Database Users

Can we no longer ask opinion based questions?

Ok So whats this new level of idiocy, are we now trully saying that one can not ask a question that involkes opinions and subjective answers, the threads could contain factual information and objective opinions but i guess we shall never know beacuse they get closed...
I am actually supprised its got this low, if you think about it almost any question answered will be subjected to an opinional bias WE ARE HUMANS
So the two "Which ROM?" questions threads get closed i think we are all big enough to realise that what one person feels is good may not be to another but we all read reviews in mags, we all read reviews on the internet and they suffer the same problems with bias you cant remove that fact, you read the responces and judge for your self, blimey what is going on here!
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=489979&page=2
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=490053

There are a ton of new ROMs out there now and it is impossible to get a "feel" of the way they perform unless you spend all of your time flashing ROMs. Constructive discussion of ROMs and their strong and weak points shouldn't be cause for public shame.

[URL=http://img120.imageshack.us/my.php?image=canofwormsy.jpg]
[/URL]
or...
A: "Dutty's ROMs are the best!"
B: "F*** off, David's the best."
C: "You two know f*** all about ROMs; Neo's the best!"
--ad infinitum

Matterhorn said:
There are a ton of new ROMs out there now and it is impossible to get a "feel" of the way they perform unless you spend all of your time flashing ROMs. Constructive discussion of ROMs and their strong and weak points shouldn't be cause for public shame.
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Agreed, not everyone has the time, patience, ability, confidence to be flashing rom after rom, especially someone new to flashing. And for any user coming to these forums there is a bewildering amount of different roms and information. No one is asking for a be all and end all answer, but to get some opinions for a starting point can be very useful and inspire a bit of confidence to actually get going.
As long as constructive opinions are given, I personally don't see anything wrong in this. An answer as to why someone uses a rom for a particular reason may be the exact criteria that another person is looking for and might save that person a LOT of time and effort trying many roms first just to end up at that same rom.
The threads dazza mentioned I thought were being dealt with very constructively with some good advice in there. No one wants any flame war or anyone just being competitive with their chosen rom but please lets have some perspective, and credit most people with some intelligence and let some constructive discussion be allowed.

TraumaX said:
As long as constructive opinions are given, I personally don't see anything wrong in this. An answer as to why someone uses a rom for a particular reason may be the exact criteria that another person is looking for and might save that person a LOT of time and effort trying many roms first just to end up at that same rom.
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Click to collapse
Totally agree. What harm can come from contructive opinions. This may save a person numerous flashes and time. Where is the harm in that?
It saved me time when I first joined and flashed my first ROM!!

Indeed, ill not flash a ROM unless ive had a good read about others views, its my choice to listen to them or not, theres just simply too many ROMS and versions of ROMs to not allow this constructive debate.

Blackstone users have not invented the habit to ask about which ROM is the best, which to use, etc.
Threads like these get closed because very simple reasons: the discussions in the respective threads are based solely on subjective opinions and experiences.
Every ROM has description in the ROM thread and plenty of feedback inside. What might suit me would most probably not suit you. It all comes down to users' needs and what and how they use their devices. ROM expectations are based on these. Thus, asking questions about ROMs would normally generate answer pointing in a direction other users might find wrong.
All ROMs are public, with their description and feedback inside. Nobody stops users from testing and trying ROMs, according to their tasted and expectations.
I was the one closing those threads and will continue closing similar threads.
In case you have objections, complain to site Admin regarding this issue and do not throw your anger at the XDA community which supports us all.
Moving this thread to General as it has nothing to do with ROM developent!

tnyynt said:
In case you have objections, complain to site Admin regarding this issue and do not throw your anger at the XDA community which supports us all.
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With respect, I don't see any anger here towards XDA, just opinions again. I don't think anyone is suggesting people shouldn't read and do some research, of course they should, but there are a lot of roms, some with hundreds of pages of feedback, and it can be pretty daunting. To be sure, there is a lot of help within each of threads for the individual roms but to get some perspective and comparison of them from those who have already tried many of them with some (subjective) opinions can be extremely helpful in my view.

With respect, its not feasable to test every single ROM to get a feel for them all before maknig a choice, you dont buy a car by trying out every single car on the road, you read reviews which are ALL subjective and opinionated and then rate those experiences to your needs, that limits your choices which then allows you to try it out,
everyone knows that an opinion is just that, its a user opinion, its a view of that individual. To stop all subjective / opinionated remarks would effectively shut down the website.
For instance a thread on the Touch HDs camera speed would be factual in the sence that everyone knows its crap with moving pictures, but the thread would always be subjective since other users will notice this more, you cant stop that trate in humans its in our nature, so long as the comments are not designed to personally attack anothers view the thread will live an die on its on accord with out the need to moderate them.
With regards to why i published this, it is in the communities intrest to know what they can and cant do, im not attacking you personally for closing them, just the "rules" behind the decision. but if we are not able to keep this thread civil and it gets closed then yes ill pass on my comments to the admin instead.
We are all (mostly) adults on here lets not bring the nanny state here as well.

