Comprehensive Android Phone/MODs/ROMs Thread

[dejet]

overclock/underclock
wifi tether(free)
custom roms
take off all the extra crap apps your phone has on it...

there is a long list of why to root phones, if it is worth it to you is up in the air. I love my root I change roms like I drink water lol.(also most of the time you get updates before they go OTA)

[kuronosan]

Dumb question, but what do custom roms do?

Free tethering = fuck yes, I don't feel like paying for that shit but it's not as useful as getting all the crappy shit off of my phone and upgrading it from 2.1 to something more recent. Is any of that possible with the fascinate?

[sruon]

Rooted by default, more space on the NAND since most of the bloatware is removed, performance fixes etc

http://forum.xda-developers.com/forumdisplay.php?f=706

[dejet]

http://www.droidforums.net/forum/custom-roms/

that is custom roms. It adds things to the phone. Ill just post a link to what the rom I use adds(this is for the moto droid and other phones)

http://wiki.cyanogenmod.com/index.ph...creen_settings

There is little a custom rom cant do. its built from the ground up(most of the time) Think of it as a moded xbox 360, you inject custom code into the phone.

[kuronosan]

Okay, I think I was able to root my phone as I have superuser installed... I have been trying to make a NAND backup but it keeps giving me an error saying the update.zip is not signed.

Any tips? I'm out of my element here.

[dejet]

Okay, I think I was able to root my phone as I have superuser installed... I have been trying to make a NAND backup but it keeps giving me an error saying the update.zip is not signed.

Any tips? I'm out of my element here.

you have recovery? and what device do you have?

[kuronosan]

Fascinate, I500. I used ROM Mgr to flash Clockwork Recovery but it won't install because it keeps saying update.zip isn't digitally signed.

edit: I found out the issue. Apparently I was supposed to install Clockwork using Odin, which solved the problem. It's doing a NAND backup now. Still trying to figure out how to get rid of Bloatware or load other things.

[dejet]

Fascinate, I500. I used ROM Mgr to flash Clockwork Recovery but it won't install because it keeps saying update.zip isn't digitally signed.

edit: I found out the issue. Apparently I was supposed to install Clockwork using Odin, which solved the problem. It's doing a NAND backup now. Still trying to figure out how to get rid of Bloatware or load other things.

Best way to rid yourself of bloatware is root explorer. you can do it via the terminal emulator, but root explorer just makes it happen a tad faster(without having to look up code used to mount crap)
all you do is go to system folder change it to r/w and then find the app folder and delete anything you want.(back up crap 1st as always)

Idk if yours is any different then mine is. But thats how most work(I still use a moto droid)

[kuronosan]

Yea, I accidentally deleted a lot of apps using Titanium Backup, which is great except I heard deleting them kills my chances of doing a legit OTA update (supposedly Samsung's updated their website and is rolling out the Froyo update for GS phones in the next couple of days).

I wanted to also try the wifi-tethering stuff or at least do some real streamlining. Do the OS roms usually improve performance? There's so much about these phones I don't know. XD

[dejet]

You dont want an OTA update if you have root. (it will almost always lead to a brick, or at least a lose of root)if you can flash roms there is almost no reason to wait for OTA updates. Devs will make you a rom with it built in. Look around and see if you can find a forum that works with your phone.

I wish I could help you more, but I dont no anything about the I500. Or even if there are custom roms. If there are, once 2.2 drops I am willing to bet someone will find a way for you to flash it.

[kuronosan]

I'm just waiting for the flash for 2.2 then. It has not been released but it is supposed to come out OTA in the next week or so according to some deep sources.

Thanks for the heads up, though, I would have bricked my phone for sure.

I could still use Recovery Manager if that happened though, couldn't I?

[Mafai]

You dont want an OTA update if you have root. (it will almost always lead to a brick, or at least a lose of root)if you can flash roms there is almost no reason to wait for OTA updates. Devs will make you a rom with it built in. Look around and see if you can find a forum that works with your phone.

I wish I could help you more, but I dont no anything about the I500. Or even if there are custom roms. If there are, once 2.2 drops I am willing to bet someone will find a way for you to flash it.

What rom do you run? I'm currently on CM6 stable, but last night I started setting up my machine to hopefully compile CM7 (gingerbread) when I get home tonight. From what I saw the current compiled GB roms are pretty instable (for the droid1 at least), but there has been some progress getting a lot of the issues worked out in CM7. As of right now the only CM7 alpha version released is for the nexus S, but I'm hoping all the changes are committed so I can easily have a half decent GB ROM.

[dejet]

I'm just waiting for the flash for 2.2 then. It has not been released but it is supposed to come out OTA in the next week or so according to some deep sources.

Thanks for the heads up, though, I would have bricked my phone for sure.

I could still use Recovery Manager if that happened though, couldn't I?

ya 99.9% of the time you can just flash an old nandoird backup and your golden. Something else to note, 2.2 was a pain in the ass to get root on. When 2.2 dropped for the droid early adapters had to revert to 2.1 get root then flash 2.2 lol So before you do anything, read up on it to see just what you should do.

