Hi Guys,
Slightly odd request. I'm planning on making a regular tech vlog/podcast and I definitely want to review android apps. I want the production level of this show to be high so I don't want to be filming my phone.
I've looked into using Android Screencast but the framerate is really low and almost unusable for review/how-to purposes. A recent post by Lifehacker showed how to run a emulated version of Android with market enabled. The latest version is only 1.6 however. I'd like to be able to review any android app so 2.1 is a must.
Does anyone know of a way I can run 2.1 with Market enabled whether this is through the standard SDK or something like virtualbox. SDK files or ROMs would be fine just as long as I can install apps and review them.
I'm running Ubuntu 10.04 and Windows 7 Professional so a solution for either would be great.
Many Thanks
Grinboy
BUMP.
Could someone at least explain why this isn't possible?
Ok last bump and then I'll let this die. Can't believe no one has an answer.
Sent from my HTC Hero using XDA App
I too would like to know this... I have been searching for a while tonight trying to find the answer (that's how I found this thread), but the only information I can find says to use the system.img file from a nandroid backup, but I haven't been able to make that work... It just boots to the android screen with the blinking cursor
only 1.6 for this time that can using market
Maybe if you grab some 2.1 firmware (nexus one, desire, G1 CM 5.0, etc) and put Vending.apk into your original system.img then, MAYBE, will be the Market application.
Why don't you invest in an HD camera and place it over your phone. Tons of professional sites do that. It gives it a more hands-on feel, IMO
Sent from my Nexus One using XDA App
Hey
The first (Android) smartphone with camera that can really compete with the digital cameras and no section for it?
Modding it would be great
Altek A14 Leo
Altek Leo Section
regarding the serious problems the Altek Leo has, as no google apps, not even market, no rooting published, no adobe flash, firefox will not install and so on,
a section would be useful for the distessed owners of this camera phone which
is more a fumble phone than a smart phone. Its advantages are a very good lens, an outstanding CCD chip, a xenon flash and professional camera software.
True, is buggy
I bought one actually and despite it being pretty buggy, I just absolutely love the camera.
Definitely needs some software love though:
1) Interface is pretty sluggish and 2.1 isn't helping, the latest android performance improvements would be nice.
2) Touch-screen is strangely inaccurate. Swype was a must for me.
3) Battery life is pretty bad (not certain how much a newer Android would help, but any amount of powersaving fixes would help).
4) Buttons/widgets to lock the screen (e.g. Extended Controls) don't work.
5) The camera button doesn't open the camera when the phone is locked (debatable I guess, but imo, the camera button should just open the camera, period).
6) Default alarm clock doesn't ring randomly.
7) Not to mention apps randomly crashing, strange animation bugs in the Album viewer, no google apps, terrible GPS, etc.
But despite those, I've managed to work my way round them and am in love with it.
Alex
I have one of these and I do like the quirkyness .
I would love to improve the experience by modding.
Quirkyness fits well
To continue the list (more than enough for a forum)
- Backups by Titanium, AVG or Nandroid do not work because i have no idea
how to root the Altek Leo.
- WLAN range is still very short and does not always an automatic reconnect.
- I could not manage to make any browser play flash files, but the moboplayer
plays flv files well.
- Apps like soundhound say the microphone is blocked.
About half of the apps i need are not available because they will not install
or they are exclusively available over google market and getting them from
file hosters seems a bit risky to me. Most of this problems seem to be caused
by the small software space of 120 MB for files and 83 MB for running
applications.
But i will keep the Altek Leo and use it because the camera prooved itself
as outstanding among mobile phones.
- I use the application stores Applanet, Amazone Appstore, Handango,
SlideMe SAM and the tools Memory Booster Lite, Android Tweak.
Does anyone discovered any other useful helpers for this half of an
ANDROID device ?
"We do not need any adobe flash, we have got a real xenon flash."
Where To Buy
Does anyone know where to pick up/order one of these units?
Here To Buy
Search at Ebay, you will need a Paypal account.
I bought mine from Wifigadget.
Eason of Yupitek provides International Customer Service,
have a look at the facebook pinwall.
Thanks for the tips! Really like Memory Booster and Swype.
If you're on a mac, the "missing sync" from markspace is well worth the buy - particularly given that there does not seem to be a way to add a Google account under accounts and sync - it's missing on my altek leo! Anyone elses too?
Also recommend "Lookout" if you're worried about virus from no easy way to get apks other than file sharing sites.
Despite the quirks, very happy with this all-in-one device - music player + phone + camera - 3 down to 1! Fantastic!
Vignette
Sidenote, 'Vignette' is the perfect app for this device.
It doesn't fix any of the quirkiness, but it's a photo manipulation tool which complements the fantastic camera perfectly.
You can take your pics and then touch them up making the phone a studio for all things photography.
You can purchase it from the AndAppStore.
