Rooting Your Android Based T-Mobile G1: Part 2, Rooting & New Recovery Image

This part of the process contains two main parts. In the first part, you will install a telnet application and manually configure root access. In the second part, you will install a new recovery image to make loading ROMs faster and easier. Cyanogen's recovery image is excellent. However, there are frequent changes, so always adjust the file names in the following steps to reflect the actual file you have.

click to enlarge

1. Download Cyanogen's recovery image cm-recovery-1.4.img.
2. Copy the file to your SD card's root.
3. Search the Android Market for Telnet.
4. Install the Telnet app.
5. Go to your home screen.
6. Slide open the keyboard.
7. Press Enter once, then again after a moment.
8. Type "telnetd" on the keyboard in lower case. Android 1.0 will open your dialer to your contact list while you are typing. This is normal.
9. Press Enter again.
10. Launch the Telnet app.
11. Connect to the server using port 23, which is default.
12. Type "mount -o rw,remount -t yaffs2 /dev/block/mtdblock3 /system" to make the system folder writeable.
13. Type "cd sdcard" to change to the sdcard directory.
14. Type "flash_image recovery cm-recovery-1.4.img" This replaces your existing recovery image with the new Cyanogen recovery image.
15. cat cm-recovery-1.4.img > /system/recovery.img (copies the cm-recovery image to your system directory)

As with any step in this process, it is very important to verify that the software has installed correctly. To verify that the recovery image has been correctly installed, do the following:

1. Power off your phone.
2. Turn the phone back on while holding down the Home key.
3. You should see the new Cyanogen recovery screen. The Cyanogen recovery screen for 1.4 reads "Android System Recovery <2>" across the top and "Build: CyanogenMod v1.4 + JF" across the bottom.