I have always used custom roms since my Xperia X10. The current phone I am running is a Samsung S8 but I have had several Sony's and always there has been choice in roms. I especially used to like modified stock roms for Sony's. I am looking at a new phone and am interested in the Xperia 5 II. To my surprise there are no custom roms, but the phone hasn't been on the market for that long. So I decided to see what custom roms are available for the Xperia 1 II. By coincidence, today a version of LineageOS has been released for the 1 II but before yesterday there was nothing...Not even anything about rooting. Then I went on to look at what is available for the Galaxy S20 only to find there is relatively little to choose from compared to a few years ago for the then latest or previous flagship model. So what's happened? Is there just a lot less want for custom roms? Have other ways been found to reach the same goals? For me, one of the most important things is that I want Xprivacy Lua installed. Besides that the Xposed repo had some nice modules, for which EdXposed should be used now. Also, I liked choosing a rom with nice custom functionality added and all bull**** stripped. Are there any ways to achieve these things? Or am I simply not able to find the information because of the new board?
_JT said:
Is there just a lot less want for custom roms? Have other ways been found to reach the same goals?
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Lack of device trees for the new devices.
Developers have to own the device to create them.
New file structures and layouts(?)
Maybe other stuff..
Plus Android/OEM Stock OS includes about every feature, setting, options you could need....
Yeah but for example there were overclocks, choices in odexed or deodexed, debloated roms with installer etc. And now that's all gone?
I also travelled the whole custom ROM journey by Sony (Ericsson) Xperia devices. Starting with X8 and ending with XZ1 compact. And it was fun to choose between different features, custom layouts, rooting and even go the overclocking route.
At the beginning of Android era features like overclocking have been essential on non flagship phones to get decent performance. Also there have been mods like fake multitouch for single-touch Xperia X8.
But nowadays with mature Android most of this stuff is not required any longer. My XZ1c was still rooted through Magisk but the only proper use for it was AdAway. Today there are even non-root DNS ad blockers, so that is not an argument for me anymore.
Regarding custom ROMs I think it's getting more complex with every new stock android feature to maintain compatibility. Also with the introduction of SafetyNet many of the modern phones are useless with regard to safety critical apps like banking ones as soon as you switch to inoffical builds.
In my opinion the interest might have decreased for these reasons. I don't want to spend hours on getting my phone SafetyNet compliant after rooting just to enable a feature thats available without rooting (ad block in my case). Neither do I want to loose certificates for DRM stuff (which got erased in Sony devices while unlocking BL). Finally I am happy with stock ROMs by now. And for R&D purposes I still have old phones lying around which are easier to maintain with regard to SafetyNet because the hardware does not support deep attestation.
Personally I switched to Samsung S10e because Sony decided to ditch compact phones and rather releases strange 9000:1 aspect ratio devices.
Related
Hi there,
I haven't found an appropriate forum to ask questions about the new Samsung Galaxy A3 SM-A300(FU), so I try it my luck here.
Chainfire already published its auto-root solution for the new device family, but it will take some time until a CWM or TWRP recovery will be available.
Chainfire's auto-root recovery works on my device, and I got the idea to use his working recovery to inject my own cached updates. Unfortunately, the recovery is locked by a certificate, it can't be used to run an own update script.
Is there a way to get the sources of chainfires recovery? It seems there is no possibility to contact chainfire directly.
I already tried to build my own CM-11 recovery but without success, can you give me at least some hints, how I get the needed board configuration? The common webtutorials seem to be outdated.
Thanks and regards,
cloooned
I think this model and forums should be added to XDA.
Who we should ask for it?
Yes, we need this forum....
Hi fellow members,
after my girlfriend got her Samsung Galaxy A3 aka SM-A300, I thought I'd check the forums for more infos around the "usual stuff", root, recovery, roms, kernels... etc.
Much to my surprise there is not even a forum existing about it, though the device is already out, when for other devices the forums will be created way in advance of the market-launch.
I used to develop a very bad impression about Samsung handhelds over the last years, but I have to say I'm seriously impressed with this phone.
It has a great build quality (Finally, Samsung! Just took you 4/5 years... ) and is really snappy despite beeing only mid-range. TouchWiz seems to have matured about 10 years, it just feels good and right, gone are the days of a laggy TouchWiz which many people considered crapware (me included).
Also SW-support seems great. The phone was bought last week and came with a kernel owith build date of December 2014. After initial setup there was already a SW-update available, with a kernel dated of February 10th, 2015.
For me it is the biggest Android-Surprise since years. Samsung finally delivering a well-built phone that doesn't look or feel cheap and offering great SW-support. I'd like to temporarily borrow my girlfriends A300 and give her my HTC One M7 instead, I find it that nice, though, again, beeing of only mid-range specs.