The phones are very odd. Every phone provider does things different. You might keep root from OTA, you may have to get a custom rom to keep root. God nos what they are planing for updates now...its why I woudl say before you do anything when the OTA does drop read first to see what devs got on it.

[kuronosan]

Thanks, any suggestions on what apps I should get? From what I understand a lot of background crap runs without you knowing it.

[dejet]

Thanks, any suggestions on what apps I should get? From what I understand a lot of background crap runs without you knowing it.

im at 17hours 21min and 19sec since unplugged last and I am still at 30% Iv found the key is to dim the screen as much as I can. Have it time out fast, and try and get use to turning the screen off yourself after use. Also things like facebook/gmail/email I dont let use background data I turn it off. Only at work where I no I have a charger on hand do I use it. I sync it myself all other times.

I love my phone, but I had to charge the thing twice a day. So I have been aiming to optimize its life as best I can. I think I found my sweet spot. You may have to tinker around a little for the best results.

For battery life? or just epicness lol?

A list of what I have(there are a lot more but I dont have them all installed)
Advanced task manager: Do not use it to auto kill. The only real use is to quickly kill a app that wont shut down
Launcher prob: I am not use it, but its a nice desktop ^^
adfree: you need root - free
astro: I do not use this anymore my rom came with file manager - free (can get paid)
bluetooth file transfer: - free
ebay: if you use ebay like me -free
handcent SMS: best sms app just turn off notifications for the normal one - free (has added stuff that you can pay for)
some MP3 DLer: I use mp3 online its a lot of money but ya... I did not pay for it lol there are free ones - there are free ones out there
pandora - free
paypa: if you use it - free
queue manager: netflix thing, uses adobe air, so you need to wait for 2.2 I think. There are other ones that dont use air - free
rom manager: you got this already - free (can get paid)
setcpu: if your rom does not have it built in. Its like .99 - pay (cheap)
shazam: or something like it, i got mine before they started to charge may want to look into others now - 5 free tags/ paid(or if your an old user free fully)
shopper: hay I get use out of it form time to time lol - free
root explore: not a must but its a cool tool - 4.99?
sms backup: very nice, it builds a file to store your SMS. I back mine up all the time and just wipe them from my phone every few days(back up can be made into a auto updating one - free
titanium back up - free(has paid)
skyfire/xscope: I like xscope its not free but I like it as my browser - skyfire free/xscop 2.99
Slingplayer: not cheap by any means! but I love that I can at work watch the games on my phone, you need a slingbox already -$20...

I gave you some free and pay ones. Thats my list(and I have many more, but thats all I have on my phone now)

[sruon]

First thing you'll want to do is replace your launcher, I'm using Launcher Pro and couldn't be any happier, I know ADW has released a new paid version that doesn't look bad at all too.

My personnal list:
Must haves:

• Titanium Backup
• Handcent SMS
• ROM Manager
• ASTRO
• SwiFTP : Transfer files over Wifi through FTP protocol
• Quick App Clean cache : Clean the cache used by applications
• SetCPU: Available on XDA for free
• Chrome to phone : Send Chrome/Firefox links directly to your phone
• Barcode scanner : for those QR Codes on the interweb
• OS Monitor : Allows you to check OS error messages, current processes, CPU/RAM load, network infos etc

Random stuff:

• Connectbot : SSH client
• PhoneMyPC : Very good VNC-like client, requires installing their software on each PC but it works out of the box 99% of the time
• Mortplayer : My favorite folder-based music player

I have maybe 100 more applications on my phone but those are what's gonna be useful to about anyone.

[dejet]

Ill second phonemyPC(its been in beta for some time and its a decent price)

[Mafai]

teamviewer is also beta for android now. very nice program for connecting to your home pc.

[kuronosan]

I gotta say, I love this handset now that I can receive text messages from my girlfriend's yahoo. Apparently the built-in messaging program has a filter which blocks any internet-based SMS messages.

My goal is to remove almost all the bloatware from the thing as I ran advanced task manager and saw craploads of stuff running that I didn't even turn on (like yahoo messenger comes on... I never even start that app)...

Once the OTA comes out and I can flash my phone with the rooted version (if there is one) I'll be much happier. I need to buy the Titanium Premium so I can freeze the junk apps instead of uninstalling them. I was told you can't install the updates if you uninstall the base apps. Is that true, or should I just do it anyway since I've already rooted my phone?

[Julian]

You're rooted, do whatever the hell you want.

Explore http://forum.xda-developers.com/forumdisplay.php?f=721 and have fun.

Since 2.2 is coming "soon", I suggest just waiting, unless you want to mess around just to see what you can do until then.

This is pretty much how 2.2 is going to work:

-You're already rooted
-Wait until someone has a base rom that's rooted and has clockwork recovery, and you'll install it with Odin (Do you even need root to do this? I'm not sure.)

Aaaand, that's pretty much it. You can restore your basic apps and data from titanium backup/google/etc, and go from there.

Once on 2.2, you'll have to wait until the source is released before getting any custom kernels, but custom roms should appear quickly.

Until then, if you wanna mess around, I suggest installing a custom kernel, and maybe a custom rom. It shouldn't require any sort of wipes, but I'd suggest backing up before doing it anyway.