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Hi,
I have some very basic questions about using a custom ROM in general, and on the Galaxy S6 more specifically. My old phone died today (Nexus 4) and I thought about getting the S6 now.
The problem is, I hate TouchWiz. I only really like Stock Android, which is why I got a Nexus in the first place. However, since I don't like the newest iteration of the Nexus (Nexus 6), I thought about getting the Galaxy S6 (because the hardware is great) and then switch to a custom ROM.
Since I've never done that (never even rooted my phone before), I just wanted to know the following things:
- Is it easy to put a custom ROM on the Galaxy S6?
- Are there custom ROMs for the Galaxy S6 that resemble Stock Android and still make use of its unique hardware features (eg fingerprint reader, camera features,...)
- I've heard some things about CyanogenMod, is it any good? Is it available for the S6 and is it updated frequently by the developers? If so, once the custom ROM is on the phone, will you get updates over the air?
- Will CyanogenMod for example also be updated to the newest Android versions (like 5.1.1 currently)? By this I mean, do the developers of CyanogenMod incorporate security and performance fixes made by Google?
- For how long can I expect updates for this custom ROM, for the Galaxy S6?
Thanks in advance!
jb91 said:
Hi,
I have some very basic questions about using a custom ROM in general, and on the Galaxy S6 more specifically. My old phone died today (Nexus 4) and I thought about getting the S6 now.
The problem is, I hate TouchWiz. I only really like Stock Android, which is why I got a Nexus in the first place. However, since I don't like the newest iteration of the Nexus (Nexus 6), I thought about getting the Galaxy S6 (because the hardware is great) and then switch to a custom ROM.
Since I've never done that (never even rooted my phone before), I just wanted to know the following things:
- Is it easy to put a custom ROM on the Galaxy S6?
- Are there custom ROMs for the Galaxy S6 that resemble Stock Android and still make use of its unique hardware features (eg fingerprint reader, camera features,...)
- I've heard some things about CyanogenMod, is it any good? Is it available for the S6 and is it updated frequently by the developers? If so, once the custom ROM is on the phone, will you get updates over the air?
- Will CyanogenMod for example also be updated to the newest Android versions (like 5.1.1 currently)? By this I mean, do the developers of CyanogenMod incorporate security and performance fixes made by Google?
- For how long can I expect updates for this custom ROM, for the Galaxy S6?
Thanks in advance!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes it is easy, if you take your time to read. CF-root>Odin>flash>rooted
yes there are for now 2 available roms thats are debloated and pretty much stock with some extra features
Cyanogenmod is probably the most common roms on every phonebrand i think
No its not available for S6 at the moment. And yes there are stable versions and nightlies , the last named is updated pretty much every day. As long as the Devs think there should be any updates =) hope i helped you
Just as a heads up you will find that some aosp roms will have trouble with this device due to the chip that is in it. Samsung doesn't offer any real documentation in the chip and lied to developers a while ago when they said they would. If you look back on older devices with the chip there are things that get broken. Your best bet would be a deflated touch Wiz rom.
so i haven't had a samsung phone since 2003 until the S7. the last few phones i had were running stock android, without all the crap and i loved it. now, i know that samsung ui brings with it some benefits. what would i lose (and gain) if i flashed a stock android rom on my S7? thanks
1) not sure there already is a stock rom for S7 ...
Pros:
+ Getting stock android
Cons:
- Loss of some/most/all "samsung" features (possibly also some fingerprint support and so ... )
im not sure if you know the home screen launcher (called samsung touchwiz) can be replaced with better ones like nova launcher and such... is that what you mean by Samsung UI?
changing roms actually change the functionality of the Android system wide functions/features, its different to the home screen UI.
the rom that came with your s7 is stock samsung you could say. Samsung made it, so everything, all the hardware works with the rom... some people want more software features or less features and so flash other roms, like vanilla stock roms or asop/cm roms, even though it may mean some software features wont work and even some hardware functions.
Every rom dev will tell you what's on offer and what the issues are.
the s7 is quite fast now, so you could just root the current rom (once root is available for your model) and remove/freeze apps known not to be required to clean the rom of Samsung junk. also install xposed to add new system wide changing features and such, but the more you mod the more risk of having issues.
