Newbie questions - Desire Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

Hello folks,
I just sold my Touch Diamond 2 and moved to a Desire!
I liked sense on the TD2 very much, but I don't feel like sense adds something valuable to Android. I actually think it makes the phone slower. So I switched to LauncherPro which is a step ahead.
But i'm still thinking of moving to Froyo before the official release to get things really smooth. I wonder if i do this; will android still link my contacts with facebook (the picture) or is this really Sense-related? And will i be able to install sensewidgets afterall?
Also, i've been looking at the Froyo-roms here but after reading FAQ's i still remain with one question: does everything work? Because every rom has a bugfix/progress list. Should I wait till official release?
Thanks!

the contact linking to facebook is a sense thing unfortunately.
you will not be able to use the sense widgets but there are a very large variety of replacements out there on the android market, the 'pure series' to name a few (pure messenger, pure calendar etc)
the only problem there was with froyo roms was a non-working camcorder but this has just recently been fixed, everything on froyo roms are now working
the only bug some users have found is an echo when on the phone to someone, this is believed to be caused by the nexus one noise cancelling mic (as the froyo build for the desire is ported from the nexus one), there are however some work arounds and is not even that much of a problem.
hope this helps

I would wait. Thanks what I am doing. There are too many issues with the Custom 2.2 ROMS, the positives just dont out weigh the negatives.
Just my opinion.

Related

[REQUEST]An open request to rom devs for a finished AOSP ROM

Hello,
Having used lox devs dev Eclair AOSP ROM I've realised how lacking the Hero is in its standard form - general speed of use and just the way the system feels.
In short I love using 2.0 with none of the HTC bloatware, its a shame as I don't think the ROM devs think there is much call for this - Hopefully in this thread everyone who agrees will shout up.
Obviously the dev one has its issues - sync, random crashes on phone function, etc, but I'm happy to work with it if I know there is development coming.
It would be great for one of the devs to take the project on board, knowing there is community support for this. I'm sure I'm not the only person who feels this way.
Unfortunately I'm no way programmingly minded and struggle with linux at the best of times, never mind thinking about coding, but I'd donate/support/playtest any work in progress clean android *latest version* ROM for the Hero.
Sorry...subtract 1 No. I am not an android Dev..but have been drinking Leffe
anybody got anything to add to this?
i will request Lox_Dev to update this rom when he gets some free time as i know he is working hard to get Eclair 2.1 done. I and a friend of mine is using 2.0 AOSP for last 5 days and none of us is complaining with basic features. all look good.
just 2-3 things need to be fixed.
* cant set own wallpaper as album/gallery app isnt there.
* bluetooth pairs but cant send/receive files
* camera works upto 3 megapixel.
otherwise i dont find any major problem with AOSP 2.0. i dint face a single hang in 5 days and neither did my friend.
Well, first off all. The current 2.0 / 2.1 builds all run very laggy and crappy. It is as if the video drivers aren't using any acceleration at all or something.
