DISCLAIMER: This guide is currently incomplete. It is a work in progress.

Better Guide to Rooting Droid Incredible

Boot while holding power key and center key
Pick fast boot, which will fail b/c it can't find a file
Pick recovery
Phone will reach ! triangle screen

This is the tricky part: you're trying to get the phone into recovery mode while connected to the computer.

This will allow you to push a special update.zip to the memory card and apply the update, which is actually something that will root your phone.

Droid Incredible Recovery Mode:

Rooting HTC Incredible

If you try rooting your phone using this guide, please email me and let me know how it worked out for you.

Following video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVHj6J2uCKo

Files used in video available here: http://files.charlesmartinreid.com/HTC_Droid_Incredible_Root.zip

1. Extract the HTC_Droid_Incredible_Root.zip file to a folder with the same name

2. Open the folder and launch HTCSync2.0.25.exe and complete the installation

3. Copy the sdk directory into the root of the C drive, in C:\sdk

4. Open C:\sdk and run SDK Setup.exe

a) you may get an error about https, if you do then close the window with the error message and click "Settings" on the left-hand side, then check the box that says Force https:// sources to be fetched using http://)

b) you may also need to update the version of the Tools. Click on "Available Packages" on the left-hand side of the "Android SDK and AVD Manager" window, and then check the "Android SDK Tools" box, and then click "Install Selected".

5. Go back to the unzipped HTC Droid Incredible Root folder and open command.txt

6. Open a Windows command prompt (Start > Run > "cmd")

7. Change directory to C:\sdk\tools by running

> cd\
> cd sdk
> cd tools

8. Run the adb (android debug bridge [1]) shell

> adb shell

Alternatively...

You may see a file named adb_has_moved.txt with the following content:

If you see this, go back to C:\sdk\ and re-launch SDK Manager.exe. This should come up with a window that says "Choose Packages to Install." Find "Android SDK Platform-tools, revision 3 or something similar. Click "Install". This will download for a while, then install.

Then you can launch the adb shell:

> cd\
> cd sdk
> cd platform-tools
> adb shell

The desired message is "error: device not found". This is good.

9. Turn on USB Debug Mode (Setting > Applications > Development)

10. Make sure your phone is disconnected. Power it down. Hold down the trackball button (on the bottom, in the center) and the power button together. Release when the phone screen turns on.

11. Wait 10 seconds and connect your phone to the computer with the USB cable.

12. Wait 10 seconds (approximately) while the drivers are automatically installed.

13. Press the power button to execute the Android's "FASTBOOT" option (it's already selected). It will give an error, because it is looking for a file that it cannot find on the memory card. This is expected/good.

(If the Windows device driver popup gives an error, this is OK.)

14. Hit the Volume Down key to pick the Android's "RECOVERY" option, and press the power button to execute the option. The phone will vibrate, then restart. It should show an exclamation point next to a phone icon.

(Again, if the Windows device driver popup gives an error, this is OK.)

15. What you want is to run the "adb shell" command and have the "Device not found" message go away. There are two methods for doing this:

a) Keep running adb shell after the phone icon with the red exclamation point appears on the screen. You want a message that says "- exec '/system/bin/sh' failed: No such file or directory".

b) If the above does not work (if it says "Device not found" or "Device offline"), turn off the phone, then hold the Volume Down and Power buttons until it turns on. It will fail again with the "FASTBOOT" option. Once it fails, press and hold Volume Down and Power. At this point, you will want to start running loop.bat, which contains the following:

@ECHO OFF
:TOP
adb shell
goto TOP

This should eventually change from "Device not found" to "Device offline" or "- exec '/system/bin/sh' failed: No such file or directory". Once this happens, you're good to go. Press Control + C to kill the loop.

15. Hold Volume Up and Power buttons, which brings up a System Recovery menu, which is at the top of the screen in blue text. Select the second option, "Apply sdcard:update.zip", using Volume Down to select the second option and the Power button to execute it. This should fail with an error, with text in yellow in the middle of the screen. This fails because there is no "update.zip" file on your sdcard. That's expected/good.

16. Execute 1.bat, which will upload some files. The contents of 1.bat are:

adb push payload-update.zip /sdcard/update.zip

adb shell 
su
export PATH=$PATH:/system/bin
cat /sdcard/Superuser.apk > /system/app/Superuser.apk
cat /sdcard/su > /system/bin/su
ln -s /system/bin/su /system/xbin/su
chmod 06755 /system/xbin/su
reboot