I hate sense. I hate it so much that I am ready to get rid of the phone even though overall it is a great phone. Who in their right mind thinks dragging a circle into a ring is intuitive? Most of my friends cant figure out how to anser my phone and they own other android phones. I have now had this phone for about 6 months. My previous phones were the Nexus One, which was awesome, and had i not dropped and broke the screen I would still be using that phone. T-mobile replaced it with a galaxy s which was a complete POS which led to this phone. I want to root my phone, and install ice cream sandwich (ICS), or at least native android but I do not want sense. Every thread I have found on here all seem to include the sense with ICS. Can someone point me to a ROM that will meet my needs?
To root: [Guide] to Installing S-off, Unlocking, ClockWork, Root, SuperCID & S-on
I'm currently running ARHD 4.1.9 with a no sense add on script.
This link here: [ROM] Android Revolution HD™ 5.0.2 XE | ICS | Sense 3.5 | High Quality & Performance
will direct you to the downloads for a good ICS rom install.
This link: ARHD No Sense Script
Is the add on you flash straight after you flash the rom to remove the sense script (don't reboot CWM or 4EXT flash straight after). It will give you standard android with Go Launcher EX.
It's good as a daily.
Soon enough, CM9 will be available if you're willing to wait. It's AOSP 4.0 and apparently it's progressing nicely. Now, I don't want to ask this, but why buy an HTC if you hate Sense? I know AOSP is out there, but there are better phones with AOSP (GNexus, for example). I mean, half of the Sensations have "WITH HTC SENSE" right on the battery housing.
I don't get it. HTC makes Sense, it's what differentiates HTC from others, why buy an HTC if you hate Sense?
Edit: I want to make it clear, I'm not trying to hate or be a condescending douche, I'm just trying to see a different perspective. I actually don't mind Sense, but it depends how it's done. None of the 3.5 roms run great for me, ARHD 3.x seems to be the only rom that does Sense right. Smooth and fast, lag free.
mattbutsko said:
Soon enough, CM9 will be available if you're willing to wait. It's AOSP 4.0 and apparently it's progressing nicely. Now, I don't want to ask this, but why buy an HTC if you hate Sense? I know AOSP is out there, but there are better phones with AOSP (GNexus, for example). I mean, half of the Sensations have "WITH HTC SENSE" right on the battery housing.
I don't get it. HTC makes Sense, it's what differentiates HTC from others, why buy an HTC if you hate Sense?
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Because they make great hardware? Because the Sensation is way better in terms of build quality, materials quality and weight balance than the Galaxy S II(which was the other phone I was considering). I've had several HTCs (Qtek 9100, HTC Diamond, HTC Desire, HTC Sensation) and they are all exceptionally well built.
The Diamond was the first phone where they started bundling some crappy "shell"(early version of Sense, but the name was different) on top of the Windows OS. It was really pointless for me, so I just disabled it(it was much easier back then - Settings > Today > Plugins, and you're ready ) After the Diamond I used an Nokia E51 for a while, and then bought the Desire... a nice phone indeed, but something was not right... After I downloaded and flashed CM6 for the first time I never went back to Sense again, Sense just looks ridiculous to me...
And when I bought the Sensation I used it for around 5 minutes with Sense, just to give it a try, but it was still the same $#!7.
So I, and a lot of other more advanced users, hate Sense. It is what differentiates HTC for the beginner and average user. For the advanced user the competitive advantage of HTC is their materials and build quality. And and HTC makes a great device to run CyanogenMod on(the best Android distro).
PS The Nexus S is a great phone, but I wanted the extra screen real estate and the dual-core CPU. The Galaxy Nexus is even better, but it wasn't available when I bought my Sensation. The HTC Nexus One was available when I bought my Desire, but it was 120 Euro more expensive, and I really dislike capacitive buttons(sadly, they seem to be the standard these days)
So this is basically why someone would buy HTC, and hate Sense
mafiabs said:
Because they make great hardware? Because the Sensation is way better in terms of build quality, materials quality and weight balance than the Galaxy S II(which was the other phone I was considering). I've had several HTCs (Qtek 9100, HTC Diamond, HTC Desire, HTC Sensation) and they are all exceptionally well built.
