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Hi all!
As per topic, actually.
I hope this is the right section to ask for this, as I want to make it specific for the Desire ROMs and not all the ROMs with Sense or No Sense.
I plan on getting an HTC Desire and having a custom ROM right away (that is, after going through all the required process of rooting etc.).
My question is the following:
What should I ask myself when choosing between a Sense and No Sense ROM(other than the UI experience)?
While doing a research through the forum I found some answers, however nothing was too informative. E.g. I found out that if one wants to play games in a custom ROM he should go for a No Sense ROM.
Is it because Sense ROM affects the performance or is it because of the way its settings are that does not interact with games well.
Does this happen to other kinds of applications as well?
Is there anything else that one needs to keep in mind when chosing for a ROM when it comes to Sense or No Sense?
Why go for Sense and why for No Sense?
I realize this is too much to ask, but as I searched through the forum and did not find anything specific, I believe that this will be helpful information for Desire newbies like me.
Thank you!
This may not answer your question in the depth you asked but from my own experience after using roms with and without sense I prefer the ones with sense.
Did not find any appreciable difference in speed but prefered sense roms from a purely aesthtic point of view.
Best idea is to get the phone and try different roms to see what you like. There are so many roms and everybody has their favourite that you will not get a definative answer.
The fun part is, once you are rooted you can test all ROMs and see which work best for you.
You can either spend hours trying to find an answer to this particular question or you can just try a couple of them and see what works best for you.
Sense comes with a couple of wonderful apps, which you lose (like the FM-radio) when you use a non-Sense ROM.
I don't need them per se, so I am currently on WhiteXperience, which is non-sense.
This ROM is extremely fast with low battery usage, which makes it great for playing games.
New ROMs come out every day and they get better and better each day.
A Thread with a question I also want to know since several weeks
If I get a no Sense ROM do I lose all HTC specific programs.
Widgets, ok, no issue. I don't use them either. Use Launcher Pro.
But programs, especially the mail client, how's that? Do I have to search a new one from the Market? I don't think there is one available as powerful as the HTC one.
I prefer using the sense roms cause I get the sense dialer which I much prefer over the stock Android dialer, including the contacts manager. However in using adw launcher as it feels much faster than the sense interface
Sent from my HTC Desire using XDA App
Rymon said:
E.g. I found out that if one wants to play games in a custom ROM he should go for a No Sense ROM.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've not heard that one before! I've no problems playing games with a Sense ROM.
Regards,
Dave
I love sense and can't do without it now. Sense-less roms feel really empty and boring to me now.
Doesn't really answer your question, but there are a couple ROMs that have the UI portion of sense (i believe its called rosie) removed and then had the dialer/contacts/etc ported to work with stock or alternate launchers. Iirc Cyanogen is one like this... might help you out going that route too..
As to the actual question.. I have noticed that non-sense roms do seem to be a noticeably faster, but its usually cause most are highly tweaked for increased performance and usually include a2sd+. A lot of the sense roms are also tweaked as well, but usually include the froyo a2sd, which doesn't seem to be as much of a performance boost. Onto of which most of the tweaked to the sense based roms are for UI improvements, themes, etc. And not as hardcore performance based...
Just my 2 cents... IMHO... Take it as you will
Sent from my HTC Desire using XDA App
sbdags said:
I love sense and can't do without it now. Sense-less roms feel really empty and boring to me now.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had a Motorola Milestone previously so I'm used to the stock Android.. if you want something with a little more umph, I really recommend LauncherPro (and LP Plus). My fav launcher by far!
Sent from my HTC Desire using XDA App
mikeandjaimie said:
Doesn't really answer your question, but there are a couple ROMs that have the UI portion of sense (i believe its called rosie) removed and then had the dialer/contacts/etc ported to work with stock or alternate launchers. Iirc Cyanogen is one like this... might help you out going that route too..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just an fyi, but CyanogenMod is most assuredly *nothing* like this.
CyanogenMod is based on AOSP Android, but has been significantly customized from the original source. It owes nothing to the Sense frameworks that HTC have built into their own version of Android.
Regards,
Dave
foxmeister said:
Just an fyi, but CyanogenMod is most assuredly *nothing* like this.
CyanogenMod is based on AOSP Android, but has been significantly customized from the original source. It owes nothing to the Sense frameworks that HTC have built into their own version of Android.
