OpenGL games are running slow on HD2? - HD2 General

So far i have tried NFS undercover, Flight commander and Boom Blox.
They are all running with some lag. not smooth at all.
Is anyone else noticing this?
Update: I just hard reset my device to see if the problem is caused by something i installed. After a hard reset the OpenGL games are still lagging which is very frustrating. I had the TG01 before and all these games were running fine. what a huge disappointed from the HD2!

Ya the Phone is quite new just yet even HTC admitted the original ROM's performance is not what it should be and are working on an update. It should be sorted soon so don't panic
Also as soon as the SPL is cracked and the modders start playing with ROMs, expect to see performance improve even more than stock ROMs

^^^^^^
It's simply unacceptable for us or HTC to expect people to patch things up through hacking their phones by SPL and installing custom ROMs from XDA.
I reckon that less than half of future HD2 owners will know how to flash custom ROMs into their phones.
This is quite a dissapointing news indeed...these things should work out of the box.

jagnet said:
Ya the Phone is quite new just yet even HTC admitted the original ROM's performance is not what it should be and are working on an update.
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I only see something similar on italian rom not the others.

Let's try to narrow this down a little as i think there is a problem with the drivers on the device. the HD2 itself is super fast, it is just opengl games that lag.
If you own an HD2 please post if you see a lag when playing OpenGL games, the name of the game and your ROM version.
If you do not see a lag please post the same.
I am using WWE 1.43.479.2 ROM and treid the follwing:
NFS undercover: lags in portrait, less lag in landscape.
Boom Blox: Lags in both portrait and landscape
Flight commander: Lags in landscape
Tower Defence: lags in landscape
Xtrakt: no lag at all
Electopia (openGL ES 2.0): no lag

It could be due to the fact that games like NFS were written for MSM72xx processors specifically and have their own drivers that don't work well with Snapdragon...

Just to clear up a few misconceptions:
- HTC has acknowledged that there are performance issues with a particular ROM, however, as far as we know, these performance issues have absolutely nothing to do with OpenGL games. They affect the HD2's general performance doing non-3D stuff. So far as one can tell, these issues don't seem to affect the British version of the phone. They were discovered by an Italian site. Distribution of HD2's in Italy has been halted. I heard one rumour that the same thing has happened in France.
- HTC never puts proper hardware drivers on their phones - never has and quite possibly never will. If you check out this website you'll see that complaints about lack of proper drivers on HTC phones date back a good three years, and pretty much every phone HTC has ever made has had similar issues. If you go back four or more years, there were no drivers then either; but the hardware HTC bought from Qualcomm ran (for its time) fairly fast even without them, so it wasn't too much of an issue. The trouble started when Qualcomm's latest hardware didn't reach its advertised level of performance without proper drivers.
Three years ago, nothing ran with proper acceleration on HTC's phones, not even HTC's own software. Nowadays the software that is actually built into the phone can make use of hardware acceleration, but third party software that you install yourself typically can't.
This doesn't just apply to 3D acceleration, it causes problems with (for example) video playback on most HTC phones; Coreplayer (3rd party video player) runs a lot slower than HTCAlbum or Windows Media Player on HTC phones, but it runs faster on many other phones. (This is unlikely to be a practical problem on the HD2, as the CPU is powerful enough that Coreplayer can play anything you might reasonably want to play using the CPU alone; but it's a real problem on phones like the original Touch HD, the Touch Diamond2 and Touch Pro2).
- The blame for this is (arguably) shared between HTC and Qualcomm (the company that makes the chips HTC uses in its phones). Qualcomm has several different prices that they charge for their chips, depending on the level of software support that you buy with them. As I understand it, HTC chooses to pay the amount which allows their own software to get proper hardware support, but they won't pay the more expensive rate which would allow them to make a phone which offers hardware acceleration to third party products. (By contrast, Toshiba pays the full rate). To what extent this is HTC's fault for not paying and to what extent it is Qualcomm's fault for charging more than HTC can afford is unclear.
- The chances of anyone on XDA dev reverse-engineering an OpenGL driver for the Snapdragon chipset in the near future are, I would say, fairly slim. It's not impossible: a guy called Neo has produced a Direct3D driver for the older Qualcomm chipset used in phones like the Touch Pro and Touch Pro2. (See here). However, it's not on a par with what Qualcomm would produce, even after several years of work.
- It's possible that someone might be able to rip off a driver by stealing files from the ROM image of a TG01 or a NeoTouch - however, even if that worked, that would be illegal. Such a driver couldn't be distributed via this website or even advertised on it, otherwise Qualcomm would sue the website for intellectual property theft. So, if you really want to get the entire XDA developers website permanently shut down, then a good way to go about it would be to post here asking for someone to produce a pirated driver.
- The game Xtrakt is designed to directly access Qualcomm hardware; effectively it bundles a 3D library and a hard-wired driver within the game itself, rather than depending on support from the software on the phone. Consequently, the fact that Xtrakt runs smoothly doesn't mean that the phone can accelerate anything else. It's too early to be certain, but it looks as though Electopia may use the same approach.
- The upshot of all this is that I wouldn't get your hopes up for proper 3D acceleration on the HD2 in the foreseeable future.
EDIT: Note that the above is correct as I understand it but if you feel you have a better understanding than I do on any of these points, then feel free to correct me!

