How to Root the Sony Xperia Play (R800x) for Verizon
by Jonathan Lonczak
Aug 28, 2011 1:29 PM –
First I want to say that everything written below will void the warranty on your device and probably brick your phone. If you do not like having a warranty on your device and you like your phone as a paperweight and nothing more… read on… and I’ll explain how to root Sony Xperia Play (R800x) for Verizon. (AndroidTapp.com is not responsible so follow at your own risk.) 
Second, this is an advanced root method. If you are not comfortable with Command Prompt, do not know that your USB Port is a Com Port, have not flashed anything through ADB before, and don’t know how to install Windows Drivers then you should not attempt to do anything written below. This is much more complicated then running an application like Gingerbreak or Z4Root; do not attempt this without basic knowledge of the command prompt and ADB.
You have been warned, continuing past this point will brick your phone and void your warranty.
All of the instructions I am sharing below were obtained through these two websites: XDA and The Android Soul; all the credit for this goes to Ashergray, Mills00013, and the people over at The Android Soul. I am just writing a slightly more detailed “how to” in order to make the great instructions they gave to make more sense for Windows users plus put all of this great information in one place!
The first step for gaining root on your Sony Xperia Play R800x is to unlock your phone’s bootloader. In order to do this you will first need to send a private message to Ashergray on XDA and request a bootloader unlock code for your device. In the message you send to him please include your phone’s MEID, this will be the number listed under Settings> About Phone> Status> MEID. Without your device’s MEID Ashergray cannot determine the Unlock code for your device and you will be wasting his time. Also consider donating to his Paypal account at this time, since these developers do all this work for us for free. I think that donating in order to keep them doing it is a good idea if you desire continued development for your device.
After obtaining the unlock code for your device follow the instructions posted on either The Android Soul or Sony Ericsson website. These are both written clearly and concisely so I will not attempt to rewrite what is already written well. What I will stress on this section of the unlock process is that it is necessary to install the basic USB drivers for your Xperia Play before attempting to install the fastboot drivers. In order to do this, attach your Sony Xperia Play to your PC with USB Debugging turned off and allow your computer to automatically recognize the device. No additional driver downloads should be needed on this section. After your basic drivers are installed unplug your device and then download and install the fastboot drivers.
After downloading the fastboot drivers you will need to download and install ADB. You can install the Android SDK here and included in the SDK are both ADB and Fastboot protocols for all Android devices. After installing the SDK and navigating to the command prompt to continue to follow either Sony’s or Android Soul’s instructions, make sure your device has USB Debugging Enabled and make sure your device is turned off. Then hold down the search key and the power button until you see a blue light coming out of the power button at the top of the phone; then continue following the bootloader unlock instructions.
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Xperia Play Root
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Xperia Play Root Access Granted
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Xperia Play Superuser Permissions
After unlocking your device’s bootloader follow Ashergray’s instructions for “The Easy Way” here. At this part of the process you will boot your device in to a custom recovery. It is important to note that currently the R800x has no recovery for the device so the only way to ever enter into recovery is to boot up a recovery image off your device’s bootloader using ADB. You should do a backup at this point in the process to make sure that you can restore your device without root at a later date if you so please, and after that flash the update.zip containing the information to root your device. Wipe Data and Factory Reset then reboot your device and you are good to go!!!
All you need to do now is remove the bloatware and free up some of that precious memory on your device. I highly recommend purchasing Titanium Backup to backup all of the system applications first and then remove the ones you no longer want. If you have further questions about development or rooting the Sony Xperia Play r800x please refer to XDA Developers for the Sony Xperia Play.
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How to Root Sony Xperia Play,
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Root Tips and Tricks,
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Sony Xperia Play,
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