Database Info

Any real need to root?

I sent my Galaxy S Vibrant through the dishwasher, which didn't turn out particularly well, and the insurance company sent me this G2X as a replacement.
Pleasantly surprised that wifi tethering works out of the box. That was the big point of rooting the Samsung and upgrading first to Bionic (which was awesome) and then to CM7 (which was a big wad of bugs).
Any particular advantage to rooting? LG seems to be much better than Samsung as keeping up with the joneses.

rooting
I recently got my G2x and after following the instructions for installing nvflash and CM recovery I began flashing many different ROMs. I had never done it before and instantly became an addict. My girlfriend who got hers on the same day kept hers stock. Her camera seems to be brighter, mine is faster with a lot less bloat. I did overclock my CPU which so far seems to work well with this phone.

Bloat
yelvington said:
I sent my Galaxy S Vibrant through the dishwasher, which didn't turn out particularly well, and the insurance company sent me this G2X as a replacement.
Pleasantly surprised that wifi tethering works out of the box. That was the big point of rooting the Samsung and upgrading first to Bionic (which was awesome) and then to CM7 (which was a big wad of bugs).
Any particular advantage to rooting? LG seems to be much better than Samsung as keeping up with the joneses.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is worth rooting if for no other reason than to get all the bloat off. Try tsugi rom. It is super stable and lightning fast.

Just the ordinary stuff:
-adfree
-UV kernels
-set CPU
-battery calibration
Those alone are worth the root.

bloat
After having it overnight I can see the advantage of rooting to clean some of the autostart junk out of /system. A couple of times I've had it essentially lock up and the list of processes shown by ATK (when I can get to run) is insane.

Rooting isn't really required or hardly used. I DO use root explorer to make system changes and rom Manager if you crack flash.
But everyday stuff... Maybe titanium backup but I never used it either. Best to restore apps manually.
Most phones require root to install clockwork mod recovery. With Tegra devices you only need to nvflash which doesn't require root. Once you have a custom recovery you can flash roms and custom stuff without root.
So root isn't really important on the G2x unless you want to use a root required app.
-sent from temp HTC Rezound waiting for Galaxy Nexus

I have my phone rooted and tight now only need root for two purposes: 1. I use App Quarantine to freeze unwanted system apps, and 2. I use SetCPU to underclock while the screen's off to save on battery use.
Subtle but important for my phone at least. It all depends on what you use your phone for. Rooting the G2x is pretty easy so it's simple enough to have it if you need it.

Got mine rooted and on CM7. Yes it depends on what you use it for and prefer. I like the custom options that CM7 provide like gestures and specific sound settings etc. In general you do get more freedom to do things and personalize, at the risk of messing it up if you are not careful.

yelvington said:
After having it overnight I can see the advantage of rooting to clean some of the autostart junk out of /system. A couple of times I've had it essentially lock up and the list of processes shown by ATK (when I can get to run) is insane.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Why are you using Advanced Task Killer?

Rooting can bring many nice things.
Such as better battery life, better phone performance, opening your phone up for countless customization options.
And a great benefit: no more waiting months and months for new firmware from T-Mobile, get the latest and greatest right away.
And that's just what iI know, I'm sure.there's many other ways.
Sent from my LG-P999 using xda premium

Does root/de-bloat make such a difference?

I have had my phone for just over a week.
I have no complaints. I just need more time to get used to the different UI after my HTC Vivid.
Battery life is great, I can get around two days with moderate use and about 3 hours screen on time.
I don't notice any lag or overheating. I have not yet inserted an SD card and not sure I am going to need with all the available space.
I have not rooted yet, everything is stock except that I loaded ART yesterday to give that a try.
Those of you have rooted/de-bloated after using the phone for some time (not those who rooted before leaving the store!) how much real difference did you notice in performance before and after?