In Lox's 2.0 clean build (which I've used for the past few days) every bit of animation except the lockscreen goes laggy. Scrolling through the menu, opening the menu, opening the notifications... it never goes as smooth as on the 1.5 based ROMS.
I'm in no way complaining, don't get me wrong. I'm very interested in using a stock android experience but so far nothing is working good yet. The 1.6 based tries don't support all the hardware, and the 2.0 / 2.1 based ROMs aren't up to speed.
This is more than understandable ofcourse. The 2.0 / 2.1 based ROMS are based on leaked alpha / beta work which just isn't ready yet, and 1.6 differs too much from the stock android ROM to get all the hardware working OK.
So my hope is that when HTC releases their 2.0 / 2.1 official ROM, we can use it to make a clean vanilla Android 2.x experience which runs as snappy as our current HTC 1.5 versions, and still with all the hardware working OK. Maybe even with a guide how to 'backup' or transfer the googlebits from the official 2.x ROM.
A clean 2.x ROM, but with the googlebits, and with the HTC music player + album + camera + browser... now that would be awesome.
Starting a thread like this isn't really much use right now, since we only have buggy laggy 2.x bits from a leaked ROM to get stuff working.
dipje said:
A clean 2.x ROM, but with the googlebits, and with the HTC music player + album + camera + browser... now that would be awesome.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ha, ridiculous. Seriously I don't get people's issue with Sense UI, if you don't want it fine.. But deal with the fact that you're losing HTC apps as well.
kwiksand said:
But deal with the fact that you're losing HTC apps as well.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
omg how am I ever gonna live without a laggy browser, calendar, contact list or sms application?
It would be the best thing ever, IMO.
And nobody needs to be offended, those who want sense UI can just use that
Exactly! So stop flooding Hero (HTC) ROM threads with useless crap about wanting a ROM minus Rosie/Sense UI, E2K you've been the worst offender?!?!
You must be happy now that a almost fully functional AOSP ROM's in the wild!
kwiksand said:
Exactly! So stop flooding Hero (HTC) ROM threads with useless crap about wanting a ROM minus Rosie/Sense UI, E2K you've been the worst offender?!?!
You must be happy now that a almost fully functional AOSP ROM's in the wild!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Happy?? I am more happy than ever! (regarding the hero)
Also very thankful that the developers got their sh*t together and are pumping out roms like real pro's.
THe devs should be called "hero" not this 2007 pos A7200 cellphone
kwiksand said:
Ha, ridiculous. Seriously I don't get people's issue with Sense UI, if you don't want it fine.. But deal with the fact that you're losing HTC apps as well.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
wtf is wrong with stating what would be a nice combo in my opinion? I even started by saying that for now there should be no hope and 'just requesting it to the devs' right now is bonkers. When a good HTC 2.x ROM comes along the devs have something to play with, until then this thread was useless... and still you gonna call that ridiculous? Your even saying that to a user who has tried a vanilla ROM for the whole of 30 hours before running back to my nandroid backup with MCR on it.
Go troll somewhere else please, or at least read the posts carefully and whole you're going to attack.