"Stock" android is called AOSP okay? It's a little confusing when you say it like that.
Anyhoo, AOSP is faster than TW, and you will have constant update even when S7 is not supported by samsung anymore. However, Samsung made sure that TW is best compatible with their devices so you wouldn't notice any difference at all when it comes to speed. Also when flashing AOSP, you will lose almost all features TW has.
I wouldn't recommend flashing a stock android. Reasons:
1. you'll have to void your warranty and trip the Knox counter. This is a one way street, there is no known method to "untrip" this counter, so Knox will be disabled on your phone (even some samsung services like samsung pay MIGHT be disabled)
2. the s7 hase plenty of power and enough ram, so "having more free ram" or "faster app opening speeds" isn't hardly an argument nowadays anymore.
3. Bloatware removal? Well, at least my s7 (exynos version with dtm german telekom image) came surprisingly clean. Microsoft Office, the usual google apps and the usual samsung apps. No Bild.de, hrs hotels or such crap anymore. And you can disable the apps you don't want easily via the app manager or via another android app called psp (or similar, just search the s7 subforum a bit, you'll find it).
4. optimization: as the posters stated above: the s7 rom is designed for the s7, and just the s7. so all the hardware is probably supported the best under this rom. in the early days of android one just had to cope with the 2g/3g modem, acceleration/light sensor, wifi and perhaps gps. nowadays there is tons of stuff more: fingerprint, special bluetooth low energy functionality, special camera sdks (mostly not public), magnetometer, some people also believe there is a fm radio chip in the s7... and so on and so on... this is making things difficult to implement for the developers of rom bundles as cyanogenmod or aosp.
---> if your only concern is the newest android in case of security: the s7 has android 6.0.1 now, this version has a decent capability to get SECURITY updates from google directly. Meaning the most crucial android wide security loopholes will be fixed. no more "stagefreight will never be patched for my 2,5 year old phone" anymore.
---> if you always want the newest roms for the newest pure android features: I assure you, samsung is sometimes ahead of those. the 5.x rom I am currently using on my xperia mini pro is actually pretty similar in case of functionality/usability with the 4.x rom of my s5. many of the features I missed in the pure 4.x which samsung implemented are now standard in the 5.x "clean android".
I guess you should just lay low and wait for your guarantee to be over OR reconsider once a good rom is available which has features that you urgently want.
I'm also currently waiting for a rooting method which doesn't trip knox to appear so that I can root my s7 and start using it. It's just in the original packaging right now waiting...
-acid
AcidBurns said:
I wouldn't recommend flashing a stock android. Reasons:
1. you'll have to void your warranty and trip the Knox counter. This is a one way street, there is no known method to "untrip" this counter, so Knox will be disabled on your phone (even some samsung services like samsung pay MIGHT be disabled)
2. the s7 hase plenty of power and enough ram, so "having more free ram" or "faster app opening speeds" isn't hardly an argument nowadays anymore.
3. Bloatware removal? Well, at least my s7 (exynos version with dtm german telekom image) came surprisingly clean. Microsoft Office, the usual google apps and the usual samsung apps. No Bild.de, hrs hotels or such crap anymore. And you can disable the apps you don't want easily via the app manager or via another android app called psp (or similar, just search the s7 subforum a bit, you'll find it).
4. optimization: as the posters stated above: the s7 rom is designed for the s7, and just the s7. so all the hardware is probably supported the best under this rom. in the early days of android one just had to cope with the 2g/3g modem, acceleration/light sensor, wifi and perhaps gps. nowadays there is tons of stuff more: fingerprint, special bluetooth low energy functionality, special camera sdks (mostly not public), magnetometer, some people also believe there is a fm radio chip in the s7... and so on and so on... this is making things difficult to implement for the developers of rom bundles as cyanogenmod or aosp.
---> if your only concern is the newest android in case of security: the s7 has android 6.0.1 now, this version has a decent capability to get SECURITY updates from google directly. Meaning the most crucial android wide security loopholes will be fixed. no more "stagefreight will never be patched for my 2,5 year old phone" anymore.
