Telus Galaxy S2 (T989D) Ultimate Root and Optimization Guide with Steps

[bruddah]

I need some help :S i tried using the toolkit to root my phone twice and both times i got an error. I stopped trying after the 2nd time. I noticed that SuperUser had been installed onto my phone and now i just noticed that when i try to go to Settings>Developer Options my phone cannot access it. When i try to press developer Options the screen goes black and nothing works. I have to press home a couple of times for me to be able to get back home. Any solutions?

[bmg002]

First, I would like to say thank you for the awesome tutorial. I followed this tutorial to get my SGH-T989D running ICS 4.0.3 rooted and had no difficulty at all (just followed everything to the letter and read through everything 3 times before I even began... yeah, I'm paranoid, but phones are not cheap).

I have a question about the custom kernel/roms you suggested: With BeastMod you say to use Mr. X's synergy Kernel, but with Mr. X's ROM you say to use stock with CIQ removed. Is there anything wrong with using Mr. X's ROM with Mr. X's Synergy kernel or is this pair not a safe bet?

IF the kernels are compatible with each other, I am thinking of trying to dual boot the phone to handle both Mr. X's ROM and BeastMod... just so I can evaluate both of them and swap ROMs any time I need to reboot (this allows me to do a better evaluation of the ROM as I am mostly concerned with stability and compatibility with my current applications/games and currently I am needing to reboot roughly once every 2 or 3 days to keep the phone happy).

I am wondering about compatibility because when trying to install a custom kernel on my SGH-T959D, I picked an incompatible kernel (Synergy... read good reviews and decided to try it not realizing it wasn't compatible with my phone) and got stuck in a boot-loop... it was a brick. Couldn't get into download, couldn't get into recovery, it showed the splash screen and if I was QUICK, I could get ADB to get into the logs where it was having an issue with the hardware abstraction layer drivers which forced it to reboot. Brought it back to telus and tried telling them that it was a bad update via Kies, but they didn't buy it and I had to get a new phone... so I went with the SGH-T989D (at the suggestion of the gal working at the telus store).
I am just being cautious because I don't want to end up with the same brick I did with the SGH-T959D, but I am finding the stock kernel/rom is eating up more battery than I like and at times, things are not as responsive as I would like... I am also having issues with MTP, but both Telus and Samsung are telling me to wipe it to fix the issue and I'm thinking that if I am wiping anyways, why not pop a custom kernel and ROM on as well.

One last question: are the recommended kernel/roms ICS or GGB?

[bmg002]

I need some help :S i tried using the toolkit to root my phone twice and both times i got an error. I stopped trying after the 2nd time. I noticed that SuperUser had been installed onto my phone and now i just noticed that when i try to go to Settings>Developer Options my phone cannot access it. When i try to press developer Options the screen goes black and nothing works. I have to press home a couple of times for me to be able to get back home. Any solutions?

I think I found your problem: you followed the instructions for rooting a TELUS Galaxy S2 (SGH-T989D) on your RAZR. That will not work. If you are LUCKY, a factory reset of your phone may fix it... if that doesn't fix it (which I imagine it won't), you will need to find a factory Kernel/ROM for your phone and flash that onto your phone WITH the appropriate software for flashing a RAZR. I don't have a RAZR so I can't be too much help, but the guys here on Howard Forums OR on XDA-Developers.com can probably help more with that.

[o2qc418]

I think I found your problem: you followed the instructions for rooting a TELUS Galaxy S2 (SGH-T989D) on your RAZR. That will not work. If you are LUCKY, a factory reset of your phone may fix it... if that doesn't fix it (which I imagine it won't), you will need to find a factory Kernel/ROM for your phone and flash that onto your phone WITH the appropriate software for flashing a RAZR. I don't have a RAZR so I can't be too much help, but the guys here on Howard Forums OR on XDA-Developers.com can probably help more with that.

bruddah
Give me back my RAZR! <------ lol this a a msg tied with your avatar and the number of msg you have posted ...

