Posted: June 18, 2010/Under: Mobile Phones & GPS/By: My Digital Life Editorial Team

Rooting the Sprint HTC Evo 4G allows user to gain root access and administrative privilege to the system’s kernel, allowing users the complete control on the smartphone mobile device. Note the the rooting of HTC Evo 4G currently only works on HTC Evo 4G on stock firmware, and is not updated via Sprint OTA update or Sprint RUU. Installing new update or RUU will make the phone unrootable, for now until new hack been hacked. Sprint has released an update to fix SD card storage bug, which also blocks rooting hack.

By following the step-by-step guide below to root HTC Evo 4G, use can flash custom ROM, boot into custom recovery mode, and write to system, boot and recovery partitions through recovery, though Evo owner still cannot write to system or recovery while in Android interface, nor can flash a custom recovery that can be booting into by holding Volume Down button while powering on. Rooting will also require wipe off of all data on the phone.

Prerequisites to Root HTC Evo 4G

WARNING: The rooting of HTC Evo 4G will delete and wipe all data on the phone, so backup (including apps) before proceeding.

How to Root HTC Evo 4G

  1. Plug in the phone into the PC using the USB connection cable. On the notification bar of the Android phone, a “USB Connection” icon should be shown. Open the notifications page, and click on USB Connection option with “Select to manager your USB connection” note.
  2. Select Memory Card Access and click OK to access the phone like a external USB mass storage drive.
  3. Copy the PC36IMG.zip to the root of HTC Evo 4G’s SD card, which typically named as “Removable Disk” drive.
  4. Power off the phone by pressing and holding the Power button for a while, and select Power off followed by OK.
  5. Press and hold Volume Down while powering on the phone. Continue to hold Volume Down button until the whilte bootloader screen is shown.
  6. After a few seconds the phone will begin to checking for files with a blue progress bar. The phone should find PC36IMG.zip.
  7. The phone will list all the images contained in the ZIP file, and ask user if want to flash. Select Yes.
  8. Once flashing of images is completed, the phone will ask user if want to reboot. Select Yes.
  9. The HTC Evo 4G will now boot into a rooted debug ROM, and the phone is basically rooted. However, the debug ROM will not show protected apps in the Market, so continue the following steps to install a rooted version of the stock ROM.
  10. Reconnect the phone to the computer via USB cable and enter the disk drive mode.
  11. Rename the PC36IMG.zip file to any name to prevent it from running whenever user restarts the phone.

How to Flash a Rooted Stock ROM or Custom ROM

  1. Rename recovery-clockwork-1.8.1.7-supersonic.zip to update.zip.
  2. Copy the update.zip to the root of the phone’s SD card.

    Note: This is the ONLY file on SD card to be named “update.zip.” DO NOT rename any other files to “update.zip” or remove this file.

  3. Download the rooted stock ROM: Supersonic_1.32.651.1_rooted.zip

    Note: It’s also possible to replace the stock ROM with any other custom ROM.

  4. Copy Supersonic_1.32.651.1_rooted.zip to the HTC Evo 4G’s SD card.
  5. Power off the phone by pressing and holding the Power button for a while, and select Power off followed by OK.
  6. Press and hold Volume Down while powering on the phone. Continue to hold Volume Down button until the whilte bootloader screen is shown.
  7. Select Recovery from the menu (Power button selects) to enter recovery mode.
  8. When the red exclamation mark appears, press and hold Volume Up button, and then press Power button.
  9. In the menu, select Apply sdcard:update.zip option.
  10. The phone should launch and boot into the ClockworkMod custom recovery, and display the following menu:

    -reboot system now
    -apply sdcard: update.zip
    -wipe data/factory reset
    -wipe cache partition
    -install zip from sdcard
    -nandroid
    -partitions menu
    -advanced
    – *****Go Back*****

  11. Select wipe data/factory reset and confirm the action.
  12. Select wipe cache partition and confirm the action.
  13. Select install zip from sdcard, and then select choose zip from sdcard.
  14. Navigate to the custom ROM (e.g. Supersonic_1.32.651.1_rooted.zip) that want to install on the phone and press Power button to select it.

    A progress bar will be displayed indicating the installation process.

  15. One the ROM is finished installing, select **Go Back**, and then select reboot system now from the menu.
  16. The HTC Evo 4G is now rooted.

Tip: For any reason, user who want to go back to stock ROM build (and remove the root) for HTC Evo 4G can download and run the following original Sprint HTC Evo 4G RUU. This is the only RUU that will still allow Evo 4G to be rooted using method above after flashing.

Original HTC Evo 4G stock ROM RUU: RUU_Supersonic_1.32.651.1_Radio_1.39.00.04.26_release_171253.exe

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