Dream still an okay phone? - G1 General

Hi guys!
I've been thinking about moving to android for a while, but never really had much incentive to do so, as my current e63 does the job for most things.
My Nokia e63 is now falling apart (usb cover connector has gone brittle, missing half of my 7 key etc).
I'm thinking about picking up the HTC Dream (of which new ones are avaliable on ebay for around $230 AUD) on the TPG Mobile $18.99 "medium cap", which has 500mb of data and approx $700 worth of calls/messages.
There are plenty of stable eclair/froyo roms for the dream, and it has a hardware keyboard, which is nice (and something I have gotten used to). The CPU does seem to be clocked a bit on the low side, but from what I understand, most of the custom roms available support overclocking the device.
Is there anything I should know about the phone before buying, are they still any good with custom roms?
Can anyone see any issues with this plan/idea? How would this compare to any of the phones available through othermajor service providers on $29 caps (X10 mini pro, LG optimus all of which have much worse data, 200mb)?

It is definitely still a good phone, but that price seems a touch high for a phone that is 2 years old and used -- its more than half the original selling price, which was $400.
The CPU clock rate has little impact on the device's performance. Those who overclock experience placebo at best. The biggest limitation against android running smoothly on Dream hardware is the lack of RAM. With 192 MB total, only 95 is available to the linux kernel, and the bloatedness of community roms makes this a very very tight fit. As a result, certain hacks, like RAMZSWAP have to be used -- this is a compressed ramdisk used as swap, it helps reduce memory consumption by about half the size of the ramdisk, so if you set a ramzswap of 32MB, you have a net savings of 16 MB. The problem with this is that compressing the swap takes a hit against the CPU and you can end up with some slowness.
It will run without ramzswap, but you are likely to experience the "magical disappearing application" problem when it doesn't have enough available RAM to run even a single application.
mystichobo said:
Hi guys!
I've been thinking about moving to android for a while, but never really had much incentive to do so, as my current e63 does the job for most things.
My Nokia e63 is now falling apart (usb cover connector has gone brittle, missing half of my 7 key etc).
I'm thinking about picking up the HTC Dream (of which new ones are avaliable on ebay for around $230 AUD) on the TPG Mobile $18.99 "medium cap", which has 500mb of data and approx $700 worth of calls/messages.
There are plenty of stable eclair/froyo roms for the dream, and it has a hardware keyboard, which is nice (and something I have gotten used to). The CPU does seem to be clocked a bit on the low side, but from what I understand, most of the custom roms available support overclocking the device.
Is there anything I should know about the phone before buying, are they still any good with custom roms?
Can anyone see any issues with this plan/idea? How would this compare to any of the phones available through othermajor service providers on $29 caps (X10 mini pro, LG optimus all of which have much worse data, 200mb)?
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Click to collapse

Related

Herald Or G900

Hello Everyone!
I ordered Herald yesterday. Probably at the end of this week I am gonna be holding it in my hands. Even though; I can not stop thinking about Toshiba Protege G900. It has got pretty good pros compared to Herald. Should I cancel my order and buy a G900? My hesitation comes from:
1- Obviously Cpu Speed. 201 vs. 520 Mhz. (Well. Some say G900 is slow and laggy due to high resolution)
2- Price. G900 is 50 bucks cheaper in my country.(I do not mind that a lot actually)
3- Htc has 16 Kb of level 1 cache, G900 has 32 kb (I do not know what does that effect)
4-Htc has 64 Mb of ram when G900 has 128 mb
5-Bigger, better screen with higher resolution on G900
6-G900 has 2.5mm audio jack
7-G900 has 3G
8-Well, as you can see G900 looks like a newer better technology but, Some people on the review sites say that G900 has a poor battery and overall performance even when overclocked, due to high resolution. Plus It it not compitable with a lot of software because of high resolution issues.
So what do you say? Should I get "the better but untrustworthy one" or "good old slow reliable one"?
Thanks!..
I would stick to HTC just b/c of a community such as this...its that simple for me
Just because of community? Yes it is important but what do you think about pdas. If you were unaware of such community which one would you buy?
Let me tell you something, you'll probably throw the G900 into the wall after a week of use. Even the latest firmware has not fully cured the its very popular SOD(sleep of death) in which the device does not comes out of standby. This happens even more if you put your device in standby with data connections running. Couple this with the instability it posses and no support from Toshiba(they say that they wont be rolling out any new firmwares for G900), I would say, why buy something so expensive which is just so unreliable and whose specs only look good on paper and not in reality.
I'm using herald(dopod C800) from the past 1month and perfectly happy with it. I jumped to it from O2 Atom Life(which has 624Mhz processor & still feel, it was slower than Herald). I'm happy with my decision. I m a happy customer and have even ordered a Black Armor(metal) case for it from Boxwave.com since this is going to be a keeper for sure
edit: Herald is not slow at all if you overclock it(which is harmless and does not effect the battery life much). Also, the ROMs here will make your device much more reliable, stable and faster.
kdskamal said:
Let me tell you something, you'll probably throw the G900 into the wall after a week of use. Even the latest firmware has not fully cured the its very popular SOD(sleep of death) in which the device does not comes out of standbuy. This happens even more if you put your device in standby with data connections running. Couple this with the instability it posses and no support from Toshiba(they say that they wont be rolling out any new firmwares for G900), I would say, why buy something so expensive which is just so unreliable and whose specs only look good on paper and not in reality.
I'm using herald(dopod C800) from the past 1month and perfectly happy with it. I jumped to it from O2 Atom Life(which has 624Mhz processor & still feels slower than Herald). I'm happy with my decision. I m a happy customer and have even ordered a Black Armor(metal) case for it from Boxwave.com since this is going to be a keeper for sure
edit: Herald is not slow at all if you overclock it(which is harmless and does not effect the battery life much). Also, the ROMs here will make your device much more reliable, stable and faster.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks a lot man. You totally cleaned my suspicions about Herald. I am keeping my order and will be around about my questions on Herald.

