When the first Android Wear watches hit the streets it didn’t take long for hackers to figure out how to root the watches, unlock their bootloaders, and install custom ROMS and recoveries. After all, the Samsung Gear Live and LG G Watch are running a version of Android, and they have USB cables.

The new Moto 360 is a tougher nut to crack. Since it uses wireless charging, there’s no easy way to plug in a USB cable and enable USB debugging (although there is support for Bluetooth debugging).

But Daniel Padilla figured out how to create a custom cable that connects to the unused USB pins on the Moto 360 — and he’s unlocked the bootloader.

moto 360 unlocked

This paves the way for installing custom firmware that can change the behavior of Motorola’s smartwatch. At the very least, it could allow users to install a custom recovery which will make it easier to backup, restore, or flash software updates to your device manually.

The Moto 360 is a $250 watch with a 1.56 inch, 320 x 290 pixel round display, 512MB of RAM, 4GB of storage, Bluetooth 4.0, and a TI OMAP 3 processor. It’s one of the best looking smartwatches on the market at the moment… at least for fans of traditional watch design. And now we know it’s also a hackable device… for folks who want to build their own cables and risk breaking their hardware or messing up the software.

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13 replies on “Motorola Moto 360 bootloader unlocked”

  1. Uhm, I think it’s noto so useful for the 99% of customers. No one will try to destroy his phone opening it and making a home made USB connection, maybe if it is possible to flash from Bluetooth it will be possible, in other case no one will unmount its phone losing the IP67 protection just to flash a custom kernel or rom

    1. Hopefully, later they will find a way to do this without cracking open the device and physically messing with hardware (via Bluetooth?).

      1. Exactly what I think, but bluetooth flashing is still dangerous, the best flashes are all WIRED, this because wireless connections can be unstable (like moto 360 seems to be sometimes) and I think I won’t flash in ANY case a custom recovery or ROM via bluetooth, especially because I think that from stock recovery & ROM you can’t flash anything via bluetooth, so I think that for the first time you will necessarily open the device to unlock the bl.
        Hope I’m wrong

        1. I would be very wary of flashing anything over a wireless connection and I’d need to see either some good evidence that it worked really well or it would need to run a few hash checks.

  2. That’s nice, maybe someone will make a custom kernel to reduce power usage so it would actually last a whole day.

    1. Do you have one? If so, it doesn’t last you an entire day? The only times I have needed a charge before going to sleep was in the first few charging cycles. I average an 18 hour day and usually have between 35-40% life left when putting it on the charger with regular notifications and custom faces.

      1. Does it matter which arm the watch is on and which pocket the phone is in? Being bags of water, we humans tend to make it harder for radio waves to go through us. Might it need to up the transmitting power on the Bluetooth antenna to get it to connect?

        1. ?? Haha I doubt it. At work, my phone stays out on my desk most of the day. I periodically leave and don’t take my phone, so the connection drops and re-establishes frequently. If in my pocket, it’s always left wrist and left pocket.

  3. Does this mean I’ll soon be able to play Doom on a circular display? Sign me up!

Comments are closed.