[Poll] Froyo or Sense?

All the hype surrounding Froyo got me thinking - chances are, when a Froyo ROM leaks, someone will quickly port it to the Desire but that does mean that sense isn't going to be a part of it. I'm not sure how long that'll take, most likely HTC will take their time porting it and I'm not sure how feasible it'll be for someone to port it themselves, so when it boils down to it, us Desire Owners may be faced with a choice - Froyo or Sense?
Which will you be going for?
its a tough one for me, been trying to use helix and freedhome to get the nexus feel and yes i do like the nexus desktop more, however all the sense handy stuff is just too important for me to be thrown away, so i think i will stick to it until htc releases an update with sense
It's definitely a tough choice for me. I think I can get used to not having Sense's home screen, but as I'm new to Android, I'm nervous about ditching sense entirely in case there's some amazing background feature that I use all the time without realising it lol
I reckon we'll see an update from HTC sooner than people think.
But having said that, if it takes longer than a couple of weeks I'll be ditching the stock software...
If Froyo gives me Apps2SD I will move straight away regardless of my preference for the Sense UI
I love HTC Sense but Flash support and speed improvements are more important for me
I hope HTC will be fast this time
Can't remember the source, but apparently someone from HTC stated that Sense 2.2 would be out in a month at most due to how similar 2.1 and 2.2 are and because of the non-existent hardware issues as opposed to Hero and weaker 1.6 phones. If it takes longer than that and/or if someone comes up with an easier root method for Desire (it's probably a lot easier than it looks but I can't be bothered with live cd's as of yet) I'm definitely switching to Android 2.2 until HTC hurries up.
EDIT: Just remembered - Seeing how Droid Incredible was just released and HTC Evo 4G is coming out in over a month, there's no way that HTC will settle for their flagship US superphone to recieve just 2.1. Expect 2.2 released unusually quickly.
You don't NEED a live CD to root the desire, I did mine entirely from within Windows 7 64bit.
Hmmm, awesome. Will look into it at some point.
Yeah the only thing to keep in mind with Win7 (x64, at least) is that the .bat files supplied with Paul's r4 hack don't anticipate Win7 taking a few seconds longer to recognise the device. By simply having a delay between some of the commands, it worked perfectly for me.
tuatha said:
I reckon we'll see an update from HTC sooner than people think.
But having said that, if it takes longer than a couple of weeks I'll be ditching the stock software...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This ^ but I'll give them a month.
I think (hope) that since the Desire is mostly a Nexus One inside the update will be pretty swift...
...Unless HTC decide to throw in some improvements to the Sense layer, or must do some changes to the core of Sense required by the new OS...
I'm not sure. I think I will give them a month after the first custom ROMs become available.
I want 2.2 with HTC sense. Can't we have it all?
I've only ever used a Desire, so I have no idea what the difference is between a regular Android OS and a Sense one. In addition to those two options there's also what Orange UK has done to my phone. Stupid things, by all accounts - removing Google Talk but leaving the service running; installing apps I can't remove and which take up valuable space (and which I could download for myself if I wanted them); breaking the browser so when I zoom in/out it doesn't reformat the text, etc etc. And because Orange and HTC are going to want to pollute my phone with all their crap it means I'm likely going to see 2.2 released in 4 days, but be unable to use it until July or whenever HTC/Orange have finished defiling it.
I think Froyo will be coming to the HTC Desire pretty fast. And the reason is the full flash support.
HTC promised that we would get full flash soon after we bought our desire's.
Anyway, if I had to choose between what we have now (2.1 and sense) or 2.2 stock.. I think I would stick with sense. We do not know what 2.2 will bring yet, so I could change my mind.
I am just assuming that HTC will bring froyo fast and we will get the best out of both worlds.
Does anybody know of a list of programs/changes that Sense brings to Android? My Desire is my first Android phone and I have no idea what exactly is part of Android and what's been added by HTC Sense. I understand that programs like Friendstream were added by HTC, but what about the widgets or the multiple screens?
guys I have used a 2.1 Android phone without Sense. I found it very plain compared to sense. The most obvious difference was the widget list is only a few items compared to the widget list on sense which is quite big. The widgets on sense are prettier too, calender, clock etc. There is 5 screens versus 7 available. The helicopter view is gone on normal android. the browser doesn't reflow. I think android is awesome, but its more a framework, a scaffolding, rather than an entire user experience. I guess that suits some people more than others, but I am totally sold on sense. love it. And the nexus one people I have showed my phone to really liked it too.
just found this guys post on google forums
"I don't want the whole Sense UI running, just the HTC (Desire) stock widgets. As people have managed to get the HTC keyboard running on the Nexus One, so I think it should be possible to get the HTC widgets running in a similar fashion. The bundled widgets in the Nexus One, especially the clock widget are too plain, and I've been unable to find any widgets in the Android Market which even get close to the HTC bundled widgets in terms of aesthetic appeal."
Since Froyo+Sense will come eventually, I don't see why bother to reinstall and reconfigure all applications and settings for Froyo, and then do that all over again few weeks later when Sense version comes.
And it is always wise to wait few weeks after release to see if there is any problems with new version.
But then again, it there are no guys which install on first day, who would give such informations?
Android widgets: analog clock, calender, music, picture frame, power control, search, youtube, facebook.
HTC widgets that come with Sense UI(including all of the above default android ones): Bookmarks, Calender(HTC one), clock(HTC one), footprints, friendstream, mail, messages, music (HTC one), news reader, people, photo album, photo frame, search, stocks, sync all, twitter, weather.
vlasac.. I totally agree. I think I'll just wait for 2.2 sense. I just hope it comes within 8 weeks of the android release of 2.2. Hope so.