I can add my 5 cents here.... this is a well known problem, in every forum.
You can open a thread asking "What ROM are you using and WHY?" and IMHO this could be interesting, but asking " ROM Ratings...Your Opinions" or worst " What ROM is the best for me?" are tricky questions, because RATING and OPINIONS doesn't fit well together in the first case and BEST FOR you? ...who knows is the first answer I have in mind
This doesn't seems to have high relevance but those threads could be, on the dark side, "Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs)", starting a flame war against or pro single chefs.
Are "dangerous" threads, a thread, may be with a poll, "What rom are you using and WHY" could be dangerous but interesting and will survive ONLY if users are responsible and avoid a flame war
Thanks, 5 cents donated

As tynnyt said "this is not a blackstone problem".
This issue was discussed to death here : http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=466666
Thanks
Dave

i don't have time to test each rom and for each of them to test every aspects in order to have my own conclusion.
as many others from here, would very intersted in the answer wich rom is best, but i am old enough (you would be surprised) to know that there is no answer to that question. from different reasons, pointed enough around here
what i want to suggest is a different approach, ofcourse if mods and admins will find that useful
instead in statement like x rom is better than y rom, or z rom rules, maybe guys who use or test different roms can give a feedback to others, with little experience, time or dare, concerning few aspects of the rom
for instance:
user noris08 (me) uses frank's rom v.1.5.12345. i would qualify that like that:
- glamurous looking
- moderate usability
- great battery life (15 days stand by - wouldn't you like that?)
- not so good speed
- extremely good for memory management (75% free)
- fix following known issues:
1. fix stutters in audio playing
2. add hardware acceleration for coreplayer
3. 3G signal always on 5 bars
4. gps fix in 5 sec
4. so on
- noticed bugs:
1. alarm clock doesn't work in stand by
2. appoinments shown with 2 hours delay
3. so on
- i would recomend it for mutimedia users
- i would rate it 7/10
it is likely that will be only a few guys with big harts to post their impressions, but is more then nothing.
in this way maybe we will not hurt rom developers feelings by just comparing x rom with y rom. they will also have some feed back concerning their work, appart of "thanks and great job mate"
just a thought!
cheers to everybody!

I agree 100% with the above post.

That a somewhat more acceptable way of putting things. If you also agree on benchmarking the ROMs (procedure, software used, etc.) then every user can post results/bugs/appearance/etc. and you'd have a standardized way of centralizing information that would be based on facts.

we're all big and old enough to know the difference, i think its quite disrespectful to ban such questions for several reasons, but something that is quite relevent is language.
English isnt everyones native language, gramatically speaking it might read to us as "which is the best ROM ever" but that might not be what they ment.
but whatever, seems minds are made and common sence has taken another knock back at the expence of so called politcal correctness, in this case offending the egos of the cookers out strips the need for new inexperienced users wanting simple feedback from the community about something without having to drudge through 1000s of pages of posts and spending much of there free time trying out every last ROM out there.
Just seems crazy if you ask me.

tnyynt said:
That a somewhat more acceptable way of putting things. If you also agree on benchmarking the ROMs (procedure, software used, etc.) then every user can post results/bugs/appearance/etc. and you'd have a standardized way of centralizing information that would be based on facts.
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I agree, this would be a good thread to start, i.e. benchmarking the ROMs procedure, software used, etc

tnyynt said:
That a somewhat more acceptable way of putting things. If you also agree on benchmarking the ROMs (procedure, software used, etc.) then every user can post results/bugs/appearance/etc. and you'd have a standardized way of centralizing information that would be based on facts.
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Click to collapse
but using your logic, is it factual?
"- great battery life (15 days stand by - wouldn't you like that?)"
hell i have that ROM and its only lasting 10 days, instantly it becomes opinionated and subjectional
ok thats an extreme example, but even with a very well laid out feedback such as that people will disagree, you have to either ban them all or let adults use their own common sence.
I would like to say add guide lines for "which ROM" requests but another human trait is that they wont read them either.

dazza9075 said:
but using your logic, is it factual?
"- great battery life (15 days stand by - wouldn't you like that?)"
hell i have that ROM and its only lasting 10 days, instantly it becomes opinionated and subjectional
ok thats an extreme example, but even with a very well laid out feedback such as that people will disagree, you have to either ban them all or let adults use their own common sence.
I would like to say add guide lines for which ROM requests but another human trait is that they wont read them in the first place.
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Wasn't talking about battery (but even that could be reported as Radio + ROM + usage) but about using the same benchmark tool that needs to run in the same circumstances (i.e: after hard reset, manila disabled, etc.), about reporting memory usage after start up and after a day's usage, reporting bugs, etc.
I.E.:
SKTools benchmark:
X
X
X
X
Battery:
5 days with
A Radio
B Rom
X calls/day, X minutes of wifi, X no. of messages
Memory after startup:
X used
Storage memory after hard reset:
X used
Startup time:
X seconds from vibrate till stable today screen
etc.

id agree, a simple standardised benchmark runing a number of tests over a few hours would give a good account without the opinions, any suggestions?

dazza9075 said:
id agree, a simple standardised benchmark runing a number of tests over a few hours would give a good account without the opinions, any suggestions?
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You Guys find a way out and ellaborate the procedure that'd help you most. I gave you some hints. I'll support that, and I believe so will my fellow MOD colleagues.