vangrieg said:
It could be due to the fact that games like NFS were written for MSM72xx processors specifically and have their own drivers that don't work well with Snapdragon...
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Click to collapse
Xtrakt was written specifically for MSM72xx processors, and (according to this thread) is lag-free on the HD2. (Unless there's a Snapdragon-specific version of it that I'm not aware of). I would speculate that it's the other way round - games with hard-wired acceleration (like Xtrakt and possibly Electopia) run okay, but anything which expects the platform to handle 3D acceleration doesn't.
techdave said:
It's simply unacceptable for us or HTC to expect people to patch things up through hacking their phones by SPL and installing custom ROMs from XDA.
I reckon that less than half of future HD2 owners will know how to flash custom ROMs into their phones.
This is quite a dissapointing news indeed...these things should work out of the box.
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Click to collapse
I find it hard to disgagree with any of that.

but i do see the drivers under the Windows folder. they file names are identical to those in the tg01 so the drivers are there fit the games only the games don't run very well.
they do however run very well on the tg01

AFAIK, NFS also comes with its own driver. I may be wrong though.

techdave said:
^^^^^^
It's simply unacceptable for us or HTC to expect people to patch things up through hacking their phones by SPL and installing custom ROMs from XDA.
I reckon that less than half of future HD2 owners will know how to flash custom ROMs into their phones.
This is quite a dissapointing news indeed...these things should work out of the box.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
come on guys, this happen to all kind of phones and it is absolutely normal, where on earth anyone of us see a perfect phone with perfect rom???? are you guys just expecting too much?? give HTC some time, HD2 is easily the best phone ever made and I would consider it is finally a good phone in the decade?

precsmo said:
come on guys, this happen to all kind of phones and it is absolutely normal, where on earth anyone of us see a perfect phone with perfect rom???? are you guys just expecting too much?? give HTC some time, HD2 is easily the best phone ever made and I would consider it is finally a good phone in the decade?
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That's some nice sweet talking there. HTC won't do anything if it's not affecting the general performance of the phone. It's the same as with my current phone the Polaris. HTC never did anything, even when many many ppl complained about bad 3D performance. If there was any real alternative to the HD2 I wouldn't buy from HTC again.
So I suppose it's not a big deal that WM doesn't have many modern 3D games, because the HD2 won't be able to run them smooth anyway.
EDIT: @Shasarak: Thanks for post #7. I agree and think you hit bullseye.

precsmo said:
come on guys, this happen to all kind of phones and it is absolutely normal, where on earth anyone of us see a perfect phone with perfect rom???? are you guys just expecting too much??
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Click to collapse
There's a colossal difference between expecting a ROM to be "perfect" and mererly expecting it not to contain any major bugs. The latter is entirely reasonable. There's also nothing unreasonable about expecting hardware to be shipped with the drivers needed to use it properly (if that does turn out to be the problem here).

Shasarak said:
There's a colossal difference between expecting a ROM to be "perfect" and mererly expecting it not to contain any major bugs. The latter is entirely reasonable. There's also nothing unreasonable about expecting hardware to be shipped with the drivers needed to use it properly (if that does turn out to be the problem here).
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I agree but be advised that the drivers are there..they just for some reason don't perform very well.
On the other hand the drivers on the TG01 were performing very well with the games i tested (but the device was very buggy and poorly built, thus i don't have it anymore), so maybe we can copy the drivers from the TG01 to the HD2 and it will work well?

so much for the god of mobile CPU's in the snapdragon....

Then again, it's not snapdragon's fault..

niknik76 said:
Then again, it's not snapdragon's fault..
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Yeah - the the TG01 has a Snapdragon chipset too, but the games work on that - the problem is specific to the HD2, it's not a problem with Snapdragon phones in general.

vangrieg said:
AFAIK, NFS also comes with its own driver. I may be wrong though.
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Click to collapse
Well, you could be right; but if you are, and that's what's causing the problem, then why does it run lag-free on a TG01 but not on an HD2?

Shasarak said:
So, if you really want to get the entire XDA developers website permanently shut down, then a good way to go about it would be to post here asking for someone to produce a pirated driver.
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clubtech said:
so maybe we can copy the drivers from the TG01 to the HD2 and it will work well?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

Producing a pirated driver, hosting it here, and someone copying drivers from a TG01 to a HD2 are two different things right?

