Have you ever rooted your mobile phone?

Yes, every one I have owned, I have rooted. And installed different ROMs. Mostly to get rid of the pre-packed crap apps that the vendors included on the phones.

Positive effects: faster, less bloated, often letting me use features that the standard installed packages didn’t include (or didn’t do well).

It’s not for the faint of heart. If you don’t follow the instructions to the letter you can brick your phone.

Yes. To force the phone to install all apps and related data to the SD card, because of the tiny internal memory.
It was a disaster.
There was only one ROM version that allowed rooting, and after that, I got an error message everytime I booted the phone, the thing did not charge at all when plugged into the PC, and only at a snails pace, when plugged into the wall outlet.
Plus the original intent, did not work either.
So I decided to just buy a new phone, instead, the glorious Xiaomi Mi A1.

@elbanditoroso ROMs? As in, physical chips?

^^Yeah..I have heard it can freeze sometimes and can’t do anything in that scenario.What are the odds for that? Also your warranty becomes void once you root your phone I suppose.

I had an original Moto X. I rooted it to try a newer version of Android after official updates stopped. There were no big improvements, and the camera didn’t work, so I reverted to the stock OS after about a week.

I haven’t bother with subsequent phones. The OS hasn’t made huge changes, all new functionality I need is in the apps.

ROMs? As in, physical chips?

ROMs as in image files (to update the flash ROM on the phone).

PC Magazine – Definition of: Android ROM

<strong>(Android Read Only Memory)</strong> A file containing the executable instructions (a system image) of an Android OS and affiliated apps. The “stock ROM” comes installed on the phone or tablet, while a “custom ROM” comes from a third party. The custom ROM is either a uniquely modified OS, such as Cyanogen, or a stock version made available for older devices or for new devices before the vendor release date. See CyanogenMod.

<strong>Flashing the ROM</strong>
Flashing a ROM means installing the system image into the device’s internal flash memory. Flash memory holds the Android’s firmware, the same as most other portable devices with an embedded OS.

It really depends on what you expect from your phone, whether it is worth it or not to take the time to learn to root your phone.

I find it worthwhile. Some do not.

Nope…I’m a chicken when it comes to those kind of things UNLESS I know what I’m doing & in this case I wouldn’t have a clue!!! Depending on who you have your service with, it can invalidate the warranty on the phone.

@Call_Me_Jay Oh I see, ROM images, thanks. :-)

Thank you for explaining what you mean by “rooted”, I was rather taken aback by the question because down here, especially in past decades, the word “rooted” was interchangeable with “fucked”, insofar as sex goes.

^lol..I didn’t know that..)

No.