[How to] Root Android Ice Cream Sandwich Without Odin (using CWM)

This method is tested by me on S2 and is tested by others on: Samsung + non Samsung phones. No more waiting for custom kernels! This method is the safest and most reliable as it keeps your original stock kernel and it doesn’t use odin to “flash” a new kernel; in addition, no custom mod is applied! We are not responsible for any damage that may be caused to any phone. Just to relax you, if you follow the steps as described it’s most likely that you will not end up with a bricked phone. Please read and understand the whole article before starting the root process. This is the step by step procedure for Samsung Galaxy S2 (GT-i1900), instructions for other devices can be found at the end of this post.   Instructions:

For i9100 ICS users and some other phones: you can skip these steps and flash directly the signed zip in stock recovery 3e to root To get temporary cwm (to make nandroid backups…) or if stock recovery gives you a signature error, follow these universal steps:

• Download recovery-clockwork-4.0.1.5-galaxys2.zip, the last cwm for i9100 Galaxy S2. This is the non touch version working with volume up/down keys and power button to select menu For other phones, download the cwm image from here http://clockworkmod.com/rommanager

• Put the previously downloaded recovery-clockwork-4.0.1.5-galaxys2.zip file on your external sd card

• Download the root file:

  – CWM_Root_SuperSU.0.94-Busybox.1.20.2-S2-signed.zip for Chainfire SuperSU (the one that comes with CF_Root)

  – CWM_Root_Superuser_3.1.3_Busybox_1.20.2-signed.zip if you prefer the classic ChainsDD superuser.

  I advise SuperSU for 2 reasons: it lets you unroot from within superSU application and it lets you migrate to ChainsDD superuser if you like later

• Copy the CWM_Root_XXX.zip file you downloaded to internal sd card

• Boot into stock recovery (volume up+home+power), and select “apply update from external storage”. Now select the recovery-clockwork-4.0.1.5-galaxys2.zip file you copied in previous step (this step gives a temporary flash that will disappear after reboot)

• You get CWM recovery interface (this custom recovery is temporary, not permanent)

• Inside CWM, select “install zip from sdcard”. Then, select “choose zip from sdcard”. Now, scroll down to the“CWM_Root_XXX.zip” file and hit power button to install it.

• It will add SuperSU or Superuser last version apk to system/app, last superuser binary (su) to system/xbin and busybox last version to system/xbin, all with correct file permissions.

• Reboot and you get permanent root + busybox installed on your stock kernel.

• To unroot, do the above steps and replace the file CWM_Root_XXX.zip by the attached CWM_Unroot_SuperUser-Busybox-Uninstaller-Update1-signed.zip. It will delete superuser, su and busybox files

Here’s my source, don’t forget to say thank you 😉 s2tip.blogspot.com