Regards,
Dave
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry yeah I worded it wrong.. I should have said sense-less ROMs that have some of the sense components ported. My bad, but thanks for pointing it out.
Sent from my HTC Desire using XDA App
Thank you everyone!
I will follow your advice and try out different ROMS of both UIs (Sense and non-Sense) and see which of the two I prefer.
I will most probably start with a Sense ROM and if I stumble upon any issues I will try the other one as well.
Can you please point me towards two or three ROMs of each UI that I should definitely try out?
As for the battery efficiency of the ROM I do not worry. I have stumbled upon a couple of threads that IMHO give the best advice I could get when it comes to managing several phone settings in order to reduce power drainage.
Try this one, you can remove Sense very quickly if you want, but Sense Dialer will stay, which is better anyway.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=741661
You wouldn't go wrong trying the Cyanogenmod ROM, its a non-sense one, but as stated before, very tweaked.
As regards one of the other posters, an excellent replacement for the mail app is K-9, you'll find it in the market, and its been my mail app of choice since I owned my G1, it handles IMAP very well, though I've not tried it with an exchange server, so can't comment there
Hope that helps
Tried many sense and non-sense roms. This is what I found:
HTC Sense roms have:
- Better Gallery, faster and with better zoom
- Better Dialer, faster, sleek and functional
- Better and nicer graphics for contacts
- Better camera application. Touch focus (coming to non-sense), better autofocus
- Better integrated Clipboard and selection mode
- Some other HTC applications for News, Twitter, Plurk, Facebook, Weather, etc. But these can be replaced more easily
- Some nice widgets for the above applications. They have a very nice graphic appearance
- (subjective) better memory management, I find AOSP builds too aggressive in some regards
- Nice touches like usb-plugging choice, Bluetooth FTP, etc
- Medium-high auto brightness levels
For Non-Sense roms you get:
- many kernels to choose, OC, UV, etc. At least until htc froyo source is released
- crazy high benchmarks if you OC
- much more configurability, mainly for the interface
- configurable Auto-brightness
- system wide equalizer
- some stuff I don't use (so I don't know well) like OpenVPN
- WiFi N ?
- Cyanogen Renders (in some)
- many new tweaks and releases every week
personally I really don't mind the bugs and quirks you sometimes get in AOSP roms, but I can't really live with the available alternatives to the HTC Gallery, Dialer and Camera.
Anyway these are some of the possible replacements for HTC stuff:
- Email client -> Maildroid
- Dialer -> Dialer One
- Gallery -> .... uuuuhmmmm .... errrr..... either Stock 3D Gallery or Just Pictures. They are both crap in my opinion
- Camera -> Vignette or just use stock Nexus One
- Home Launcher -> Many to choose
- News -> Feedr
- Twitter -> official client
I'm new to the android-scene (comming from omnia wm6.5).
I just had a few questions for u guys, before i get reply's like use search etc., i did search around but there are like so many threads and so much info that it just isnt that clear to me .
so i want to root my phone & flash a custom rom. But i've seen there are some different types of roms
for example:
leedroid
oxygen
defrost
auraxtsense
cyanogenMod
MIUI
... ?
Now my major question is whats the difference between all these types?
I know some have sense, others dont. But it aint all about interface i assume?
If someone could enlighten me a bit i would really appreciate it .
My apologies again if a thread like this would excist allready...
Thx in advance guys !!
Okay, no comments about search, but i think this should be posted in the Q&A section...
Well, in short, there are 2 kind of roms: Sense-based and AOSP roms. Sense based are roms based on the official HTC Sense base, like LeeDroid, AuraxtSense etc. These roms have the Sense launcher and all the Sense goodies.
AOSP roms like Oxygen, DeFrost, Cyanogen, are pure AOSP with extras. Search google for a better explanation what AOSP is, but in short it is a pure Google rom (like the Nexus has). AOSP roms are faster and smaller than Sense roms.
Then you've got MIUI, this is basically an AOSP rom, but with a customized launcher which makes it feel like something different (although more iphoney)...
Ans now there are AOSP roms, based on the new Gingerbread...
For pro's and cons, search first. I prefer AOSP because of the speed and no bloatware, but if you prefer eye candy, look at Sense roms (or MIUI)...
Thanks for the quick reply! (+thanks)
The roms like Oxygen, DeFrost, Cyanogen. The difference between these are just different people (cooks) who make em?