Related

The death of the cruise

It seems like the cruise has been abandon. I am not a rom freak but its been forever since anything has been developed for the polaris. What gives??
If thats the case i guess its time to move on to the iphone
Only if the embeeded graphics acceleration were fully included in drivers, it'd be enough to satisfy most users of the device, it's really irritating that the device performs worse than other older devices in graphics... that reminds me never to buy another device with a Qualcomm chipset (hence any HTC phone), so my next device would will come with a Marvell or Samsung chipset (mmm, those new Acer phones looks interesting).
I would never go to an iPhone, it's a toy, no more than that... I must admit that Apple scores 10 in marketing and they can sell uninformed people their devices.
Sorry for the rant, I just needed to say that aloud
dortyboy said:
It seems like the cruise has been abandon. I am not a rom freak but its been forever since anything has been developed for the polaris. What gives??
If thats the case i guess its time to move on to the iphone
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What new stuff exactly are you're looking for?
There's a heap of applications being written every day that will run on Polaris(check the Forum).
Some guys are doing a great job in porting Android to Polaris as well. Take a look - it's pretty cool.
Whether it's a Polaris, Nokia or iPhone there's only so much you can do with it.....
Yes I agree, Polaris is not dead, it only reached a level of maturity that there is no need for any other heavy develpment... after all it's a good device with qvga standar screen that can run anything for qvga, and has a dpad...
Yes the 3d drivers issue gone a little bad, some roms dont even support or include them, but they perform good anyway, I don't think it's that slow device if you know what your doing.... you wont run photoshop on it...
And dont be sure that having samsung or marvell proccessor will be heaven on earth... a lot of my friends are fustrated with crashes, no reason overflows... and most of devices carring them dont have 3d acceleration.
The Polaris has 3D acceleration, in a way. It's just still not finished yet. It takes a HELL of alot time and effort to fix it, and most developers don't want to put in so much effort anymore, especially with Winmo7 around the corner with it's new kernel.
However, i still think it's possible to get Manila3D running without the sleep-bug, as long as people are motivated. But for alot of people, that comes with a price...
@Drakh: What about the Tegra when it comes out? Sorta best of both worlds...HTC device, which means in terms of hardware most devices will actually be pretty fully featured, and in terms of chipset, it's coming from a far better company than any of the other options given. Only obvious concern, it'll be a completely new product and is still untested by the market, almost certainly there's going to be at least a couple of flaws in the early iterations.
I don't know that I'd call Time-of-Death on the Polaris yet. I suspect a lot more development will kick back up when the Iolite actually hits shelves. At the very least, when serious Iolite development kicks up, and starts incorporating newer features/versions of software, it'll be relatively easy to create pair of roms side-by-side to cover both devices.
Polaris is my worst phone ever. It was expensive at the time and everything is slow about it, even the 2d operations like opening windows, clicking startmenu, slow camera, slow scrolling in windows like file explorer, all programs list etc etc etc. Real disappointment and i'm also looking for other smartphones with a different chipset/manufacturer.
i agree. i bout my Polaris over a year ago for 720 usd in NYC. for that i could have bought 3 iphones and it was disappointing to me that htc doesn't take the time to upgrade there phones. instead the fool us with a new one with slight improvements then another one with slight improvements. why cant they just focus on one phone and try and make it as best as possible.
This is primarily a htc device forum.
For anyone who thinks they may fair better with another brand device it is worth noting that the development that go on - largely thanks to xda-developers - is not something that is replicated on any other device.
The iphone is a matter of taste and while they have plenty of programs on app-store, it is as someone said earlier - a toy, a fashion accessory, an ipod with a phone in it.
If you are cheesed off with htc's lack of dedication to one device then I dont blame you, we all get sick of it, but every manufacturer is in it to make money and they are all slow to push out decent updates and have their own advantages and shortfalls.
At least with the htc devices we have xda-developers - and as long as it is there (and long may it live) we have the chance of enjoying the CHOICE of different softwares instead of having to make do with whats there as most of the other devices.
dortyboy said:
i agree. i bout my Polaris over a year ago for 720 usd in NYC. for that i could have bought 3 iphones and it was disappointing to me that htc doesn't take the time to upgrade there phones. instead the fool us with a new one with slight improvements then another one with slight improvements. why cant they just focus on one phone and try and make it as best as possible.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
but what is it you want it to do that it doesn't do?
is it games? then buy a Nintendo DS - sure you can't make calls with it but it's a great games device.
want to watch movies? the Sony PSP has great video playback but it won't manage you calendar.
I guess the point I'm making is that devices like the Polaris try to do lots of different things - and it does some things better than others.
I'm sure that when you got your Polaris you checked it out at the time and probably thought it was a pretty impressive device.
Most of the recent improvements have been to screen resolution, memory and processor speed and performance. All of these are hardware related and something that can not simply be plugged in and made work.
As time moves on technology improves and devices look better, maybe work a little faster and do more things. To expect something that's a couple of years old to work as well as a device you can buy today is a bit unrealistic.
I agree with Bally - at least we benefit from up-to-date software through the hard work of the cooks and developers at XDA-Devs.
Personally, my Polaris has never worked better or faster.
u guys are so quick to jump to your own conclusions! i never said i did not like my polaris; i love it! i am simply saying that there comes a time especially with htc devices that as we say a particular phone has run its course.
i just wanted to spark some interest in the phone and apparently i did.