The best roms............. coming soon

I have read many posts where people are asking which is the best rom for my device (and have done myself) only to get abrupt replies with something like "how dare you ask this, chefs put a lot of effort into each rom and its down to personal preferance blah blah" ................"THREAD CLOSED"
Does every one think think this is the best way for xda to be run or is there other people that think this should be allowed to be debated? I know this is originally a developer forum, however I would hazard a guess that there is now more public users that devolpers.
The thing is developers develope roms and yes certainly they put a lot of time and effort into it and are respected rightly so for it. however can the end user really be expected not to be allowed to discuss these roms on the forum only to be told the above mensioned things. It happens time and again over and over. People like myself (the end user) do not have time to flash every rom to find the ones they like. (its a days setting up for myself after a flash) and if its crap (which there is no denying. some are) its a day wasted.
What I think the forum needs is a "ROM USER REVIEW" section where people like myself can go and rate a rom for other users referance.
Surely this is the key to better roms. If one developers rom is poor hes going to be able to see that its poor and will/might take the user rating / comments on board and the next time try harder.... ultimately producing a better rom.
Competition is what makes better products, If handset manufacturers took the same stance as xda we would be waiting for the realease of the o2 xda 2s later this year. and this is the same in all industries.

Totally agree, people that make good ROMs should be applauded by some kind of user rating system. same way people can avoid wasting time flashing not so good or buggy ones.

jaxouk said:
I have read many posts where people are asking which is the best rom for my device (and have done myself) only to get abrupt replies with something like "how dare you ask this, chefs put a lot of effort into each rom and its down to personal preferance blah blah" ................"THREAD CLOSED"
Does every one think think this is the best way for xda to be run or is there other people that think this should be allowed to be debated? I know this is originally a developer forum, however I would hazard a guess that there is now more public users that devolpers.
The thing is developers develope roms and yes certainly they put a lot of time and effort into it and are respected rightly so for it. however can the end user really be expected not to be allowed to discuss these roms on the forum only to be told the above mensioned things. It happens time and again over and over. People like myself (the end user) do not have time to flash every rom to find the ones they like. (its a days setting up for myself after a flash) and if its crap (which there is no denying. some are) its a day wasted.
What I think the forum needs is a "ROM USER REVIEW" section where people like myself can go and rate a rom for other users referance.
Surely this is the key to better roms. If one developers rom is poor hes going to be able to see that its poor and will/might take the user rating / comments on board and the next time try harder.... ultimately producing a better rom.
Competition is what makes better products, If handset manufacturers took the same stance as xda we would be waiting for the realease of the o2 xda 2s later this year. and this is the same in all industries.
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Click to collapse
I think the mods should close this thread too. If you don't have enough time to flash them all then take a look at what the chefs have on the menu then take a plunge based on what you think will be good for you.
The best ROMs are combination of various things to various people. I like my ROMs light and fully loaded, I like them fast, stable and I want the maximum internal storage. So how are you going to define this best ROM for me or others? There some great ROMs out there that do not fit my bill but it does not mean there are not among the best ROMs (again my view will be different than yours).
Now the warning about how there are more users then they are chefs is nothing new to developers. If they were not more users then developers, we would not need developers because you would not have the demand. That is simple economics.
To the end if you are not going to try all the ROMs and provide your opinion base on your publicly define logic of what is the best, then this will be another useless thread. This is exactly what others have done by providing benchmarks which are useful if you are into benchmarks. However, I do use the benchmark information to get numbers I am interested in (like internal storage, memory, etc...).
This is not meant to kill your inspiration but your opening comments killed the entire thread for me even though it is only one post thus far. A little bit more friendly tone could have gone a long way. Either way I am not looking for a response to my comments that way we will see how this thread shapes up.

Well here we go again. There is no answer to which rom is the best. Its your choice.
Maybe you simply love a Ford car, but well others might hate a Ford car and choose a BMW instead. Its all up to personal experience. You use one rom in one way, and maybe that rom works better that way. Then some other dude will find that rom crap because he uses it in a whole other way. Maybe he wants to use his phone for navigation and calling, so he likes the rom a lot as it does what he wants it to, but you might complain that it is a crap rom because there are some sms bugs. The other user dosn't use sms writing so he dosn't recognize these bugs. This is only an example, but i hope you get my point
All discussion to a rom should be within the specific roms own thread.

i don't watch movies, buy stuff, listen to movies, etc because of their ratings given by others. so i pass on this

umhhh. i started a similar thread i had named ,'So who is the Master chef?'.it was harshly closed. never understood why.....

everyone loves his rom and his chef..can't really have an objective and representative rating system...
I know and undrstand where you are coming from...too many roms and one cannot choose...
with that said...if there WOULD BE a clear cut winning rom...then everybody would flash just that and the rest of the cook can retire...this way every cook has his "followers" and thus we have this large amount of roms and they all get updated and improved over time...
those like me and you that do not have the time...well then they cannot afford to flash too many roms...its that simple...if you are expecting someone to offer you a new best rom every day and then you just come home and flash it every night...well that service won't be happening...
and yes I believe we have 1000s of leechers and only a dozen cooks. xda developers is by far not just a developing community anymore...but then again we could be considered "beta testers".