The ROMS are classified into 4 these days:
-AOSP (Cynogenmod, DeFrost, etc.)
-Sense (LeeDroid, etc.)
-New-Sense(Robociks Z, RCmixHD, etc.)
-MIUI (Rodriguezmod MIUI, etc.)
AOSP: Fastest, free of bloatware, most exellence battery live, not wearing any Sense cosmetics.
Sense : good battery live, beautiful, orginal Desire feeling.
Edit: I am currently using Robociks Z v0.5
New-Sense : average battery live, even more beautiful, still has some bugs (720 recording for example), a whole new experience of HD and Z.
MIUI: good battery live, IPhone-look (I hate it), some left overs of chinese letters.
Try the ROMs yourself and decide which one to keep.
For me...I am flashing another ROM every 2 weeks...I just can not make up my mind which ROM I should keep..
Edit: I am currently using Robociks Z v0.5
I have read that sense roms have limitations on them and i was just wondering what are the of mods can you do on an Asop rom vs a Sense rom? T.I.A.
Opinions vary widely here - I'll attempt an objective explanation.
Sense is the layer of goodies HTC puts onto the device - like the neato weather animation, the Rosie (launcher, at the most basic level) at the bottom, etc.
VZW, while not HTC or part of Sense, also puts stuff on the device.
AOSP has (in most cases) none of the 'value added' goodies from HTC Sense or VZW.
The AOSP ROM is built from the source code for the device - hence the acronym - AOSP=Android Open Source Project.
Most widgets from Sense do not work on AOSP - a couple Sense apps do, like the flashlight, FM Radio, a few others. I suppose this could be labeled a limitation, but that's opinion. Conversely, many of the apps or widgets emulating certain Sense functions are available in the market.
All that said, users form their own opinions/experience based on what they utilize from Sense, VZW, and AOSP itself.
Try on an AOSP ROM and see what you think - there's Froyo and Gingerbread flavors available.
smtom said:
Opinions vary widely here - I'll attempt an objective explanation.
Sense is the layer of goodies HTC puts onto the device - like the neato weather animation, the Rosie (launcher, at the most basic level) at the bottom, etc.
VZW, while not HTC or part of Sense, also puts stuff on the device.
AOSP has (in most cases) none of the 'value added' goodies from HTC Sense or VZW.
The AOSP ROM is built from the source code for the device - hence the acronym - AOSP=Android Open Source Project.
Most widgets from Sense do not work on AOSP - a couple Sense apps do, like the flashlight, FM Radio, a few others. I suppose this could be labeled a limitation, but that's opinion. Conversely, many of the apps or widgets emulating certain Sense functions are available in the market.
All that said, users form their own opinions/experience based on what they utilize from Sense, VZW, and AOSP itself.
Try on an AOSP ROM and see what you think - there's Froyo and Gingerbread flavors available.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
All of this is very true.
From a user-perspective this is what you'll see differently.
1. Camera/Camcorder/Gallery - This is generally better on Sense ROMs for our phone because they were made for our phone. And as for gallery, I prefer the 2d Sense gallery vs the 3d gallery in AOSP ROMs that often are buggy for me.
2. Dialer - I like to be able to use the T9 to type in my contacts names (yes I know there are 3rd party programs that do this, I'm talking strictly AOSP).
3. Rosie Launcher - Like stated before, the launcher is good if you use the widgets and stuff, I personally don't use it though.
4. Smoothness vs Snappiness - In my experience, AOSP ROMs are snappier, which means there is more "raw power" feel to it. Sense is very smooth, some things might take milliseconds longer to load, but it feels very smooth and I think the overall feel is nicer.
Basically, our phone was designed in mind to have HTC Sense on it. With AOSP ROMs, some of the features feel "botched" (in my opinion, the camera/camcorder is botched the most). But there are really no "limitations" to either, they are both android after all.
TheWhiteBandito said it very well.. that was essentially my experience with everything. i stayed away from AOSP for a while because i really liked the sense camera/camcorder, gallery app, dialer, calculator, and a few little things. I think i used launcher pro so rosie didn't matter much for me.
Now i'm on MIUI which is AOSP but it has some SERIOUS customizations. it has its own camera and gallery apps which are similar to the sense apps. the dialer i think is better than AOSP and Sense dialers. it also offers tons of other customizations which are really great. check it out
The only thing I think I would miss from Sense is the fact I miss so many widgets.
