Experience with GSIs? - Google Pixel 3 Questions & Answers

Does anyone have experience with running any GSI on their Pixel 3 that they'd be able to share? I recently ordered a 3 and figured I'd start with DU but I like to switch things up every so often and there are a lot of GSIs to choose from.
I'm curious if it feels like a step down from a custom ROM or if it feels incomplete? As I understand it, GSIs are best on Google devices. Anything else you'd like to share, please do.
Thanks in advance

Related

I need a custom rom built. Any takers?

Feel free to delete if this isn't allowed here, I feel that this thread is mostly dead anyhow with Oreo officially released.
I have a Verizon Pixel with an unlocked bootloader. Currently on the latest PureNexus. I want to try something a little different. I want to try a new rom with a few mods. I really want THE BARE MINIMUM Latest Nougat AOSP installed and running for optimum battery life. There are only a handful of apps that I really need, and I'd sideload them. I'd like to leave gapps out, Ya, I know, no play store, I can use F-droid and apkmirror, and something like Hermit for gmail/google calendar. I'd only need a few minimal modifications, the only one I'd really like is "Battery Circle" option, but I'd take the normal PA or PN settings option. No PIE. I'd like EX kernel to underclock a bit, and see what it all looks like performance and battery wise. Fingerprint unlock is essential. Is this something someone here can help with? If you are interested, reply below. There has to be someone else that's interested in this as well. I can't be the only one. Maybe just a rom built from PN sources w/o gapps?
*Disclaimer, I'm comfortable in ADB and flashing roms/TWRP.
I'd like Root and Xposed, for things like systemwide adblock. Yes, I know that Android Pay won't work with no gapps installed, I'm really trying to simplify here.
Your thoughts?
This should be in the questions and discussion thread above, not this thread, this is for already developed roms kernels.ect probably have better luck in the correct thread, though build roms for pixel abd pixel with the A/B partions is a royal pain in the ass from what I've read so I doubt anyone is going to developed a room for one person, but I wish you luck
ne0ns4l4m4nder said:
This should be in the questions and discussion thread above, not this thread, this is for already developed roms kernels.ect probably have better luck in the correct thread, though build roms for pixel and pixel with the A/B partions is a royal pain in the ass from what I've read so I doubt anyone is going to developed a room for one person, but I wish you luck
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I feel that the people reading the Q and A stuff is more about how to configure some piece of software on your device, or what software did you use to accomplish x/y/z, not custom rom level stuff.
Maybe I'll reach out to beans and see what he can whip up for me.

¿It is worth to change to Lineage OS 17.1?

Hello people, thanks for reading!
I have a very very mindblowing situation, i have a Mi Mix 2S with MIUI 11 Beta,Android 10 from Xiaomi.eu (Very beautiful people) and i want to know if someone of you think that it is worth to move to stock android on this device.
I'd already have Lineage OS in my previous devices, and i really really like it, and i want to test it on this device too, but i don't want to have bad times with bad performance because of the OS.
If anyone have any type of advice for me, of the experience of having stock android on this device. I want to know everything about the experience, i want to use the stock gestures and a lot of things.
I'm open to receive your comments.
Thanks in advance people! :good:
potatus said:
Hello people, thanks for reading!
I have a very very mindblowing situation, i have a Mi Mix 2S with MIUI 11 Beta,Android 10 from Xiaomi.eu (Very beautiful people) and i want to know if someone of you think that it is worth to move to stock android on this device.
I'd already have Lineage OS in my previous devices, and i really really like it, and i want to test it on this device too, but i don't want to have bad times with bad performance because of the OS.
If anyone have any type of advice for me, of the experience of having stock android on this device. I want to know everything about the experience, i want to use the stock gestures and a lot of things.
I'm open to receive your comments.
Thanks in advance people! :good:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
MIUI11 is quite bad with battery for me, especially on 4G. (and any android 10 based system for that matter). That is the reason why I stick with LOS16 which is grrat on the battery on my usage scenario.

Question Is it possible to flash stock Android to the POCO X3 Pro?