Never thought it would be possible to receive a kernel via official channels from Samsung which build date is less than two weeks ago.
YES, we need a dedicated forum to it.
Thanks!
The design is very appealing for a midrange device and also compared to a S5mini.
In case there will be no future mini version of the upcoming Galaxy S6, this will be the only alternative to a screen oversized phone and will replace the mini series.
cloooned said:
Hi there,
I haven't found an appropriate forum to ask questions about the new Samsung Galaxy A3 SM-A300(FU), so I try it my luck here.
Chainfire already published its auto-root solution for the new device family, but it will take some time until a CWM or TWRP recovery will be available.
Chainfire's auto-root recovery works on my device, and I got the idea to use his working recovery to inject my own cached updates. Unfortunately, the recovery is locked by a certificate, it can't be used to run an own update script.
Is there a way to get the sources of chainfires recovery? It seems there is no possibility to contact chainfire directly.
I already tried to build my own CM-11 recovery but without success, can you give me at least some hints, how I get the needed board configuration? The common webtutorials seem to be outdated.
Thanks and regards,
cloooned
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
you can take a look here http://opensource.samsung.com/reception/receptionSub.do?method=sub&sub=F&searchValue=A300
wird
l have this device from January....l've been searching for cwm recovery or custom things but only got root by CF........seems like this phone its a ghost sometimes l have the impression that l am the one and only owner of this.....no forum no disgussions about it........ a big shame l guess........
l hope in the near future somebody will begin with the development.....
Same here, seems like I'm in some alternative reality, where Samsung's never launched A3 although I'm holding it in my hand right now...
...or because its not a flagship phone, Samsung gives no support, at least compared to S6. Crap!
'A' series really hasn't caught the development thread anywhere. Seems like the Samsung community is awaiting the S6 and has disregarded the launch of anything prior to it.
I also have the A3 I am looking hi and low for details about is as I I seem to be missing the USB Host option for my USB drives what has really F'ed me off as might be mid ranged but its a option I would of thought it would of had since its a sealed SD card slot
Hi guys,
I want to find a cheap Android phone (around $100) which is good for AOSP and kernel development.
I need it cheap because I want to buy a lot of them for my classes in University (about 50 phones).
There are tons of cheap phones, but I am not sure that it will be easy to find Android and kernel sources for them.
I would prefer a vendor that open-sources all stuff, so I do not have to waste too much time for searching sources.
What would you suggest?
Max88888 said:
Hi guys,
I want to find a cheap Android phone (around $100) which is good for AOSP and kernel development.
I need it cheap because I want to buy a lot of them for my classes in University (about 50 phones).
There are tons of cheap phones, but I am not sure that it will be easy to find Android and kernel sources for them.
I would prefer a vendor that open-sources all stuff, so I do not have to waste too much time for searching sources.
What would you suggest?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Maybe Samsung Galaxy Trend Plus (if you can find many of them)
Sent from my GT-S7580 using Tapatalk
Cheap Phones
The FIGO Virtue 2 is about as cheap as you are going to get (50 bucks) for a phone running Android 5.1 out of the box. Not exactly a fire breather but it is complete. 512MB RAM 8GB ROM MT 6580 chipset. SMALL display. Feels like a toy when you pick it up.
Just got a first partially successful attempt at TWRP to at least not bring the whole thing down when booting to recovery but at this point all it will do is show me what I need to eventually fix and let me re-boot normally, but it is a start :good:
UPDATE 18 November 2016 - TWRP now appears to be fully functional (hacked a different one into it) so looking to create or find a CM 12 ROM for it.
The 5.1 implementation is delightfully devoid of bloatware although not quite the "pico" GApps option I would prefer with CM.
Easy to root with Kingo Root (use the APK rather than the PC version) and the standard MTK tools you can find online will work with it as well.
Their web site is figoglobal.com
They have some reasonable support staff as well. People who actually respond intelligently to e-mails and offer useful replies. Rarely if ever life telephone support but it is, after all, the 21st century and these are all rather inexpensive mass produced in China devices
TRY the redmi 3s
I am in need of a new phone and I am looking for suggestions for something that should be easily rootable?
Any device that using Android 5.0 and below and you just need Kingroot to root it easily.
I am no expert on Android but considering Android 5 came out in 2014 and we are now on Android 7 is it realistic to expect to find a new phone running Android 5?
Can you think of any?
Usually cheap chinese phones that are available on the market like Lenovo, Leagoo or etc. and some retailers still selling old Android models mostly from KitKat and Lollipop ones.
So unlikely for any phone that most people would be looking for. Also Kingroot is full of spyware/adware and hardly a good route to be considering in any case.
