Gadgetory

hey guys so what's the bootloader I know we've thrown that word around quite a bit but what is it why is it there what does it do why is it so difficult to unlock that's what we're going to talk about today on the very first episode of Android power user whoa whoa whoa Android power user what's that isn't this supposed to be the Android guy weakly so the evolution of that let me tell you why we're changing things up just a little bit okay we're changing things up a lot but what we're doing is we're taking what was originally kind of an editorial with some technical roots that a lot of you have told us was a little bit long-winded and I'll be the first to agree and we're turning it into something that's going to take regular Android users and turn them into Android power users so where does that leave all of you power users already well this is going to help us get back to our roots and establish a firm foundation teach us a lot about stuff that we may know a little bit about but a lot of detail about what's there why it's there why we have it and what we can do to get around it at least in the case of today's video so today's topic is what is the bootloader before we talk about that we've got to talk about what is booting it's an unusual word booting in a computer we use it every day but what does it mean and where did it come from well when you are getting up to do a job whether that's in the military whether that's a private contractor whether that's at a desk you know like me one of the first things you do after you get dressed is you put your boots on that's where the term bootstrapping comes from bootstrapping helps you put your boots on faster you put straps on your boots you can pull them up quicker so when you're booting up that means you're putting your boots on you're getting ready to go to work that's what that term comes from so now that we've got that out of the way what's the bootloader well the bootloader is code that runs really before any operating system loads its purpose is essentially like your brain telling you how to put your boots on once you get your boots on then go out and build a bridge or dig a hole or put up a fence or launch a rocket to Mars all of those things are different their operating system things that your brain does but first and foremost you got to put your boots on and you got to load that up you got it hit the ground and go to work that's what the boot loader does you can have a boot loader that boots up Android you could have a boot loader that boots up Windows Phone you can have a boot loader that boots up iOS or Windows or Linux or any one of those they all do kind of the same job but in different ways but they all have to start with that boot loader so it's custom code it sits there and essentially just waits for a kernel and waits for an operating system so it can boot right up and get to work boot loaders are very Hardware specific in fact every smartphone that you have out there and retablos even every desktop and laptop computer they're all going to have different boot loaders they're specific to the board that they're running on that's one reason why there's no two ways to unlock a boot loader that's exactly the same because all the boot loaders are different now you're thinking wait a minute Android is open-source I should be able to get in there and do that really fast really easy right androids open-source boot loaders aren't they're proprietary to the manufacturer that makes the device that gets us to our next question why our bootloader is locked it's a good question very frustrating question luckily we've got really smart members in the community who can unlock boot loaders very quickly sometimes we get stumbling blocks but why are they locked in the first place well it comes down to a couple reasons first of all you've got carriers carriers want to limit you to what they tell you you can do they've done all this demographics they've studied all this stuff they know what's best for you at least that's what they think they also know they've only got a certain amount of bandwidth on their networks so they can't let you do everything because then you could gobble up all of their bandwidth and that would hurt everybody from a manufacturer standpoint they might lock their bootloader because they don't want you getting in there and messing with it now why wouldn't they want you doing that well they're the ones who have to warranty these things and if you break your device after you've had it two days it's going to cost them money to fix it for you now luckily they're going to be able to say you unlock your bootloader and did something to it and broke it so that's not covered by warranty but they still don't even want the call because the call takes money and of course that makes you frustrated and upset you're going to tell the Twitterverse about how terrible manufacturer XYZ is because their phone doesn't work anymore and you're just going to leave out the fact that you were trying to unlock the bootloader and bricked it so they don't want the negative press either so why would someone want to unlock their bootloader well very simply people want to be able to do stuff with their phones that they might not be able to and when I say phones I mean tablets as well you want to do stuff maybe you want to overclock great you've got to unlock your bootloader probably throw on a custom kernel maybe you want to run a custom ROM like CyanogenMod or a okp great you got to unlock your bootloader flash custom rom you just got to do it maybe all you want to do is run some apps that aren't available on your phone Wow okay unlock your bootloader and install them you don't always have to do it for custom apps but sometimes you do case in point you want to be able to run apps that require root permissions to get root generally speaking you got to unlock your bootloader and say it with me flash your custom ROM or unlock your bootloader and unlock access to root install all the stuff that you need for root that's something else we'll talk about that in an upcoming video but there are lots and lots of reasons you want to tether on your device but you don't have a tethering app on your device great unlock your bootloader and go ahead and do it you want to run Google Wallet before it was available everywhere great unlock your bootloader and flash that Google Wallet apk onto your device and brick your secure element like I did in the past but that's a risk that you take when you're unlocking your bootloader and that's why it's locked so that's a just a very quick overview about why we have bootloaders what it is so we've got two things to talk about in our comments today first thing is boot loaders questions comments why do you unlock your bootloader why why do you leave it locked what do you want to do to to make you have to unlock it and what are some reasons why you might not ever want to unlock it let us know down in the comments just write down below okay go ahead and do that of course this is where I'm going to put in the plug if you liked the video give it a big thumbs up tell your friends about it the second part of the comments this is our first Android power user episode it's still in its infancy and it's still growing and developing we want to know what you want out of this okay we've kind of evolved from the editorial flavor of the Android guy weekly and we were moving more and more towards educational topics as we were going and really found out you know this is this is something that deserves a different format a different show that's why we're here we're going to do a lot tighter coupling of the video with the article over at pocketnow.com so make sure you head over to the article itself the link is going to be right down there if you're watching this on youtube it's right there okay click on that go to pocket now and you can get details that aren't in the video over at pocketnow.com you can also kind of talk about that in the conversation over there in the the comments on that article as well but we want to know today what do you think of the new format how do you want it to change we're going to try and keep these relatively short with more detail over at the article so you want to go over there and get that let us know what you think and how you like it good alright for PocketNow and the android power user weekly I'm Joe Levi and thanks for watching you