It’s good to know that you won’t have to resort to shady methods if you want to unlock your HTC One’s bootloader, especially since you probably want to root your HTC One.
Like many other manufacturers these days, HTC has provided users, especially developer and modder types, in a completely legal way.
The great thing about having a legal option is that there is still is a possibility that you won’t completely void your warranty.
If you want to do this for whatever reason, the HTCdev website has all of the resources that you need to do so.
There are a heap of reasons why you should do this.
Flash a Custom ROM
A custom ROM is basically a custom version of the Android operating system that is running on your phone.
Installing a Custom ROM has a lot of possible benefits. Flashing a custom ROM will allow you to get a newer version of Android, with tons of new features, that your manufacturer might not have yet.
A custom ROM will also come with lots of features that will allow you to do things like overclocking (which boosts performance) and underclocking (which boost battery life).
Custom ROMs will also free you from all of the uninstallable crapware that comes preinstalled on your device. This give you better performance, more battery life, and more room for things you actually need.
Root and Flash a New Kernel
A kernel is basically the bridge between your operating system (your ROM) that your device’s hardware. Flashing a custom kernel can also (together with the ROM you are using) significantly boost the performance of your device.
In order for you to flash a custom kernel, you need to root your device first. This will give you “root access” which will allow you to make changes at an administrator level. In order for you to root your HTC One, you first need to unlock the bootloader.
The following will work with all of these models:
The Prerequisites:
Fully Charge your phone.
Turn off Fastboot in the battery manager in the settings menu.
Got to your phone’s developer options menu and enable USB debugging.
Register an account at HTCdev.
Make sure that you have ADB, Fastboot, and HTC sync installed on your device. All of these resources are available on the HTCdev unlock instructions page that shows up once you initiate the process.
Backup your device data using ADB, and backup all of the files in your storage on your computer. This is important because this process wipes all of the data off of your phone.
Unlocking:
If you have already followed all of the instructions above, you can start the process.
Power down your device.
Press volume down while pressing the power button to start your device in bootloader mode.
Once the menu appears, use the volume buttons to highlight Fastboot and select it using the power button.
Connect your phone to your computer.
Open up a command prompt (or terminal for mac and linux) and type in fastboot oem get_identifier_token
Once you input the command, you will see a line of text appear. Highlight the text that appears.
Note: Start copying from the line, <<<< Identifier Token Start >>>> and end with <<<< Identifier Token End >>>>. Also make sure not to include the <bootloader> or INFO prefixes that appear before each line of code.
Open your browser, load the HTCdev website, and login to your account.
Select Unlock Bootloader and Get Started.
The page you will be brought to contains a disclaimer telling you about the risk associated with doing this.
Select your device from the dropdown list and press Begin Unlock Bootloader. If your device is not in the drop down list, choose All Other Supported Models.
You will then go through different conformation processes and steps that will finally bring you to the first instructions page.
It basically contains all of the steps that we mentioned above. You can use this to check against the steps that we provided to you. The page also includes links to all of the resources that you need to download.
Go to the second page, check all of the instructions just to make sure, and paste the code that you got from the command prompt/terminal in the box found at the lower portion of the page.
Once you submit it, the code will be sent to the email that you used for your HTCdev account.
Download the Unlock_code.bin from you email address and put it in your fastboot folder.
Go back to the command prompt and type fastboot flash unlocktoken Unlock_code.bin
Check your device. The screen will be displaying a message asking you if you want to proceed. Select yes with the volume keys, and confirm the action with the power button.
Once your device restarts, the process has been completed.
Take note that the process works and is practically the same for all HTC devices, including all HTC Models, shipped after September 2011 running whatever version of Android.
However, you should also know that different carriers in different countries have different policies when it comes to unlocking HTC One’s bootloader.
A quick phone call is usually enough to find out what your provider’s policy is.
You can now proceed to root, flash a custom ROM, or whatever you want to do to your device. Enjoy the ride!