I'm coming from a Mi A3 running stock Android 11 which I love.
The screen on the X3 Pro is a delight to behold for my poor old eyes but there are a few things that either I don't like in the MiUI or just aren't working properly. Is there any way to flash stock Android 11 on this phone?
Twibble said:
Is there any way to flash stock Android 11 on this phone?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You could take a look at LineageOS, it's pretty much the purest custom rom out there.
Oops, I guess that we can't delete a post!
thorin0815 said:
You could take a look at LineageOS, it's pretty much the purest custom rom out there.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for chipping in thorin0815. Yes I have seen a few "How to" articles but can't seem to find a really good description of how well it runs and what the pros and cons might be. Do you have any idea of how close to the pure Android experience it would be and if there are any major pitfalls or disappointments that have been reported? The phone I have came with an unbelievable 2 year warranty and I am reluctant to flash a system that I might regret at a later date.
Twibble said:
Thanks for chipping in thorin0815. Yes I have seen a few "How to" articles but can't seem to find a really good description of how well it runs and what the pros and cons might be. Do you have any idea of how close to the pure Android experience it would be and if there are any major pitfalls or disappointments that have been reported? The phone I have came with an unbelievable 2 year warranty and I am reluctant to flash a system that I might regret at a later date.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you will use Google Play Store, Google Calendar, Google Pay, or Google Apps, then LineageOS will need some adjustments and modifications to let those Google Apps services work properly. And possibly some banking apps may not work.
Whether each ROM pros and cons are, it is subjective. For example, customizations, for some people it's useless, while some people wants more customizations.
Try and error, flash a ROM and feel if that ROM fits your need. You know what you need, we don't know.
Most users starts with ArrowOS.
Pixel ROMs UI looks like Pixel phones.
LineageOS is completely open source.
I don't know other ROMs.
Read each ROM thread for each features, and possibly read some recent replies for update informations.

Best custom ROM for Nord?

Hello,
I've decided to try out a custom ROM, not because I hate OxygenOS11 but just looking for a new experience. Once I got the phone I upgraded immediately to Android 11 but then I saw (and still see) a lot of people swearing by OxygenOS Android 10. Is it worth it to downgrade? What would I lose from V11?
And my main question is for those who tried them, which custom ROM is best for you and why?
qp2988 said:
Hello,
I've decided to try out a custom ROM, not because I hate OxygenOS11 but just looking for a new experience. Once I got the phone I upgraded immediately to Android 11 but then I saw (and still see) a lot of people swearing by OxygenOS Android 10. Is it worth it to downgrade? What would I lose from V11?
And my main question is for those who tried them, which custom ROM is best for you and why?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've used Oxygen OS for like 6 months after I got the Nord. Then I moved to Pixel Experience Plus based on A11. Worked fine, but it is discontinued now and they have started with A12. Used it for a while, everything worked fine, some minor bluetooth issues (not sure why), small bugs which you won't notice initially and they aren't a deal breaker.
Now I've switched to Proton KnockOff ROM, everything is fine. Minor UI jitters while locking sometimes. No major bugs faced so far. Also tried Project Radiant Unofficial Build (works fine though).
My final thoughts:
If you want clean pixel phone feel and no customization then Pixel Experience A12 is the way to go.
Plus, this ROM has OTA updates enabled.
If you want some customization and overall good performance and you don't mind unofficial builds then Project Radiant is worth trying.
If you want good performance and tons of customization then I'd say Proton will be a good idea.
NOTE: All the ROMs above are A12 based, I used them without root and the same Kernel it came shipped with.
Try different GCams because some of them lag and even crash many a times, I'd say go with BSG GCam or Urnyx05.
Thank you so much for your comprehensive response, much appreciated. I'll also post here my own findings after testing.
qp2988 said:
Thank you so much for your comprehensive response, much appreciated. I'll also post here my own findings after testing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did u tried? I'm interested at your experience

Question Has anyone tried GSI ROMs? How're they compared to stock? (1 III/5 III)