Not sure it makes a difference as far as speed. My reasoning, I don't use those apps so why keep them. Also I don't want spy software on my phone with carrier iq.

yea also get Greenify. it will give you more control over what and when do your apps get to run. You will save more battery and free up more ram.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.oasisfeng.greenify&hl=en

Debloating and using greenify helps my battery a good amount.

kalani91 said:
Debloating and using greenify helps my battery a good amount.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes indeed. About an hour to an hour and a half more. That's what i'm seeing at any rate. 45 hours between charges @ 5 hours of screen time.

There are many tweaks that I routinely apply to my phone that requires root or root apps. I feel limited without them

Anyone know how to hibernate Facebook on the g3. It's considered a system level app

txtech89 said:
Anyone know how to hibernate Facebook on the g3. It's considered a system level app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is in the greenify donation package if you also use xposed framework.
Sent from my AT&T LG G3

txtech89 said:
Anyone know how to hibernate Facebook on the g3. It's considered a system level app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
or...
you could uninstall it with root uninstaller, reinstall from the play store then it shouldn't be considered a system ap.

txtech89 said:
Anyone know how to hibernate Facebook on the g3. It's considered a system level app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Same as the post above this one, except I used titanium backup.

kalani91 said:
Debloating and using greenify helps my battery a good amount.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree. I should have saved some of my battery stats prior to rooting, de-bloating, and installing greenify, but I can say with certainty that my battery performance has improved noticeably.

kalani91 said:
Debloating and using greenify helps my battery a good amount.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In addition to battery life, I've also noticed a slight improvement in performance due to the bloatware not running in the background.
Sent from my AT&T LG G3

Thanks all.
I will probably get to it soon. I just want to make sure I can follow how to get everything back to stock should the need arise.
I switched to ART a few days ago. Yesterday I got 40 hours with an estimated 8 hours left with the battery on 42% and SOT of 3h37m.
Today I was on wifi surfing from early plus some longer phone calls. Currently on 9h usage with 36h estimated left and SOT of 2h25m.
So things can only get better if I debloat.

You can disable all the preloaded apps without rooting. I seriously doubt rooting and deleting the apks is going to do anything besides free up space.

redhooka said:
You can disable all the preloaded apps without rooting. I seriously doubt rooting and deleting the apks is going to do anything besides free up space.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
you couldn't be more wrong... for one thing, getting rid of the carrierIQ crap requires root and it alone makes a world of difference. some of the things eating up resources can't simply be "disabled" in the Application Manager.

Cleaners, which one is the best?

As title says, which one ram/junk cleaners are the best?
I have HTC M8 and I know HTC have its own Boost+, is it worth using?

I like the Smart Booster Xposed module, but it's root/xposed only. When I don't have root, I use CCleaner, i've tried dozens of others and they all seem to include the same amount of extra bloatware, The apps that come from CM (clean master) all have some kind of cleaning utility at the cost of installing maybe a dozen more crapapps.
Maybe there are others that work well but I just use smart booster because all of my devices are rooted right now. If there is something better than CCleaner, that would be great
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

Sharp852 said:
As title says, which one ram/junk cleaners are the best?
I have HTC M8 and I know HTC have its own Boost+, is it worth using?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To be honest I never trust the stock version of anything. I much rather prefer to root, install a recovery and seek the best possible.
I am sure that the HTC stock boost is not bad and works, however it isn't the best for sure. Any app on the play store will provide about the same usefulness and will probably blast you with ads and other bloatware. I never tried the "Smart Booster Xposed module" but I will give it a try.
It may seem nice to see "RAM freed" but you can just close the apps yourself and free the RAM. I remain skeptical of how much these apps really do. For maximum performance I use greenify and amplify, two apps that extend battery life by limiting apps by hibernating them. However you need root and xposed framework installed.