[Q] Which ROM?!?! Totally unable to choose...

Hi all,
I'm a newbie of the Androids world. (and also in HTCs one).
I'm coming from the world of Nokia hacking and modding and here, with all the mods changed, I feel a bit (just not to say totally) lost.
I bought this week a new HTC Desire, I feel very happy and proud of my choice, the AMOLED screen is something superlative.
But, coming to my problem:
I discovered that to join the wifi hotspot in my university i need to set the proxy and other stuff which i can do only with root privilege and other apps, so I decided that is just arrived the time to f**k up the guarantee and install a rom one time for all, at the beginning so i must not reinstall many apps, settings and other stuffs.
I'm searching for a ROM which is the most possible similar to the original Sense FroYo that is now installed on the phone. But at the moment for me I think it's to hard to be able to recognize the differences between two ROMs, so...
Which is better for me to choose in the huge list of post #1 of the "Desire Index - Everything is here" thread?
Obviously it must have the root capabilities, ap2sd and..? (i'm totally ignorant in which are the starter-important mod)
thx for you help and sorry for my poor english..
Piemo said:
Hi all,
I'm a newbie of the Androids world. (and also in HTCs one).
I'm coming from the world of Nokia hacking and modding and here, with all the mods changed, I feel a bit (just not to say totally) lost.
I bought this week a new HTC Desire, I feel very happy and proud of my choice, the AMOLED screen is something superlative.
But, coming to my problem:
I discovered that to join the wifi hotspot in my university i need to set the proxy and other stuff which i can do only with root privilege and other apps, so I decided that is just arrived the time to f**k up the guarantee and install a rom one time for all, at the beginning so i must not reinstall many apps, settings and other stuffs.
I'm searching for a ROM which is the most possible similar to the original Sense FroYo that is now installed on the phone. But at the moment for me I think it's to hard to be able to recognize the differences between two ROMs, so...
Which is better for me to choose in the huge list of post #1 of the "Desire Index - Everything is here" thread?
Obviously it must have the root capabilities, ap2sd and..? (i'm totally ignorant in which are the starter-important mod)
thx for you help and sorry for my poor english..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LeeDroid! But I'm biased, been using it a couple of months and it rocks, full Sense ROM, A2SD+ (need an ext partition on your SD card for this), themeable, overclockable if you want. I've tried other but nothing has persuaded me to switch.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=773997
this one is all stock but for the root access, but if you root, why just go for the same as you got?
Invest a few bucks in titanium backup or mybackup pro and rom manager and try some of the top roms like AuraxTSense, LeeDroid, both with Sense as you know it, or Miui and OpenDesire which run alternative launchers.
There is never just flash one rom and be happy once you have set yor foot in here
By far the greatest of all is LeeDorid.Lots of good features and a lot of updates !
Modaco Custom ROM
Should be as good as Leedroid or even better in my opinion ;-)
zambara said:
By far the greatest of all is LeeDorid.Lots of good features and a lot of updates !
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
MIUI 10.0.29 is honest to god stunning, its fast, overclockable, excellent batterylife and the whole UI is a nice overhaul. Its clean and everything has been designed for use, the system menu has been re-organized for the better making it easier and clearer to get to all options. They have also done things like add settings to the notification panel, added kintetic scrolling (so things bounce) FM radio re-skinned all major apps. The lockscreen has also been changed to a custom lockscreen which has quick access to phone and messaging, barring that i'd suggest trying DeFrost, he does good builds of CyanogenMod, or Cyanogen Mod 6.1 rc1. Not a huge fan of CM6, its seems as slow as sense roms on my phone. OD and DeFrost dont seem to suffer this issue however.
Mr favourite non-Miui rom is OpenDesire, theyr quick and dont come with bloatware r crap pre-installed, but Adam_g has been absent lately.
For 'sense' builds try leeDroid (imo bloated with tonnes of crap), Modaco Custom Rom (www.desire.modaco.com) or Alex-V sense rom. Theres also AuraxTSense but its hideous. Imo for a good sense rom try a modaco rom with a sense kernel such as vorkKernel, or 'HAVS 2.6.32 for Sense Roms V5' by richardtrip
Jedipottsy said:
MIUI 10.0.29 is honest to god stunning, its fast, overclockable, excellent batterylife and the whole UI is a nice overhaul. Its clean and everything has been designed for use, the system menu has been re-organized for the better making it easier and clearer to get to all options. They have also done things like add settings to the notification panel, added kintetic scrolling (so things bounce) FM radio re-skinned all major apps. The lockscreen has also been changed to a custom lockscreen which has quick access to phone and messaging, barring that i'd suggest trying DeFrost, he does good builds of CyanogenMod, or Cyanogen Mod 6.1 rc1. Not a huge fan of CM6, its seems as slow as sense roms on my phone. OD and DeFrost dont seem to suffer this issue however.