---> if you always want the newest roms for the newest pure android features: I assure you, samsung is sometimes ahead of those. the 5.x rom I am currently using on my xperia mini pro is actually pretty similar in case of functionality/usability with the 4.x rom of my s5. many of the features I missed in the pure 4.x which samsung implemented are now standard in the 5.x "clean android".
I guess you should just lay low and wait for your guarantee to be over OR reconsider once a good rom is available which has features that you urgently want.
I'm also currently waiting for a rooting method which doesn't trip knox to appear so that I can root my s7 and start using it. It's just in the original packaging right now waiting...
-acid
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Click to collapse
thanks for the post. i'm not worried about the warranty. i've rooted the last 3 phones i had and never needed warranty claim. i just like running aosp as its very clean and when rooted gives me more customization options. i could care less about samsung pay or fingerprint scanner and such. so i'm ok with losing it. buying the s7 i was really looking for great hardware which it has and flashing aosp on it. the only reason i didn't go with nexus 6 is because there's no sd card.
You will not see any AOSP roms available for Exynos variants. Snapdragon variants have locked bootloader so unless Samsung unlock it (which I think may be a possibility) you will not see any roms for Snapdragon variants.
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If you want custom roms, the S7 isn't the phone for you.
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Was never a fan of flashing aosp over touchwiz unless the S7 had a gpe counter part and a port was made or something. I hade the m8 on verizon but there was also a m8 gpe as well so that was a great experience because that was just ported over and all the features were still there the boomsound, HTC camera app ect. Usually you lose on a lot of factory features that were made for that phone and what I realized when flashing aosp Roms was the drastic downgrade in camera quality, that was during the s3 and note 3 for me.
I mean I'll definitely give a aosp rom a shot no doubt about that. if we even make it that far with the s7. We still need root and unlocked BL first to even be thinking about all that. Unless you got the exynos version.
One big thing for me usually is the camera...
Somehow the stock camera is always easiest, best, flexible and most comfortable. Never really found a camera which could replace it (either not all functionality available, or just not working as smooth). But yeah, it's not as if there is (or likely will be) an AOSP rom for the S7...
I have browsed around briefly in the Gear S3 section of the xda Forums but in general, there does not seem to be much activity in the area of ROM development for the Gear S3. (Just official ROMs?)
Is there such as a thing as "root" for the S3 and and any sort of development like we see on Android based phones?
It seems that Samsung has little interest in listening to their customers and bringing missing functionality to their Tizen based watches, or at least addressing some of the issues that some of us have.
It would be great to see custom ROM development for the S3 as this might allow Devs to bring additional functionality and also to address some of the issues that some of us have.
Byte_76 said:
I have browsed around briefly in the Gear S3 section of the xda Forums but in general, there does not seem to be much activity in the area of ROM development for the Gear S3. (Just official ROMs?)
Is there such as a thing as "root" for the S3 and and any sort of development like we see on Android based phones?
It seems that Samsung has little interest in listening to their customers and bringing missing functionality to their Tizen based watches, or at least addressing some of the issues that some of us have.
It would be great to see custom ROM development for the S3 as this might allow Devs to bring additional functionality and also to address some of the issues that some of us have.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There wasn't even any development for the original gear. The closest we got was getting a CM version of android on the watch. I doubt there will be any development for the s3.
Being a smartwatch, therefore having limited application compared to a smartphone, I don't expect much in terms of custom ROMs.
One thing I'm starting to ask myself is whether the hardware would support an Android Wear OS, considering that AW 2.0 has just been released.
Not that I'm unhappy with Tizen (I have the Gear S3 since three weeks only after all); the available apps satisfy my current needs, and I have no software issue at all. I'm just curious.
BTW what would a Tizen rooted smartwatch do, compared to a non-rooted one ?
sandrinopi said:
Being a smartwatch, therefore having limited application compared to a smartphone, I don't expect much in terms of custom ROMs.
One thing I'm starting to ask myself is whether the hardware would support an Android Wear OS, considering that AW 2.0 has just been released.
Not that I'm unhappy with Tizen (I have the Gear S3 since three weeks only after all); the available apps satisfy my current needs, and I have no software issue at all. I'm just curious.