i was just frustrated how expensive htc phones are and its up to private individuals to make them work better. maybe htc should be paying XDA for there hard work
I dont think HTC like´s XDA much for obvious reasons....the reasons that made me fall in love with this community.
I bought my Polaris 2 years ago and i see new models in stores that are a few levels down so i cant complain and i will only trade my polaris for a tegra device,the rest is just small improvements
Hi All,
I bought my Orbit 2 for Christmas, second hand.
I immediately flashed the rom to C Shekar's' "a" rom, then his "b" rom; added S2U2, a few bits and bobs, changed the theme and am now happy.
It is fast enough, and I use it extensively for e mail and TomTom navigation.
I like it!
Where to go from here?
What should be the next phone, assuming I stay with HTC? (better the devil you know ...)
SpiggyTopes said:
Hi All,
I bought my Orbit 2 for Christmas, second hand.
I immediately flashed the rom to C Shekar's' "a" rom, then his "b" rom; added S2U2, a few bits and bobs, changed the theme and am now happy.
It is fast enough, and I use it extensively for e mail and TomTom navigation.
I like it!
Where to go from here?
What should be the next phone, assuming I stay with HTC? (better the devil you know ...)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i agree with u. thats why i havent bought a new phone as of yet. i dnt wanna buy another htc phone. am waiting for something new but much better than htc and that is not htc
Assuming this has become a "spill what`s on your mind" thread, i`ll let you in on my feelings as well. When i bought the phone i gave 1300 Buglarian leva for it, that`s about 650 Euro (a bit more than $860) ... i loved it, it`s my first PDA, it was GREAT ! ... all of my friends were so jealous, it was THE phone. Some time passed, i made some installs and the phone started to go bad, started freezing, gave me the worst time in my life, i`ve never had such issues with a phone. Even now i`m trying to reflash it, and it doesn't want me to, the ROM update procedure freezes at 0% and doesnt go on ... then the recovery wizard kicks in ... and here we go again, and again ...
I will NEVER, ever purchase a Windows Mobile phone anymore, its buggy, slow and it cant event work like a decent phone ... what more should i ask, if it cant do that decently. So please, spare me the "htc sux, xda rulz" stuff ... xda-developers is a place spawned by the NEED for working software, something HTC and Microsoft both cant provide. Now tell me why shouldn't i buy an iphone, it does everything it says its supposed to. Though i wont buy an iphone, i`ll wait for the Palm Pre and buy that, and i`m sure, that will be deal for my money.
whatever you buy you will get bored with it and envy some new model that comes out a week after you buy your new device......
the good thing about windows mobile devices is that at least you can fiddle around and add new stuff, change the interface etc. keeps you interested just that little bit longer
cr1960 said:
whatever you buy you will get bored with it and envy some new model that comes out a week after you buy your new device......
the good thing about windows mobile devices is that at least you can fiddle around and add new stuff, change the interface etc. keeps you interested just that little bit longer
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My thought exactly!
The best thing about a ppc is that it is a small computer!
So it gives you a lot of freedom.
But if someone just want's a good phone then buy a Nokia! And if someone just want's a good multimedia phone then buy a iphone!
cr1960 said:
whatever you buy you will get bored with it and envy some new model that comes out a week after you buy your new device......
the good thing about windows mobile devices is that at least you can fiddle around and add new stuff, change the interface etc. keeps you interested just that little bit longer
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Exactly I really want an iPhone because everything about it is just so polished, but im sure to get bored of it. I HATE my polaris sometimes, but fiddling around with it is just so much fun, Windows Mobile is crap, but trying to fill its inadequacies is fun in a twisted way.
adderz91 said:
Exactly I really want an iPhone because everything about it is just so polished, but im sure to get bored of it. I HATE my polaris sometimes, but fiddling around with it is just so much fun, Windows Mobile is crap, but trying to fill its inadequacies is fun in a twisted way.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I thought a lot about the iPhone.
But .. as far as I know, it will not run TomTom.
Also, it is sealed- you can't replace the battery or get at the memory card.
AND - iTunes is terrible (imho), I much prefer Windows Media player for playlists.
What next, phone wise?
C'mon!, you cant compare a winmo device to an iphone, you're severily limited on the iphone platform (they just meet copy&paste and a2dp now for example), I'd never buy one of those devices, you wouldn't have the flexibility we have with winmo, and more thanks to communities like this... and it means a big thank to every developer here for your dedication and time.
cr1960, when I said before that the device performs bad I meant everyday use, I understand that if you want to play intensive 3D/2D graphics better buy an game console for example, or want the best GPS, buy a garmin or want the best photos, get a dedicated camera, etc; but no, it's the everyday use of Polaris that is affected, slow drawing, and is the very only one problem I see (video drivers), everything else is OK, the hardware specs of the Polaris don't have anything to envy other devices even more "modern" ones, 400Mhz is not any slow by the way, I'll put an example: the youtube app can't show decent video just choppy one and more processing power will help little without proper drivers (and as far as I know there are other HTC devices with more power than Polaris that have the same rendering problem), but watch the same video with Coreplayer (those guys someway figured how to talk directly to video hardware), and you'll see smooth video low CPU usage, see my point? It's not about demanding unrealistic performance from our beloved device, just that is underperforming in typical everyday use as it is now (maybe deliberate?).
Asking the polaris to run full size mpeg2 videos or do h264 or run quake at 60fps is unrealistic, asking it to run 320*240 videos smootly or show menus quickly or do smooth dragging inside google maps isn't.
The interesting thing is that the video driver (when 3D/2D hw acceleration is available) problem plagues most devices that use qualcomm not only HTC, even other manufacturers; I dont see much that problem in other chipsets, where it seems manufacturers dont have much problem adding correct drivers, maybe qualcomm doesnt make it easy to device manufacturers to add correct drivers?, some say so, dunno.