Asiance said:
To be honest I never trust the stock version of anything. I much rather prefer to root, install a recovery and seek the best possible.
I am sure that the HTC stock boost is not bad and works, however it isn't the best for sure. Any app on the play store will provide about the same usefulness and will probably blast you with ads and other bloatware. I never tried the "Smart Booster Xposed module" but I will give it a try.
It may seem nice to see "RAM freed" but you can just close the apps yourself and free the RAM. I remain skeptical of how much these apps really do. For maximum performance I use greenify and amplify, two apps that extend battery life by limiting apps by hibernating them. However you need root and xposed framework installed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well,i have already Greenify, that is must one ?...and what abiut those .zip flashing tweaks? Worth? Any recommendations?
Sent from my HTC One (M8) using XDA Labs

Sharp852 said:
Well,i have already Greenify, that is must one ?...and what abiut those .zip flashing tweaks? Worth? Any recommendations?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I dont know, I never tried flashing tweaks.

Asiance said:
I dont know, I never tried flashing tweaks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The "official" TWRP app does it, and does it well. I was looking for one that did the same for CWM, but could not find one.
I have an upside-down TWRP installed into one of my devices, it was the only way to get a recovery installed. I downloaded the image from Needrom and use Carliv's Kitchen to apply the kernel info from my own Stock Recovery. The only problem (other than the GUI being upside down while the touches are rightside up) is, my Stock recovery is 6.5mb and the TWRP is about 13mb. So I don't know what problems that might cause. The Magic MTK TWRP installer won't work because the recovery that it creates is just 100mb bigger. I only use the recovery to root the device, because the slider is easy to figure out where to slide. Everything else is almost impossible to navigate, so the TWRP app comes in handy. I did wipe my Dalvik Cache from the recovery, I think you can do that as well from the app.
---------- Post added at 07:35 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:03 AM ----------
Asiance said:
To be honest I never trust the stock version of anything. I much rather prefer to root, install a recovery and seek the best possible.
I am sure that the HTC stock boost is not bad and works, however it isn't the best for sure. Any app on the play store will provide about the same usefulness and will probably blast you with ads and other bloatware. I never tried the "Smart Booster Xposed module" but I will give it a try.
It may seem nice to see "RAM freed" but you can just close the apps yourself and free the RAM. I remain skeptical of how much these apps really do. For maximum performance I use greenify and amplify, two apps that extend battery life by limiting apps by hibernating them. However you need root and xposed framework installed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Smart Booster is handy because you can automate it, to clear running tasks and caches at various intervals. Without it, my devices are using about 90% of the RAM, Smart Booster brings that down to about an average 50-60% Depends on what apps you have installed though. You can also Hibernate apps in Smart Booster, so that they don't run until you actually need them, and then they shut down after you're done.

i never trust any cleaner or antivirus apps for phone. I doubt whether they work or not.
sometimes, they even make my phone more sluggish than usual. that's bad

Root and custom rom or stock

Hello i have the pixel for about 1 week and is really an amazing phone, the best android i have ever had probably, maybe in pair with HTC ONE M8, is near perfect but one of the points that keeps me on android is the posibility of customizing things and improve some thing about a phone, sound, camera, themes, battery, and many other factors.
I used to change phones so quickly since i buy and sell them and test in the while, but didnt find a phone good enough yet, and the pixel is near perfect in every way possible. But i see it almost has no development, i was surprised when i checked forums and didnt find much development.
Well lets go directly in my "problem" lets call it like that:
Things i would like to do on the Pixel are:
1- Customize themes, something like samsung and oneplus offers, the ability to change themes, like making it completely black in settings and menu.
2- Improve the sound, since this is one of the weakest points in the phone, i want to improve it and activate the frontal speaker.
3- Add Miracast, since i use a lot this and i dont know why google took it.
4- Improve a little more the battery, i have an excellent battery life on the pixel 5" like 5/6 hours of SOT in a whole day, but i thing it can goes a little better.
I know all of these can be done with root and custom kernel and roms, but i would like to know if i will lose something rooting and unlocking the bootloader.
For example in my previus Nexus 6P the camera has damaged after rooting then when returned to stock it worked back well.
1- Do i need to root to install any custom kernel and rom ?
2- Do i need to unlock bootloader to install custom kernel and rom?
For example im planning to put franco kernel and pure nexus rom, i will lose something doing this?do i have to unlock bootloader to do this?
Thank you very much for your answers. Regards