By poor battery life, how many days do you get out of it?
root and market
Has anyone tried the Gingerbreak exploit? I heard it might work on older devices. Also, if you don't trust file sharing sites and want stuff from the market. You could try running an emulator and installing the Market on that, then sideloading the APKs. I haven't tried it myself yet, but it seems there are a lot of people doing this. Here's one HOWTO which is specific to Mac but I think it's prety much the same or at least you should be able to use the same system image. http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1387830/how-to-install-android-market-app-on-the-emulator there are lots of other links if you google "android market emulator" I don't have the Leo yet because they're sold out in Taiwan, but I've got mine on order. I'm most interested whether the google apps work at all if they're sideloaded. I've just sort of bricked my older Cyanogen device. Any feedback would be appreciated.
Oh, here's a Windows specific link - http://www.tech-recipes.com/rx/10004/accessing-android-market-from-android-sdk/
and be careful with Gingerbreak!
There's also UniversalAndRoot to try http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=747598
and SuperOneClick http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=803682
Poor battery-life
@rocky7st
It depends on usage. Light usage is ok. Any sort of medium/heavy usage won't get you through the day.
I bought it from an ebay seller which sent me 2 batteries which was helpful:
cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=230614421067
It's is useful since it allows me to occasionally geek out with the camera, playing with apps or using the GPS (i.e. 2 hours straight) and and it'll completely run out of juice by late afternoon.
I usually wait till I get home to recharge it on those occasions, but it's been very useful to be able to switch to the backup battery if I'm out and about and I really need to use the phone.
@everyone_else
On the topic of side-loading apps, my gf has an Android phone with a market on it, so I use the "Astro" file manager which allows you to "Backup" the apks, and then I transfer them to my phone via email.
I've been unable to get my device to show up with adb, so not far enough to try SuperOneClick.
UniversalAndRoot says something like "unable to root"
Z4Root says "running root exploit" and does not progress..
That's bad news but good to know at the same time. Hopefully there will be a method soon. Still waiting on mine but I unbricked my older one. Seems to be an almost total lack of hands-on reviews (outside of a trade show) so I thought someone might be interested in this one. Also, I emailed the author to see whether and how he installed the Market app.
http://120x160.com/old-entries/216-hardware-review-altek-leo-a14-camera-phone
Cheers for the reply jackflap. Do you guys know anything about the Android 2.2 upgrade, I've heard Altek is meant to be releasing it next month.
Okay, I got SuperOneClick working so I have root. ADB worked in windows after installing the Altek software.
ADB in linux still cannot find the phone..
So I tried installing various vending.apk files but keep getting MISSING SHARED LIBRARY or out of date SDK.
@daktak I've been trying to develop for the Leo but have not been able to get ADB to work in windows. Where did you obtain the Altek software?
Hi All,
I am a complete noob here and non technical.
Recently bought an altek leo with the sole purpose of loading an app called Passport Photo Plus and using the device to create passport photopgraphs and to send by Bluetooth to a compatible printer.
We have been doing this on other android smartphones but wanted to use the altek due to its camera features.
It appears that our desired app is ony avaiable on Market.
Being non -technical we have tried and failed to find a way to install this app on our leo.
I'm sure there may be other apps available but we specifically want this one due to it's features.
Does anybody know if this can be done, and if so how? Can anybody point me in the right direction (in easy to understand non tech terms please!)
Would happily pay a small fee for succesful step by step instructions (not sure if I can post that here, if not please ignore / mods pls delete).
Many thanks in advance.
I get asked sometimes why root an android device. What is your reasons for rooting and what are the benefits? I'd be interested to hear your views.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app
st3vo_1986 said:
I get asked sometimes why root an android device. What is your reasons for rooting and what are the benefits? I'd be interested to hear your views.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Most phones come with the operating system "locked" by the manufacturers. They do not want their devices to be meddled with and made unusable by the user. There are valid reasons for them to do this, some I think will be as follows.
1. Maintain integrity of the phone they sell.
2. Lower Helpdesk cost. Users who do not know how, meddled and rendered phone un-usable during warranty and then make claims for repair under warranty terms. This will unrealistically increase the cost of providing repair works under the warranty period.
3. Ease of maintenance. There is one copy of the ROM. If the user brings in a phone that is not working, they will just flash the standard ROM over as a first check. This is easy to do for the first step of troubleshooting.
4. Avoid bad publicity- the word of mouth that there is a high rate of return for maintenance (due to incompetent wannabe phone hackers) spread and this creates a public image of the phone being "unreliable".
Reasons for rooting is mainly to be able to use the phone as how we like to use it. Some examples:
1. Not happy with the phone producer's version of Android user-interface. Same version of Android, but different manufacturers offer their own take on the user interface. By rooting the phone, the user can change to a custom ROM that he finds suitable.
2. Not happy with the manufacturer's choice of apps. For example, the media-player app. Without rooting, you cannot uninstall the media app that came with the phone ROM. Yes, you can install an additional media-player app, but then you will have some bloatware (manufacturer's app) that you cannot uninstall.
