Hi all,
I have been lurking around the forums for a while and I have gone from being totally oblivious to at least feeling as though I am somewhat android-literate now, although I still have a lot to learn. I finally took the plunge and rooted my phone last week without a hitch by using the guide here. Now I'm ready to tinker.
I'm currently running on the stock Vibrant updates...the last thing I did was the OTA GPS fix that came out maybe a month or two ago (which has worked great for me btw, no more issues with GPS). I'm trying to pick a new ROM, but I'm not familiar enough with them to pick one.
My wishlist:
-I'd like to move up to a 2.2 build
-go to a more vanilla Android (not TouchWiz)
-I'd prefer speed and stability over snazzy theming or custom animations
-I'd love to get rid of the long time to startup, and the annoying sound that goes with startup/shutdown
-At this point I'm not looking to overclock (one step at a time )
-I do like my Swype keyboard, and would like to keep it
-I plan to start using my phone in place of my iPod, so music friendliness would be a plus.
I'm not sure what other info would help narrow this down, but any suggestions? I'm loving the idea that my awesome phone could be even better.
Sounds like Eugene R2 with Swype added back (it doesn't come with it).
His io kernel helps. You would really benefit from voodoo though.
Thanks for the response. I'll give that a try. I may have to read up on voodoo because I have no idea what that is, but I think I'm fairly comfortable with how to put in a new ROM or kernel.
Thanks for your help! Any other suggestions (or just agreement with the first one) would be welcome.
Yeah, curious if others have another suggestion. Nero with voodoo us gold for me.
Here is voodoo:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=870480
Nero has it though, you just need to enable it (he has really good instructions In the nero v3 thread). Always remember to disable before you flash anything else though, or you'll have to use odin to get back to stock (my warning, seriously, worth it though)
Ext4 makes the Vibrant a new phone.
I would second that opinion on Eugenes GingerBread Clone R2 . Ive been running it and I cant say anything bad about it . IO kernel has great battery life as for swype I just pulled it from NeroV3 . If you want you can go to Q&A section and I have directions and the files need to get swype running . The title is "WHERE DO I GET SWYPE FOR EUGENES GINGERBREAD CLONE?" .
I really appreciate the help guys. I'm going to give the GingerBread Clone a run here in the next hour or so and see how it goes.
Any last advice for a first time ROM-flasher?
Make sure you are not hardware locked before you do anything .
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
I just wanted to thank everybody again. I kind of fell off using forums for a while, but I thought it was worth coming back to give an update. I flashed the Gingerbread Clone ROM that night and have been using it since.
I love it! My battery lasts between 30-35 hours per charge most of the time as long as I'm not gaming on it. There was a little bit of an adjustment period for a couple things, but I'm definitely happy with it. No pulldown settings toggles was a change, and the non-Swype keyboard was too. I'd say I actually prefer the new keyboard because of the good autocomplete options within just a couple letters, and I never went back to Swype.
I don't know if I could even quantify all of the little differences, but overall it seems to be snappier with better battery life. Can't complain about that! Thanks to everybody who offered suggestions.
I said 30-35 hours, but I just looked at my phone and saw I'm currently at 2 days and 6.5 hours since my last charge. Haven't used my phone a ton the last couple days, so that gives an idea of how intense the battery life has been. I'm at 54 hours and I still have another couple left if the battery indicator is to be believed.
Related
What do you guys think is better???
xplod420 said:
What do you guys think is better???
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I have tried both releases. If I had to speculate, I think Obsidian is based off of an early kernel\build from Eugene. It felt VERY rushed to me and I LOVE all of Bionix roms but had this one removed in about 45 minutes. I feel Macnut R10 is outstanding.
Same as above user posted. It was slow, and wasn't themed as the other roms. And I think it was rushed too because sombionix wanted to be in the froyo race.
I went with none. I am on AOSPish 2.2 and it's great! Lots better than Obcidian.
Eugene is not going to be doing any further R releases for macnut. He got his hands on the ODIN 2.2 from a T-Mo friend and stated this in his thread. I would flash his 2.2 he obtained, or BETTER YET, wait till he makes some tweaks to it. He is lightning fast, so it should not be too long now.
I imagine bionix and crew will use this as a base too?