You could try widgetsoid from the Market. I really liked the Sense Widgets, but widgetsoid is actually more advanced. You can make all sorts of custom widget bars and even load into the notification pull down. I also run Launcher Pro instead of Sense launcher. It works better and you can do a lot more with it. Rosie was an improvement when all you had was stock Donut, but these days there are better options and HTC has not really kept up.
That being said, I still like a lot about Sense. In particular, the Mail app, Facebook sync and photo posting, Camera, Gallery, and overall aesthetics. It would be hard to give these up.
(Oh, and download the Gingerbread keyboard from the Market.)
As others have said its not necessarily limitations but more the look and feel of the OS. Honestly, while I do love the Sense flip clock, the only two widgets I really missed were the full page calendar and friends. Now that I'm on CM7 I use LauncherPro Plus and the full page widgets are almost exactly the same look and function of the Sense ones. Play around with different combinations of both Sense and AOSP and see what you think.
sent from my DInc
thanks everyone, all that was very informative. currently using inc re-engineered z and liking it a lot but i might try MIUI for an ASOP rom since it sounds like it doesn't have problems with the camera/camcorder
gemitero said:
thanks everyone, all that was very informative. currently using inc re-engineered z and liking it a lot but i might try MIUI for an ASOP rom since it sounds like it doesn't have problems with the camera/camcorder
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
MIUI is indeed cool, but stay away from the newest (3.18) if you want to use 720p video recording. Until something happens to get us the drivers for our camera on gingerbread, that capability will be unavailable.
I actually have MIUI GB version on my SD card. I was planning to try it out but I'm so amazed how this miui rom is so diiferent from sense. Its like I need to learn how to use my dinc all over again lol. Thanks for the heads up. Ill eventually flash the GB version to try it out but I'm enjoying this one right now
Sent from my HTC Incredible using XDA App
Thats the best way to go about it is try for yourself. Every dinc is slightly different from other dinc's some are great some are good some are bad. So try try try and you will find the flavor that suits you and your dinc the best.
Hi all,
The Dev Forum seems to be pretty abundant with Sense-based ROMs at the moment, and I guess that's to be expected with 3.0 being everyone's new(ish) favourite thing, but not all of us are Sense fans and I just wanted to get people's opinions on the current state of play concerning AOSP ROMs and their latest versions, especially around battery life.
What have you used / are you using, and how do the current suite of AOSP ROMs compare with each other in terms of battery life (but other stuff as well)?
I'd love to hear about people's recent experiences.
Thanks.
This rom is the best aosp rom I've used yet. Blazing fast and amazing battery life.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1070501
I tried Gingerbeast, HydrogenMod, Hikari, CyanogenMod and Ginger S and I can't seem to get any of them to be 100% fully functional. I've had a problem with bluetooth not working, not being able to import contacts, the home button stops working, com.android.phone force closing, etc. I've full wiped, reinstalled, fixed permissions, etc, but I can't get any AOSP rom to work. Surely there must be a leak of the AOSP rom that HTC use before adding Sense and other HTC addons?
While AOSP roms are light wight and seem fast they will never compare to roms built off of sense roms. Why you ask. Look at the roms like CM7 and other AOSP roms, they have to use open source drivers that dont make full use of the hardware. Like wifi and blue tooth. Both lose 25% strength because of the Open Source drivers instead of using the drivers built for the Phone like the closed source HTC drivers.
Umm, apologies if I've confused myself out of sheer ignorance, but can't you just flash a custom kernel like Lordmod's excellent one, which DOES contain official DHD phone drivers?
BenRoark said:
Umm, apologies if I've confused myself out of sheer ignorance, but can't you just flash a custom kernel like Lordmod's excellent one, which DOES contain official DHD phone drivers?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sense based kernels will not work on an AOSP roms
LM is a aosp kernel.
i don't see any problems with pretty much all of the AOSP kernels i have used (Most CM based ones, quite a few Miui Ones, and the default CM7). The Wifi and BT work, gaming is pretty good, and its also much less laggy (Sense based roms occasionally freeze for no reason. Its annoying with music playing)
The only thing i dislike about AOSP roms is the camera which doesnt have touch to focus video recording, but pretty much every other sense feature can be replaced by a free, custom app (LauncherPro is much better than rosie 3.0/.5, custom video players play more movies, etc.)
