Root Should I root my Android?

[bobolacupcsr]

I've had the Sony Ericsson X10 for a couple of months now and ive been pretty pleased with it overall. I used to have an Ipod Touch 2G which i Jailbroke and made it soo much better but slower.

Is it worth rooting my X10? I really like it but it can be laggy compared to other friends phones ive seen my friends use (HTC Desire, Samsung Galaxy) they seem to run so much smoother. I also love the idea of some apps like screenshotting (especially as a previous Ipod Touch user). I usually never have problems with my technology so im not concerned about losing warranty, but is there any major chances of my phone becoming really dodgy?

Also is there any official release dates for android OS on the X10 phone, I'm sick of seeing so many people complaining about Sony being so far behind with 2.1 haha

Thanks to anyone who can help me. I'm a new Android user but i know a fair bit about computer technology, so use language you think i can comprehend

 

[ninja_reject]

Rooting can make your device faster, not slower. Once you remove unnecessary bloatware that insists on staying open all the time despite never being used, everything will speed up. You just have to do your research and follow directions very carefully.

 

[takeshi]

Is it worth rooting my X10? I really like it but it can be laggy compared to other friends phones ive seen my friends use (HTC Desire, Samsung Galaxy) they seem to run so much smoother. I also love the idea of some apps like screenshotting (especially as a previous Ipod Touch user). I usually never have problems with my technology so im not concerned about losing warranty, but is there any major chances of my phone becoming really dodgy?

Worth is always highly subjective. From what you've said, you can benefit from rooting, custom ROM's etc. There's always the potential to make things worse when you have full admin rights on any machine. If you can read and follow instructions you probably won't have any problems but life rarely offers guarantees.

Rooting can make your device faster, not slower.

Rooting itself doesn't do either. It's what you do after rooting that can improve or degrade performance. It's certainly possible to make things worse on a rooted device. It really just depends on what the user does.

 

[ninja_reject]

Rooting itself doesn't do either. It's what you do after rooting that can improve or degrade performance. It's certainly possible to make things worse on a rooted device. It really just depends on what the user does.

I am sure I mentioned just what one can do to make one's device run faster after rooting. Probably why you only quoted my first sentence.

 

[sweeds]

Rooting can make your device faster, not slower. Once you remove unnecessary bloatware that insists on staying open all the time despite never being used, everything will speed up. You just have to do your research and follow directions very carefully.

From a user interested in knowing more about rooting, what kind of bloatware are the you referring to specifically?

Can you name any program(s) that you were able to disable post-root that made a significant difference in performance?

 

[beau420]

From a user interested in knowing more about rooting, what kind of bloatware are the you referring to specifically?

Can you name any program(s) that you were able to disable post-root that made a significant difference in performance?

Here are some generic tips for helping speed up the phone.

How to Speed Up Your Old or Sluggish Android Device

As for tips on rooting, I wish there was a decent place to read up about it from scratch...but for the most part, it's reading and trying.

Rooting is super easy, but like someone else said. Just rooting, doesn't do anything for the user. It allows you to remove junk that your cell provider may have added and Sony has added.

If you want, install the Task Manager app...if you notice things are running slowly, open up Task Manager and stop all the apps (it will restart the important one's by itself) next time make note of which apps are in that list that you may not use.

I had one Alarm Clock app I never used, but it always showed up on that list of running apps. I removed the app because I never really used it.

Here is an example. Mediascape and Timescape and Face recognition. All of these apps are very memory hungry and unless you root, you can't remove that stuff.

So the options after you root are going to be....do I want to mess around and remove stuff? Or just download and install a custom rom where someone has done all that stuff for me?

Here is a much tougher guide to read - http://androidforums.com/x10-all-things-root/272949-flashtool-guide-how-n00bies.html

That Lifehacker website has a lot of Android tips for people who are new to the rooting and the installing custom roms and apps and all that stuff.

 

[x10iii]

what is face recognition used for... because its always using up my battery, so will it be ok if i remove it?

 

[werthers]

what is face recognition used for... because its always using up my battery, so will it be ok if i remove it?

It's from the camera it tracks faces, a box that appears around peoples face. I'm not too sure what it will do if you remove it, it shouldn't effect anything but you never know

 

[beau420]

what is face recognition used for... because its always using up my battery, so will it be ok if i remove it?

When you take pictures, it focus' on people's faces....and more.

Tutorial – Face Recognition in XPERIA X10 | Product Launch Blog

Over the years our mobile phones have often inherited new features from dedicated point&shoot cameras, things like face-detection, smile-shutter etc have been some of the latest. In X10 this is taken one step further as the feature face recognition is added, a feature that as far as I know isn’t really that common in dedicated cameras. I would guess that is due to the fact that a dedicated camera is something you use to take pictures or shoot movies – period. You then watch the pictures in you computer, print them or show them online. This might be the reason why this feature is instead generally implemented in the application used to watch and store the pics, such as Google Picasa etc.
Mobile phones on the other hand are used in another way, I can of course only speak for myself but I keep all my pics in my phone while the pictures on the memory cards of my cameras always get deleted after I’ve copied them to my PCs or online storage.
This builds quite a big library of pics over time and getting the opportunity to automatically get them tagged to people in my phonebook really is a cool thing.