3. Change to a newer (or older) version of Android. E.g., Older phones that are rooted can upgrade from Android 2x to 4x, if the hardware is suitable.
4. Change operating system. After having an Android phone, a user might want to change his mind try out a Windows Phone. After rooting the phone, it is possible to change the operating system from Android to Windows and vice versa. A good example are the older WM6x phones, such as HTC Touch HD or HD2, they can be installed and work with Android, and if the user is not happy, revert to WM6x. Without rooting the phone, this cannot be done.
5. Build and install our own tailor-made custom ROM using a Kitchen+ROM of choice. Sometimes, a custom ROM provided by an independent developer may not be entirely suitable for all of us. With the Kitchen+ROM, it is possible to break-down the ROM to components, and select the components to build another ROM (a variant of the original) that meets a specific requirement. For example, it is possible to exclude GoogleMarket, Facebook, Twitter apps and build a ROM without them, if a person wishes.
There are many more other reasons, but I guess the main ones are those.
Hope this helps.
Hello to all. I am new to the form and new to smartphones. I just retired my old Motorola flip phone and bought a used Samsung Galaxy S4 SGH-I537 with Lollipop 5.0.1 installed. I am 68 years young, enjoy learning and dislike companies that watch my every move and dictate what is installed on devices that I own. I build (assemble parts) my own computers and consider myself "handy" around computers but will stop shout of "tech-savvy".
I have been searching and learning and right now I am on overload with all the info / knowledge I have been reading. To the best of my knowledge this phone, mainly because of Lollipop is not root able at this time. At least not with automated software which I would prefer. Now my question which after searching I did not find an answer. Is there a PC installed software that allows control of this phone. I want to safely remove bloat ware, pack up and other related maintenance duties.
I have read, on this forum and others about all the apps I can install on the phone like SD Maid, Titanium, Root Explorer and so many more. I am reluctant to install all of those for two reasons. I am installing a bunch of apps to cleanup my phone, not sure if that makes sense, second, working with a small screen and small keyboard seems like a recipe for mistakes / disaster.
So, is there a PC application available (paid is fine) or not? I am running Windows 7 64
Thank you all.
Mike
hammyj said:
Hello to all. I am new to the form and new to smartphones. I just retired my old Motorola flip phone and bought a used Samsung Galaxy S4 SGH-I537 with Lollipop 5.0.1 installed. I am 68 years young, enjoy learning and dislike companies that watch my every move and dictate what is installed on devices that I own. I build (assemble parts) my own computers and consider myself "handy" around computers but will stop shout of "tech-savvy".
I have been searching and learning and right now I am on overload with all the info / knowledge I have been reading. To the best of my knowledge this phone, mainly because of Lollipop is not root able at this time. At least not with automated software which I would prefer. Now my question which after searching I did not find an answer. Is there a PC installed software that allows control of this phone. I want to safely remove bloat ware, pack up and other related maintenance duties.
I have read, on this forum and others about all the apps I can install on the phone like SD Maid, Titanium, Root Explorer and so many more. I am reluctant to install all of those for two reasons. I am installing a bunch of apps to cleanup my phone, not sure if that makes sense, second, working with a small screen and small keyboard seems like a recipe for mistakes / disaster.
So, is there a PC application available (paid is fine) or not? I am running Windows 7 64
Thank you all.
Mike
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sir..
First of all if you want to remove ur bloatware..etc then Root is must....
U can search the forum how to root ur device.. U will definitely find a way...
And the second thing if you want to control your device via pc... Like handling calls,msgs,data transfer...
Then Airdroid is the best option for you...
Hope this helps...
IF I HELPED U THEN HIT THE THANKS BUTTON
Hello.
I have a Samsung Galaxy Note (GT-N8000). It has Android 4.1.
I want to upgrade it to Lollipop, to Android 4.4 or to a reliable custom rom. I prefer roms that are lightweight, easy to use and a little bloated. I do not know what is the best version because I have never owned another Android device.
I tried to find the roms to download, but I cannot find the official Samsung download page. It is difficult to find a reliable source that has living download links. So I need some help.
I tried Cyanogenmod and I hated it. It seems that it is only for cellphones and for that reason it is poor for tablets. I do not know what are the good things that Samsung put on their tablets to compare to pure Android. Of course, I do not like software bloat. Some people claim that Samsung adds a bad GUI to the system, but the Cyanogenmod GUI is terrible.
It has an unneeded upper bar. Everything could fit on the bottom bar instead of using two bars.
The touch keyboard has fewer options and the number keys are not independent. Furthermore, my language needs diacritics.
The menu where apps are listed cannot be managed easily. The Samsung GUI lets me uninstall apps, sort apps, move apps and create folders.
Although I do not use most of Google apps, such as G+, I need Gmail; but no Google apps are on Cyanogenmod.
Excuse me. Maybe nobody has read it. Let me try again.
NIL