The Diamond was the first phone where they started bundling some crappy "shell"(early version of Sense, but the name was different) on top of the Windows OS. It was really pointless for me, so I just disabled it(it was much easier back then - Settings > Today > Plugins, and you're ready ) After the Diamond I used an Nokia E51 for a while, and then bought the Desire... a nice phone indeed, but something was not right... After I downloaded and flashed CM6 for the first time I never went back to Sense again, Sense just looks ridiculous to me...
And when I bought the Sensation I used it for around 5 minutes with Sense, just to give it a try, but it was still the same $#!7.
So I, and a lot of other more advanced users, hate Sense. It is what differentiates HTC for the beginner and average user. For the advanced user the competitive advantage of HTC is their materials and build quality. And and HTC makes a great device to run CyanogenMod on(the best Android distro).
PS The Nexus S is a great phone, but I wanted the extra screen real estate and the dual-core CPU. The Galaxy Nexus is even better, but it wasn't available when I bought my Sensation. The HTC Nexus One was available when I bought my Desire, but it was 120 Euro more expensive, and I really dislike capacitive buttons(sadly, they seem to be the standard these days)
So this is basically why someone would buy HTC, and hate Sense
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Sense 3.0 is the thing what made me buy HTC Sensation... believe me, even my wife bought a Xperia Arc "after" using my old Desire HD for a while... and she made me sell it at a loss after a weeks time...and got a Sensation XE...
If you hate Sense so much, go for SII ..... but i simply cannot live without Sense ... there is so much in it...
Why should I buy SII when I don't like the hardware? Crappy plastic, horribly light, otherwise a decent phone. I don't mind Sense being loaded when I buy the phone, as long as I can install whatever I want after that. After all I do realize that Sense is a major selling point for HTC. A lot of non-technical users love it, and there is nothing wrong with that. A lot of non-technical users also like Windows, and that's why the PC business is what it is today, but still I wouldn't use it even for a day
Also, when you say that there is so much in Sense you obviously haven't tried CyanogenMod... there are settings and customizations which I(and probably you also) didn't even suspected to exist, while using Sense...
Have a nice day, and use whatever makes more sense to you, after all that's why we use an open system
Not all HTC phones have Sense. I guess you miss my post about having a Nexus One? That is an HTC phone.. No sense, just native Android, and it was flawless. I had 4 samsung galaxys and they all had problems within 4 months and 1 of them lasted 2.5 months before it failed. So basically I had 1 fail after 2 months then every one after that had issues within a few days to a week of getting it in the mail. After reading the reviews of the galaxy nexus, i am not interested. Same cheap feel as the current and previous galaxy and they still have the same problems as the previous versions. I just read a thread about how tapping the galaxy nexus phone causes it to buzz/vibrate. I had the same problem with 2 of my galaxy phones, not to mention none of them worked with GPS even after installing the samsung "fix", and then resorting to changing the server settings ect.. Samsung makes great displays, too bad the only quality part is the screen. This phone was sent to me as a replacement to my galaxy so I really didnt buy it. Other than HTC, at this point there really is no alternative. In my opinion no other manufacturer makes a quality phone so that is why i choose HTC as a manufacturer. I also knew if I didnt like the phone, once rooting was available I could root it and install native android which is why I am here.
