The main reason why most android users try to "root" their devices is because of bloatware. Now, I won't be talking about "rooting your android device" or "android bloatware" since you can find these topic scattered all over the internet and they are all practically saying the same thing. I will be sharing my experience when I first tried to root my device and it got "bricked". You can also use this "how to" in unrooted devices.
Let me start with some of these basic terminologies:
Root - changing the Operating System, behavior, and authorizations on your device. You will have "superuser" access where you can delete pretty much anything that you do not want on your device.
Bricked Device - is pretty much a useless device. Sometimes, phone bricking is defined as loss on warranty, but most of the time this means that your android device is screwed and cannot function normally.
Bloatware - programs that are pre-installed and cannot be deleted unless you have superuser access.
Now that we have got that out of the way (you can read more about them on various websites) we can discuss directly how I managed to get my android back in working condition.
Basically, like most curious android users, I was mesmerized with the concept of making your device run faster, more memory, remove unwanted pre-installed programs, improve battery life, wi-fi tethering, and all of the other things that you cannot do in a normal android device. I read a lot of instructions and researched on the best way to avoid bricking my device. My first advice is follow these instructions to the letter. (which I obviously did not and that is the reason why I got my device messed up.)
What i failed to follow is to backup my device. So, i cannot stress this more, "Backup your device!" either on a external sd card or save the file on a drive on your computer. Just make sure that you have a backup that will be saved in a .zip file.
As I mentioned earlier, i never created a backup for my device and ended up in a predicament. I have rooted my phone and deleted all, i mean all, pre-ins talled Google apps. My biggest mistake was to delete even the factory keyboard and installed a custom keyboard. Then it came a time when I wanted to put my device back on it's original Android OS so I unrooted my device. This brought my device back to android OS but all the bloatwares are still disabled. And yes, worst thing is the keyboard is already gone. I mean GONE and not just disabled. I could not navigate Google Play Store to install another keyboard. I cannot even register an email account to access Google Play.
I am not a "guru" in tinkering with android devices so I tried to research about this. I cannot find a solution where they uninstalled and deleted their stock android keyboard. I know that I can somehow fix the problem by connecting my device to my computer via USB. I installed android SDK platform and tried repairing the damage done from there. Unfortunately, nothing worked. Then "I thought what if I use my micro sd card to solve the problem?" I did not have a backup though. To my amazement, I learned that you can download these "Stock Android Images / Stock Android Operating System / Stock Android Firmware". You just need to know what Operating system (android KitKat, Lollipop, Jellybean, etc...) your device is running on then the problem as solved regarding backups. I also learned how to boot your android device and load the .zip file from there.
The steps I took in summary are:
Let me start with some of these basic terminologies:
Root - changing the Operating System, behavior, and authorizations on your device. You will have "superuser" access where you can delete pretty much anything that you do not want on your device.
Bricked Device - is pretty much a useless device. Sometimes, phone bricking is defined as loss on warranty, but most of the time this means that your android device is screwed and cannot function normally.
Bloatware - programs that are pre-installed and cannot be deleted unless you have superuser access.
Now that we have got that out of the way (you can read more about them on various websites) we can discuss directly how I managed to get my android back in working condition.
Basically, like most curious android users, I was mesmerized with the concept of making your device run faster, more memory, remove unwanted pre-installed programs, improve battery life, wi-fi tethering, and all of the other things that you cannot do in a normal android device. I read a lot of instructions and researched on the best way to avoid bricking my device. My first advice is follow these instructions to the letter. (which I obviously did not and that is the reason why I got my device messed up.)
What i failed to follow is to backup my device. So, i cannot stress this more, "Backup your device!" either on a external sd card or save the file on a drive on your computer. Just make sure that you have a backup that will be saved in a .zip file.
As I mentioned earlier, i never created a backup for my device and ended up in a predicament. I have rooted my phone and deleted all, i mean all, pre-ins talled Google apps. My biggest mistake was to delete even the factory keyboard and installed a custom keyboard. Then it came a time when I wanted to put my device back on it's original Android OS so I unrooted my device. This brought my device back to android OS but all the bloatwares are still disabled. And yes, worst thing is the keyboard is already gone. I mean GONE and not just disabled. I could not navigate Google Play Store to install another keyboard. I cannot even register an email account to access Google Play.
I am not a "guru" in tinkering with android devices so I tried to research about this. I cannot find a solution where they uninstalled and deleted their stock android keyboard. I know that I can somehow fix the problem by connecting my device to my computer via USB. I installed android SDK platform and tried repairing the damage done from there. Unfortunately, nothing worked. Then "I thought what if I use my micro sd card to solve the problem?" I did not have a backup though. To my amazement, I learned that you can download these "Stock Android Images / Stock Android Operating System / Stock Android Firmware". You just need to know what Operating system (android KitKat, Lollipop, Jellybean, etc...) your device is running on then the problem as solved regarding backups. I also learned how to boot your android device and load the .zip file from there.
The steps I took in summary are:
- Download a stock android OS that is compatible with your device. Place it in a micro sd card. (you can try searching for "android 4.1.2 firmware acer iconia b1 a71" for example if you are using that kind of device.)
- Turn off your android device. Press and hold the volume up key then press the power button until your device starts up.
- You should see the android boot screen. Select SD Image Update Mode > Apply Update from SD card. You can navigate the options here using the volume and power controls.
- Boot the device and Viola! Your Android is in perfect working condition and you got your keyboard back. Now you can re-install all your apps and have learned the importance of backing up your device.
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