Root Question about rooting and msl.

[kakapopo]

My friend has an Evo and his data stopped working a week ago. He can't call, text, or go on the web, only wifi works.He's tried going to costumer service for help but they're useless. I seen a lot of people reccomend reseting your phone with it's msl but we don't have his msl. Costumer service won't give it to him. So I told him I could root his phone and find his msl with msl reader app that requires root on the playstore but I have a few questions.

1. If I root it, find the msl, and reset it while it's rooted will I brick the phone?

2. Does resetting your phone with it's msl unactivate it? If it does will he have to reactivate it with his same account but pay another 35$ airtime?

3. Will resetting it even restore his data?

4. Any other suggestions to restoring the phone's data without reseting it?

5. Is there any other way to find his msl without having to root it or asking costumer service?

 

[droiddekka]

1. never perform a factory reset from within the rom of a rooted phone. factory resets should always be performed from within your custom recovery.

2. no...resetting a rooted phone or retrieving the MSL from it has not impact on the phone's activation status.

3. no probably not. i would check what the radio version and make sure you're on the latest. see the "fix everything thread" for more info

4. a radio flash will not require a reset, and very well may fix the problem

5. get "MSL READER" from the market. it's free.