The title is basically self-explanatory. I'm particularly interested in these things:
AOSP/LOS/anything clean: how's battery drain? More than on stock or not?
Camera: could we replace ours with gcam? Is 70-105 switch working well?
Camera: do we have smth like XperianceCamera?
What features are we losing with unlocking bootloader? None afaics, but I may have missed something.
Thanks in advance! :^)
About Xperia 5 IV. It works great to me.
1.- No idea, never used stock. I have strong dislikes on Google.
2.- It works fine with OpenCamera, all 4 cameras detected (front, back normal, back close, back wide).
3.- No idea, I would need to try.
4.- It works fine.
Looks like I wrote a novel so TLDR:
I suck at this stuff, just getting back into custom ROMs - tried Pixel Experience 13 and Lineage OS(no Play Services (I think Android 13/A13 Beta)).
Stock Sony Rom + Root is the way to go. At least for right now.
Wouldn't count on GCam working or working well.
(Sony) Photo Pro is proprietary too afaik so you'd need someone to port it to custom OS like Lineage without G Services (what I read someone feel free to correct me). It might work with LineageOS with G Services or whatever else, I didn't try it.
END OF TLDR:
ROM EXPERIENCES:
Pixel Experience was weird, probably worked fine but I don't think the dimensions of the Xperia 5 III work well with how PE is scaled. Just this users opinion. Also I really only tried it to try it- not a huge fan of Google lately.
Lineage OS almost worked but the version I had text messages didn't work. The default one or others from F-Droid. I'm positive its user error on my part. Battery life seemed great though, it's anecdotal but it seemed markedly better without Google constantly checking in. Probably my bias.
Its important to me to have some Sony Apps and overall functionality (seems like low dev support when comparing to other devices IE Galaxy/Pixel) so I think stock Sony ROM+ Rooted is the way to go. Seemingly the general consensus on the forum too (especially since its pretty stock Android anyway).
Bonus objectives for me on stock Sony Rom is to DeGoogle + MicroG although I haven't made it all the way there yet. Then maybe long term try a Xperia 5 IV ROM for sh*ts and giggles for Android 13 since I doubt the 5 III will get it.
FUNCTIONALITY:
Your questions about GCam and losing functionality: I have heard/seen a lot of things online about GCam either needing to be ported to devices individually or that its part of Google's "Special Sauce" software wise. So I would expect stripped functionality if functional at all.
Someone who is a lot smarter and experienced than me should clarify on these last two:
Downsides to an unlocked bootloader+Custom ROM is same as always: risk of user error, bricking your device (soft bricked mine), depending on the ROM you choose you may not have Google Apps/limited so Banking apps and streaming apps won't work or won't go all the way up the resolution chain 4k20 69 fps etc. And I'm sure there is a security disclaimer somewhere out there too if you aren't careful.
Pros are same as always: Control of your device, system wide ad blocker, admin rights to delete bloatware, customization, custom ROMs, better battery life, potentially longer OS support, privacy, security, etc.
RAMBLINGS OF GETTING BACK INTO ROOTING WITH THE X5 III
*In case there are others out there who are similar to me in either getting back into rooting after a long time or the first time*
I'm pretty much a novice at this stuff but I was finally able to get my phone unlocked a few weeks ago and tried a few different ROMs. Out of what I tried I really only remember the Pixel Experience and Lineage OS. PE was fine but I'm not a huge fan of all the Google stuff so I went in the opposite direction and did Lineage OS without the Google Play Store/Services/App Framework whatever. It was almost a keeper for me except messaging wasn't working for whatever reason ((I wonder ^^)but really I think it was because it was an A13 beta). I tried a few different messaging apps but between that and losing some Sony Apps I decided to back to stock.
I feel like the big points for this phone are the camera app, the display customization depending on the content viewed, and possibly the gaming tweaks/music app? Last two are a stretch but eh ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
The new plan was/is hoping to do was DeGoogle the stock ROM and replace it with MicroG. I haven't gotten around to it because the post I was looking at on how to do it on this forum linked to another post in a different forum and it was for Android 11. My phone is on Android 12. Looking at the comments people had said the process was the same for 12 as 11 or very similar. Shouldn't be too hard but knowing me it will take me another afternoon or two to get it figured out and working.
Long term I'm kind of hoping that when an Android 13 ROM comes out for the Xperia 5 IV we could try throwing it on our devices too. Since I doubt we will be getting Android 13 on the Xperia 5 III. I know the physical camera is different on the 5 IV but everything else seems close enough to a normie like me that maybe it would be worth it to try. Then its back to figuring out how to DeGoogle on an unsupported device and installing MicroG etc etc.
Sorry its such a late response and not the most technical (or maybe even 100% accurate) but that was at least my experience a bit ago trying a few different ROMs on the GSI thread linked in the "How To" post listed here.
This phone has really grown on me and I'm bummed I'm not savvy in any amount of Android development so I am unable to make customizations/tweaks to the stock ROM. Or customize other OS ROM's to port here. Which makes me reliant on others to do the work so I can leech off it haha. On more widely used phones like Samsung or the Pixel its NBD since there are so many users. But a small community like this, it doesn't seem like there is a lot being done. Not a dig or anything, just not a ton of options. Although being able to install a ton of different custom ROMS from the GSI thread is really cool even if it isn't tailored to the Xperia 5 III.
Part of why I threw up so much info on here goes with the last paragraph. You probably won't get a lot of responses. There aren't a ton of peeps here and those who are generally already know what they are doing.
If you end up trying a bunch of different ROMs and find one you really like LMK!
+1 to that. I don't get 5G and had bad time trying to obtain signal. It doesn't worth.