BTW what would a Tizen rooted smartwatch do, compared to a non-rooted one ?
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Click to collapse
Yeah, at some point people will start talking about android wear on the gear s3 but i doubt that kind of port will be successful. It hasn't been in the past and also consider that Google said that android wear 2.0 will not work with android pay "if you use nfc payments" if you have a rooted phone. Samsung Pay may not even work since it's baked into the Gear app and will probably experience syncing problems. Rooting Tizen wont give you much more than the capability of adding custom ringtones, nothing major at this point
We don't need a different rom for the gear s3, we need apps and at some point Samsung has to pay some attention to this because i'm tired of supporting this company and not being able to do some very basic things that a smart watch like this should be able to do.
sandrinopi said:
One thing I'm starting to ask myself is whether the hardware would support an Android Wear OS, considering that AW 2.0 has just been released.
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Click to collapse
I don't think anyone is going to invest the time trying to port AW into the S3, because it's easier to do the reverse- copy the S3 form factor. I predict one of the major watch manufacturers is going to release an AW 2.0 watch that looks like the S3, including the rotating bezel (since 2.0 easily accommodates that).
sandrinopi said:
Being a smartwatch, therefore having limited application compared to a smartphone, I don't expect much in terms of custom ROMs.
One thing I'm starting to ask myself is whether the hardware would support an Android Wear OS, considering that AW 2.0 has just been released.
Not that I'm unhappy with Tizen (I have the Gear S3 since three weeks only after all); the available apps satisfy my current needs, and I have no software issue at all. I'm just curious.
BTW what would a Tizen rooted smartwatch do, compared to a non-rooted one ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
A rooted device would basically let the user do what they want with the watch. Basic annoyances could be corrected. Things like getting rid of pre installed apps/watch faces you don't use, get rid of standalone icon on watch faces, being able to re arrange ALL icons to where you want etc could then be done. So instead of Samsung dictating what and how things are installed you could have more flexibility to do what you want how you want.
That's all I want. Root, removal of stock apps, replace with the ones I want.
Hi all, is it at all possible for someone who knows how, try and get an Android Wear 2.0 build working on the Gear S3? I love the design but absolutely dislike Tizen OS. Has literally no good app support, S Health is the worst fitness app I've ever used and it's literally boring to use. I think Android Wear would fix this issue. If Garmin used an AMOLED display with their Fenix 5 Id have stayed with Garmin but for now I'm looking at potential Android Wear devices, trouble is, they all look either minimalistic and boring or don't have the specific basic features one needs.
Thanks, just throwing it out there...
ds980x said:
Hi all, is it at all possible for someone who knows how, try and get an Android Wear 2.0 build working on the Gear S3? I love the design but absolutely dislike Tizen OS. Has literally no good app support, S Health is the worst fitness app I've ever used and it's literally boring to use. I think Android Wear would fix this issue. If Garmin used an AMOLED display with their Fenix 5 Id have stayed with Garmin but for now I'm looking at potential Android Wear devices, trouble is, they all look either minimalistic and boring or don't have the specific basic features one needs.
Thanks, just throwing it out there...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I doubt it's possible, but you may want to try asking this in the S3 Roms and Development Forum.
Hi,
I am looking into buying a S6 or S7 for my wife. I know the S7 is the newer version (duh) but future proofing also means having access to newer Android Versions. Afaik nougat is the last android update the S6 will receive while I am guessing that the S7 will also get Android O. That would leave me with installing a custom rom (on the S6) when O comes out. I tried having a look at the forums but I am not sure: Is it correct to say that the S7 is the better phone when it comes to custom roms?
Thanks for the help!
I have an S6 and Exynos = no custom/Aosp roms. I know they are very early stages of Aosp because Exynos will not release the source code. So getting a working version of Android O before it is officially released for S6 is a lot of work to get stable. I cant see that happening.
I have ordered my S7 but dont have any experience at the moment with it. I have seen AOSP on the S7 so that means there is a lot of development going on. Which for me is key when buying a new phone. Exchange, contribute, share and improve info.
So short answer is YES
LineageOS is out for both phones, but i'll bet some stuff still doesn't work. I would opt for the s7 mainly due to the bigger battery.