Boot Box for root downloads and changes boot animation
Boot Box is an application rooted devices that allows you to browse a marketplace of boot animations, download and install them automatically. It also includes a feature called Scrambler to allow you play random boot animations every boot so you have something interesting and new to watch every time you reboot.
On HTC devices you’re probably going to require S-OFF or a ROM that stores animations in a writable folder. You’re also going to have to figure out what the name and location of your boot animation is if your device is not listed if you want to change it.
An example is the Sprint HTC One M8 based off of stock stores the boot animation in /system/customize/resource/ with a name of spcs_startus_animation.zip – non-Sprint versions of the M8 obviously wouldn’t have “spcs” in the name as that’s Sprint’s shorthand for their Sprint PCS name. Additionally non-Sprint is probably branded differently.
The app requires root in order to write to system folders, on HTC you additionally need to be S-OFF or have installed a custom kernel that disables system write protection.
Alternately it can create a flashable zip for use in recovery mode if you want to use it that way. Certain features such as Scrambler won’t work that way, but if you’re not using that it’s not much of a concern.
Boot Box allows you to back up your current animation, the market allows you to browse tons of animations, view animated GIF previews (or sometimes YouTube videos,) restrict resolution to only the current screen resolution, limit mature content, and do most things you would want to do with an app like this.
It does require a little bit of knowledge about the layout and boot animation name of your current ROM. If you’re not comfortable poking around the /system folder looking for a zip file that contains boot animations, and your phone isn’t listed in their common locations database, it might be a bit more complex than the beginning root user would be comfortable with.
If you’ve created a boot animation and want to share it with the world, it also allows you to do that. I haven’t played with that option yet as I’m pretty talentless when it comes to animations, but if you’re a master at it you can upload your awesome works.
Overall it appears to be a wonderful free boot animation hub and application. Should be noted that if you’re on a Samsung ROM based on stock there are additional hurdles you’ll need to go through, however most custom AOSP ROMs should be supported without any issue.
As it’s a root application that’s going to be mucking around with one file your system partition, might as well preemptively make a nandroid backup. There’s really not much that can go wrong modifying a boot animation, but for safety’s sake, a backup never hurt.
At least one person claimed the thing was attempting to brick their device in the Google Play reviews, but with what it does chances of that are pretty darn slim.
Download: Google Play