Without focusing on the quality of the ROMs themselves, my take on this is that Eugene does not approach his ROMs as "software projects". That is, once you start using his ROMs, he is very good at updating them; but he adds stuff, or removes stuff, and then maybe later puts stuff back with no apparent rhyme or reason. While this may be fine for a lot of people, for me it's kind of odd. It would be great if he incrementally worked on and released ROM's with clear change logs and a good software development life cycle. I realize this is a lot to ask, especially since he has indicated many times that he creates ROM's for himself, and not really for other people. So he changes and does whatever he feels like without really having an overall plan, so to speak.
Bionix on the other hand is very methodical and very good at documenting what is going on. So as a community driver I much prefer Team Whiskey because they are more concerned about how to keep people informed on what they are doing, keeping change logs, and being methodical. This is a big plus and is hard for me to ignore.
All the above being said, the best ROM for me is the ROM that can manage to make battery life on the phone last as long as possible. The battery life has been my major issue with the Vibrant since I got it, and so far Eugene seems to be the best at making the battery last longer. At least that has been my experience with several of his ROMs.
So, in the end, I am stuck between two ROM developers. If Bionix were to develop a good ROM with good battery life, then I would stick with them for sure.
I hope this helps, and please know this is not a flame towards anyone. Both developers are incredibly generous with their time and efforts and I would never look a gift horse in the mouth.
Cheers.
AOSPish. Seemed like the simplest option, deliciously vanilla-ish, and seems to be working great thus far.
If we ever get into the Cyanogen game I'd be likely to go back to him. His ROMs were always tasty on my G1 N1 etc.
Yes, the battery life for me is very important. I have used Bionix roms before and i liked it a lot. Time to try something new. The reason i am afraid to try Eugene's rom is because he has lag fix enabled on his rom. I had bad experience disabling lag fixes before and ended up with bricked phone.
I had problem with both on my bell gt i9000m
Firsti had to flash back ugjh2 modem to get bell network to connect for both on obsidian my phone just crash every time I plug usb cable and on macnut volume button crash my phone turning off the phone won't end up I need to remove the battery and aux does not work sound still go out from phone speaker
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App
Just curious! I am still using it cause i find it to be the best one still out there, bug proof
Personally and I mean personally the best one was Fusion 1.2 which I just stopped using to switch to Nero Beta 3.
If I was go back from anything it would be back to that rom.
WOW I'm not the only one!
I was flashing something every few days and then I got Bionix and Voodoo. It's beautiful, fast and stable. I figured I'd be flashing something else, but then I got busy and realized that I really like what I have. Som people on here trash talk the Vibrant. I guess they aren't seeing what I'm seeing.
I will probably flash a froyo when things settle down a bit, but I was really disappointed when I saw that it still uses RFS.
Maybe I'll see what happens with the Nexus S code.
Nope you aren't the only one. I too refuse to use anything else, it's great. Speed, bug free & great battery life, what else could you want?
Everytime I think about upgrading and decide on a particular rom, I go into the rom's thread and quickly end up changing my mind. Too many complaints and bugs that I don't feel like living with.
Besides, I don't see what all the fuss is about with Froyo (or Gingerbread for that matter). People act like they're revolutionary upgrades... they're anything but.
Same here, but still on Bionix Fusion 1.1! I never found the heart to flash to 1.2.
Found no need to flash any other ROM seeing as how this does everything I need it to and I don't need to be on the cutting edge. Battery life still gets me through a day as long as I give it a daily reboot.
Will probably end up trying Nero at some point if I ever find some free time.
I think for me Fusion 1.2 was the best and now I'm running Nero 3 beta, which was a tough decision because I had such great reliability in 1.2
Now with Nero Beta 3 I haven't fully seen the battery awesomeness of Fusion 1.2, but man its just so much more fluid. The screen swapping and feel is more refine. It feels more natural to me. When you click on a button it just opens and pretty quick I might add. My lock/unlock seems more responsive. The Status bar seems more responsive. The camera opens up fast.
Apps like NewsRob would take a bit nearly a second or maybe longer to clear all of the unread articles because it had to mark them all as read. With Nero Beta 3 its nearly instant.
Anyways I'm not a spokes person or anything, but as for somebody who shy'd away from all the other versions beyond Fusion 1.2 I'm rather happy with it and worst case I can just flash back to Fusion 1.2 and run a nandroid and be good to go. Ooops, looks like Nero V1 just landed. Time to read what that has in store.