Mr favourite non-Miui rom is OpenDesire, theyr quick and dont come with bloatware r crap pre-installed, but Adam_g has been absent lately.
For 'sense' builds try leeDroid (imo bloated with tonnes of crap), Modaco Custom Rom (www.desire.modaco.com) or Alex-V sense rom. Theres also AuraxTSense but its hideous. Imo for a good sense rom try a modaco rom with a sense kernel such as vorkKernel, or 'HAVS 2.6.32 for Sense Roms V5' by richardtrip
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
CyanogenMOD is one of the fastest ROM and the one with the most fixes and updates! Dont say bad things about CyanogenMOD RomĀ“s !! Without him this Community would be nothing!
Sense or AOSP? Minimalist or Feature-Packed? Depends on your personal needs...
You could start with a rooted stock, after a week try Leedroid/RCmixHD/MIUI and next week CM6.
Or you just get DSIXDA's Kitchen, learn some ADB and Shell Stuff and make your own ROM.
Go for cyanogen to get the best android experience...
This post might fit better in the Desire Q and A and not the Development section mate
this is not a post for the development section, in future please reasd the forum rules before posting
I've tried Leedroid (SENSE) and DeFrost (NON-SENSE).
Both are really good but after some experience I've decided to stick with non sense ROMs. They are by far faster but that eventually comes at the price of some higher battery drain.
DeFrost FTW !
You must be thinking, i'll find the best and most popular one and i wont be flashing again in the next few months/weeks. You're wrong. You come here, you'll be flashing all roms as the clocks ticking.
I have tried all except MIUI and Defrost so far. and am sticking on OpenDesire for the longest AOSP rom and Modaco R8 for the sense ROM.
But my personal choice;
CyanogenMod : Be it Nightly, stable or RC, i love it to the core! Best AOSP rom ever. I tried them all and they are super fast! The reason i didnt use it currently because i waited for the stable 6.1. Hehe~~ Love the nightlies before RC1 got released though.
OpenDesire : The dev(AdamG) used to have minor updates almost everyday but now, very2 long time before an update, meaning it is at the most stable version now. and it is true cuz i didnt believe it at first( I used to use the older versions and it still have some bugs) but now it is the best for me. Best after CM(cant deny CM, they are the master here).
LeeDroid : Well i've tried all Sense roms already, and this seems the most stable and fast(though i found out it become slower over time, my fault for installing so many apps maybe). I used to love NeXTSense by Neo, but when it got changed to AuraxtSense, i jumped to Lee.
I'm sorry for posting in the wrong section, but i wasn't sure where to post in the different areas.
Well, you named different roms, but which are the differences (explained to a nearly-noob)?
I'm searching for something with the same interface of the normale roms, but purified from all the (in)utilities. In fact a clean and fast rom, in which THEN i decide what i like to install and personalize...
If I can make a representation, a roms with no apps which are not native (facebook, twitter, opera and all the others), but with only the things that you nedd as a basis for all the rest.
Lol the op will still have a hard time deciding. XD
The best way for you to choose which Rom to use is to download and test each one individually. Hope you get ORD btw
sent from the dark side
I'd like to test them all, but at the moment i'm under exams and for next 5 weeks don't have enough time to test anything.
so I was searching for a direct suggestion explaining what will change and what will not change..
If you want a rooted rom similar to your current one, why don't you just use unrevoked to root your current rom?
Sent from my HTC Desire using XDA App
MIUI! or Defrost!
If you want speed, then go for Cyanogenmod 6.1, DeFroST or OpenDesire. If you want a nice UI, too, you have to put a theme on it or use a Rom like RCMixHD, AuraxTSense or smth. like that.
a-ehm...are there ROMs that haven't been named yet? LOL
Piemo said:
I'd like to test them all, but at the moment i'm under exams and for next 5 weeks don't have enough time to test anything.
so I was searching for a direct suggestion explaining what will change and what will not change..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
easy, test it while you go. thats what i did.
Here's my timeline(some are examples);
I'm meeting my girlfriend tomorrow, lets bring LeeDroid! and yeah i did it, i manage to test all features and stability while I'm in the bus travelling from my place to her(took 8 hours in the bus). i screwed up while playing around though, the phone didnt boot so i had to restore nandroid of my modaco R8 back...haha~~
This weekend is examination time(yeah seriously no joke), so last week i flashed OpenDesire. Now i'm still using it. done exploring it in a day though, and keeping it longer than i imagined since i love it.
Presentation week, damn it this week was very busy and i tried Cyanogenmod Nightly 149. Love it. but no themes for it so i flashes CM 6.0.2...but aah too many gallery crash for me so i'm back to OpenDesire.
Well those are my moments, you'll be done exploring in 2 days at max for a rom though. Be sure to test all primary function first before you begin to like them. I did all in a day only. shouldnt be too hard.

