In many ways, and quite intentionally, the Nexus One is a break from the traditional cell phone pattern to which American consumers have become accustomed. For one, you can’t just walk into a cell phone store and purchase a Nexus One. Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, the Nexus One is not bound to a particular carrier. This means that you can pull out the T-Mobil SIM card that came with your card (or even order one without a SIM card at all) and stick in a SIM card from another provider and your phone will work just fine.
Now this is a pretty big departure from the way most cell phones are distributed in the United States and Canada. Almost all phones sold in North America come with custom ROMs that prevent you from using them on any other cell phone network than the one that sold you the phone. This is not the case in Europe and Asia, where the phones, like the Nexus One, will work with any provider, as long as the hardware is compatible with the network.
For years, companies in North America have been offering a service where they will “unlock” your phone and allow you to remove the custom ROM that prevents your phone from connecting to any network. Because of this, “Unlocking” has become synonymous with allowing your phone.
Ok, with this bit of background, let’s jump into the definitions:
“Unlocking”: In the USA, this has come to mean freeing your cell phone from it’s carrier. Buy a phone on AT&T, “unlock” it and then use it with a Sprint or T-Mobile SIM card.
Unlock: Opening your phone’s operating system so you can install custom ROMs. All phones, even the Nexus One, come locked, which prevents you from updating or modifying the device’s ROM. Unlocking a phone allows you to do real damage to your device, including completely killing it (known as “bricking”, because your phone has become as useful as a brick). Because of this, many manufacturers (including HTC) will void your warranty if you unlock your phone. You can tell if your Nexus One is unlocked because a little unlocked padlock will show up in your boot-graphic. (I am trying to get a picture of this and will update this blog post if I can get one.)
Rooting: Rooting a phone (or any device) is the process by which you acquire “root” access to the device. ”Root” is simply the unix term for “superuser” or “administrator”, and devices with linux like operating systems will use the word “root” when they talk about getting full access to a device. With root access, you can do lots of things that the makers of the phone (and the custom ROMs) don’t really want you to do…but that’s what makes it fun!
I hope that clears up the confusion…I will be checking the comments if there are more questions. Next blog I will talk about the online resources available for those who want to get their hands a bit dirty with unlocking and rooting their Nexus One.