Can anyone give me a great reason to flash a 2.2.1 ROM? I know 2.3 should be awesome and I'm more than willing to wait. I've been on Nero V3 for a couple of months and have never had better battery life (I'm on day 3 with 31% remaining and moderate calling in between) or stability. I'm only interested in switching if there's a great reason to. Right now the only reason I can think of, is beacuse there really is no more themeing going on for Nero and I couldn't say that flashing Bionix themes would work either. Random question to help me get through my morning here at work......thanks in advance for all of your input and expertise.
gtiryan said:
Can anyone give me a great reason to flash a 2.2.1 ROM? I know 2.3 should be awesome and I'm more than willing to wait. I've been on Nero V3 for a couple of months and have never had better battery life (I'm on day 3 with 31% remaining and moderate calling in between) or stability. I'm only interested in switching if there's a great reason to. Right now the only reason I can think of, is beacuse there really is no more themeing going on for Nero and I couldn't say that flashing Bionix themes would work either. Random question to help me get through my morning here at work......thanks in advance for all of your input and expertise.
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If your happy with what you have. If you have read what the other roms have to offer in them and it doesn't interest you. Then your right it's a Random Pointless Question. Here is a random thought for you. Can you back up the rom your on? Could you then flash several different roms to see what they are about for yourself? That way if none interest you then you can go back to the one your on.
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I've used both and don't see any major difference. Flash whichever ROM you like best.
2.2.1 I9000 ROMS over Nero:
Positives:
-Able to use any I9000 Theme (there are over 30 available, all really good)
-Faster opening of apps and generally less lag
-Better GPS than Nero
-Dead Horse, DOW, Dragon kernels work with it (though they also work on Nero)
Negatives:
Wi-Fi calling will not work.
Hadn't thought much of backing up what I had and then trying something else. I also didn't think much about kernals, just UI changes were all I was thinking of at first. I appreciate your input guys, and I will keep looking at what becomes available. Thanks!
Flash away and find out what you like...roms are like sneakers--one for every occasion and each person.
gtiryan said:
Can anyone give me a great reason to flash a 2.2.1 ROM? I know 2.3 should be awesome and I'm more than willing to wait. I've been on Nero V3 for a couple of months and have never had better battery life (I'm on day 3 with 31% remaining and moderate calling in between) or stability. I'm only interested in switching if there's a great reason to. Right now the only reason I can think of, is beacuse there really is no more themeing going on for Nero and I couldn't say that flashing Bionix themes would work either. Random question to help me get through my morning here at work......thanks in advance for all of your input and expertise.
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Try better roms, their better because they have new things nero doesn't have. 2.2.1 is... well it feels the same because i use voodoo, but yeah. It is techinically faster.
3 days and 31%?
OH HELL NAW!
Thats like super light use lol.
2.2.1 has higher quadrants and just feels snappier too. I had darky running on my vibrant with dead horse and jfs lagfix. The phone was ridiculously fast.
Why wait, you are missing out on all the flashing fun... and headache too.
im on trigger 3.0.0.1 and i want to switch i either want eugenes "gcr3" and axura
I just went from trigger to CM7 and definitely loving it. I waited until it was stable with good battery life. I highly recommend it
d1eharddan said:
im on trigger 3.0.0.1 and i want to switch i either want eugenes "gcr3" and axura
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I'm loving Axura. I put the Erebos theme on top, and used the Bali kernel, and it's terrific. Seems speedy, no real lag (maybe a half-second to open Handcent). Everything's smooth. Battery is pretty great. I'm getting 30-ish hours per charge (light-ish use), give or take (I'm at 26% after 18 hrs right now, with 88% of that number display use and 4% cell standby, which I think is pretty good).
I'm running CM7 right now, and it's absolutely amazing.
Except for a little battery drain (will be more until you mess with settings to make it drain less), and the whole GPS thing on GB, it's great.
trigger, bionix, malice and bi-winning . fastest ill say malice and bi with bullet.
Man, if i had a dollar for everytime i saw one of these threads.....
Mr. Apocalypse said:
Man, if i had a dollar for everytime i saw one of these threads.....
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True, but I honestly find them useful in terms of frequency. The developers are doing such great work so consistently often I think it's great to read what people are using from day to day and week to week.
The most major problem I found with ROMs has been a lack of coverage of them. The threads are great to find out what's been updated when, but sometimes there's very little guidance in terms of how updates improve (or don't) usability.
Because, honestly, just up above, I noted my favorite ROM right now is Axura on a Vibrant, but two weeks ago it might have been Bionix or Trigger, and I'm fairly sure the latter two have been upgraded in that amount of time. Plus there's the new Heathen, and Simply Galaxy, and now that Android's up to 2.3.4 it's only a matter of time before that makes it to a Vibrant ROM, most likely.