[Q] A Crapload Of Questions

So yeah, I have a crapload of questions.
I recently asked about rooting and keeping HTC Sense. In retrospect, I don't think I'll need Sense, I just tried out AppLauncher, and I have to say, I think I'm sold on it. I'm just wondering what exactly HTC Sense has? Is there anything it has that I'll really miss? So far the only thing I can think of is the HTC Sense website for a lost phone, backing up data, and the weather widget/FriendStream...though adding Facebook to HTC sense shows all my contacts in the Phone button which is a huge piss off, but meh.
So that being said, I think I'm about ready to give rooting a shot, but now I've been confused with even more things. And the more I read the more I get confused. Especially where I have to downgrade the firmware, I'm wondering if it's still okay to do this, since the guy at Bell told me if I didn't do / get certain updates I'd have to send my phone back to HTC for repair.
There's stock Android, Cyanogen, and it seems like a million other ROMs. Which is the best to use? If I want total customizability, but also good functionality?
Finally, I'm using a Bell-branded Desire Z on the the Bell network. So Whatever I do will need to work okay with it.
As I've said, I'm totally new to this, and I'm scared to hell of bricking my phone since I just signed a contract and don't to shell out $500 bucks for a new one.
There's just so much info on this forum and it's a bit overwhelming/confusing, not that a lot of info is a bad thing, I'm just lost lol.
EDIT: If anything I wrote seems too rambling or doesn't make much sense please specify that and I'll clarify it.
cant help you root your phone but just follow the instructions that the person who writes the threads say. It's not that easy to brick your phone unless you just completely dont follow directions.
1. Downgrade is perfectly fine, it's to allow you to use a certain method to root your phone.
2. Try out different roms to see what you like, it's like asking whats your favorite video game, how can you really choose, some will agree some wont. I personally like the Miui roms which is the iphonelike and android UI mashup. the apps built in are nice on the eyes, the physics of the phones movement is very smooth, it can oc to 1.5ghz, and you can just download a launcher to replace the original if you dont like it.
3. ask the dev's on the thread if your not sure. i have no idea about bell, but it would seem that it shouldnt have any affect on rooting your phone, just maybe the radio but that is different then rooting or flashing roms.
P.S. you might miss the small things from Sense like, it looks nice, turns on fast, widgets, the dialer to search contact, incoming calls doesnt disrupt navigation, and it's original live wallpaper lol.
So are you saying that I can't search by contact in the default phone app? That kind of sucks.
I guess more of what I'm asking is just based on people's experiences what the best route to go is. I know there are different tastes, I'm more concerned about reliability, so I'm sure people could help with a ROM choice with that criteria.
So downgrading firmware won't affect phone performance? And can it still be reverted to stock in case the phone needs warranty repair? Just trying to cover all my bases.
And thanks, I'll ask around in the deg thread.
Bloodlvst said:
So are you saying that I can't search by contact in the default phone app? That kind of sucks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There are usually apps available that provide Sense functionality to non-Sense ROMs. In regards to the above, you can try DialerOne.
To help you with the ROMs think of them in terms of how different Linux OS's are setup (if you know a bit about this).
You have the base OS's such as Cyanogen. Now some one doesn't like the look of that so they change the Frameworkres.apk to give it defferent colors, transparencies, icons and so on. Now they want a few extra apps to be included in the install so they add them to the /system/app directory or add a /data directory. Repackage it and now they have a custom OS called WINNING ROM (or whatever). These are easy to do and can be completed in a matter of minutes since there aren't any big alterations in the base coding of the OS. This is why you see a lot of ROMs that look like Cyanogens and the developer usually (and should be) states what version of some one elses ROM it's based off of.
Then you have ROMs that tweak certain parameters for speed or add other functionalities to a ROM such as a custom kernel, audio/video codecs, a2ext, compcache/linux swap, and others. Plus a complete custom UI (launcher), port parts of other ROMs such as Sense to work on their ROM, and toms of other things. These take days, weeks, or even months and usually have release cycles and updates. Cyanogen, Virtuous, Enomther, Villain, and a few others make up these ROMs.
Hope that helps with your ROM quest. It can be a bit overwhelming but remember to ask, ask, ask, and then ask some more and also read, at least the OP (original post) and a few pages past that. Some people may get upset and flame you for it but most will be glad to help in any way.
If you flash a non-Sense ROM, you will miss the HTC camera app. Its far and away better than the stock Android one, and I haven't found any Market camera apps that measure up, either. Also, the camera button on the Sense builds seems much more responsive than on CM7.
Also, I'm not sure about this, but the Sense ROMs seem to have better or more hardware codecs for playing a wider array of video formats. Lots of the videos I've tried on CM7 and CM6 are only playable using software decoding (on a variety of players, but RockPlayer is my favorite) and end up super laggy (very low frame rate) and audio way out of sync. On stock Sense and Virtuous, those videos play fine, hardware decoding, silky smooth, and audio in sync.