I closed this thread, due to the same reason all the others that are similar all over xda are closed on sight.
These kind of threads usualy/always ends up in disputes and flamewars, there is always some hotheaded ppl who burst into flames when someone dont have the same view as they do.
So... sorry, yeah we close

Making sense of different roms

The title of the thread is just to get all you fine people steaming in here to tell me off. But now your here by your own free will...
I've been a long time browser of these forums and recently a more active member. I used to be a very amateur coder when I was yonger and know to a small extent the hard work you guys put into these roms, so seriously to everyone congratulations on some amazing efforts.
I did want to address the reason topic titles such as the one I chose here crop up however. When I had a diamond before my HD2 there were just a few good roms to choose from and I soon settled down and chose one after trying them out. A few months back I started this same process with my HD2 but found every ROM I flashed to have a few bugs which annoyed me in day to day use, and I eventually went back to stock. Since then I havn't really tried again.
Today I have again been looking at perhaps flashing to a cooked ROM and in the beginning of these efforts I tried out the search term "best HD2 ROM". The threads that resulted were obviously very short and the authors told off for being lazy and discrediting the great works of all the chefs here. But the very good point is made that there are ALOT of ROM's for the HD2, and whilst it may only take 5 mnins to flash a ROM it takes hours, if not days, to find out if it suited to you. With the risk of losing personal info on each flash and having to reconfigure your apps each time this can be a very tedious process.
I'm basically wondering if there is any way to have a thread that can provide a way of rating the advantages and disadvantages of each ROM without having to wade through topics with hundreds of pages of mostly useless posts. It just so daunting with all these ROM's that many people may never even start.
I am just now thinking of flexing my (somewhat out of date) webmastering ability to create a "ROM Review" website - good idea?
What are people's thoughts?
p.s. This is probably also in the wrong section of the forum... just clicked "new topic" where I was browsing without thinking where it should go, please move if appropriate, thanks.

I completely agree with your idea to open this thread.
Finally we have someone who wants to put it to rights. Because every day we have new ROM or several ROM's, and every time flashing and soft re-installation takes a lot of time... and after all that you understand that "this ROM is not really what you wanted to be"...
Go on with your idea.. and I think - this section is the right place for your thread.

you got my vote

Good to see I'm not alone here, any feedback is much appriciated, even if its just a +1

Agreed, Sir.

This was taken from another thread about a similar question
"I also see no point to a list of pro's or cons of any particular ROM as most are built for the same thing, speed and stability. The only real differences you are going to see are what programs the person has loaded."
If this is indeed the case. then a list of the roms with the space taken up by the rom on the phone. the apps installed and how quick, stable each one would be must surely be a good idea?
I truly hope you can follow through with your idea.

I think there is no such thing as "the" best ROM.
Each user has different preferences, especially WinMo smartphones are
rarely one the same like another: Included software, tweaks, mods, themes, designs.
The possibilities are endless.
Also, an earlier thread here at the HD2 forum about speed (with benchmarks
as neutral as possible) ended up in unfriendly discussions (which is a mild
term to describe what happened).
An HD2 is so extremely fast that I seriously doubt that the "average" user
can tell a big difference between different ROMs. Sometimes, a buggy ROM
may be obviously slower, but in the average case, the difference will just
not really be felt, but only perceived, sometimes only imagined.
I think that it is part of this forum that there is no rating of the available
ROMs. If you watch the forum, you can easily find out which ROMs seem to
have more acceptance and therefore more fans - and if you check the ROM
description and screenshots of the chef, you can easily find out if the ROM
is something you might like.
Just to finish: How exactly does a ROM qualify as "the best"? Speed? Come
on... Software which comes with it? Come on, again...
Imho, it all ends up in optical mods and tweaks plus some extremely basic
software which is really a must for everybody. If you would ask me what
this could be, I cannot give you any name because WinMo and Manila are
on most ROMs anyway...

I couldn't agree more Mega. Very brave of you to start this thread ; )
I was a bit of a flashaholic with both my Elf and my Raphael, but I still haven't flashed anything to my Leo because it's so hard to figure out exactly what I'm going to get. Apart from the features of each ROM, it's hard to get an idea of the things that might be missing from each. Like, have the original bugs been fixed? Stuff like the audio booster turning off, AAC files being mis-sorted in the audio player, volume keys still active when the screen is off and incremental volume control or even the relative volume between headphones and phone speaker. I just can't be bothered to start flashing a million ROMs to find out. That's not laziness by the way, honest! I'm sure I'll get over it and start flashing soon ; )

tictac0566 said:
I think there is no such thing as "the" best ROM.
Each user has different preferences, especially WinMo smartphones are
rarely one the same like another: Included software, tweaks, mods, themes, designs.
The possibilities are endless.
Also, an earlier thread here at the HD2 forum about speed (with benchmarks
as neutral as possible) ended up in unfriendly discussions (which is a mild
term to describe what happened).
An HD2 is so extremely fast that I seriously doubt that the "average" user
can tell a big difference between different ROMs. Sometimes, a buggy ROM
may be obviously slower, but in the average case, the difference will just
not really be felt, but only perceived, sometimes only imagined.
I think that it is part of this forum that there is no rating of the available
ROMs. If you watch the forum, you can easily find out which ROMs seem to
have more acceptance and therefore more fans - and if you check the ROM
description and screenshots of the chef, you can easily find out if the ROM
is something you might like.
Just to finish: How exactly does a ROM qualify as "the best"? Speed? Come
on... Software which comes with it? Come on, again...
Imho, it all ends up in optical mods and tweaks plus some extremely basic
software which is really a must for everybody. If you would ask me what
this could be, I cannot give you any name because WinMo and Manila are
on most ROMs anyway...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree, how would one rate the BEST? Well to be honest you cant really as each person has there own needs and wants in a rom. What might be an Ideal rom for me might not be the best rom for you. I could rate a rom at 10 and you might give it a 2, then it turns into a bashing session and that can not be allowed. The rating system has been brought up many times before and each time it comes to the same end. There will never be an accurate way to tell the best rom. I am not trying to be harsh here but threads like this are beating a dead horse.