[Q]

Would it be possible to make panels that are dedicated to certain apps like core player or morphgear which could then take advantage of the graphics via the new sdk? Would be a lot better if we could get some use out of the ati graphics...or would it not work like that. I tried searching on google but couldnt find much.
http://developer.sonyericsson.com/site/global/newsandevents/latestnews/newsfeb09/p_xperia_sdk_opengles_update.jsp
Afaik, hardware acceleration can only be achieved if the software developer gets the info they need from Qualcomm. Coreplayer is still working on it and morphgear.. don't count on it.
The panels won't be able to help here, you can have the panel itself accelerated, but not the app running inside.
hey Angelusz, sorry about not replying sooner mate!
This driver thing is a serious problem...if I knew how crippled the x1 was...I dont think i would have purchased it.
The new 3d game by sony is, lets be honset, ****e. I have more fun playing emulated games and these fancy 3d ones with zero playability. I just wish that we could make the x1 as good as it should be.
Is there word/hope that this could be fixed? Are there guys in other parts of xda working on a fix...which could also help us x1 users?
Some 3d performance increased can be achieved through installing other drivers (for instance the omnia's, diamond's, or better yet the Rhodium's.
2d.. I have no idea how to work that out though. It's a problem all MSMxxxx CPU's from Qualcomm have, including the diamond, touch pro and touch HD. I'm not sure about the Rhodium and Blue Topaz, but I'm guessing they're using the same chip as the X1 and touch HD.
Would it be possible for some clever guys(s) to make a driver from scratch? I noticed a post in offering a bounty for the first person to achieve the goal would get all the $$$. Cause I know that a lot of x1 owners (and prob other htc users) would all chip in for such a worthy cause.
...or should I just face facts that its never gonna happen
Thanks for replying to all my questions, im new to the ppc thing and still cant get my head round the fact that they have crippled our phone. Games on the iphone look upto psp standards!

