did, and I was surprised that the extracted data size total is about 30KB !!

I could find an exploitation, but things went well, and there were no problems.

Finally, thank you again for your great help.

>>Vivas<<

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest craigcrawford1988

Those errors are fine, and the part where you needed to edit the sbf was unnecessary. There is a link in the "Known Issues" section with a tool if the Start button stays blank :rolleyes:.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest iamdarren

working here!!

thanks very much!

u had any luck using android commander with the root??

i cant seem to use the screenies or the app manager.

but the over clock is working so yes the root is defiately sorted.

only 1 thing i noticed. koutchs super user white list doesnt display properly, its squashed up in the top left corner. dont affect it though as you can still delete stuff.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest craigcrawford1988
working here!!

thanks very much!

u had any luck using android commander with the root??

i cant seem to use the screenies or the app manager.

but the over clock is working so yes the root is defiately sorted.

only 1 thing i noticed. koutchs super user white list doesnt display properly, its squashed up in the top left corner. dont affect it though as you can still delete stuff.

I haven't used Android Commander, but I know anything which requests root is able to successfully get it. And unfortunately, you'll have to live with the squished super user whitelist for now.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest stru85

Hi! I haven't been rooting my android devices since my G1 but my Telus Motorola Milestone has been giving me a hard time.. I am on the stock 2.1 Telus firmware and tried everything that I'm capable of.. I seem to have a common problem in which I get the following results when I try to root via the Android Recovery E2:

--Install from sdcard...

Finding update package...

Opening update package...

Verifying update package...

Installing update...

cannot find update_binary

Rooting your phone...

Install from sdcard complete.

I know other ppl have had the same thing and were able to get root, but I don't. I try wiping my phone first, didn't work. I tried to flash the Custom Open Recovery 1.14, and it work. I tried to initially flash the service and non-service sbf of Telus and it didn't work.

I seem to get the Please manually reboot your device when RSD lite has finished flashing either the Telus SBF or the vulnerable SBF.. but it doesnt get stuck there; after 10-15 seconds, I get a "PASS" and "FINISH". I was wondering if I should immediatly do the workaround that Tazd discovered as soon as I see the mention of manually rebooting my device? I sincerely tried everything. I'm sorry if I forgot to provide any useful info that would help you.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest craigcrawford1988
Hi! I haven't been rooting my android devices since my G1 but my Telus Motorola Milestone has been giving me a hard time.. I am on the stock 2.1 Telus firmware and tried everything that I'm capable of.. I seem to have a common problem in which I get the following results when I try to root via the Android Recovery E2:

--Install from sdcard...

Finding update package...

Opening update package...

Verifying update package...

Installing update...

cannot find update_binary

Rooting your phone...

Install from sdcard complete.

I know other ppl have had the same thing and were able to get root, but I don't. I try wiping my phone first, didn't work. I tried to flash the Custom Open Recovery 1.14, and it work. I tried to initially flash the service and non-service sbf of Telus and it didn't work.

I seem to get the Please manually reboot your device when RSD lite has finished flashing either the Telus SBF or the vulnerable SBF.. but it doesnt get stuck there; after 10-15 seconds, I get a "PASS" and "FINISH". I was wondering if I should immediatly do the workaround that Tazd discovered as soon as I see the mention of manually rebooting my device? I sincerely tried everything. I'm sorry if I forgot to provide any useful info that would help you.

Flash non-service, if the phone starts up without the settings you defined and asks you to set up the phone for the first time then you'll know it's worked.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest stru85
Flash non-service, if the phone starts up without the settings you defined and asks you to set up the phone for the first time then you'll know it's worked.

Still doesnt work!! I have followed all the workarounds I've found and can't get root access! The detailed steps are pretty easy to follow, I don't know how it still fails for me.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest craigcrawford1988
Still doesnt work!! I have followed all the workarounds I've found and can't get root access! The detailed steps are pretty easy to follow, I don't know how it still fails for me.