You will need to unlock bootloader to do any mods. Even to root.
Personally I use Pure Nexus ROM and it's amazing. Full themeing with Substratum is there. Lots of tweaks. There is a WETA mod for audio that adds Viper4Android driver.
Two Roms that seem to be very stable are Pure Nexus and Dirty Unicorns.
Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk

milan187 said:
You will need to unlock bootloader to do any mods. Even to root.
Personally I use Pure Nexus ROM and it's amazing. Full themeing with Substratum is there. Lots of tweaks. There is a WETA mod for audio that adds Viper4Android driver.
Two Roms that seem to be very stable are Pure Nexus and Dirty Unicorns.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the fast answer. So I don't lose anything opening the bootloader? And what about battery life. On stock in getting superb battery life. You use any custom kernel?

By the questions you asked I take it you're pretty new at installing custom roms? I'd say don't do it and be happy with what you get with stock Android. Bet you 10 to 1 you'll brick your Pixel.

hectorcde said:
Thanks for the fast answer. So I don't lose anything opening the bootloader? And what about battery life. On stock in getting superb battery life. You use any custom kernel?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unlocking the bootloader will wipe your data so if you decide to do it, back things up first.

pixel_junkie said:
By the questions you asked I take it you're pretty new at installing custom roms? I'd say don't do it and be happy with what you get with stock Android. Bet you 10 to 1 you'll brick your Pixel.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No i am not new at all in this I have installed custom Roms on hundreds of devices from different Brands. I have been customized phone since Sony Ericsson devices before android. But any device is different is not the same procedure to root unlock and install things on Samsung Motorola and HTC any has its own way.
I just asking these because I'm Nexus devices rooting caused camera problems. And the pixel is so amazing like it it's already not like most devices that needs several things to work good. But if I can improve some things without loosing anything I would like to install customs and mods.
Enviado desde mi Pixel mediante Tapatalk

Just for my 2 cents, regarding battery life I've tried stock, stock rooted, PureNexus, and custom kernels. By far the best battery life has been stock + rooted with Greenify using aggressive doze and hibernating many apps. I actually had much worse battery life with PureNexus and both Franco kernel and stock, lots of wake locks.

geoff5093 said:
Just for my 2 cents, regarding battery life I've tried stock, stock rooted, PureNexus, and custom kernels. By far the best battery life has been stock + rooted with Greenify using aggressive doze and hibernating many apps. I actually had much worse battery life with PureNexus and both Franco kernel and stock, lots of wake locks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice but aggressive doze doesnt means you lose notifications from apps when you lock the device. Like WhatsApp Facebook Tapatalk notifications. I'm getting near 6 hours of SOT in wifi I'm really amazed with it.
Enviado desde mi Pixel mediante Tapatalk

hectorcde said:
Nice but aggressive doze doesnt means you lose notifications from apps when you lock the device. Like WhatsApp Facebook Tapatalk notifications. I'm getting near 6 hours of SOT in wifi I'm really amazed with it.
Enviado desde mi Pixel mediante Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I still get notifications in near real-time. I think what you're talking about is when you hibernate apps. I have some social media apps not hibernated, and those come through while my phone is idle with the screen off, while apps that are hibernated come through delayed which I don't mind.

Just to throw in my opinion, most Google devices (Nexus and Pixel) have enough hardware power to last beyond the support life cycle. If this is your daily driver, I'd wait and research until you no longer receive new versions of the OS. At that point tweak the phone to your heart's content. That's just my opinion though.

geoff5093 said:
I still get notifications in near real-time. I think what you're talking about is when you hibernate apps. I have some social media apps not hibernated, and those come through while my phone is idle with the screen off, while apps that are hibernated come through delayed which I don't mind.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice. I have to try that apk I read several times for years about it but never used. If you have time you could send me your setup of Greenify and the apps you hibernate. Thanks a lot.
Enviado desde mi Pixel mediante Tapatalk

hectorcde said:
Nice. I have to try that apk I read several times for years about it but never used. If you have time you could send me your setup of Greenify and the apps you hibernate. Thanks a lot.
Enviado desde mi Pixel mediante Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have everything hibernated except for some social media apps, and have the donation package so I have aggressive doze and wakeup enabled
Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk

Stock vs ROM
I ran stock for a while and tried PureNexus. I love the PureNexus ROM, and I can't say I had any problems running it. I tried installing the Hexa ROM, but I could never get it to install the GAPPs correctly, so I reverted back to PureNexus. I've run it rooted and unrooted, no difference that I can see, other than running some apps like Titanium backup and I want to know if something is trying to request root access.