High Expectations

Hi
With the inminent release of HTC HD 2 with the new HTC Sense interface and Windows Mobile 6.5 .....
does this means we will have our HD´s finally running smooth and clean?
Better kinetic scrolling, less bugs and lags?
Refined cooked roms maybe?
Or our phones are doomed because of the actual 528 mhz processor?
Any comments??
just wait and see what our Chefs and Devs are going to do with the Leo/HD2 ROM. Only after that we can say/decide whether or HD is going to be doomed because af the old processor.
It looks quite obvious. It's not the processor or otherwise the hardware which cause the HD to be far from smooth. The Hero has got the same hardware but due to Android it runs completely smooth - I was shocked about the speed when I play-tested in the shop!
This led me to the following conclusions:
- the driver issue due to (a lack of ?) agreements between Qualcomm and HTC ;
- WM is a heavy-weight OS which does not go easy on resources -> it's simply not normal that you need a 1GHz processor plus a lot of RAM to run WM 6.1 smoothly. That's the typical Microsoft overload.
->> Don't expect your HD to become faster due to the Leo phenomenon. Sure, this community will always do its best (e.g. improving drivers, optimizing ROMs, etc.) but there are certain limits beyond which nothing can be done anymore ...
There is no connection. The HD2 will have completely different hardware so it's not like we can steal drivers from the new phone. Hence, this means nothing. Our phone is doomed unless there is some major breakthrough on the user developed driver's side, which I'm getting less and less optimistic about. I sincerely apologise for my bad mood...
Have you tried a good lightweight ROM (such as http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=472972) before deciding your phone is doomed?
If you haven't, I urge you to try it. The lag from the stock ROM and most other bloated ROMs just disappeared after I installed this one.
Also, due to Windows Mobile being very extensible, it's quite easy to add whatever you need to this bare bones ROM.
I'll try that, thank you for the hint. What I meant is sure, you can strip it down to make it the fastest possible, but this won't give us back the hardware we paid for and we are not using. It's like having a super video card on your pc but being forced to use the preexistent onboard vga because nobody developed a driver for your new hardware.

wouldnt it be nice to put 1ghz processor in blackstone

i was just wondering with so many custom modifications being made to blackstone... in its software department by developers.... why havent we seen someone taking out the 529mhz processor and replacing it with the 1ghz snapdragon processor.... if not tht than something like a 800mhz or 600mhz processor....
and with that increasing ram a bit aswell to say like 512mb
hispeedworm said:
i was just wondering with so many custom modifications being made to blackstone... in its software department by developers.... why havent we seen someone taking out the 529mhz processor and replacing it with the 1ghz snapdragon processor.... if not tht than something like a 800mhz or 600mhz processor....
and with that increasing ram a bit aswell to say like 512mb
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think they basically did that..........It's called the LEO!
not by htc... i mean by some basement modification.... like someone takes his hd n experiments on it a bit... not goin out and buying a newer model
all the cpus dont have the same nr of pins and located in the same places
Nothing's impossible!!! I'll get Mike Channon to start working on a tutorial toute suite!!! Will you look at his dedication with 3 packs of 3M floppy disks!!!
ACER F1
If you want snap dragon power in a Touch hd format then you want the ACER f1, together with the announcment that XDA is going to start support third party devices it makes this phone start to lok quite interesting as it is much cheaper than the HD2 and a better size in my opinion. The Nexus one is also another alternative if andriod floats you boat, it doesnt flat mine at the moment but it may get better in the not too distant furure.
A 1Ghz processor, and a Tegra graphics chip, and a 10mp camera with 720p video recording, and an AMOLED screen, and multi touchnessness, and...
the tech is there, "they" just dont want to deliver and "ultimate handset, they prefer to trckle out the tech in order that we buy handset after handset after another hoping for that perfect one. Look at the HD2, great handset but no 720p enabled, no TV out, it could have been a monster. maybe next time eh?
stoolzo said:
the tech is there, "they" just dont want to deliver and "ultimate handset, they prefer to trckle out the tech in order that we buy handset after handset after another hoping for that perfect one. Look at the HD2, great handset but no 720p enabled, no TV out, it could have been a monster. maybe next time eh?
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Click to collapse
Wouldn't bet on it. HTC have a habit of not really advancing great amounts between each device released. Look at the specs of latest devices and forthcoming ones....no real improvement whatsoever!!
Fallen Spartan said:
Wouldn't bet on it. HTC have a habit of not really advancing great amounts between each device released. Look at the specs of latest devices and forthcoming ones....no real improvement whatsoever!!
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Couldn't agree more. There is really no device that has all the nice features in it. They want to create variety of devices to sell more. It's all about marketing strategy.
hispeedworm said:
i was just wondering with so many custom modifications being made to blackstone... in its software department by developers.... why havent we seen someone taking out the 529mhz processor and replacing it with the 1ghz snapdragon processor.... if not tht than something like a 800mhz or 600mhz processor....
and with that increasing ram a bit aswell to say like 512mb
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Click to collapse
i whas wondering it to and in that topic we came to the conclusion that if it eventually would be possible to upgrade hardware there also need to be made different roms matchings the devices hardware
Fallen Spartan said:
Wouldn't bet on it. HTC have a habit of not really advancing great amounts between each device released. Look at the specs of latest devices and forthcoming ones....no real improvement whatsoever!!
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that only serves to prove my point
st3ph3nt3 said:
Couldn't agree more. There is really no device that has all the nice features in it. They want to create variety of devices to sell more. It's all about marketing strategy.
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Click to collapse
quite right, its a numbers game, a perfect device would kill the market.
and as to the question, do you have any idea whats involved in changing hardware in the HD? firstly its a chipset, its not just one chip you stick any chip thats not ment to be in there and it isnt going to work, you would need to change the whole set, that pretty much means your sticking a new PCB in. not even to mention the pin and track layouts.
secondly the software isnt like a computer, you cant swap things and install new drivers, mostly because there are no drivers, the OS is made HTC then build the base platform around the hardware. Back in the day you might have found an old PDA that had two versions one had more RAM perhaps, the spaces on the PCB might be in the cheeper version which aloud you to upgrade the RAM. Those days are gone. take a look at any PDA PCB and you will see several surface mounted ICs on a tiny PCB.

