Root and custom recovery of Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc LT15i

April 22, 2012 | Filed under: Android,Featured | Posted by: Sam Turker

The Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc LT15i is one of the most popular handset for it’s style and performance. Despite being overshadowed by dual-core and quad-core devices, the Xperia Arc’s hardware hasn’t discouraged its devoted users.

With the Android development community frequently churning out new mods and tweaks for virtually every Android device available, there are still many ways that Xperia Arc users can optimize and enhance their phones’ hardware. One such method is by rooting your phone and installing custom ROMs.

If you have been a loyal Sony Ericsson fan and still don’t want to replace your Xperia Arc just yet, then you might want to try rooting it and installing custom ROMs for a change. In this post, you’ll learn how to root and install ClockworkMod Recovery (custom recovery) on your Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc LT15i.

Warning

Rooting and unlocking your phone’s bootloader will void your warranty. The methods discussed below are extremely dangerous and could brick your device. We will not be held responsible for whatever happens to your phone. Proceed at your own risk.

Requirements

Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc LT15i
A Windows PC
USB drivers for the Xperia Arc installed on your PC.
Backup of your personal files and important data. You can read our guides on how to backup your data locally and how to backup your data to the cloud.
Enable USB Debugging. You can do this by heading to Settings > Applications > Development > USB Debugging. Make sure that there is a check mark beside that option.
Enable Unknown Sources. You can do this by heading to Menu > Settings Applications > Unknown Sources. Make sure that there is check mark beside that option.

Instructions for Rooting

Download the DooMLoRD rooting script rooting script from here (DooMLoRD_v1_ROOT-zergRush-busybox-su.zip, 1.8 kB)
Extract the contents of the ZIP file using any archiving software such as WinZIP or 7-Zip and save the extracted files to a folder on your PC.
Connect your Xperia Arc to your PC via USB cable. Put your phone in Charge only mode.
On your PC, double-click the RunMe.Bat from the extracted files. Follow the onscreen instructions carefully to start rooting your phone.
After the rooting process is done, reboot your phone.
Verify if you have root access by downloading the SuperUser app for free from the Google Play Store.

Installing ClockworkMod Recovery

Choose any of the three methods/procedures below.

Installing ClockworkMod Recovery 5.0.2.6

Download the ClockworkMod Recovery package from here (CWM-Install.rar, 1.45 MB) and save it to your PC.
Extract the downloaded file using any extracting software such as Winzip or 7-zip and place them in a folder.
Connect your Xperia Arc to your PC via the USB cable.
On your PC, run install-cwm1.cmd from the extracted files.
Follow the onscreen instructions to install ClockworkMod Recovery 5 on your Xperia Arc.
Disconnect your phone.

Installing ClockworkMod Recovery 5.0.2.7

IMPORTANT: For this procedure, your phone needs to be running stock Android 2.3 firmware.

Download Root Explorer from the Google Play Store and install it on your phone.
Download ClockworkMod Recovery (CWM-5.0.2.7-nAa-r2.tar, 2.6 MB) from here and save to your PC.
Extract the downloaded file using any extracting software such as WinRAR or 7-Zip. You should get a folder named system and two subfolders xbin and bin.
Connect your Xperia Arc to your PC.
Copy the extracted folders and files to your phone’s internal SD card.
Disconnect your phone.
On your phone, launch the Root Explorer app.
Using Root Explorer, copy all the contents of the system folder that you copied into the SD card, into the /system directory.
Using Root Explorer, set the permissions of all the copied files, as follows:
1. Owner — Read, Write, Execute
2. Group — Read, Execute
3. Others — Read Execute
Double-check everything (especially /system/bin/chargemon) before rebooting the phone to avoid getting into bootloops.
Reboot your phone.

Xperia CWM Auto Installer

For those of you who don’t want to risk of manually patching up your phone, you can also try the Xperia CWM Auto Installer app that automatically installs ClockworkMod Recovery on your device. You can download the Xperia CWM Auto Installer from the Google Play Store for free or download the app from here. Just launch the application, and press the Install button in the app to install ClockworkMod Recovery on your system.

To boot into ClockworkMod Recovery, reboot your device and press the Volume Down key when the Sony Ericsson logo appears when the notification LED turns blue.

via: androidauthority