There are some aesthetic stuff, like HTC does some pretty significant theme changes for Sense, and you will lose customizations like the HTC Skins. And you will lose the HTC widgets (like the clocks) and apps (stocks, weather). But as mentioned, there are lots of Market apps that pretty well simulate many of the Sense apps and widgets, or are very suitable replacements.
Thanks for the detailed replies guys.
KCRic, thanks for list of known ROMs that's basically what I wanted to know, and your Linux flavour comparison helped too
Redpoint, I'm not sure how often I'd ever use the camera anyway...when I get home I'll have to find some screens of the default camera. That being said, I see your ROM is Virtuous. Is that a Sense-like ROM in case I agree with you on the ca?era app?
Thanks!
Bloodlvst said:
Redpoint, I'm not sure how often I'd ever use the camera anyway...when I get home I'll have to find some screens of the default camera. That being said, I see your ROM is Virtuous. Is that a Sense-like ROM in case I agree with you on the ca?era app?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wow, you don't use the camera? I use it all the time, for those "spur of the moment" snapshots, or to quickly take a pic that I can MMS to a friend or family.
Yes, Virtuous is mostly stock Sense, but with some optimizations and with some extra features added. Its also based on the 1.85 ROM, one of the more recent stock Sense versions.
Guides, links for just about everything you can ever think of is here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=916431
BTW, be sure to click the "Thanks" button if you found responses to be helpful!
ROM LIST
Sense ROMS
Gingerbread - Android 2.3
Shokouhi 2.0
Desire S G2 Port Sense2.1
Probably others.
Froyo - Android 2.2
Virtuous
Stock ROMS
Gingerbread - Android 2.3
CyanogenMod 7
Stock Gingerbread 1.7
iceandfire 1.7
Pyromod 1.2
GingerVillian 1.5
meXdroidMod
Froyo - Android 2.2
CyanogenMod 6
Others of unimportance now.
The Other ROMS
Gingerbread - Android 2.3
MIUI (The 2.3 one)
Froyo - Android 2.2
MIUI (The 2.2 one)
LiquidVillian (Or whatever it was called.)
I probably just wasted 10 minutes of my life doing this, but meh, it was something to do.
Now to kill myself since I had to listen to Nickelback through it. Damn 4Music.
I would hardly call CM7 (and ROMs based on it) "Stock".
Although "Non-Sense" is not a very good sounding name for that category, also.
redpoint73 said:
I would hardly call CM7 (and ROMs based on it) "Stock".
Although "Non-Sense" is not a very good sounding name for that category, also.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
AOSP Based.
There should be 2 categories. CM Based and AOSP.
But I don't think there are any AOSP ROMs. Which I hate, cos when people say they've built a stock ROM, but it's based on CyanogenMod.
redpoint73 said:
Wow, you don't use the camera? I use it all the time, for those "spur of the moment" snapshots, or to quickly take a pic that I can MMS to a friend or family.
Yes, Virtuous is mostly stock Sense, but with some optimizations and with some extra features added. Its also based on the 1.85 ROM, one of the more recent stock Sense versions.
Guides, links for just about everything you can ever think of is here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=916431
BTW, be sure to click the "Thanks" button if you found responses to be helpful!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So I'm guessing no one has cooked up a weird ROM that is like Cyanogen with the Sense camera app lol.
Anywho, I really only have a couple of questions now.
Would you recommend Gingerbread or Froyo? I'm guessing Gingerbread probably runs better / is better than Froyo, but it's hard to say.
Also, how easy is it to restore my phone to factory condition if I need to?
And finally, I read the wiki, it says to make sure I have the windows USB drivers installed...do I just throw those in my windows drivers folder?
EDIT: Wanted to add, the instructiosn for recovering to stock doesn't include the version. So any help there is appreciated.
Or you know, if any of you would be so kind to PM me / add me to IM if you've done this on a Bell phone in Canada that would be awesome too
The drivers go in your Android SDK folder, where ever adb resides. At least on XP and Vista that's the case - I'm not sure if the adb issue was ever resolved in Windows 7. You could always use VM linux or dual boot linux if you like, it's much easier imo. Wubi works too I think.
When it comes to Froyo vs. Gingerbread it's literally like a linux in the sense that one is completely stable and well known by this point (Froyo) an the other is bleeding edge, not stable at times, some things are just not compatible unless you port them, and peoples knowledge base on it isn't as thorough.
I've never returned this phone to stock, which I assume you mean s-on and no superuser permissions. So I have no idea how difficult it is, though I do know you need to make sure you 100% know what you're doing before attempting it - especially if you have s-off. It's a pandoras box if you mess it up.
Ah okay, I'll definitely stick with Froyo for now then. I've always stayed 1 version behidn with Fedora lol.
I did get the drivers working, made my gold card, about to downgrade my firmware.
Are the instructions the same for 1.84.666.2 ?
Edit: Successfully rooted. Now time to find a new ROM. thanks again for all the help. Quesiton though, I have no HSDPA icon anymore...do I need a new "radio" or something?
No, it will do that and some ROMs don't have either the 'H' or the 3G' icon - just depends on the developer. You can still flash a different radio - anyone listed in the G2 radio sticky will work, flash a few and see what works best for you.
There's also a radio version/.ril file issue being debated so you might check that thread too and flash the zip provided just to be safe. I think it's in the G2 questions forum but I can't remember.