I Dream of a new Phone

You know, at some point you almost have to wonder how much more do we really "need" in software.
Things we needed were GPS, wifi tether and better audio. We have all that now in hacks, workarounds. While we didn't need to OC that's just a nice bonus along with apps2sd but the fact still remains, it's a phone.
The sad thing about the G1 is the hardware and particularly the camera/video functions among others.
Thank goodness for android and google. They really got it right and are really pushing the technology, which makes it exciting. One day we'll have hardware that's as good as android and the development going on at this forum but even today we have so much more functionality than the typical phones out there.
I was a blackberry user for many years. I liked blackberry for one reason. They just did what they were supposed to do.
My son and I were out of town the other day and we had this discussion. (he works for T-mo.) I asked him if you were stranded and had only one phone call to make, would he pick his BB or his MT3g. He said without hesitation, the BB and I concurred. It's not that we could not count on Android, but if we were betting our survival on it, the BB hardware would get the call.
I like the g1 better than any other phone out there right now. The virtual keyboards lacks a lot to be desired. Having the best android phone and the work that Enom, Cyan and others have made a pretty lame hardware phone better obviously but we still have a ways to go on hardware.
I've looked at all of the newer offerings out there but always come back to the G1. Fact is, as lame as it is, it's still better than all of them.
Who will make a really fine android phone is anyone's guess. If you have not followed some of the pocket video cameras that technology is really moving along. We can already do 1080p/30fps and 720p/60 in the Kodak zi8. Panasonic and Canon both have optical image stabilizers that actually work and shoot still images at 5mp and up. Some are using Zeiss and Leica lenses. Get some of that technology inside an android phone along with a flash and you really have a "camera phone".
I never understood why HTC and others put the speaker on the back away from your ears. As small as the speakers are, it only makes sense to put them where you can hear them. If your phone is to be used for an mp3 player, video player, GPS device, speaker phone why not put the sound where you ears are?
It also boggles my mind why something with all these capabilities, like gps wifi, email, web surfing and such a large screen has such pathetic battery life. The stock battery is about 900mah usable as we know, and that's a battle we fight every single day.
One of these days it's going to dawn on manufactures what we actually need in a all in one device. The OS is solid and getting better everyday, but the hardware is lagging waaay behind from current state of the art and some of these designs for android are only incremental and cosmetic upgrades at best and some of the makers are STILL missing the point entirely.
If it's going to be a phone that does multimedia, surf the web and has a camera, let's bring up the hardware changes up to the rest of the technology and I suspect many of us will leave the G1 far behind. Until then, my G1 has to stay.
Oh yeah, one more thing, if it's going to be a camera phone, add a tripod mount to the bottom of the phone. How hard could that be?
IMO they leave all the high tech junk out to keep the cost down. Before android, I always wanted the TP2, or the htc fuze. The high sticker price is what kept it out of reach for me. These htc android phones retail for a steep amount already, if the add high-def cameras, state of the art processors, big RAM and screens the cost will be out of the "average consumer price range". I've seen a couple smartphones that cost well over a grand, I think that's what your looking for
Remember 10 years back, phone screens were monocrome, ringers were just beeps, and motorola was king. Give it some time, maybe in another ten years all that you described will be standard in a smartphone.
Even Nokia in the N series has a much better camera for a camera phone. While it's still SD it does an excellent job for video and the "N" price is about the same as a G1.
You can buy one of the Panny Lumix P&S cameras for about $200.00 at costco that does 720p/30 that have both optical zoom and optical IS and very sharp lenses and that's a full fledged camera. I just can't see it costing that much more for something similar and even if we didn't have HD, we still should have something usable for our G1 which we don't right now.
Look at the Creative Vado, that thing is 99.00 and while it's not state of the art, it does a surprisingly good job at video.
The G1 was $599.00 when it first came out. That's pretty steep for the hardware we actually received. HTC didn't even give us a headphone jack. Who's bright idea was that one for a "multimedia device"? Yes we can add one with some drilling and soldering, but why should we for $600.00?
The "upgrade" if you can call it that, to the MT3g was ram and styling. HTC still didn't see the need for a headphone jack. FINALLY, they heard us and gave us a headphone jack in the Touch Pro 2. Like I said, I think we get incremental upgrades in these HTC phones for whatever reason. I'm not shelling out for another phone unless I see some real improvements which I haven't seen in the last year.
The virtual keyboards are hard to use, I'm much faster with the hardware keyboard. Great idea, but not ready for prime time IMO. If HTC is going to mandate I use one like the MT3g, better make it really work well, which let's face it, it does not.
I'm not telling you anything you don't know, we all have the g1 on here. I just wish someone would do better and I'm hoping one day they will because I believe in Android but I'm not happy with the HTC hardware or their design flaws. I think we all could agree on that point.
I just ordered an extended battery for my G1 because I don't see anything coming soon worth replacing it. I wish it wasn't so, but appears to be the case from my viewpoint at least.
I don't see me changing from a G1/Dream for a long time, especially with the new Tmo contract set up. I am no longer on a contract, so that means the next time I want a phone, I have to pay for the phone in installments for 20 months or up front. That alone will make me think harder about an upgrade in phones. The "minor" improvements for me have not been worth the pricetags they have been asking, so If and when my G1 dies or I feel the need for a new phone, I will just use my insurance to get a new one for 100 dollars. Maybe by then the g1 will be phased out and I will get a g2
I was pretty happy with the g1 when i got it. the hardware is pretty decent though the camera is a let down.
The stock battery is actually 1150 which is the same as what my old mda vario had and that is a smaller battery aswell. Ive toyed with the idea of getting an extended battery but i dunno if i could deal with the extra bulk it adds to the phone.
what baffles me is that the g2/hero is practicaly the same phone, without a hardware keyboard. the only difference i have found is more ram. i would have expected a cpu upgrade atleast.
there is 1 android device that catches my eye and thats the verizon. it looks to have a much larger screen.
im hanging off until another droid phone comes out that has a full upgrade, cpu mem, camera and screen.
the screen was a disapointment being actually smaller than it looks in pictures, and very noticably smaller than the iphone. and thats what makes the virtual keyboard a little difficult, is that hhalf inch of less csreen width comapred to the iphone
veda_sticks said:
The stock battery is actually 1150
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Click to collapse
Well, all of 1150 is not usable because it cuts off at 900 to save settings. Ever notice when the phone won't start you still have a little battery life left? That's the 15% you cannot use. Yes, it's 1150, but only 900 until your phone does not work.
There is a thread on here about the Yoobao battery where someone came up with these numbers. Bottom line is it's 900 usable.
jlacy76 said:
Well, all of 1150 is not usable because it cuts off at 900 to save settings. Ever notice when the phone won't start you still have a little battery life left? That's the 15% you cannot use. Yes, it's 1150, but only 900 until your phone does not work.
There is a thread on here about the Yoobao battery where someone came up with these numbers. Bottom line is it's 900 usable.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The phone shuts off and refuses to turn on when it cannot operate with stability with the voltage that the battery is currently providing. Phones don't save a few mah to save settings because they mostly use non volatile memory to store data nowadays (taking out the battery won't erase your settings)...
You are right and I was wrong but still it's 900 usable.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=522146&page=2