Does the phone actually get reset? I.e. once you flash the non-service does it ask you to set it up again?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest markkohfm
Does the phone actually get reset? I.e. once you flash the non-service does it ask you to set it up again?

I have the milestone xt720 from singapore. i wonder if brian has found root for it...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest stru85
Does the phone actually get reset? I.e. once you flash the non-service does it ask you to set it up again?

yeah it does! That's the wierd thing. And on top of that, when I try inputing "su" in any terminal I get the "$" to change in a "#". But I can't get root access to any application. I received the phone directly from Motorola and unlocked it. Don,t know if it could help. I'm really bummed out, I never had any problems rooting a phone!

Edit: Hell, I'll film myself trying to root my phone and upload it to youtube.. I'm about to do that!

Edited by stru85
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest stru85

Wow, finally figured out a way! I was doing everything alright.. I was looking at random forums and saw that busybox may fix the problem. I did thw whole rooting process from sratch, installed Titanium Backup and at first, like always, I couldn't get root acces. I click on "Problem?" which prompted to download busybox. it downloaded to 99%, asked for root access and froze. I forced close Titanium backup redownloaded it and now it worked!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest Freakingnolife

Thanks for such a wonderful detailed tutorial! I've also come across the "Please manually power up this phone" issue. but i just let it run and my phone automatically boot up and then RSD reads "finished". strange huh~

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest Ash59

Hey buddyyy! i just rooted my motorola milestone 2.1 update 1 according to the instruction given by you. and im not sure if my root was successful. when i went to recovery mode and did the update.zip thingy. this is what i have got

--Install from sdcard...

Finding update package...

Opening update package...

Verifying update package...

Installing update...

cannot find update_binary

Rooting your phone...

Install from sdcard complete.

cannot find update_binary!! what does that means? did anything go wrong!

and lets say if the root was a success, how do i install the apps to my Sd card. i know its something to do with Apps2SD application but im not sure how to use it. could you please help me with that ;) muchhhhh appreciated!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
Guest Ash59

heyyyy man! i just needed your help with somethingg. its kinda urgent. please help me outt! I actually rooted my phone according to your instruction! and i succeed. But now i wanna unroot my motorola milestone back! could you help me with that? do i just have to flash the correct sdk using RSD lite? and i am done! or i have to do the vulnerable recovery thing as well?? thanks man

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
Guest craigcrawford1988
heyyyy man! i just needed your help with somethingg. its kinda urgent. please help me outt! I actually rooted my phone according to your instruction! and i succeed. But now i wanna unroot my motorola milestone back! could you help me with that? do i just have to flash the correct sdk using RSD lite? and i am done! or i have to do the vulnerable recovery thing as well?? thanks man

Just flash a non-service SBF and the phone will unroot.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest r00li

Just a quick question before I go rooting. Currently I have the Milestone with OS 2.1 (SHOLS_U2_02.34.3). If I root it will I lose all my settings/applications/...? I read the first post and can't figure out if that means that I lose everything when I root it or only if I want to go back to non rooted phone.

EDIT: Figured it out and rooted it. Since I had the 2.1 I only used the vulnerable recovery and it went without problems. What about the OTA updates? Will they still work or not?

Edited by r00li
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest kie777

Hi guys, i followed this tutorial and successfuly rooted my phone with no issue, i just want to ask what should i do if i want to get the open recovery like the one on xda?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...
Guest droid_dummy

Hi, I have did all of the steps given (Step 1 - 13) and when i explored my phone using usb cable, it does not have a directory named "SD Card" so what i did was selecting my USB connection to 'memory card access' and copied the file there where i changed it to update.zip

Soon after that i re-started the phone in recovery mode, when i hit apply sdcard:update.zip it states either 'no such file / directory' or 'EOCD marker occurs after start of EOCD' and the line below states 'Signature Verification Failed'

i tried selecting the USB connection to few modes: portal & tools, Windows media sync, memory card access and charge only but i still cant find a directory named 'SD Card'

the last try i did it stated E: cant open/cache/recovery/command

Can you please help me on this matter?