[Q] CM7 vrs Stock on the DHD

Hey guys,
So I'm getting a little impatient with waiting for Gingerbread on my DHD and was thinking of going to CM7 now that its Final. Previous Custom ROMS so far havn't really done it for me. I kinda like the reliablility and battery life etc of the stock build.
Has anyone tried CM7 on the DHD who could maybe give a little account of how it worked out (battery life etc)?
Thanks
jamieboy88 said:
Hey guys,
So I'm getting a little impatient with waiting for Gingerbread on my DHD and was thinking of going to CM7 now that its Final. Previous Custom ROMS so far havn't really done it for me. I kinda like the reliablility and battery life etc of the stock build.
Has anyone tried CM7 on the DHD who could maybe give a little account of how it worked out (battery life etc)?
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Battery life is superb on CM7 and much better than the Gingerbread Sense ROMs. I take it you have tried the latest Desire S builds? I recommend RCMix if you haven't. If you are wanting the pure Google experience though, you have nothing to fear with CM7.
Regards.
Stock rom offers a better connection between all the social networks, better stock widgets and htc sense camera app. hmmm i did have CM7 for while and i loved it but its just the camera app that did it for me, i guess im just too used to HTC sense !
I had no problems with CM7 either. Very nice rom. Camera App is nice. Audio is great. Having or not having HTC Sense is a big decision maker. Once or if you get bored of Sense, then you will really enjoy a rom like CM7 for all its other differences. If it could have the Sense Weather animations and clock, Touch Input keyboard and HTC Reader 2.0 - it could be my ideal rom at this point.
Although I'm a relative noob with trying the many Android roms.
Grant Barker said:
I had no problems with CM7 either. Very nice rom. Camera App is nice. Audio is great. Having or not having HTC Sense is a big decision maker. Once or if you get bored of Sense, then you will really enjoy a rom like CM7 for all its other differences. If it could have the Sense Weather animations and clock, Touch Input keyboard and HTC Reader 2.0 - it could be my ideal rom at this point.
Although I'm a relative noob with trying the many Android roms.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The clock, albeit not with the flip function, can be found all over the internet. Search for Fancy Widget (Sense Clock) to find it. If you can't and desperately need it, I will pm you the apk upon request, although will have to dig it out first. Keyboard? I'm confused as to exactly what you mean, but you can use the HTC keyboard on CM7 as well as numerous other replacements. HTC Reader??!! No way! Aldiko and Laputa both make HTC's attempt look poor. Not to mention Kindle.
Personally, the slight nuances of pure Android are what I find hard to resist. The transition animations, which were present on the Donut Sense UI but inexplicably left out since 2.1, are a big one. I know you can find ROMs which include the different animations or use Launcher Pro, but they never operate 100% and stutter/glitch at random moments. Even the way the keyboard bounces onto the screen rather than just "appearing" gives a more polished feel. The clean simple UI, which lacks the clutter and plethora of menu's that Sense incorporates is a dream to navigate, and the overall speed of the OS is unrivalled. I guess for the "average user", Sense is a comfortable, intuitive blanket which makes Android accessible for the masses. In the Windows Mobile days and arguably when Cupcake/Donut were still in use, it was a necessity. Since 2.1 however, I feel it is no longer needed as the Android UI has evolved to a point where it should appeal to anyone.
Regards.
EDIT: Just seen your website Grant! Forgive the app recommendations, I see you are already well versed in alternatives.
Thanks guys!!
Im still not sure! I wasn't the interface i was worried about! I've given the customs a whirl and its been more the reliability and performance that have brought me back to the stock ROM. I've downloaded the CM7 zip! might give it a chance over the weekend before the week starts over! Ill always have my back-up for when HTC decide to give us an official release of 2.3.3.
Maybe ill never go back once i try CM7!
cheers
if your a gameloft gamer, i suggest sticking with a sense 2.2 rom. if your a audiophile, cm7.
So using it now! Love the look and feel except I find that its a big sticky when swiping between homescreens. Any suggestions?
Sent from my Desire HD using XDA App
jamieboy88 said:
So using it now! Love the look and feel except I find that its a big sticky when swiping between homescreens. Any suggestions?
Sent from my Desire HD using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try a different launcher. Launcher Pro is one of the smoothest.
Regards.
The Regina 3D Launcher is one I've only just heard of - thanks to Pocketnow.com.
For anyone who hasn't tried CyanogenMod 7 - there are some screenshots here.
I've only tried 3 Roms so far on Android. It would be nice to have an ongoing poll based on member's records or vote or something to see which ones are the most popular.
Grant Barker said:
For anyone who hasn't tried CyanogenMod 7 - there are some screenshots here.
I've only tried 3 Roms so far on Android. It would be nice to have an ongoing poll based on member's records or vote or something to see which ones are the most popular.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
One thing I found missing is the ability to hide certain albums within the gallery. A nice feature when you've lots of crap on you SD card! Also having the GPS issue that seems pretty widespread.
Other than that, battery life = more awesome than Stock!

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