you could always flash a sense/rosie/app remover on top of a sense based rom
314 said:
LM is a aosp kernel.
i don't see any problems with pretty much all of the AOSP kernels i have used (Most CM based ones, quite a few Miui Ones, and the default CM7). The Wifi and BT work, gaming is pretty good, and its also much less laggy (Sense based roms occasionally freeze for no reason. Its annoying with music playing)
The only thing i dislike about AOSP roms is the camera which doesnt have touch to focus video recording, but pretty much every other sense feature can be replaced by a free, custom app (LauncherPro is much better than rosie 3.0/.5, custom video players play more movies, etc.)
you could always flash a sense/rosie/app remover on top of a sense based rom
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unless you needed to connect to a spicific type of network or need BT to work a certain way you wouldn't notice it.
zelendel said:
While AOSP roms are light wight and seem fast they will never compare to roms built off of sense roms. Why you ask. Look at the roms like CM7 and other AOSP roms, they have to use open source drivers that dont make full use of the hardware. Like wifi and blue tooth. Both lose 25% strength because of the Open Source drivers instead of using the drivers built for the Phone like the closed source HTC drivers.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, not sure about that 25% statement, mate.
I've been running CM7 Nightlies or CM-based ROMS for a while now and, if anything, I've noticed a significant improvement in connectivity (in general) from what I previously experienced on Sense ROMs. I'm sure that Lord Clockan's excellent kernels have a lot to do with it, but anyway...
I suppose everyone's experience is different.
Hy,
I am also a HUGE fan of AOSP. Since I bought my DHD it had Sense for one day because I had no time to flash. I also spent some time comparing Sense vs. AOSP Roms, and can say that AOSP has better performance on my DHD then Sense and always used them with the kernel they come with.
Aosp all the way. My recommended roms:
Oxygen Rom:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1348425
TalonRom:
http://code.google.com/p/talon-rom/
OMFGB:
http://rootzwiki.com/topic/6052-aospcustom-gingerbreadomfgb-131-nightlies/
OMGB:
http://rootzwiki.com/topic/7923-rompure-gingerbreadomgb-123237/
All are my personal favorites.
Regards
buzzboy said:
All are my personal favorites.
Regards
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hmm Not sure that makes sense!
I will like to know as I am looking forward to go CM9 from GB
Sense ROMs have HTC Sense interface, Senseless ROMs don't.
Senseless just doesn't have sense.
No offense Just sayin ok
Sense is good looking, laggy, hangs most the time and so.
Senseless is better, little bad looking may be, but better battery and performance.
In senseless roms U would miss Internet pass-through(connect ur phone to internet via PC) and some widgets
hellnoob said:
I will like to know as I am looking forward to go CM9 from GB
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sense is a commercial GUI offered by HTC.
It's the most visually stunning GUI for our phones, in my humble opinion.
Unfortunately, with all that beauty comes some overhead: lots of widgets and RAM-intensive processes that are always running (although not always used) so, yes, there *sometimes* is some performance degradation (but most folks don't notice/care).
"Sense-less" ROMs is an ambiguous term. It can mean 1 of 2 things:
1) ROMs that once were Sense-based but have since been modified to remove the Sense UI (my WildChild ROM is an example of this, so is jermzii's ROM, and possibly others). The benefit here is the visual glory of *most* Sense UI artefacts is retained, without all the bloat of the Sense launcher (called Rosie) and associated widgets. Also, everything still works under a Sense-less ROM of this nature. That includes the camera, proximity sensors, speedy graphics rendering, WiFi, and all the crap that you'd expect to work under any given ROM.
2) ROMs that were built from the ground-up without Sense. There are tons of ROMs like this, but probably the most famous for our phone is CyanogenMod (and any of its derivatives). Frankly, they all look ugly as sin (to me) and typically you'll find features that don't work as well (or not at all!) as the original Sense ROM. The trade-off here is that you lose beauty and some functionality in favour of being able to "get behind the scenes" and tweak things you couldn't normally tweak on the stock ROM. Although, as any decent dev here will tell you, there's nothing you can do with CM7 that you can't do with a properly modified Sense ROM. (With the possible exception, of course, of running apps that were designed solely for the CM7 framework).
Hope that answer helped you,