Thanks

im using motorola milestone 2.1

Edited by droid_dummy
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 months later...
Guest placca
Intro

Here is my 2.1 update and root guide. Firstly I would like to thank the community for these files used in this guide, without them we would not have root.

I have tried this process on my UK MILESTONE using the following:

  • UK MILESTONE.
  • 2.1 UK SBF (non-service).
  • 90.73 bootloader.


    Before you start, a few points to make:
    • I am not responsible if your phone becomes bricked from this. It worked perfectly for me without a single hitch but for you it could be different.
    • Flashing a non-service SBF will WIPE the phone, so you will start from a blank slate.
    • If you don't know what root is, then read up on it first. It may not be for you. Chances are if you are happy with your phone and you don't find it lacking, then you don't need root.
    • Please read the WHOLE guide before starting, if you find yourself confused, then do NOT start. Ask first - you may break your phone.
    • It is recommended you do this on a computer that isn't going to crash or power down mid-update. A laptop plugged in with a good battery is recommended.
      • USB Drivers (4.2.0 Download: For 32-bit Windows | For 64-bit Windows).
      • RSD Lite (4.6.0 Download: For 32/64-bit Windows).
      • SBF of your choice (from here).
      • Vulnerable Recovery SBF for bootloader 90.78 and lower ONLY (from here or here).
      • Milestone root update.zip (from here or here).

        So, if you've got this far and have decided to take the plunge and downloaded all the prerequisites, then you're ready to get started!

        Follow these steps carefully and you'll have your MILESTONE with rooted 2.1!

      1. Charge your phone battery up FULL. While your phone is charging, install the USB drivers and RSD Lite.
      2. When the phone has finished charging, shut it down and unplug the USB cable from the phone.
      3. Load the phone up into bootloader mode by holding the UP direction button on the D-PAD of the phone (up as in towards the screen) and pressing the power button until you see the screen light up.
      4. You should be presented with the following text:
        Bootloader
        
        <version number>
        
        Battery OK
        
        OK to Program
        
        Connect USB
        
        Data Cable
      5. Connect your USB cable to the phone and the last two lines should change to:
        Transfer Mode:
        
        USB


      6. Now you can load up RSD Lite using the icon on your desktop. Follow the steps in this image, selecting the 2.1 SBF you wish to flash (not the vulnerable recovery, that is later).
        rsdlite.png
      7. Wait for RSD Lite to finish (The Status column will read Finished and the Result column should read PASS).
        If you get anything else or it seems to be taking forever, please ask here and do not interrupt the program or phone.
      8. When your phone boots up and asks you to set it up, shut it down and repeat step 3 of this guide.
      9. Once into the bootloader again, you can flash the vulnerable recovery SBF. Repeat step 6, but this time select the vulnerable recovery SBF and not the 2.1 SBF. This update should take a few seconds/minutes, and the phone will start back up once this is done with RSD Lite reading a Finished and PASS result in their respective columns.
        Again, if you experience problems as outlined in step 7, don't interrupt the phone/program. Ask in this thread.
      10. In Windows explorer, navigate to the SD card of the phone and copy the milestone_root.zip file over and rename it to update.zip.
      11. Once that has copied, shut the phone down once more and put it into recovery mode (not bootloader).
        To get into recovery mode:
        • For bootloader 90.78: X button on keypad
        • For bootloader lower than 90.78: Camera button on side of phone

        Hold the respective button as detailed above and the power button together. When the Motorola logo appears, release the power button but keep hold of the X/Camera button until this icon appears:

        recovery.jpg

        [*]Phew! If you made it this far then congrats, you nearly have root!

        Now hold the Volume Up button and press the Camera button to bring up the command menu.

        [*]Select from the menu using the D-PAD and choose apply sdcard:update.zip. If all is well it should start saying Rooting your phone..., once it is complete the command menu will re-appear. Simply choose reboot system now.

        [*]Once the phone has started back up again, go through the initial setup (or skip it) and you should have a new app called Superuser Whitelist.