[bruddah]

bruddah
Give me back my RAZR! <------ lol this a a msg tied with your avatar and the number of msg you have posted ...

lool yeah bmg002 i dnt own a razr xP i own a samsung galaxy s2 t989D

[bmg002]

lool yeah bmg002 i dnt own a razr xP i own a samsung galaxy s2 t989D

Ok, well, I can try to help then. I am not a dev or nothing, just a Galaxy S 2 T989D owner myself and I followed this tutorial to root my phone.
So, Odin gave you errors. What error did you recieve? Was your phone plugged into a USB 2.0 port? Were you using the cable that originally came with your phone? What is the Android version, Baseband version, and Kernel version on your phone right now? All 4 questions are important.
The exact error message can help in diagnosing what went wrong.
A USB 2.0 port is required for doing things like this with the SGH-T989D from what I have read online (a USB hub is not recommended either, using the back USB ports on your PC is the recommended method)
Using a cheap cable can affect data rates (it shouldn't cause problems, but others have reported that changing cables resolved their issues)
and the versions can ensure that you have a version of android that can be rooted via this method.

[Fenrry]

My take and a question, I was running mine using a 3rd party Kernel, Kies was fine, didn't touch the phone for a thing while it was updating, I was using the latest version of Kies by the way, also I have Mobilicity.

Update went fine but after it was finished I have this weird N icon over the notification bar, is it for Wi-Fi N available?, also Mobilicity doesn't come as Mobilicity but CDN Roaming...it takes some time to kick but it works, anyway, looking at the apps, I saw SU and most of the old apps, a few new mainly from Telus, SU and anything that needs root will not work, so I did the sensitive and logical thing, reset the phone...WAFKPITA...Mobilicity still doesn't show and manual set doesn't work, auto search works but is slow, I will root sometime later, now I have to nap...btw, what's the N icon?..now it's gone!

Upd: who the fk came with this great idea of removing the contacts from the phone app...really?...any way to have them show in the phone app instead of a separate app?

[Fenrry]

Ok, i just updated...rooted...SU doesn't work...for some reason...but also I hate this update, phone is slower than before, Phone app has no contacts, I get this shtupid screen after every call that is extremely retarded, "Do you want to redial?"...really?...rubbish...no better word...

[Oink]

There are several conflicting threads on various sites, including here and xda, and I hope I can get some definitive answers here regarding my Samsung Galaxy S2x (SGH-T989D), which unfortunately has to go back to Telus.

Phone is rooted, otherwise stock everything. Unless rooting alter the stock rom somehow.

Rooting was done through Odin using "recovery-cmw-hercules.tar" and "CWM-SuperSU-v0.87.zip".

Questions:
What is the quickest way to revert to stock, unroot, reverse-rooting? Is flash stock ROM the only option?

Will a factory reset get rid of my root? Can I just delete the superuser files from the system directory?

"Custom binary" counter says "NO" and current binary is "Samsung Official", I assume it means I do not need to reset the flash counter


Thank you very much in advance.

[bruddah]

Ok, well, I can try to help then. I am not a dev or nothing, just a Galaxy S 2 T989D owner myself and I followed this tutorial to root my phone.
So, Odin gave you errors. What error did you recieve? Was your phone plugged into a USB 2.0 port? Were you using the cable that originally came with your phone? What is the Android version, Baseband version, and Kernel version on your phone right now? All 4 questions are important.
The exact error message can help in diagnosing what went wrong.
A USB 2.0 port is required for doing things like this with the SGH-T989D from what I have read online (a USB hub is not recommended either, using the back USB ports on your PC is the recommended method)
Using a cheap cable can affect data rates (it shouldn't cause problems, but others have reported that changing cables resolved their issues)
and the versions can ensure that you have a version of android that can be rooted via this method.

i have android 4.0.4 and im using my stock cable with a usb 2.0 port. i posted on XDA and someone there said to try to toggle signature verification but idk how to do that. I searched around and it said something bout going to the zip install file on my sd card but it wont open when i try to open it on my phone. Some other people said something about cmw but idk what cmw is :$

im pretty sure this is the error:

E: Error in sd/card/root/zip
(status 0 _
Installation aborted

EDIT: LOL NVM i found out what cwm is xD

[bruddah]

i checked and apparently my phone was rooted :P i checked using quite a few apps and they said i was rooted so i went ahead and flashed CWM and then i flashed cyanogen but i think i may be stuck in a bootloop. Its been starting and its just at the bootscreen for about 10 mins. I deleted the Dalvik cache aswell.