To everyone arguing why sense is good: Just because YOU like sense doesn't mean the rest of us do. Why are you even responding in this thread? The name of this thread isnt "Convince me why Sense is good" If you aren't going to provide information relative to the topic, please stop responding. Your responses are starting to turn this thread into an argument and that is not the intention of this thread.
dleach1407 said:
Just because YOU like sense doesn't mean the rest of us do. Why are you even responding in this thread? The name of this thread isnt "Convince me why Sense is good" If you aren't going to provide information relative to the topic, please stop responding. Your responses are starting to turn this thread into an argument and that is not the intention of this thread.
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woah! Sounds like you're going to pop a blood vessel! If you hate sense that much.. You can use the "no-sense" scripts which should do the job for the most part! You wouldn't have to deal with that stupid ring haha, try that. You lose most sense features (which isn't what you're looking for anyway) and it's still good! Some guys have developed roms that they just get rid of sense for. Check those out once you root your phone. I would advise not going for ICS yet or the roms with sense 3.5 until they're stable (That's just my opinion though) Sense 3.0 gives me 1day + of battery life and I'm not even being careful with it. Sense 3.5 gives about 18 hours with less usage and effs with my gps a bit. When you root it, my suggestion is sense 3.0 rom DE-SENSED and go from there!
The guy who posted right after you showed you what to do as well and that's for ICS
For answering the phone, u may either drag the answer call ball into the ring
or just simply drag the ring like unlocking the phone
Sense is HTC's biggest weapon
without sense, HTC may die decades ago
I guess that makes sense. I never really noticed their hardware was that much better, but sounds solid to me.
KAwAtA said:
woah! Sounds like you're going to pop a blood vessel! If you hate sense that much.. You can use the "no-sense" scripts which should do the job for the most part! You wouldn't have to deal with that stupid ring haha, try that. You lose most sense features (which isn't what you're looking for anyway) and it's still good! Some guys have developed roms that they just get rid of sense for. Check those out once you root your phone. I would advise not going for ICS yet or the roms with sense 3.5 until they're stable (That's just my opinion though) Sense 3.0 gives me 1day + of battery life and I'm not even being careful with it. Sense 3.5 gives about 18 hours with less usage and effs with my gps a bit. When you root it, my suggestion is sense 3.0 rom DE-SENSED and go from there!
The guy who posted right after you showed you what to do as well and that's for ICS
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No, not mad at all but Im sure you saw only 1 post was on topic, (the one you mentioned and the one below was kind of on topic) the others were people trying to explain why they like sense and basically telling me if I didnt like sense I should have bought a samsung. I have had this phone for 6 months, and gave it a chance (which was stated in the first post). I have used sense for 6 months and I still dont like it. I don't need other peoples opinion on why sense is good, or how their wife made them sell their phone. What does any of that have to do with me rooting my phone and installing ICS, or a rom without sense? None of those replies address the point of this thread. I want this thread to stay on track, not turn into a "I love sense" VS "I hate sense thread". I think its pretty obvious, that is the direction it was headed.
Thank you for the information. I will probably try simply removing sense from the phone first as you suggested. I dont need ICS, I just figured since I was going to root, ICS would be better. I also know ICS is coming soon with OTA. I might simply wait for that, then remove sense. I am assuming the script will work for the OTA since it works to remove sense 3.5 from the current rom floating around.
See how you get on with CM7. It's not ICS and development may have ceased in favour of CM9, but for me it's clean, fast and solid.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1258543
holy crap thats a long thread... 500+ pages? WOW! Seems like a lot of people are using that. Thanks!!!
Everybody throws around the word intuitive. I like the way the lock ring works, and do find it intuitive to me. For others. Not so much. For those who have no desire to figure anything out for themselves, and would rather be told every move to make, then there is an entire company dedicated to doing just that. The name rymes with Snapple
Sent from my HTC Sensation 4G using XDA App
rumors are rumors. there was a thread or post somewhere stating that sense on ics will toned/slimmed down since ics already has most of the features. I believe sense 3.5 was added to ics so they can work out the bugs. Well only time will tell though. Lets just see when it gets release lol.
masondoctorjt said:
Everybody throws around the word intuitive. I like the way the lock ring works, and do find it intuitive to me. For others. Not so much. For those who have no desire to figure anything out for themselves, and would rather be told every move to make, then there is an entire company dedicated to doing just that. The name rymes with Snapple
Sent from my HTC Sensation 4G using XDA App
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While I respect your opinion, I have to disagree. But again I dont understand why this is becoming a "Why I like sense" thread...