After speaking with the OP I have decided to reopen this thread. On the condition that this is "NOT" a best rom thread. This thread will be to help those that are new to ROM flashing. I will be keeping an eye on this thread and if it turn into a Best rom or bashing thread I will reclose it for good. I understand that sense the release of the HD 2 that alot of people are new to WM and with the available options in the rom thread it can be confusing. I am also moving this thread to the General Section as it is not Rom development. To all the new guys welcome.

Just wanna say thanks to Zelendal, the topic title originally wasn't constructive.
As we all know from doing a little reading about the ROM's, each one can be individually suited to different people, it like argument about which is the best smart phone or computer platform. So the kind of discussionj I was trying to provoke was about the best way to help out newcomers decide which ROM would indeed be best suited to them.
As I posted before I have been pondering making a seperate website that would allow some organisation of peoples opinions on the ROM's and I am interested as to how much support there would be amongst the community, I am also interested as to how the Cook's themselves would see such an project, providing it was done right.

sike222 said:
This was taken from another thread about a similar question
"I also see no point to a list of pro's or cons of any particular ROM as most are built for the same thing, speed and stability. The only real differences you are going to see are what programs the person has loaded."
If this is indeed the case. then a list of the roms with the space taken up by the rom on the phone. the apps installed and how quick, stable each one would be must surely be a good idea?
I truly hope you can follow through with your idea.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You quote me but you leave out an important part. The problem with making a list is that ROMs change. What might have been an issue in one build might be working just fine in the next. Keeping up with these changes and trying to keep on top of a list would be a nightmare. Also this mystical list you are looking for is usually on one of the first few post of every ROM thread. Most good cooks will list all these things that you are looking for. Only way to tell if a ROM will fit your needs is to try it. Every bodies idea of a good ROM is different. What one person might see as a con another sees as a pro. Personal opinion is a ***** and unfortunately everybody has a different one.
Good luck but I don't see a list being started or maintained for very long. Nor do I see this thread going anywhere productive.

Will Badger -
I don't think anyone is dis-agreeing that each ROM is suited individually to different people. Each cook makes his ROM how he wants it and if you share those wants with that cook you a likly to enjoy his ROM. That doesn't make it any easier to find what ROM is indeed suited to you, and as a newbe it can be extremely daunting, there are 30 odd cooks for the HD2, thats ALOT of time spent flashing and tring out ROM's.
Having said that I have been pointed towards
http://www.xdaroms.com/Default.aspx
Which is more or less everything I had in mind for a ROM information site, so its safe to say I wont be needing to build another. Iv'e been on this forum for a few months now and have not seen this site, somthing like this would need the direct support of Cooks asking people to visit in their ROM threads to submit reviews of their ROM.
Personally if that could happen I think it would be great and a fantastic resourse for newbes but I know there are alot of differing opinions on here, and perhaps its somthing the chefs would have second thoughts about.

Cool nice to know you found what you were looking for. I still find it easier to just read the actual thread for the info I'm looking for. Going over that page quickly I see no information stating whether the any of the HD2 ROMs are T-mobile compatible. You can flash a standard HD2 ROM onto the newer T-Mo HD2 since they use different processor.

i hadn't come across that site either, lol... but looking at this thread i think the guy's pretty keen to make the site useful. see here - http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=658641
there's also another thread in the ROM section that might be helpful... i'm sure jaimeeee would appreciate any input and help you wanna give
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=683743

Hi,
Thanks for the extra info, whilst the site I posted does seem to be more or less what I was thinking of doing myself it simply doesnt have the activity require to truely make it useful to anyone. It needs the support of the Forum, especially the Cooks if its going to succeed. I keep meaning to conatct the owner of th site to discuss how to push traffic onto the site but I got all caught up making a skin recently.
Hopefully we can make somthing of this!

[SUGGESTION] ROM Reviews, Comparisons, Rankings,

With the dozens of ROMS out there for our device, it would be nice and helpful if a thread was made where people could post an in-depth comparison between these roms and possibly even a ranking system in terms of downloads, review score, user feedback etc. Another possibility is a guide that would help them choose the best ROM for them.
I've been on my custom rom ever since but that decision came after hours and hours of research and reading the threads of the other ROM chefs and visiting other websites as well. It would be really helpful to the newer members who would like to modify their phones to have a dedicated review thread/area where everything is there to read.
I know this sounds lazy but it would save hundreds of research hours and make choosing the right rom suited for each individual faster and easier.
I could do it if I had the proper experience and knowledge, but sadly, I am but a noob.
I'm just throwing ideas around and see if this is a good idea. Anyone interested in this? The community will be in gratitude if this becomes a reality

i think i posted in the wrong subforum? uhmm... sorry mods. Please move if inappropriate.