J2 digital said:
Looks like I wrote a novel so TLDR:
I suck at this stuff, just getting back into custom ROMs - tried Pixel Experience 13 and Lineage OS(no Play Services (I think Android 13/A13 Beta)).
Stock Sony Rom + Root is the way to go. At least for right now.
Wouldn't count on GCam working or working well.
(Sony) Photo Pro is proprietary too afaik so you'd need someone to port it to custom OS like Lineage without G Services (what I read someone feel free to correct me). It might work with LineageOS with G Services or whatever else, I didn't try it.
END OF TLDR:
ROM EXPERIENCES:
Pixel Experience was weird, probably worked fine but I don't think the dimensions of the Xperia 5 III work well with how PE is scaled. Just this users opinion. Also I really only tried it to try it- not a huge fan of Google lately.
Lineage OS almost worked but the version I had text messages didn't work. The default one or others from F-Droid. I'm positive its user error on my part. Battery life seemed great though, it's anecdotal but it seemed markedly better without Google constantly checking in. Probably my bias.
Its important to me to have some Sony Apps and overall functionality (seems like low dev support when comparing to other devices IE Galaxy/Pixel) so I think stock Sony ROM+ Rooted is the way to go. Seemingly the general consensus on the forum too (especially since its pretty stock Android anyway).
Bonus objectives for me on stock Sony Rom is to DeGoogle + MicroG although I haven't made it all the way there yet. Then maybe long term try a Xperia 5 IV ROM for sh*ts and giggles for Android 13 since I doubt the 5 III will get it.
FUNCTIONALITY:
Your questions about GCam and losing functionality: I have heard/seen a lot of things online about GCam either needing to be ported to devices individually or that its part of Google's "Special Sauce" software wise. So I would expect stripped functionality if functional at all.
Someone who is a lot smarter and experienced than me should clarify on these last two:
Downsides to an unlocked bootloader+Custom ROM is same as always: risk of user error, bricking your device (soft bricked mine), depending on the ROM you choose you may not have Google Apps/limited so Banking apps and streaming apps won't work or won't go all the way up the resolution chain 4k20 69 fps etc. And I'm sure there is a security disclaimer somewhere out there too if you aren't careful.
Pros are same as always: Control of your device, system wide ad blocker, admin rights to delete bloatware, customization, custom ROMs, better battery life, potentially longer OS support, privacy, security, etc.
RAMBLINGS OF GETTING BACK INTO ROOTING WITH THE X5 III
*In case there are others out there who are similar to me in either getting back into rooting after a long time or the first time*
I'm pretty much a novice at this stuff but I was finally able to get my phone unlocked a few weeks ago and tried a few different ROMs. Out of what I tried I really only remember the Pixel Experience and Lineage OS. PE was fine but I'm not a huge fan of all the Google stuff so I went in the opposite direction and did Lineage OS without the Google Play Store/Services/App Framework whatever. It was almost a keeper for me except messaging wasn't working for whatever reason ((I wonder ^^)but really I think it was because it was an A13 beta). I tried a few different messaging apps but between that and losing some Sony Apps I decided to back to stock.
I feel like the big points for this phone are the camera app, the display customization depending on the content viewed, and possibly the gaming tweaks/music app? Last two are a stretch but eh ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
The new plan was/is hoping to do was DeGoogle the stock ROM and replace it with MicroG. I haven't gotten around to it because the post I was looking at on how to do it on this forum linked to another post in a different forum and it was for Android 11. My phone is on Android 12. Looking at the comments people had said the process was the same for 12 as 11 or very similar. Shouldn't be too hard but knowing me it will take me another afternoon or two to get it figured out and working.
Long term I'm kind of hoping that when an Android 13 ROM comes out for the Xperia 5 IV we could try throwing it on our devices too. Since I doubt we will be getting Android 13 on the Xperia 5 III. I know the physical camera is different on the 5 IV but everything else seems close enough to a normie like me that maybe it would be worth it to try. Then its back to figuring out how to DeGoogle on an unsupported device and installing MicroG etc etc.
Sorry its such a late response and not the most technical (or maybe even 100% accurate) but that was at least my experience a bit ago trying a few different ROMs on the GSI thread linked in the "How To" post listed here.
This phone has really grown on me and I'm bummed I'm not savvy in any amount of Android development so I am unable to make customizations/tweaks to the stock ROM. Or customize other OS ROM's to port here. Which makes me reliant on others to do the work so I can leech off it haha. On more widely used phones like Samsung or the Pixel its NBD since there are so many users. But a small community like this, it doesn't seem like there is a lot being done. Not a dig or anything, just not a ton of options. Although being able to install a ton of different custom ROMS from the GSI thread is really cool even if it isn't tailored to the Xperia 5 III.
Part of why I threw up so much info on here goes with the last paragraph. You probably won't get a lot of responses. There aren't a ton of peeps here and those who are generally already know what they are doing.
If you end up trying a bunch of different ROMs and find one you really like LMK!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for putting all your experiences out here, really a huge help. I would also like to try out lineage, but can't seem to find a supported version. Would you mind pointing me in the right direction?
Claussen said:
I would also like to try out lineage, but can't seem to find a supported version. Would you mind pointing me in the right direction?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you don't mind a customized one, try crDroid
i would like to try custom ROM's but since no TWRP anymore to get for the Xperia's i hate to reinstall everything just to test something new.

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