Dont kill me but...S7 Edge Exynos with MM might be the best phone for a while

So I been following the Pixel and Pixel XL forum for a while now, it seems like xposed and rom developement is either slow or in the case of xposed framework none existence. I think the S7 edge under Marshmallow will be the best phone with the best android firmware for a while... so to those who would want to update to the latest and greatest, realized that xposed might not even reach Samsung Nougat for a long time.
The next best thing I found was the Oneplus 3t which have MM out of the box, however you can opt for installation of Nougat if you like. CM13 is still available and there are dev for it. other than that, I dont see any other phone beating the S7 edge Exynos version.

Have to disagree. Running Nought on a freshly reset phone was the best move for me. Very snappy. I recommend the upgrade.

Jxck said:
Have to disagree. Running Nought on a freshly reset phone was the best move for me. Very snappy. I recommend the upgrade.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
then u never played with xposed....

Chord_Hugo87 said:
then u never played with xposed....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have! I've tried both vanilla, and a custom rom with all the trimmings.

Agree i went back to mm after 3 months of N since beta, yes N is a bit snappier but for the cost of bad battery life, mm is still fast and remember s7 edge has a fast hardware so its very unlikely to face lags etc.
Mm is fast reliable and xposed is ready to be used !

If Xposed it holding you back, you should rethink the advantages. GraceUI is prettier and has a lot of nifty little additions, Android N itself has some and overall its snappier.
I used to be an Xposed hog. But I could find alternatives for pretty much everything. I miss Gravitybox-level customisations but, solid custom roms such as Renovate make up for it! For Snapprefs, I use Casper, adblock by Adaway, etc..

From testing multiple ROMs
Marshmallow - Best standby time, most editable
Nougat - Worse battery life, smoother (not necessarily faster).

Galactus said:
From testing multiple ROMs
Marshmallow - Best standby time, most editable
Nougat - Worse battery life, smoother (not necessarily faster).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am using the t mobile nougat rom on my Verizon s7 edge, and the battery life is better than mm!
Sent from my SM-G935T using Tapatalk

thedisturbedone said:
If Xposed it holding you back, you should rethink the advantages. GraceUI is prettier and has a lot of nifty little additions, Android N itself has some and overall its snappier.
I used to be an Xposed hog. But I could find alternatives for pretty much everything. I miss Gravitybox-level customisations but, solid custom roms such as Renovate make up for it! For Snapprefs, I use Casper, adblock by Adaway, etc..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
WIll you Google account not be banned when using Casper?
I love snapprefs, not because of the saving/uploading/filter features, but mostly beacuse blocking preload and background loading of stories etc, Snapchat is a real battery hogger and has taken the wrong direction.
I also wanna update to N, but some of the xposed features are holding me back
Snapprefs
Youtube background play
AppsOpsXposed
Greenify
MinMinGuard
Rootcloack
Xtouchwiz
I need the rootcloack for my banking apps, can not login without root.
Are there any options?

junear said:
I am using the t mobile nougat rom on my Verizon s7 edge, and the battery life is better than mm!
Sent from my SM-G935T using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Snapdragon model = No idea about Exynos March firmware battery life.

thedisturbedone said:
If Xposed it holding you back, you should rethink the advantages. GraceUI is prettier and has a lot of nifty little additions, Android N itself has some and overall its snappier.
I used to be an Xposed hog. But I could find alternatives for pretty much everything. I miss Gravitybox-level customisations but, solid custom roms such as Renovate make up for it! For Snapprefs, I use Casper, adblock by Adaway, etc..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
there are xposed modules that could save you money, someone in here already listed it, so I wont mention it again, trying to keep it discrete so it could last a while. Grace UI is also on the Note 7 rom, which i am running from Rennovate, so I am not missing anything.