I don't think this is such a good idea, to be honest
First, it might be cause for some rather immature users to go about saying this or that is the best or this is better than that in so and so ROM etc. It's hard to find people who can give good reviews because no matter what, there's always that bias and sense of loyalty. Even comparative reviews may be hard to come by because I don't think a lot of people use a particular ROM for a long enough period of time before jumping to try another one (or they just try one, and stick to that one for whatever reason..be it because they're satisfied already, or aren't the type to want to try everything out) then once they settle on one they like, they can't really say much in terms of comparison about others they've tried before since ROMs constantly get updated. Like I may have stopped using a particular ROM because of bugs and such and move on to something else but who knows, those bugs could've been addressed already by then etc.
The thing of it is, someone will always have a different user experience from someone else. And it really depends on the person's usage of the phone. And it's really upto the user to do his/her own research. Because if we just have a thread where people will just look for whatever has the most reviews then they're just gonna jump right in to flash it perhaps without further in depth reading.. We already have a thread which is a constantly updated index of the ROMs already available. People can just start off from there, check out whatever seems appealing based on the description and jump to that thread for some further reading or ask their questions there. Opening up a thread like this might further fragment support around here. People might start asking questions on that thread, submit their complaints, ask for help, report problems etc. Even if you tell people to not do those things in that thread..well not everyone likes reading through all of the first post.
And unfortunately, not everyone is accustomed to use the ever helpful search box so they end up posting questions that already have been answered over and over again. And instead of checking out the step by step guides, they have people walk them through the process. Some people are so in a hurry to jump into custom ROMs that they end up making mistakes and bricking their phone. Some..how you say..rude users even go so far as to blame the ROM maker or the beta testers for not doing a good job because they have this or that freak bug they happen to get.
Not that I'm against helping people, especially newbies (I'm a helper on Doc's thread) but I think it would be a benefit to people especially new users to do some of their own research and discover things on their own. The respective threads of the ROMs provide more than enough information, reviews, complaints, help, guides etc.
People won't ever learn if they're spoon fed information and such all the time. I'm all for trying to make the whole experience easier for any kind of user, but I'm also all for people to do some of their own work and learn on their own. It's not just a matter of trying to save people time, it's a matter of letting people get the best user experience for them. It's not a matter of lessening the amount of people asking for help, but it's a matter of wanting them to learn.
Sometimes saving people time and effort isn't the best idea if it just gives them problems later they can't figure out on their own.
Sorry for the lengthy reply. Just my 100 pesos. Lol.
I don't mean any offense or whatever to anyone, okay? I love helping people when I have time and I just think helping people help themselves is the best. You know like..give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach a man to fish and he eats for a lifetime..that kinda stuff.
I hope my post came off as logical and with all due respect.
Peace~

Preach
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

anoneemooz said:
I don't think this is such a good idea, to be honest
First, it might be cause for some rather immature users to go about saying this or that is the best or this is better than that in so and so ROM etc. It's hard to find people who can give good reviews because no matter what, there's always that bias and sense of loyalty. Even comparative reviews may be hard to come by because I don't think a lot of people use a particular ROM for a long enough period of time before jumping to try another one (or they just try one, and stick to that one for whatever reason..be it because they're satisfied already, or aren't the type to want to try everything out) then once they settle on one they like, they can't really say much in terms of comparison about others they've tried before since ROMs constantly get updated. Like I may have stopped using a particular ROM because of bugs and such and move on to something else but who knows, those bugs could've been addressed already by then etc.
The thing of it is, someone will always have a different user experience from someone else. And it really depends on the person's usage of the phone. And it's really upto the user to do his/her own research. Because if we just have a thread where people will just look for whatever has the most reviews then they're just gonna jump right in to flash it perhaps without further in depth reading.. We already have a thread which is a constantly updated index of the ROMs already available. People can just start off from there, check out whatever seems appealing based on the description and jump to that thread for some further reading or ask their questions there. Opening up a thread like this might further fragment support around here. People might start asking questions on that thread, submit their complaints, ask for help, report problems etc. Even if you tell people to not do those things in that thread..well not everyone likes reading through all of the first post.
And unfortunately, not everyone is accustomed to use the ever helpful search box so they end up posting questions that already have been answered over and over again. And instead of checking out the step by step guides, they have people walk them through the process. Some people are so in a hurry to jump into custom ROMs that they end up making mistakes and bricking their phone. Some..how you say..rude users even go so far as to blame the ROM maker or the beta testers for not doing a good job because they have this or that freak bug they happen to get.
Not that I'm against helping people, especially newbies (I'm a helper on Doc's thread) but I think it would be a benefit to people especially new users to do some of their own research and discover things on their own. The respective threads of the ROMs provide more than enough information, reviews, complaints, help, guides etc.
People won't ever learn if they're spoon fed information and such all the time. I'm all for trying to make the whole experience easier for any kind of user, but I'm also all for people to do some of their own work and learn on their own. It's not just a matter of trying to save people time, it's a matter of letting people get the best user experience for them. It's not a matter of lessening the amount of people asking for help, but it's a matter of wanting them to learn.
Sometimes saving people time and effort isn't the best idea if it just gives them problems later they can't figure out on their own.
Sorry for the lengthy reply. Just my 100 pesos. Lol.
I don't mean any offense or whatever to anyone, okay? I love helping people when I have time and I just think helping people help themselves is the best. You know like..give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach a man to fish and he eats for a lifetime..that kinda stuff.
I hope my post came off as logical and with all due respect.
Peace~
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Fair enough. Well said kabayan! Initially, i thought that this was a good idea. Looking at things now, it's not so attractive after all. haha. Salamat!
MODS: Kindly requesting the closure and deletion of this thread please. Thanks!