What's Wrong With Windows Mobile?

All of my previous mobiles were purely phones that were used for that purpose only. When I decided I needed mobile email etc. for my business a friend who had an HD suggested the HD2 and after reading all the reviews which were pretty unanimous in praising the HD2 and Sense but were very critical about WM, I decided to go for it.
Now what is puzzling me is why so many people are critical of WM? I think it's really rather good and as a business user does eveything that I would ask of it. In fact any problems I've encountered have been with sense and as far as I can see this seems to be the case on this forum as well.
I realise that in it's present incarnation WM is designed for a stylus but on the HD2 with its superb screen I don't have much of a problem using any of the native apps and of course there are plenty of third party apps around.
So am I missing something because I just can't see the downside?
If your introduction to Win Mobile is a device like the HD2 and the resulting user experience then you would be baffled as to what is wrong with it. But keep in mind that the HD2 is exceptional in hardware compared to EVERY OTHER Win Mo device that has ever existed, bar some exceptions.
Most other devices were woefully underpowered to handle an O.S based around a desktop style U.I, never was really finger friendly and the web browser was terrible really until Opera and the others. For me personally, Palm made Win Mobile tolerable to use as well as HTC.
I absolutely agree with you - I have been using WM for years, and at times have used Symbian/UIQ. I used Symbian because my operator gave me an upgrade every year and I was told that the SonyEricsson P series was the best thing for mobile smartphones.
The journalists, almost to a man, agreed with that assessment, showering praise on the P800, P900 and P910.
I do not understand it - to my mind, and for my money, WM beat UIQ unhesitatingly in terms of raw functionality and yet I groaned as I read review after review showering praise on S-E phones and UIQ, saying it was the way of things to come, while damning WM at the same time. There were LOADS of things WM could do that UIQ could not. It was the same when I looked at the ungainly and unusable Symbian Series 60 devices - no touch screen!!! It seems almost laughable now.
At the moment, the journos, who hunt in packs, have it in for WM, and they lose no time in criticising either the OS or any device that uses it.
I agree that WM has long been due for an overhaul, and Apple's iToy has been welcome competition in forcing MS either to upgrade the OS (which it looks like they are doing) or abandon it (which it seems they are not). To my mind, the HD2 just shows what WM is capable of - the best being that it is all there, now, not promiseware.
It is good to hear someone new to WM saying what you are saying - welcome to the club!
rjstep3
So am I missing something because I just can't see the downside?
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Yeah these days i would agree there seems not to be a downside worth talking about .. The HD2 makes this tired os shine coupled with sense on top it looks modern and works very well .
I come from an iPhone 3G and im really happy with my HD2 and am impressed at the stability of the phone even on these cooked roms .. The 3G was getting dull and the HD2 was just what was needed.
However this was not always my impression or WinMo, i had an HTC Magician many years ago and i can say with 100% truth this was the worst phone i ever owned . If the battery ran out, and it would in a good few hours, the thing would hard reset and wipe all my data, leaving me to recover from backup, HTC issue or windows i do not know but it was bad .. , Windows was so unstable i would be rebooting the damn thing 1 or more times per day .. horrid .. There are many other faults i used to experience on this phone (phone lol) but i have blocked them out my mind for good.
I avoided windows phones for many a year deciding to use, Ericsson, Nokia, Samsung and Apple instead .. When the HD2 came out and i needed an upgrade, all the reviews i read and watched made me rethink my position .. Very happy i did
You're bound to think Windows Mobile is wonderful if you've never used any of its rivals. You need to spend some time on an iPhone 3GS, and then on a high-end Android phone (the Google Nexus One, for example) to get a balanced opinion.
As LordLugard points out, the HD2 is (in many respects) the best Windows Mobile phone out there; and it achieves this by compensating for, or simply hiding, many of the OS' deficiencies. It's a bit like a well-laid-out house with a monster lurking in the cellar - so long as you stay upstairs, you're fine.
Most of the day-to-day operation on an HD2 is not controlled directly by Windows Mobile, but has been skinned by HTC as part of its "Sense UI" front-end. If you ever have to venture beneath that, then things get much uglier. For example, go onto the settings tab, Data Services, and click ActiveSync. This gets you into the SenseUI screen for ActiveSync settings; looks quite nice, very finger-friendly. But you'll notice this is incomplete: there's no way to set the Peak Times. To do this you need to go Start Menu, Tools, ActiveSync, Menu, Schedule. Now you're in the default Windows Mobile screen for controlling the same settings (as opposed to the Sense UI skin). Notice the immediate visual difference, and how difficult it is to click the checkboxes accurately with your finger? Raw Windows Mobile is like that all the way through; it's just that HTC has managed to hide it most of the time.
Performance is another issue. Windows Mobile 6.5 is based on the Windows CE 5.2 kernel - which hasn't been seriously updated in 5 or 6 years. That means core OS operations are coded in such a way that they cannot take full advantage of any CPU that was designed more recently than that. This means that Windows Mobile always runs much slower than competing OSes on the same hardware. It also (for other reasons) is a memory hog. Again, you don't notice this so much on an HD2, because the Snapdragon processor is fast enough, and there's enough memory, that even Windows Mobile generally doesn't slow it down too much. But there are exceptions. If you look at the specifications for HTC's not-quite-released-yet Bravo phone, for example, this runs on very similar hardware to the HD2 (also based on the Snapdragon chipset) but it offers playback of 720p video clips, and the ability to capture 720p video using the camera. The reason the HD2 can't do is because it's running Windows Mobile.
There are general usability issues, too. Notice how many "tweaks" are advertised on this forum that require specially written utility programmes or registry edits to enable? On other OSes you generally don't need to do this: everything works in a sensible way as soon as you take the phone out of the box. Windows Mobile phones are very much ongoing projects - it takes weeks or even months to get them working the way you want. If you're the sort of person who enjoys that, great. And, arguably, if you are an inveterate tweaker, WinMo offers a higher degree of customisability. But many people prefer a phone that just works; and Android and iPhone do a much better job of that.
There are many other issues, too; the complete lack of multi-touch support in the OS is an obvious one.
I'm new to windows mobile, and have to say I don't get why it's put down so much. Sure it's taken me a couple of weeks to get my head around, and sure you may have to tweak settings to get the phone how you want it, but that's half the fun (although sometimes can cause you intense frustration). I've come from an iphone, and whilst this works better out of the box and you don't need to tweak as much, there were still things I wanted to tweak to get it just how I wanted it, but couldn't unless I jailbroke it. When I did this it was much slower at times and more glitchy. I tried several jailbreaks and they were all the same. Blackra1n was the best I found but still upset the phone.
Anyway, back onto winmo, my only negative comments about it have already been mentioned by others. It's not as finger friendly as other OS's, including sense, but it's not that bad really. And it's a little ugly, but again not that bad. The good points far out-weigh the bad imo
Shasarak said:
Performance is another issue. Windows Mobile 6.5 is based on..... this means that Windows Mobile always runs much slower than competing OSes on the same hardware..... is a memory hog..... The reason the HD2 can't do is because it's running Windows Mobile.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Again trying to spread that lie?
I get the feeling that you're paid by Apple to spread this kind of FUD...
Edited to remove response to a misplaced quote .. (it was out of place given context now above)
Cass67 said:
So this is not true ? I was under impression that from the system info pages this is a WinCE 5.02 based OS .. Wrong ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry, the quote was misplaced.
It is a WinCE based OS but that does not at all mean that it's slower than in any noticeable way and it has nothing to do with the ability of playing HD video.
Neither iPhone nor Android make use of any of the ARMv7 instructions in order to play HD video (and btw. the iPhone doesn't officially play HD video). Moreover, if you compare Android, Windows Mobile and iPhone OS on similar hardware, you can see that Windows Mobile is just as fast in most of the day-to-day tasks and even faster at some. And lastly, iPhone OS is much more of a memory hog than Windows Mobile, which you can see by comparing the RAM usage of both, and in addition to that, Windows Mobile has much better memory management (which is probably one of the reasons why Apple doesn't allow multitasking).