The rings are not intuitive. It requires you be familiar with the phone (which by definition makes it not intuitive) and as much as I dislike the Iphone and apple products in general, I can pick up any Iphone no matter what generation and use it without issue, and I sure as heck dont have to "figure out" how to answer the phone when it rings. Same goes for any native android phone, but the vast majority of people who pick up my phone have to ask how to unlock it. Having a red decline button and a green answer button requiring them to be pulled into a ring is not intuitive. However, a green button that says answer and a red button that says decline that you press to perform the action stated on the button, I find intuitive. I have no problem answering the phone, or using the phone, but I have found certain things about sense I just dislike as a whole, especially after using native android on my nexus one. The lock/unlock ring, and answer buttons are just the tip of the iceberg. In my opinion, all android phones should have the option to use native android, or the manufacturers GUI and I hope Google implements that.
dleach1407 said:
To everyone arguing why sense is good: Just because YOU like sense doesn't mean the rest of us do. Why are you even responding in this thread? The name of this thread isnt "Convince me why Sense is good" If you aren't going to provide information relative to the topic, please stop responding. Your responses are starting to turn this thread into an argument and that is not the intention of this thread.
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Dude. Calm down. I don't particularly like Sense either, but it sure is pretty and fun to play around with for a bit.
The bad news is there's no real 'native' (I assume you mean AOSP) ICS out there yet. There's the 'Voldemort ROM' that we're not allowed to discuss or link to here, but it's not usable yet. If you're really desperate for ICS, you could try out Virtuous Inquisition from the development section. It's the Sense-ICS leak but it's had almost all of Sense stripped out. It's far far better than I was expecting it to be, but it's not without its bugs.
Your best bet would be to just install CyanogenMod 7 and wait for KMobs to release CM9 for us - when it's ready.
Edit: Hah! I didn't even see there was a second page!
Merry Christmas
Merry Christmas and happy new year in advance. I pray to God that our Sensation should get all the upgrades as early as possible like native ics.
Hello to all of you here in the Sensation forums, and let me say I couldn't be happier to be back here! I used to own a Tmo Sensation & I've been gone for a while as I dabbled in the department of the Galaxy S2 (yuck) & the HTC Amaze (great device but no Sensation). As the new devices rolled out I followed on the band wagon but I just kept finding myself missing my sensation. Though it seems to be popular belief that the GS2 is some sort of Android god, I just couldn't love it, & my Amaze was just never as practical as my Sensation due to battery life & development. So, that's my long unnecessary story, thank for listening! Lol.
Now I'm no expert but not quite a noob when it comes to rooting & flashing but its seems quite a lot has changed since I was last here, & I mostly mean the addition of the ICS firmware. I have fallen in love with ICS on my Transformer Prime & I've even almost completely replaced my net book, even being a small business owner, its just so functional for my daily tasks.
So my question is that the last time I was on the Sensation I used a guide by VipeR to get root, cwm, & s-off. Is this still the method I want to use if the ice firmware is where I'm headed, or is there a more up to date method? I'd also like to know what is the smoothest fully functional ice build/rom that the majority are using here, as I see there are a few? Also, any advice or links that anyone might have for me on any significant info or changes that have occurred since the addition of ICS would also be greatly appreciated! I have taken some time to skim through some of the areas that are new to me here, but being new to owning my own business has accounted for a lot of my free time, & family time. I don't have any problem reading & educating myself, but any direction that could be offered would be fantastic! Thank you in advance to all of you great ppl in this forum & I look forward to hanging around here, as Tmo GS2 forum I was most recently in was getting a little off putting & unfriendly.