@anoneemooz,
Just a hypothetical question, if it happens that Samsung release a froyo rom (2.2 only) and it comes with your native language locale with Swype as well would you still be in the latest rom, or would you stick to the rom with those features?
Not trying to flame, but would like an honest opinion about this.
Maraming salamat sa inyo!

g00ndu said:
@anoneemooz,
Just a hypothetical question, if it happens that Samsung release a froyo rom (2.2 only) and it comes with your native language locale with Swype as well would you still be in the latest rom, or would you stick to the rom with those features?
Not trying to flame, but would like an honest opinion about this.
Maraming salamat sa inyo!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not a flame at all haha!
Well, I'm pretty used to everything being in English and I'd prefer it actually. It's a major language in the Philippines. It's my first language too so I wouldn't switch. Maybe I'd install the Swype with Filipino, but I might rarely use it since I usually stick to English or Chinese except for the occasional Filipino words which I can just type out if need be.
As for the phone's locale..I'm happy with United States or France so I'd stick to custom ROMs probably for forever. 2.2.1 ROMs have been awesome and knowing our awesome devs around here...2.3 will be even better~

anoneemooz said:
I don't think this is such a good idea, to be honest
First, it might be cause for some rather immature users to go about saying this or that is the best or this is better than that in so and so ROM etc. It's hard to find people who can give good reviews because no matter what, there's always that bias and sense of loyalty. Even comparative reviews may be hard to come by because I don't think a lot of people use a particular ROM for a long enough period of time before jumping to try another one (or they just try one, and stick to that one for whatever reason..be it because they're satisfied already, or aren't the type to want to try everything out) then once they settle on one they like, they can't really say much in terms of comparison about others they've tried before since ROMs constantly get updated. Like I may have stopped using a particular ROM because of bugs and such and move on to something else but who knows, those bugs could've been addressed already by then etc.
The thing of it is, someone will always have a different user experience from someone else. And it really depends on the person's usage of the phone. And it's really upto the user to do his/her own research. Because if we just have a thread where people will just look for whatever has the most reviews then they're just gonna jump right in to flash it perhaps without further in depth reading.. We already have a thread which is a constantly updated index of the ROMs already available. People can just start off from there, check out whatever seems appealing based on the description and jump to that thread for some further reading or ask their questions there. Opening up a thread like this might further fragment support around here. People might start asking questions on that thread, submit their complaints, ask for help, report problems etc. Even if you tell people to not do those things in that thread..well not everyone likes reading through all of the first post.
And unfortunately, not everyone is accustomed to use the ever helpful search box so they end up posting questions that already have been answered over and over again. And instead of checking out the step by step guides, they have people walk them through the process. Some people are so in a hurry to jump into custom ROMs that they end up making mistakes and bricking their phone. Some..how you say..rude users even go so far as to blame the ROM maker or the beta testers for not doing a good job because they have this or that freak bug they happen to get.
Not that I'm against helping people, especially newbies (I'm a helper on Doc's thread) but I think it would be a benefit to people especially new users to do some of their own research and discover things on their own. The respective threads of the ROMs provide more than enough information, reviews, complaints, help, guides etc.
People won't ever learn if they're spoon fed information and such all the time. I'm all for trying to make the whole experience easier for any kind of user, but I'm also all for people to do some of their own work and learn on their own. It's not just a matter of trying to save people time, it's a matter of letting people get the best user experience for them. It's not a matter of lessening the amount of people asking for help, but it's a matter of wanting them to learn.
Sometimes saving people time and effort isn't the best idea if it just gives them problems later they can't figure out on their own.
Sorry for the lengthy reply. Just my 100 pesos. Lol.
I don't mean any offense or whatever to anyone, okay? I love helping people when I have time and I just think helping people help themselves is the best. You know like..give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach a man to fish and he eats for a lifetime..that kinda stuff.
I hope my post came off as logical and with all due respect.
Peace~
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1, i agree with you.

g00ndu said:
@anoneemooz,
Just a hypothetical question, if it happens that Samsung release a froyo rom (2.2 only) and it comes with your native language locale with Swype as well would you still be in the latest rom, or would you stick to the rom with those features?
Not trying to flame, but would like an honest opinion about this.
Maraming salamat sa inyo!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As English language is a working language in India, most of the users would prefer a phone with English as default. There would be some who use Hindi also. But they wouldn't miss Hindi on their phone.