freyberry said:
It is a WinCE based OS but that does not at all mean that it's slower than in any noticeable way and it has nothing to do with the ability of playing HD video.
Sorry, the quote was misplaced.
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Heh, no worries ..
freyberry said:
(and btw. the iPhone doesn't officially play HD video).
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Click to collapse
Officially, no. Unofficially it can play 1080p video. See, for example, http://gizmodo.com/5045466/the-iphone-handles-1080p-video-just-fine
freyberry said:
Moreover, if you compare Android, Windows Mobile and iPhone OS on similar hardware, you can see that Windows Mobile is just as fast in most of the day-to-day tasks and even faster at some.
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Click to collapse
I'd have more patience for that claim if it were not self-evidently untrue. Android apps can be a bit held back by the whole Java architecture, sure; but what exactly is your explanation as to why the HTC Bravo can both play and record 720p when the HD2 can't, despite being based on virtually identical hardware? It's clearly nothing whatever to do with drivers and hardware acceleration. There are plenty of applications that offer hardware-accelerated playback under Windows Mobile. On the HD2 we get hardware-accelerated MP4's and WMV's in Pocket Media Player. On the TG01, the specially customised version of Coreplayer that the phone ships with offers hardware-accelerated playback of any codec that CorePlayer supports. And yet neither application on either phone can play 720p video at acceptable speeds.
I recall that your stated position the last time we discussed this was that a hardware-accelerated version of CorePlayer could not possibly exist (see http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=622393&page=2 posts #18 and #20); this despite the fact that it ships with every TG01 sold and that several people had previously downloaded it from this forum and run it on an HD2 (see http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=613355 ). You then went on to demand that I supply evidence in support of claims I hadn't made. Frankly, your credibility on this point is in tatters; so, can we just drop it, please? Stop trying to derail the thread.
(And before anyone asks, no, I cannot tell you where to download the TG01 version of CorePlayer.)
Officially, no. Unofficially it can play 1080p video.
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Click to collapse
That's why I said officially.
hat exactly is your explanation as to why the HTC Bravo can both play and record 720p when the HD2 can't
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Click to collapse
Because the Bravo has drivers, the HD2 has not. It's as simple as that. If anyone would make drivers for the HD2, it could play HD video as well.
And by the way, those drivers do exist in the labs of Qualcomm.
Since you are unable to point me to the proof of the Coreplayer version playing 720p in EVERY format, your post is just empty words. Looking at the thread you linked, I can absolutely not see any proof of that. Instead, I can see proof of what I am saying.
Do you always post random links in order to "prove" your lies and hope nobody reads them?
Additionally, your claims that WM is responsible for the lack of HD video playback capabilities contradict the existence of a Coreplayer version for WM that plays HD video. It also proves my point that it's all about drivers and has nothing to do with the operating system.
Truth is, the HD2's inability to play HD video as absolutely NOTHING to do with Windows Mobile. Moreover, your claims that Windows Mobile is in any way slower than the other OSs is just wrong. It is not only just as fast, it also has much better memory management than for example the iPhone, which is why Apple doesn't allow multitasking and while you can run lots of applications simultaneously on a WM device with 128MB RAM, it's almost impossible to send more than one or two applications to the background on a hacked iPhone 3G with the same amount of RAM, which proves that your claims of WM being a "memory hog" are utter bull****, just like all the rest of what you allege.
I'm not going to accept that you spread that kind of bull**** here on the forum. You're a liar (or maybe paid for spreading FUD), and your insistence on those false (and even contradictory) claims is not only ridiculous, it doesn't make them true either.
Same here, I cant find any Major flows in the OS yet!
But when you read about WM in Google, forums! they scare you about the problems!
Yes sure it dosent have as much Apps as other Mobile Os, But every app i need i got in here and a damn fast phone
But sure if compared to older phones it might be unfair.
I am 100% sure that I read in a tech review that Windows Mobile disables the HD functions built into the Snapdragon. Is this not so?
donalgodon said:
I am 100% sure that I read in a tech review that Windows Mobile disables the HD functions built into the Snapdragon. Is this not so?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, this is not so.
Shasarak said:
You're bound to think Windows Mobile is wonderful if you've never used any of its rivals. You need to spend some time on an iPhone 3GS, and then on a high-end Android phone (the Google Nexus One, for example) to get a balanced opinion.
As LordLugard points out, the HD2 is (in many respects) the best Windows Mobile phone out there; and it achieves this by compensating for, or simply hiding, many of the OS' deficiencies. It's a bit like a well-laid-out house with a monster lurking in the cellar - so long as you stay upstairs, you're fine.
Most of the day-to-day operation on an HD2 is not controlled directly by Windows Mobile, but has been skinned by HTC as part of its "Sense UI" front-end. If you ever have to venture beneath that, then things get much uglier. For example, go onto the settings tab, Data Services, and click ActiveSync. This gets you into the SenseUI screen for ActiveSync settings; looks quite nice, very finger-friendly. But you'll notice this is incomplete: there's no way to set the Peak Times. To do this you need to go Start Menu, Tools, ActiveSync, Menu, Schedule. Now you're in the default Windows Mobile screen for controlling the same settings (as opposed to the Sense UI skin). Notice the immediate visual difference, and how difficult it is to click the checkboxes accurately with your finger? Raw Windows Mobile is like that all the way through; it's just that HTC has managed to hide it most of the time.
Performance is another issue. Windows Mobile 6.5 is based on the Windows CE 5.2 kernel - which hasn't been seriously updated in 5 or 6 years. That means core OS operations are coded in such a way that they cannot take full advantage of any CPU that was designed more recently than that. This means that Windows Mobile always runs much slower than competing OSes on the same hardware. It also (for other reasons) is a memory hog. Again, you don't notice this so much on an HD2, because the Snapdragon processor is fast enough, and there's enough memory, that even Windows Mobile generally doesn't slow it down too much. But there are exceptions. If you look at the specifications for HTC's not-quite-released-yet Bravo phone, for example, this runs on very similar hardware to the HD2 (also based on the Snapdragon chipset) but it offers playback of 720p video clips, and the ability to capture 720p video using the camera. The reason the HD2 can't do is because it's running Windows Mobile.
There are general usability issues, too. Notice how many "tweaks" are advertised on this forum that require specially written utility programmes or registry edits to enable? On other OSes you generally don't need to do this: everything works in a sensible way as soon as you take the phone out of the box. Windows Mobile phones are very much ongoing projects - it takes weeks or even months to get them working the way you want. If you're the sort of person who enjoys that, great. And, arguably, if you are an inveterate tweaker, WinMo offers a higher degree of customisability. But many people prefer a phone that just works; and Android and iPhone do a much better job of that.
There are many other issues, too; the complete lack of multi-touch support in the OS is an obvious one.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LOL...
gabbs said:
LOL...
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Why do you even qoute that BS?
freyberry said:
Why do you even qoute that BS?
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Click to collapse
some ppl might be reading it and think it's fact..
LOL
well this is my first wm phone and what a choice I made,its totally awesome and for me blows all other phones out of the park. I had the Sony satio before this but sent it back after 5 days,I'm so glad I did.as for apps,you just have to look about,there's 1000's spread about....I also know a good site for (free) games....lol
donwhann said:
... I also know a good site for (free) games....lol
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Click to collapse
May I remind you of the forum rules - this site is for sharing!
So if you know of a site with some good free (and legal) games, please let us in on the info!
thanks
rjstep3

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