[eye_create]

i checked and apparently my phone was rooted :P i checked using quite a few apps and they said i was rooted so i went ahead and flashed CWM and then i flashed cyanogen but i think i may be stuck in a bootloop. Its been starting and its just at the bootscreen for about 10 mins. I deleted the Dalvik cache aswell.

Install Darkside Cache Wipe. Older versions of CWM don't work that well when wiping cache and fixing permissions.

[bmg002]

i checked and apparently my phone was rooted :P i checked using quite a few apps and they said i was rooted so i went ahead and flashed CWM and then i flashed cyanogen but i think i may be stuck in a bootloop. Its been starting and its just at the bootscreen for about 10 mins. I deleted the Dalvik cache aswell.

I also recommend the darkside cache wipe. I am glad to know you got your phone rooted though.
Now a few thoughts on the bootloop you are experiencing:
1) you flashed cyanogen for the T989 or T989D correct? I have not seen many versions of Cyanogen for the T989 which is why I haven't gone down that route yet.
2) can you still get into recovery/download mode? If so, you can always reflash to something else
3) you made a nandroid backup before flashing cyanogen, correct? if so, you should be able to go back to that point without any issues
4) you wiped the phone before flashing cyanogen, correct?
5) you installed it via the appropriate method, correct? What I mean is, if you downloaded an odin image, you installed it through odin OR if you downloaded a cwm/twrp image, you installed it through cwm/twrp, correct?

I have never run cyanogen on the T989D, so I cannot comment much on how the install process for it works. But I do know (from my T959D) that if you flash an incorrect kernel or rom onto your phone, you do risk bricking it (flashed the kernel "semaphore" which is for the I9100 onto the T959D and it wouldn't boot at all... no recovery or download mode and the log cat was complaining about the hardware application layer failling... it was a brick... that was when I got my T989D).

Hopefully the above info helps. Good luck with the phone.
If you can't get cyanogen working, you could try a different rom. I have been running jedi mind trick for a little bit now and am happy with it (it is based on Android 4.0.3). And I have heard good things about Jedi Knight (it is based on Android 4.0.4).

[bruddah]

I also recommend the darkside cache wipe. I am glad to know you got your phone rooted though.
Now a few thoughts on the bootloop you are experiencing:
1) you flashed cyanogen for the T989 or T989D correct? I have not seen many versions of Cyanogen for the T989 which is why I haven't gone down that route yet.
2) can you still get into recovery/download mode? If so, you can always reflash to something else
3) you made a nandroid backup before flashing cyanogen, correct? if so, you should be able to go back to that point without any issues
4) you wiped the phone before flashing cyanogen, correct?
5) you installed it via the appropriate method, correct? What I mean is, if you downloaded an odin image, you installed it through odin OR if you downloaded a cwm/twrp image, you installed it through cwm/twrp, correct?

I have never run cyanogen on the T989D, so I cannot comment much on how the install process for it works. But I do know (from my T959D) that if you flash an incorrect kernel or rom onto your phone, you do risk bricking it (flashed the kernel "semaphore" which is for the I9100 onto the T959D and it wouldn't boot at all... no recovery or download mode and the log cat was complaining about the hardware application layer failling... it was a brick... that was when I got my T989D).

Hopefully the above info helps. Good luck with the phone.
If you can't get cyanogen working, you could try a different rom. I have been running jedi mind trick for a little bit now and am happy with it (it is based on Android 4.0.3). And I have heard good things about Jedi Knight (it is based on Android 4.0.4).

I saw the video for the Rom Manager app and it said that it only shows mods that will work with your phone so i assumed that it would work. Yeah i can get in to the recovery mode for CWM but i just wana get rid of my root. Honestly that bootloop really scared me so im going to stay off of roms for a bit. Im fine with just unrooting and re-rooting just to get google wallet or i may not even bother at this time. i dont know if i made a nandroid backup i dont think i did :$ i think i may have when i initially tried to root my phone using the Rooting toolkit i downloaded on my computer. No i did not wipe my phone before installing cyanogen i wiped the Dalvik cache and thats about it. The video i saw about the Rom Manager app said that it should work and everything and the video was sponsered on the page for the app on the Play Store. Do any on you have any solutions of how i can unroot without loosing all my stuff? also thanks for the idea ill think about using Jedi Mind trick or Jedi Knight .

[bruddah]

does anyone have a stock telus ics odin flashable rom?