        Whenever an app requests root access you will get a prompt on screen similar to

        device.png

      End

      If you made it fully through this guide then you should now be able to download apps such as Root Explorer and be able to mount the various directories as r/w and be able to start going deeper into modding your phone.

      One of the best bits of this is being able to uninstall the CRAPPY apps that come with the phone and clog up memory such as Facebook or Sim Toolkit (these are deleted from /system/app), you can find out more about modding with root by other various guides.

      Just as a final note: I recommend turning off OTA updates as they wont work for a rooted phone, you'll need to use RSD Lite from the future (unless you unroot).

      Well I hope you find this guide useful! Took me long enough to write it :unsure:

      Known Issues

      [*]Sometimes, even when you have done everything right in RSD Lite - the start button remains greyed out. You must launch it by command line on such occasions:

      Download this batch file, copy it and the SBFs you wish to flash into the RSD Lite folder and then drag and drop the SBFs you wish to flash onto it.

      [*]Sometimes RSD Lite is unable to restart the phone as it needs (RSD Lite will read: Please manually power up this phone). If this happens you must manually assist the phone in flashing. Thanks to tazd for reporting this issue and finding the workaround.

    [*]Disconnect the USB cable and shut the phone down.

    [*]Start the phone up in bootloader mode.

    [*]Reconnect the USB cable. RSD Lite should continue now.

    Hi!

    Nice to see a great guide for rooting Milestone for European fellows as well; now i live in Hungary and recently purchased what turned out to be a Russian version of Milestone. I want to root it because I cannot use 3G services though I do have the correct settings from my service provider (Telenor).

    Do you think it would help or will I possibly have some issues while rooting? I want to flash Central-European non-service 2.1 SBF.

    Thanks,

    Placca

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

Progress failed at step 9 during vulnerable sbf.

I got a " Critical Error: FEBE " after FEBE there was a number but I don't remember it.

what should I do?

Edited by roosh
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...
Guest droidtech1

Edited ***

I am having a problem. I managed to complete the root process but have a strange side effect after: screen slider is missing so can't unlock screen. Thought it was vunerable recovery at first deleting it because I saw the slider after flashing the 2.1 UK sbf, but after more experimentation I realised that after flashing the 2.1 UK sbf it reboots automatically and the slider is there, then if the phone is rebooted again, the slider is missing(this happens wether I flash vun recov or not). I did get the manually reboot error on RSD but followed the instructions of unplugging usb before rebooting in boot mode, had zero effect.

Obviously something is wrong with the 2.1 UK sbf I used. Is there a better source of droid sbf files other than

http://and-developers.com/sbf

?

Edited by droidtech1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...
Guest varumin

hello i think i may have bricked my phone. at first, i tried rooting and it worked. but not as i hoped.

im using motorola milestone from starhub singapore.

used the STAR_36_GOT_SERVICE and OR-GOTmod_v1.04a from GOT to do what i needed, even managed to push the cpu up to 800mhz. problem is after booting, the android OS kept giving force close messages.

i tried reflashing again with a different rom this time.

used the SHOLS_U2_05.26.4_SIGNED_UCASHLSMR2EMEAB1B806E.0R_PDS003_USAMS1FRYORTSEA_P013_A00

_HWp2a_WIG145030_Service1FF.sbf

this time it hung on the rsdlite for about 2 hrs and i just plugged it out. after which when i boot up the phone it now shows

bootloader 90.78

code corrupt

battery low

cannot program

the battery low and cannot program errors are flashing.

i tried leaving it to charge overnight via direct a/c charger then the next morning trying to get to the boot loader by holding down X on the keyboard then the power button but after i let go of the x, then the power button the same screen still shows!

i do not get the triangle with an exclamation mark within it anymore!

i noticed that when i charged it direct to A/C the led near the usb port did not light up.

but when i plugged it into the usb port on my laptop, it did.

am now leaving the phone to charge via usb. its now 10.43am. hopefully i do not get that problem again tonight when i try again after dinner.

Can anyone please help me on this matter?

Thanks

im using motorola milestone from starhub singapore.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.