Comprehensive Android Phone/MODs/ROMs Thread

[Julian]

Are you on EB13?

Kernels and custom roms, you go into recovery, and click install zip, and you isntall it from in there.

[*Shinzon*]

Yeah I'm on the official EB13 update that the phone automatically updated to the day I got it. And thank you for the instructions. If for any reason I need/want to go back to stock, do I just restore all system settings from my titanium backups or do I have use ODIN? I was a little unclear of that.

[Chun Liroy]

Is it hypocritical to want this but at the same time think that the iPad is still a huge waste of money?

[kareface]

I picked one up last night. I like it so far, but it's still very clearly a work in progress. Flash support and the micro SD slot are waiting on software updates before they'll work. A large number of apps aren't available for it yet. I thought that there would be a lot of instability, but I really haven't had any crashes. However the youtube app is still glitchy. The worst part is to get 4g service, you'll have to mail it in to get upgraded (it's free to do), in a few months time. If you aren't in any rush to own a tablet, I'd wait until the wrinkles have been ironed out. With that said, I bought several tablets over the last few months (including an ipad), and I've always been a pretty critical person of the products I buy. I really like this tablet, it has a lot of the features that I was frustrated was missing from the ipad. I'll be putting it through it's paces over the next few months.

Edit: Just a note, side by side with the ipad, the screen on the xoom isn't as vivid. I'm not an apple fanboy in any sense of the word, so this isn't some stupid defense of the ipad.

[Julian]

Is it hypocritical to want this but at the same time think that the iPad is still a huge waste of money?

Yes.

And you need to ODIN to return to stock. Titanium is just to back up all your apps, so they're stored in your SD card. So whenever you wipe and put something else on your phone, you can just install titanium and restore your apps.

[Chun Liroy]

I dunno why, but I feel like an iPad is just a giant iPhone that's full of gimmicks while an android tablet can actually be of use. Afaik it's pretty much fact that there's tons more versatility and freedom compared to an iPad. Could just be my hate for Apple talking as well.

[dejet]

as much as I hate apple lets not bash them in this thread ~_~ till the zoom really gets everything in order the ipad is by far the best tablet.

[kareface]

Apple is pretty nazi about the app store. Even something as simple as a clone of a ti calculator wasn't allowed on the store, which angered me because sometimes it's nice to have one around even if it's emulated.

The last straw for me was the lack of any good collaborative whiteboard software that would work with non-ipad users as well. I do tutoring and it's nice to be able to use a collaborative whiteboard when you can't be face to face. With out flash support I suspected that someone must of made a program that would allow a good collaborative space between ipads and normal computers. Nope, there really isn't any good way of using the ipad for that purpose. If it had flash support, there would be many other options. There are non-flash based whiteboards, but most of them leave a lot to be desired. I picked up a wacom for my home computer and I use that for the time being, but I'm really hoping in the long run to use the xoom in place of the wacom. I don't need most of the benefits of a wacom, I just need something that I can draw math and physics solutions on.

I don't hate the ipad, I just don't like elements of it. It's still a good tablet; it just lacks many of the features that I would make use of.

[*Shinzon*]

Ok one more question for android owners who don't own a Nexus S. How many of you have swapped to the ETX4 file format? I hear that it's the primary reason the Nexus is smooth. Now, my Epic isn't slow by any means and I'm just wondering if it's worth doing really.

[Haiko]

To any Evo users.. what Rom you guys are currently using?

[archibaldcrane]

So, I just ordered a Samsung Galaxy S 4G on t-mobile, arrives Thursday. Never had an Android phone before, want to root it, get rid of the bloatware, etc. etc.

As I understand it, I'll have to wait for someone to make a version of 2.2 specifically supporting my exact device before I do all that? Not exactly sure how this works. Apparently Superoneclick 1.7 works to root it...wait, so ...ok, so I can root it, but can't install CM7 unless there's a version of it for my particular device? Is that right? I don't think CM supported the Galaxy S (3G).

[*Shinzon*]

My epic 4g is a Galaxy S phone and I was able to root and tinker with stuff as soon as I rooted it with a one click root. The Xda developers website had a wiki for my phone that I was able to follow and kinda understand though as I mentioned before all the posts and even the wiki page assumed some familiarity with the process making it hard for a new user like me to understand. But check the website for your particular phone. I'm sure you can find something.