If not preferring Kingroot, you might want to find some devices that are using Snapdragon chipset, which are pretty easy to install most of custom roms. recoveries and etc. but requires a little bit higher than average android usage skills. Any device is using Android Marshmallow and above would require to use TWRP or similar custom recoveries to root the device, that's the only way to do it.
It sounds reasonable but my current Experia Z3 rooting attempt fell at the first hurdle because the bootloader unlocking option says 'NO'!
So the detail of the process is critical and general simplified methods are often far from it. Hence being very clear on the rooting method is more important than the phone spec.
I wasnt expecting simple answers here just methods of narrowing down the choices, so all information is helpful.
But it does seem I have to start from the exact phone and try to work backwards to find out rootability as I have no experience to draw on.
Anyone rooted a phone recently?
Well rooting Samsung phones with odin(flashing twrp from odin) is the simplest way in todays date.
Hello,
I bought several smartphone in the past until now and I always want to use them as long I can.
So Android obsolescence comes quite quickly once a smartphone arrives on the market (around 2 or 3 years after). We lose security patches, capability to use upper android version.... So each time I try to use custom ROM based on AOSP or Lineage / CM BUT I lose the capability to make decent photo with the Camera.
Currently it is unacceptable because I have to immortalize best moments of my life (childs, family ...).
The questions are simple : Do you know Android smartphone manufacturer or specific models with open / published camera drivers / framework that can be used on AOSP / Lineage OS?
I have the same question, if a manufacturer publish camera drivers that be used on upper Android version (EX: published for Marshmallow but useable on Oreo).
Thanks
There isn't one. This is the difference between open source and closed sourced drivers. The cameras and drivers are not even made by the device oem.
Updates these days are not that bad. You get a flagship and it will easily last 5 years. Even if 2 of them are only with security updates.
Hello zelendel,
Thank you for this reply.
In consequence all smarphone suffer of the same miseries. There is no way to get a Lineage with the same camera quality than stock experience due to closed source?! :crying:
Pretty much yes. I have not found a single device that doesn't suffer. It's one of the things you give up when you swap over to aosp base. Just like when using Linux. You lose anything special the oem did.
Hi there,
I noticed that there isn't as much activity for custom Roms for tablets as there are for smartphones. I wonder why. Is it because there aren't as many tablets as smartphones and therefore there is less interest in building custom roms?
I wanted to buy a tablet for my mother ( Chuwi HiPad Max) and noticed that the manufacturer doesn't have a good reputation for updating their devices (just few security patches and that's it), so I looked here on XDA with the hope of some custom roms but couldn't find any (not only for this device which is fairly new, but for most tablets even of other brands).
Should I buy a specific tablet (not more expensive than 200€/$) that is known to have more roms? Do you have any recommendation? The tablet will be used for watching Netflix/Prime Videos/YouTube, emailing and internet surfing.
Thank you
Purchase the 8-inch Amazon Fire HD 10 ( 2021 ) tablet ( cheapest one ) or the 10-inch Lenovo Smart Tab P10 tablet: you can get both on Amazon.
JustIceForSake said:
Hi there,
I noticed that there isn't as much activity for custom Roms for tablets as there are for smartphones. I wonder why. Is it because there aren't as many tablets as smartphones and therefore there is less interest in building custom roms?
I wanted to buy a tablet for my mother ( Chuwi HiPad Max) and noticed that the manufacturer doesn't have a good reputation for updating their devices (just few security patches and that's it), so I looked here on XDA with the hope of some custom roms but couldn't find any (not only for this device which is fairly new, but for most tablets even of other brands).
Should I buy a specific tablet (not more expensive than 200€/$) that is known to have more roms? Do you have any recommendation? The tablet will be used for watching Netflix/Prime Videos/YouTube, emailing and internet surfing.
Thank you
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Custom rom development is based on people using the tablet and being interested in making other custom roms for their tablet. Either those who are developers don't have a need for a tablet or there are developers without an incentive (money) to develop a custom rom. Developing a custom rom takes time, even months. Why should someone invest months without pay? Thus the lack of custom roms. Now you could try your luck with generic system images. Those are kind of a custom rom. Made to run on an unlimited number of devices, smartphones and tablets included.
Fytdyh said:
Custom rom development is based on people using the tablet and being interested in making other custom roms for their tablet. Either those who are developers don't have a need for a tablet or there are developers without an incentive (money) to develop a custom rom. Developing a custom rom takes time, even months. Why should someone invest months without pay? Thus the lack of custom roms. Now you could try your luck with generic system images. Those are kind of a custom rom. Made to run on an unlimited number of devices, smartphones and tablets included.
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Click to collapse
Very interesting, thank you
Where I can find chuwi hipad max roms, how to root device and recover
hello i have the same problem ,i need the firmware !!