Posted from my Elegant Transformer Prime
androholic said:
So my question is that the last time I was on the Sensation I used a guide by VipeR to get root, cwm, & s-off. Is this still the method I want to use if the ice firmware is where I'm headed, or is there a more up to date method? I'd also like to know what is the smoothest fully functional ice build/rom that the majority are using here, as I see there are a few?
Posted from my Elegant Transformer Prime
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you have to follow this guide, which is the viper one, cause it is the best method and it is explained very well!
I am using insertcoin 4.6.1 give it a try and you will never change rom
follow the same guide but install 4ext afterwards. it gives you the optian to make a choice if give by roms wich clockwork just standard says no to. 4ext.net dl recovery updater and install by that. nandroid backups are at my phone found in clockworkmod->backup because i sued cwm to at first but with ARHD 4ext can by and was my new recovery
Just curious...the consensus seems to be that ICS will be pushed to the Sensation next month already. Can't wait?
Even if you like the ROMs here (I don't blame you...I like them too! ) I would think that with the official ICS out, these devs would make their respective ROMs even more stable since it will be built on the official one.
If ICS wasn't so close to coming out or wasn't going to be available on your phone, I would definitely go for it, but being that it's so close...
Personally I'm waiting. Then once I've got the OTA, I'm rooting and looking for the ROM of my dreams. LOL!
Thank you very much for posting and honestly I have been considering that. I really want ICS as pure as possible. I had purchased the gnex but I returned it as I just didn't think it was worth the $700 I had spent. I went back with the sensation thinking this was probably much better of a chance of pure ICS than my Tmo gs2. I would have done the htc amaze but there is not as much development for it as the sensation, not to mention the battery life, and I have always loved the sensation. I have learned my lesson with samsung I will buy nothing but htc from here out. I spend the majority of my time on my aces transformer prime and have just fallen in love with this very pure form of ICS.
I used the revolutionary.io site to unlock my Sensation, worked without a problem. Installed CWM and then a few roms, settled on Darkforest as it is the most stable ICS rom I've tried. And the Sensation is definitely better than the Galaxy S2 in my opinion, such a better build quality and feel to it!
androholic said:
Thank you very much for posting and honestly I have been considering that. I really want ICS as pure as possible. I had purchased the gnex but I returned it as I just didn't think it was worth the $700 I had spent. I went back with the sensation thinking this was probably much better of a chance of pure ICS than my Tmo gs2. I would have done the htc amaze but there is not as much development for it as the sensation, not to mention the battery life, and I have always loved the sensation. I have learned my lesson with samsung I will buy nothing but htc from here out. I spend the majority of my time on my aces transformer prime and have just fallen in love with this very pure form of ICS.
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Just curious...what problems did you have with Samsung stuff?
androholic said:
Thank you very much for posting and honestly I have been considering that. I really want ICS as pure as possible. I had purchased the gnex but I returned it as I just didn't think it was worth the $700 I had spent. I went back with the sensation thinking this was probably much better of a chance of pure ICS than my Tmo gs2. I would have done the htc amaze but there is not as much development for it as the sensation, not to mention the battery life, and I have always loved the sensation. I have learned my lesson with samsung I will buy nothing but htc from here out. I spend the majority of my time on my aces transformer prime and have just fallen in love with this very pure form of ICS.
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As others have said, S-OFF etc. from the VipeR thread.
The main thing to be careful of is: S-OFF before upgrading the firmware, revolutionary.io doesn't currently support 1.23/1.27 HBOOTs.
If you want an AOSP like experience have a look at Virtuous Inquisition.
gol_n_dal said:
If you want an AOSP like experience have a look at Virtuous Inquisition.