Not needed....could remove.

 

[DomtaR]

Is it worth rooting my X10? I really like it but it can be laggy compared to other friends phones ive seen my friends use (HTC Desire, Samsung Galaxy) they seem to run so much smoother. I also love the idea of some apps like screenshotting (especially as a previous Ipod Touch user). I usually never have problems with my technology so im not concerned about losing warranty, but is there any major chances of my phone becoming really dodgy?

Rooting and installing a custom IS indeed worth it; in my opinion, it is a lot less laggy.
Currently I am still on 1.6 OS firmware with a .49 baseband, using the Eminence Custom Rom, and it's significantly faster and less laggy than SE's stock 2.1 OS!

Hope you go through with Root and enjoy your phone x1000 more like I did =)

 

[beau420]

Rooting and installing a custom IS indeed worth it; in my opinion, it is a lot less laggy.
Currently I am still on 1.6 OS firmware with a .49 baseband, using the Eminence Custom Rom, and it's significantly faster and less laggy than SE's stock 2.1 OS!

Hope you go through with Root and enjoy your phone x1000 more like I did =)

Agreed.

Although I could never go back to 1.6....so few apps....but even the custom ROM I am using. 100 times better than if I install the Generic 2.1 x10 ROM.

 

[Smoked]

For me this is an easy answer...yes..root the phone and then have fun with it...but then i'm pretty technical and comfortable with this stuff. Think about it this way...what has ever been made that has never been improved on by tinkering? Guys soup up their cars, people overclock PC's... everything can be improved on to get better performance....for these phones rooting is the first step.

I have been running custom ROM's for a few months now...i've probably flashed about 10 of them on to see which I preferred and the one day I decided to flash back to a stock 2.1 to start over it felt SO SLOW. The developers on XDA have done so much to free up these phones and let them fly it's ridiculous how much nicer it is to use their products than the stock...and it's all free

 

[kratos]

I am running an Original Moto Droid and it is basically obsolete compared to all the new devices. However, since I am rooted, my phone is able to stay relatively new and my ROM contantly has update with new/better features!

So, with that said, yes, rooting can be a great thing for your phone. But, always remember to make nandroid backups before ever deleting anything from /system/app or making any significant changes that you wouldn't normally be able to do on a stock phone. Trust me when I tell you that you will need to revert to a backup at least once, I know I have!!!

Happy rooting...

Kratos

 

[bobolacupcsr]

sorry ive taken a while to get back to my original post
i guess in saying "does rooting make it slower" i was thinking of when i jailbroke my ipod, i loaded it up with a heap of junk making it really laggy

ill definately research in detail the dangers of touching anything i plan to do

A list of the things i plan to remove from my device if i root it are:
Timescape
mediascape
face recognition
calendar
creatouch
gmail
moxier calendar, mail, tasks
playnow
postcard
quadrapop
setup guide
talk
voice dailer
voice search

this is because i dont use any of them and i assume they take up a bit of space, but mostly from what ive seen in running services, they always pop up even if im not using them :S can anyone verify if it is dangerous to uninstall any particular one of those

also whats the best map (not gps) application that i can use for my phone, i need to choose out of latitude, maps, navigation, places, wisepilot. i probably plan to uninstall 3 or 4 of these along with my other list

im looking forward to rooting my phone cause ive seen friends HTC phones which have the same spec but run so much smoother
im on 2.1 android firmware btw if anyone wanted to know

 

[jhnelo]

i am no tech guy but i managed to root my x10 and install custom roms and i would never go back to stock. i am currently running blue sparks rom best i have used so far but it is only 2.1.

 

[kratos]

sorry ive taken a while to get back to my original post
i guess in saying "does rooting make it slower" i was thinking of when i jailbroke my ipod, i loaded it up with a heap of junk making it really laggy

ill definately research in detail the dangers of touching anything i plan to do

A list of the things i plan to remove from my device if i root it are:
Timescape
mediascape
face recognition
calendar
creatouch
gmail
moxier calendar, mail, tasks
playnow
postcard
quadrapop
setup guide
talk
voice dailer
voice search

this is because i dont use any of them and i assume they take up a bit of space, but mostly from what ive seen in running services, they always pop up even if im not using them :S can anyone verify if it is dangerous to uninstall any particular one of those

also whats the best map (not gps) application that i can use for my phone, i need to choose out of latitude, maps, navigation, places, wisepilot. i probably plan to uninstall 3 or 4 of these along with my other list

im looking forward to rooting my phone cause ive seen friends HTC phones which have the same spec but run so much smoother
im on 2.1 android firmware btw if anyone wanted to know

I do not suggest removing gmail or gtalk for any reason. These need to be on your phone if you ever want to use the market and other Google services. As for the calendar, if you are using a different calendar interface, but it is still uploading to Google Calendar, then you must keep the stock calendar in place.

As for the other apps, I do not see why you couldn't remove them. I highly suggest making a nandroid backup right after rooting your device. Absolutely never delete, change, etc. any /system apps, files, directories, etc without nandroid backing up first!!!!

Kratos