LyLu said:
WIll you Google account not be banned when using Casper?
I love snapprefs, not because of the saving/uploading/filter features, but mostly beacuse blocking preload and background loading of stories etc, Snapchat is a real battery hogger and has taken the wrong direction.
I also wanna update to N, but some of the xposed features are holding me back
Snapprefs
Youtube background play
AppsOpsXposed
Greenify
MinMinGuard
Rootcloack
Xtouchwiz
I need the rootcloack for my banking apps, can not login without root.
Are there any options?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Casper can be used with a new Google account. It hasn't banned me for anything so far. But make sure you don't login to Casper. Use it as a root session. This means you still need Snapchat to be installed. Plus Casper doesn't support chat function yet... So you can't completely replace Snapchat either.
YouTube background play can be done via a cracked apk. I think OGtube? Honestly not sure about this.
Appops is not something I've used, but Android 7 allows you to modify permissions and I use a firewall AFwall+.
Greenify works completely fine without Xposed. I've been very happy with it.
Minmin.. AdAway does the job for me very well.
Rootcloack is similar to Magisk. You can get past safety net with it.
Xtouchwiz has no equivalent but there are many customizations baked into the ROM I use-Renovate. And I think Superman ROM has equally or more.
I'm sure others will have more alternatives!

Nougat on s7 edge really transforms the phone in all aspects. The UI is prettier, snapier, smoother, with more options. The whole experience of using the phone is improved by 100%.
As regards battery life, at least my Exynos variant, is much much better when it comes to battery. The doze mode works better, and in general I get fantastic SoT.
Maybe nougat is optimized currently for the Exynos processor...? and maybe in some further updates the nougat firmware will be improved for the SnapDragon variant models ?

I know it doesn't help at all saying it, but with Nougat I have significantly more battery life. I'm talking 1 to 2+ hours more! The other day I was watching a YouTube playlist after work and fell asleep. I woke up the next day to the phone still playing videos. Battery was at 2% and I had 10h and 6m of SoT. I have 100+ apps installed. Not rooted.

nitrous² said:
I know it doesn't help at all saying it, but with Nougat I have significantly more battery life. I'm talking 1 to 2+ hours more! The other day I was watching a YouTube playlist after work and fell asleep. I woke up the next day to the phone still playing videos. Battery was at 2% and I had 10h and 6m of SoT. I have 100+ apps installed. Not rooted.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wow thats really great, any battery saving apps or settings ? I.e. greenify

kloodee said:
Wow thats really great, any battery saving apps or settings ? I.e. greenify
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, none at all. My only explanation would that I don't use social media apps, except for the occasional tweet and some lurking on G+ and Reddit.

Chord_Hugo87 said:
then u never played with xposed....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Some people like their phone bug free and secure.

Faspaiso said:
Some people like their phone bug free and secure.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
some people dont know how to install xposed...I never had a problem with bugs or getting hack or getting my identity stolen...stop visiting pron site on your phone.

Just to Admit I regret didn't buy this phone...
I am looking for S8 and hope to buy it

Chord_Hugo87 said:
some people dont know how to install xposed...I never had a problem with bugs or getting hack or getting my identity stolen...stop visiting pron site on your phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I never had problems get "hacked" either. But it is a fact that your rooted phone (and definitely with Xposed Framework) are more prone to attacks and other kind of malicious things, while bugs also happen far more. It's not even a debate you can have, as it's a well-known fact in the Android universe, which is also the reason many devs don't recommend or support it on their rom. The logcat is filled bugs, even though you don't see them, they're there and both slow down phone, drain battery and cause other problems and now or then bugs will happens that will be irritating like apps crashs.
We could just as well argue for the earth being round or flat, where you were on the flat side.