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I second this, I too have a transformer prime and I can't stand not having ICS. Virtious Inquisition is by far the best AOSP rom out there for the sensaiton. I've tried many others but this is the best working and fastest. ARHD is good if you like sense, but VI is best if you like pure AOSP (with a few HTC things like camera etc)
Sent from my Asus Transformer of The Prime Kind.
Hey everyone. So I've been rolling VI since almost day one when I bought my Sensation used in February. Coming from AOSP roms on my old Desire, I wanted a similar experience. It's been running extremely smooth and it basically runs anything I throw at it.
However, I'm starting to get an itch to try out some of the new Sense 4 ROMs that have been popping up of late. I used to love Sense on the Desire, but felt it slowed down the phone considerably compared to AOSP builds (Sense 3.X especially).
Are there any performance drags by going to a Sense 4 rom? I'd love the extra features, but I also highly value snappy performance. Also I'd love to hear a few suggestions of solid Sense 4.0 ROMs to try. From what I can see, PKMN, Insertcoin, and Ordroid are popular choices?
Any thoughts? Much appreciated
There is indeed a performance drag on every sense 4 rom I've tried (all of them). Its not that they're laggy or anything but moving from application to application has a one or two second delay, sometimes more, so the roms are just kind of slower. Just do a nandroid backup and try it out.
Most people will tell you there isn't any kind of speed issue but if you favor performance like I do, you'll see it instantly.
I don't notice a problem with sense 4, in fact its very nice. Download and judge for yourself. I think you will
Be suprised on how nice they are. If you don't care for it, no harm done, just flash back. Its always best to try for yourself and make your own conclusion. Best of luck.
Sent from my HTC Sensation 4G using xda premium
I've had a similar experience .. After a couple of months during which I (happily) used VI, the urge to flash was too strong.. and since VI wasn't updated any more I started trying the main roms on the forum..
Sense 4 is very nice, but I'm very sensible to smoothness and speed and imho senseless aosp rom are by far the best at the moment.
Now I've been using berserk for a while and It has become my daily driver
Inviato dal mio HTC Sensation XE
Hi forum!
I've got the opportunity to pick up a used HTC Desire S on the cheap right now. Since I'm getting very annoyed with my current phone (HTC Desire X, which after an update has been ruined), Would it still be a good buy? I like Sense 3.6 over 4.x so I don't care about software updates etc. Is it still wise to buy it right now or is it too old?
~Shadow
Development has stop. Most of the dev who were actively developing/porting have moved on to other project.
But if you like sense irregardless whether it's 3.x or 4.x, sense in my opinion is most stable, but most of it's development have stop awhile ago.
We have a few cm/aosp/pac/miui roms if you want to try those out, but there are hits and miss, but still stable for your daily activities.
For some gps is an issue, but it does work for me without a glitch. Using TopNTP hasn't failed me yet.
Desire s have 2 panels, sony and hitachi. read here. You will want the sony panel. the link has details on how to check those out.
Check the charge rate, my device seems to have something faulty, it takes hours(8 hours) to fully charge. Tried on 3 batteries, all the same.
If all the above checks alright, and the price is right, then go for it. The custom sense rom are lovely. i have viper rom on my device. Even though it has been discontinued, it's stable and fast.
Definitely NO. I do'nt know the price you can get it but I am positive you can find alot better phones than DS. Development has stopped and most JB ROMS are not 100% error proof.
menthol1979 said:
Definitely NO. I do'nt know the price you can get it but I am positive you can find alot better phones than DS. Development has stopped and most JB ROMS are not 100% error proof.
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I baught mine for 40 euro, go find a better phone for that. The Desire S is a great little phone, yes development aint what it used to be but if he just plans on using the phone as a "phone" then why not? Not everyone wants JB, im one of them. He said he likes sense 3.6 and theres a good few solid sense 3.6 roms around. I use ViperS sense 4.1 and its flawless imo. I have a few phones but the desire s is what i use everyday for work n that. Cant fault it at all.