One of my friends/past co-worker bought a Rogers HTC Dream during the school year. He wanted to put Cyanogenmod on it, but something just wasn’t playing right and it couldn’t be done. Since I’m now done my undergrad, I had the time needed to tackle this pressing issue! And so I did!
I have never done anything with Android or CM before, so the first step I took was reading up how to do things on the CM Wiki, as well as various XDA Developers threads. Things such as how to root the phone, how to flash the radios…
If you’re looking for help, before you read on take note that I am not a developer, and have no in-depth knowledge of how these things work. I take no responsibility in any mishap to you or your device! Aside from that…
The first thing I learned to do was to fastboot into the Dream. This is done by pressing Camera + Power. On this screen, you’ll see the model, the device type (32A vs 32B), whether a certain lock is on/off (S-ON vs S-OFF), the SPL version and the radio version…amongst other information. For the device I was given, it had the following:
Dream PVT 32B SHIP S-ON d
HBOOT 1.33.0010 (Drea21000)
CPLD-4
Radio – 3.22.26.17
Jan 2, 09 21:33:16
From this, you can tell that:
- the SPL needed to be upgraded from 1.33.0010 to DangerSPL 1.33.2005
- the radio is a post-911 Rogers patch
- security is ON
- this is a 32B device
OK. Groovy. I know I need to upgrade the SPL. Wait, in order to do that…I need to have root! Did I have root? I read up on how to root the device, and installed the Terminal Emulator application. I tried that Press ENT twice, then type ‘telnetd’, then open up Telnet and connect method…but it didn’t work. That seemed too easy anyway. So I raked my brain and the threads until I stumbled upon a post talking about Universal Androot. Sure enough, this app did the trick…and now the device is rooted! How did I know? Go into the Terminal Emulator app and type su; this will try to let you do things as a super user. That, and a SU prompt should pop up asking if you really want to run that command as a super user. Of course you do, pssh 😛
OK, so thats out of the way. Before you flash your radios or even a new SPL, you need to be able to boot into a Recovery Image! I downloaded and installed FlashRec, as per XDA/Wiki-CM instructions. I also tried the following:
- Open FlashRec
- Backup the recovery image
- Download the new recovery image linked
- Flash/Install the new version
Additionally/alternatively…in addition to all that, after you’ve downloaded the Amon-RA recovery image , renamed it recovery.img and placed it on the root of your SD card, you can try:
- In Flashrec, delete the image name and type sdcard/recovery.img
- Press Flash
- If that fails, press on the far right of Backup such that there’s a star and then press Flash again
Of course, none of this worked for me. How the heck do I flash a recovery image!? WHY IS THIS SO RAGE-INDUCING!? From more forum reading, I decided to try out a solution shown:
- Open Terminal Emulator
- Type flash_image recovery /sdcard/recovery.img
- Wait a little bit. Just a little.
It should work right? Let’s check! Turn off your phone, then turn it on again by pressing and holding Home + Power until you get into a recovery menu. Sure enough, I got in! WOO! Now what?
Now, scroll down with the trackball to Flash ZIP from SD and choose the SPL update! At this point, you should reboot to finish the SPL upgrade. It SHOULD reboot into recovery. If not, you know what to do 😉 And, if you’re unsure if your SPL was updated, go back to Fastboot!
If you haven’t already, update your radio. I didn’t since, well, you read from above I’m already using the post-911 patch. Now we’re on to the main show. The final act! But first, make sure you have Brian Crook’s CM6 port on the SD card too!
Head back to the Flash ZIP from SD menu. This time, choose the CM zip file and wait a bit as it installs. Now, because we’re using a Rogers post-911 EB1 HTC Dream, we need to install Brian Crook’s CM6 port! Flash that sucka! Optionally, you can also flash Tiny GApps (search for it) if you wanted all them Google Apps after flashing the bcrook port. Restart your phone now.
Your phone shakes. It boots up. Its still booting at the Rogers screen…did it freeze!? OH DAMM- WHAT!? A CYANOGENMOD BOOT ANIMATION!? YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!! Now, your phone should take at least 5 minutes on the first boot…be patient. And well, there you have it, basically; you should be good to go on enjoying Cyanogenmod on your HTC Dream!
A problem I DID notice with this installation is that I can never shut the phone OFF. What I mean is, when I click Power Off, it’ll power off…THEN REBOOT ITSELF! Oh well, its not like you’ll ever REALLY need to shut your phone off, right? 😛
🙂<--click