Big debate. S3 or One X

[Khare]

My csc is oxa

[Jay]

My csc is oxa

As is mine.

[Wazzzer]

Jay where did you download yours from?

Here's mine...

[Jay]

From SamMobile


There's a load of FUD being spread about about CSC's from what I've been reading - got bored of the bickering and gave up reading after 5 minutes

[Wazzzer]

Any chance you could send it over to me mate?

Edit - Don't worry I've got it downloading

[Wazzzer]

All done, flashed the Sam mobile version over and I have a CSC again

Kies still only half connects but I can view the phone in windows explorer so that's good enough for me

[Adam]

I'v defected from the Apple brand and bought myself a Samsung S3 after selling the Iphone 5....Can someone explain what rooting gives you over the standard ROM?

[Jay]

Welcome 

Access to apps that will let you do certain things you can't while not rooted. There is a great little app called wifikill which lists all other wireless devices on the WAP you're connected to and lets you "kill" their network connection without disconnecting them

One great example is taking a bit for bit backup of your phone, called a NANDroid backup (because it  backs up your NAND flash memory) - another is modifying the system how you want, including certain GUI changes you can't always achieve with alternate launchers (I really like NOVA Premium with stock Jelly Bean theme).

You can also flash custom ROM's which change the UI / System menu's and give a different set of features - but I've found Samsung's TouchWiz has a lot of good features which other roms don't have (unless they're based on Samsung's).

Or you can stay stock if you don't need root. Another nice feature about the S3 is the USB OTG, pickup a USB OTG cable on ebay/amazon for less than a quid and you can plug in additional storage/BlueTooth devices etc

Did you consider the Nexus 4 at all? £280 for a 16GB device that's way faster than the S3 similar size screen, but no SD card which is unfortunately a deal breaker for me, because 16Gb just isn't enough.

[Adam]

So overall is it an easy process to do? What do I use? And chance of permanently bricking the phone?

I did look at the nexus 4 but the looks, lack of as card, and the fact its made by LG is my deal breaker.

[Jay]

Very simple to do, if you ever wanted. There is always a chance something will go wrong, unlikely, but you never can say it's 100% going to work. There are "devs" with a few hundred flash markers and they've never had an issue.

For the simplest method you'll need access to Windows. Download Odin and the root package, extract them both, start Odin, Choose PDA and the root package to flash, leave all check boxes as they are unless otherwise stated in the instructions, click GO.

ChainFire has a different method of rooting now, but you can still use the root that gives you a custom recovery to do backup/restore/wipes/partitioning SD cards etc The only thing to bare in mind is that you'll need to use Triangle away to reset the flash counter for wattanty purposes & this doesn't seem to get rid of the custom status in download mode - at least on my phone.
My mothers HTC Desire S had been unlocked and it wouldn't boot after flashing a custom rom, then it wouldn't boot after flashing with a stock HTC rom - sent it to Voda/HTC came back a week later with the latest stock rom on it.

See this thread for full details.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1695238