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http://www.droidforums.net/forum/android-roms/45504-updated-droid-rom-links-kernels-themes.html "but not touch the kernel" Wrong. "KERNELS: (please read developer's posts carefully on installation instructions, ROM compatibility, and notes) - ChevyNo1(see ROMS above for other kernels): http://www.droidforums.net/forum/chevyno1/32272-update-new-kernels-low-voltage-medium-voltage-3-25-2010-a.html - Bekit: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1123576/Android/bekit_kernels/0.8/bekit_boot-links.html - P3Droid kernels: http://www.p3designs.info/kernels/ - P3Droid kernels for Koush ROM: http://www.mydroidworld.com/forums/p...ur-flavor.html - Team Chaos kernels: Kernels Thread - Jake's kernels: http://ninebysix.com/page.cfm/android-dev/droid-dev - Dave12308's kernels: http://www.mydroidworld.com/forums/dave12308/" You simply have no idea what the fuck you're talking about.

http://www.droidforums.net/forum/android-roms/45504-updated-droid-rom-links-kernels-themes.html "but not touch the kernel" Wrong. "KERNELS: (please read developer's posts carefully on installation instructions, ROM compatibility, and notes) - ChevyNo1(see ROMS above for other kernels): http://www.droidforums.net/forum/chevyno1/32272-update-new-kernels-low-voltage-medium-voltage-3-25-2010-a.html - Bekit: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1123576/Android/bekit_kernels/0.8/bekit_boot-links.html - P3Droid kernels: http://www.p3designs.info/kernels/ - P3Droid kernels for Koush ROM: http://www.mydroidworld.com/forums/p...ur-flavor.html - Team Chaos kernels: Kernels Thread - Jake's kernels: http://ninebysix.com/page.cfm/android-dev/droid-dev - Dave12308's kernels: http://www.mydroidworld.com/forums/dave12308/" You simply have no idea what the fuck you're talking about.

There are a number of Android phones that can have custom (or vanilla) roms flashed onto them. It's not really any harder now than reinstalling a stock version of an OS on your pc (instead of the rescue disks crap they give you now). The vast majority of the process is quite automated now.

See http://www.mydroidworld.com/ and their forums for the current state of what phones can bee rooted and what phones can be reflashed and with what. Heck many of the phones can even be overclocked if you so desire :)

Someone will find a way around this very quickly

It's not even clear if this information is real. TFA links to a forum post which doesn't seem to actually contain a source of the information (the OP states it's a mix of "hard information" and "conjecture"). Said forum post then links to the eFUSE wikipedia article, which lists Droid X as having an implementation of eFUSE. However, if you look at the Droid X wikipedia page linked to from there, you'll see the original mobilecrunch.com is what is cited for the eFUSE inclusion bit.

I'm not saying there is something fishy going on, but this could easily not be true.

Sounds like an astro-tufing campaign using fox news or coulter style circular references (stewart loves dismantling these on the daily show).

I'm a fan of the mac platform, but this looks like a clever ploy by *cough* certain competitors *cough* to tarnish the platform in general. It's the pavlovian training with inconsistent stimuli.. "one android phone has this horrible bomb in it, I wonder how many others have undiscovered 'features' ".

That particular quotation was taken directly from here.

While “trip” is not the correct word to use in correlation to a fuse, this isn’t really a fuse – it’s on-chip circuitry:

If certain sub-systems fail, or are taking too long to respond, or are consuming too much power, the chip can instantly change its behavior by 'blowing' an eFUSE. This process does not physically destroy the eFUSE, so it is reversible and repeatable, using JTAG programming.

As such (IMHO, at least), “trip” actually does seem to be a fairly acceptable word for this action.

So a guy [p3droid] few know posts a speculative comment

So this post is a mix of hard information and a bit of conjecture on my part (guesses).

and /. takes it as fact? At least p3droid has the courtesy to warn his readers what a conjecture is and that's all his post is.

Someone will find a way around this very quickly

It's not even clear if this information is real. TFA links to a forum post which doesn't seem to actually contain a source of the information (the OP states it's a mix of "hard information" and "conjecture"). Said forum post then links to the eFUSE wikipedia article, which lists Droid X as having an implementation of eFUSE. However, if you look at the Droid X wikipedia page linked to from there, you'll see the original mobilecrunch.com is what is cited for the eFUSE inclusion bit.

I'm not saying there is something fishy going on, but this could easily not be true.

I did follow the TFA to the origin of the story (MyDroidWorld forum), and I still don't see any code, captured data or even a photo of the said eFuse chip inside the DroidX. I understand that the original poster appears to be a reputable hacker, but come on, what kind of real reporting is this? Can anyone else verify these claims? More information needed, thank you very much whoever posts it, because if true, this is an outrage.

TFA doesn't explain what an "eFuse" is, but if it's anything like an actual fuse, then shorting it should be easy enough.

If you follow the link in the story to here, it says:

The eFuse is coded with information that it either looks for or is passed to it from the bootloader. The bootloader is loaded with information it looks for when it begins the boot-up process. (I have seen the sbf file look for a certain bootloader when it begins so its safe to assume that this is the process).

Once the the eFuse verifies that the information it is looking for or that has been passed through to it by the bootloader is correct then the boot process continues. What type of information is written to the bootloader? So far i've been able to verify that the firmware information (what we call ROMS), the kernel information, and the bootloader version.

If the eFuse failes to verify this information then the eFuse receives a command to "blow the fuse" or "trip the fuse". This results in the booting process becoming corrupted and resulting in a permanent bricking of the Phone. This FailSafe is activated anytime the bootloader is tampered with or any of the above three parts of the phone has been tampered with.

Basically, they've added trusted computing to a phone.

The eFuse is the gatekeeper -- if it detects that you've done something they haven't approved, it causes the phone to self destruct.

So far, it doesn't seem like this is an easy thing to work around.

I've seen people have rooted and installed custom ROMs on their Android phones. Are you looking for source code, or something more?