[DISCUSSION] the Master ROM? (Collective Coding)

I have often wondered what would happen if we gathered our collective knowledge, in a scientific way to make a ROM to rule them all. I'm not a DEV, I wish I had time/expertise to get into it, but I don't. So there's a disclaimer I guess.
I get that people like different looks, different features, but what if there was a collective that worked on a single ROM?
Here are my thoughts:
I've often sat back and looked at/flashed different ROMs and wondered what really differentiates them. Some are "tuned" one way, or "optimized" another. I can't help but think there are a handful of devs who go about their whole devving life "trial and error" optimizing. Not saying this shouldn't happen, but what if there was a place where other devs said "hey, don't change that build.prop line unless you also change this other one here"?
It would be nice if we knew what every setting did, or was supposed to do, but that's asking too much. But, I can't help but think that our devs have to reinvent the wheel sometimes. How many threads have you seen about optimizing this or that? Or how about tweaks that become obsolete?
I'm not saying I have an answer, but I see what I think to be a problem, and the problem I see is that all our wonderful devs spending time and energy on things that have already been done before. I'm aware that a lot of "training" and transfer of knowledge happens on IRC, and that is good. But when DEVs have to move on or get new devices, is that wealth of knowledge preserved?
Perhaps I'm too naive, and it's not as easy as saying "that setting is fully optimized, don't touch" or "this setting has a lot of leeway" or "if you change that each device will react differently".
Was just wondering if some of the DEVs would chime in. I know there is a certain amount of satisfaction that comes from doing something for yourself from the ground up, no doubt about it. I've always been curious to know if the DEVs would/could gather up their talents en masse to accomplish something greater than the collective of what already exists.
Thanks!
...and I'm enjoying the ICS 9 Alpha very much, but the recent MIUI Tips thread is giving me an itch to flash something new =]

isnt that what cyanogenmod is?

s89281b said:
isnt that what cyanogenmod is?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No. CM is designed to be a stable, well-performing platform that's optimized as much as possible, while remaining compatible.
OP, I understand where you're coming from, but a lot of what goes into development that isn't feature-add has tradeoffs. One might enhance performance at the expense of stability, or enhance stability at the expense of performance. Then there's the balance. Atop that, you do get plenty of things that may work perfectly on your device, but not at all on the next (many CPU/GPU related items, like overclocking/undervolting). The main reason there isn't a "master ROM" is that what's best for one user is not best for the whole. There's really no such thing as "best". Things that are widely known to be best practices will make their way into almost every ROM - for example, noCIQ here, pre-EL30 - but the rest won't.
The whole point of ROMs are to give users choice that the manufacturer did not. If there were only one 'master ROM', there'd be nothing to choose!
Now, as for knowledge preservation... Much of it is. A lot of what goes into popular ROMs are optimizations posted elsewhere, from around XDA. I have found many tips and tricks and tools and tinkers in the past, and used them extensively, because the vast majority of knowledge does stay searchable. IRC is just a tool for real-time support (guiding someone through something), for quick questions, or for real-time chat within dev communities.

Essentially what the OP is saying is that he wants a ROM just like an Apple iPhone, since the iPhone is basically the one ROM to rule them all
On a serious note, that is the beauty of Android because there really isn't one ROM to rule them all. Every one has their own opinion as to what is best for them and as k0nane says, sometimes you have to steal from Peter to give to Paul (Performance vs Stability).

k0nane said:
No. CM is designed to be a stable, well-performing platform that's optimized as much as possible, while remaining compatible.
OP, I understand where you're coming from, but a lot of what goes into development that isn't feature-add has tradeoffs. One might enhance performance at the expense of stability, or enhance stability at the expense of performance. Then there's the balance. Atop that, you do get plenty of things that may work perfectly on your device, but not at all on the next (many CPU/GPU related items, like overclocking/undervolting). The main reason there isn't a "master ROM" is that what's best for one user is not best for the whole. There's really no such thing as "best". Things that are widely known to be best practices will make their way into almost every ROM - for example, noCIQ here, pre-EL30 - but the rest won't.
The whole point of ROMs are to give users choice that the manufacturer did not. If there were only one 'master ROM', there'd be nothing to choose!
Now, as for knowledge preservation... Much of it is. A lot of what goes into popular ROMs are optimizations posted elsewhere, from around XDA. I have found many tips and tricks and tools and tinkers in the past, and used them extensively, because the vast majority of knowledge does stay searchable. IRC is just a tool for real-time support (guiding someone through something), for quick questions, or for real-time chat within dev communities.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the love k0nane =]
Can't you just humor me, and pretend we're playing Zelda, and say you are working on the Master ROM? hehehe
That's what I figured, I was just curious and thought I'd do a brain dump in case it helped =]
I know that ROM kitchens were on their way back before last summer, that sounded somewhat appealing, but they have a whole other slew of complications.
In the end, I am thoroughly thrilled with the products that come from our dev community. And let's be honest, given a little time, CM9 may become the ROM to rule them all.

adelmundo said:
Essentially what the OP is saying is that he wants a ROM just like an Apple iPhone, since the iPhone is basically the one ROM to rule them all
On a serious note, that is the beauty of Android because there really isn't one ROM to rule them all. Every one has their own opinion as to what is best for them and as k0nane says, sometimes you have to steal from Peter to give to Paul (Performance vs Stability).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
...I think I just spit up in my mouth.

MeetFace said:
Can't you just humor me, and pretend we're playing Zelda, and say you are working on the Master ROM? hehehe
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I did, on EI22, and never released it. That thing flew.

k0nane said:
I did, on EI22, and never released it. That thing flew.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Zelda always was one elusive broad.