In other words, instead of commenting on the nature of the thread, why not be useful and contribute? Some of us like to discuss what we're using at any given moment, and some of us flash new ROMs from week to week.
This same topic would have had entirely different comments just last week. The only really possible solution to avoid them would be to create a new sub-forum for each device that included threads reviewing each ROM.
And I, for one, would love such a feature.
I've been using Heathens Private stock 2.2.1. version and its a very good rom. It's beautiful and very smooth even without voodoo.
I like Simply Galaxy RC3.2.1 its a 2.3.3 rom and it's sleek and fast.
I also like it because the install instructions are easy. LOL.
Hi, I haven't been an xda user in a while , I used to love tinkering around with my phones all day long.
now, I life has been taking over and I don't have the time to try out new stuff all day long.
that being said, the last rom I tried was a team whiskey bionix v1.3.1 sometime in early 2011 . I don't even think I wiped anything since.
I want a new rom, I feel like my phone is getting sluggish. I don't want to try roms that is going to make the phone slower, or is made for a faster phone (assuming ICS would be out of the question for me)
should I just stick with my current rom and wipe everything? I didn't have any complaints with it.
or are there better ones out now that wont compromise performance.
also another important thing for me is audio quality and saw many recommendations for voodoo sound. I don't have a kernal that supports it. I am running 2.6.32.9 jaeyoon.yoon
so pretty much what is the best rom and kernal combination for me that has no bugs, everything will run nice and snappy on. I don't want to experiment around anymore. I will straight up run the most recommended one.
many thanks in advance
I was in the same boat as you. I loaded Bionix back in February of last year and hadn't touched my phone's ROM since. For some reason I decided to see if there was anything new and sure enough ICS ROMs were available.
I love being on the cutting edge but my phone has to work too. I travel a lot and when I'm on the road I need to be able to depend on the phone working reliably. Looking at the ROMs available I went with the one with the most forum activity - that was ICS Passion. I flashed it first and was immediately impressed. Most everything works with the exception of the speakerphone which, while it does work, it seems like it picks up a lot of background noise.
Since then I've tried a few others but based on reliability and some UI preferences I went back to Passion. There are several battery mods which is nice, I like the Newborn3 battery style myself.
The other thing I've experimented with is the Kernel. I settled on the Glitch kernel because it seems the fastest to me and has no problem with the lock screen. It has Voodoo stuff which I honestly don't use much. The kernel does have issues creating a Nandoid backup but I never use those either ;-)
After using ICS I will not go back. In fact even the newer phones such as the SGS2 hold no attraction for me until there is a good ICS ROM available.
Hope that helps.
First off thank you bigjoe87865 for posting your question as I was in a similar situation. I previously had Axura and it was way too buggy and slugish. I finally had it the other night and started researching posts on the best rom and saw your question.
Second, atatistcheff, you installed ICS Passion and eventually you put the Glitch kernel. What was the reasoning in going about in installing this kernel and not using what was supplied with ICS passion? Would I enjoy my phone with just using ICS?
Was in the same boat as you until this week - long time Froyo user (Trigger and Bi-winning) for the past year. The GB roms always seemed to be too much trouble and not very practical.
After seeing all the positive feedback on the ICS ROMs, I figured I'd give it a shot and installed ICS Passion this week. Was immediately impressed with the speed, stability and functionality. Only problem I has was the battery life - it was simply awful. Saw posts regarding the battery life of SlimICS and flashed it on Friday. Works just as well as Passion, with the battery life I'm used from my Froyo ROMs. My single complaint is that the stock kernel doesn't support Voodoo sound, but I can do without that for the time being.
Long answer short: there's pretty much no reason to avoid ICS at this point - I'm a very light GPS user, so this is not a priority for me.
bones192nd said:
Second, atatistcheff, you installed ICS Passion and eventually you put the Glitch kernel. What was the reasoning in going about in installing this kernel and not using what was supplied with ICS passion? Would I enjoy my phone with just using ICS?
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Passion always had a nagging issue with the lock screen for me. That is every few times when I pressed the power button to wake the phone up it would not respond. I'd have to press several times to get it to wake up. I've seen this issue posted about several times. It's really not serious and as with most issues YMMV. I think you'd be fine with Passion and the stock kernel. I like Glitch because the lock screen issue is non-existant and it seems to work fine with Passion.
You guys want a good ICS rom, flash ICZenwich 1.4, you'll thank me later
For those that want a very good froyo rom then I would go with
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1441976
It is based off the bionix with the fisherman mod It is Rock Solid