[archibaldcrane]

There is no page on their wiki for the Galaxy S 4G, and I went through about the last 5 days worth of posts on the site and didn't see it mentioned

It just came out a week ago.

Does the 4G still work on your epic after rooting?

[*Shinzon*]

Um, I think so. To be honest I haven't switched to 4g yet because of how badly it drains battery. 3g browsing speeds have so far been great though.

Edit: Heh, I didn't realize I could get 4g where I am. Yes it works, connected to Sprint's 4g network and it's working just fine.

[Julian]

http://forum.xda-developers.com/forumdisplay.php?f=1065

Since it's a new phone, you're going to have to wait a while. Keep an eye on the dev forums, and personal opinion: Don't install anything until there's a good amount of posts claiming success. Especially since your phone doesn't have any kind of recovery yet.

Like mentioned above, quite a bit of this will assume some knowledge. Feel free to ask any questions about it here, or shoot me a PM, and I'll do my best to respond. Just make sure to include a link to whatever you're talking about, since your phone isn't the same as mine.

The learning curve is a bit rough at the start, but once you get started it's actually really easy.

Also, rooting is just granting yourself super user/root privileges, it doesn't change the phone or the rom you're using or anything at all. With root, you can download some kind of root explorer (it's just a file manager which requests root so that it can modify system files), and you can remove bloatware from there.

[archibaldcrane]

Ok cool. So I'll root it and put stuff on - sounds like Titanium Backup will allow me to get rid of the bloatware. When people talk about "are there any ROMs for it yet?" ...what exactly does that mean?

[Julian]

Viper, Nebula, Bonsai, whatever, all that shit that you see on that forum, are all the current popular custom roms. I don't really like them, because they're kinda just modifications of the base system with crap sprinkled on top. A ton of them include themes which I find ugly and dislike. The one main thing is that they all remove the sprint bloatware, so running one of them will be an improvement over running the stock rom.

Now, besides those, there are two different projects you'll want to keep an eye on: MiUi and CyanogenMod. Both of those (At least Cyanogen, not 100% sure about MiUI but I'm pretty sure it's the same case) are built directly from the AOSP. (Android Open Source Project) What this means, is that they're based upon just plain old vanilla android. The problem with these is that it takes a lot of work having to modify it so that it works with different hardware, they're basically doing what Samsung, HTC, etc, do to their phones, without really all of the knowledge that those companies had. Why is this good? Well, since it's built directly from source, they're easy to modify to do, well, a ton of cool and different things. Kind of things that you can't really do by just modifying the already modified stock rom that companies supply. (I'm not 100% sure if this is exactly how it works, I'm no phone dev, but from my limited (limited just towards cellphones, really) understanding, it is)

Both Cyanogen and MiUi are pretty buggy for the epic right now, but they're being worked on. The biggest thing holding those projects back was the lack of source for froyo, which was just released earlier this week, so expect a ton of cool stuff coming soon.

This post basically explains it, just ignore the top Epic-related stuff.

edit: Cut out unimportant stuff. Custom roms are mostly just taking the base Android rom that's currently in your phone, and making slight modifications. Most of them are theme related stuff. Custom roms, when you install them, also come with base apps, which may include some stuff you don't have. They're technically not allowed to include payed apps, though. They also don't include bloatware, obviously.

The REAL super custom stuff, I described in the above quote.

[archibaldcrane]

So, unless Cyanogen or whoever makes a 'custom...stock' Android for the Samsung Galaxy S 4G, I'll be stuck using their dumb TouchWiz mod of it? And there was no release of Cyanogen for the SGS?

Bleh.

[dejet]

the major reason for custom anything is a custom kernel. That allows overclocking, wifi teathering and such. themes can be done via many other means. Launcher pro and many of the other launcher programs.

and of course um, faster updates lol, but that goes hand and hand with a kernel as well. you cant really run old kernels on new OS updates.

[Julian]

Give it some time. Regular custom roms will show up soon, probably once someone gets clockwork recovery working.

Also, touchwiz is a launcher. Download the "Home Switcher" app, then grab ADW Launcher or Launcher Pro, install them, and mess around. You should be able to do that while on the stock rom.

Cyanogen is open source, as is Android. All you need is for a dev to pick it up, and port it to your phone, which will probably take quite a bit of work. There are a few devs currently working on getting Cyanogen working on the current Galaxy S phones. I'm assuming your phone probably isn't too different from the normal Galaxy S's, so it's probably just a matter of time.