Pros/Cons of U8800

Hi there, this is my first post and I have an interest in this phone. Can owners of this phone please briefly state the pros and cons of this device as it would be a real help for me (and others) to decide whether I purchase this phone or not.
I will create a list in the next post weighing out all the good and the not so good features of this phone.
Thanks in advance!
List of Pros/cons
The list so far:
Pros:
- Great value
- Very fast 2nd Gen Snapdragon CPU which is easily overclockable
- Adreno 205 GPU (very good graphics)
- 512mb RAM
- 2gb Internal memory
- Large 3.8" WVGA screen
- 3g / HSDPA / Wi-Fi b/g/n / Bluetooth / GPS
- 5mp Camera with 720p HD recording
- Parts are cheap to replace (batteries, chargers etc.)
- Feature packed
- Decent battery (personal preference)
Cons:
- Bulky
- Not the best aesthetics (personal preference)
- Low quality components (crappy Bluetooth, Mic, Camera, Internal Memory and Poor touchscreen/multi-touch implementation)
- Android 2.2 (However, you can easily flash a stable 2.3.5 Rom)
- Lack of knowledge/customer support from Huawei[
- Branding (I'm being picky )
only thing i could call a con and that's really stretching it is it's relative bulkiness.
No dual core
Actually Android 2.2 is pretty old already, that would be a bad thing. But we already have a stable 2.3.5-ROM so it is no big deal at all. Not the best aesthetics? I think it looks pretty expensive if you ask me. The galaxy s of a friend of mine does not look any better than the u8800. As far as I know the camera is not that great, and the megapixel do not provide any information about the quality (my old camera with 3MP makes better photos than any phonecamera, simply because it has a real object lens and a bigger sensor).
In my opinion the real advantage of this device is that you get the speed of devices that cost twice as much. Of course those devices have a much bigger screen, do not forget that.
There is one situation in which the processor will be too slow: Playing some n64-games; for example Zelda - Ocarina of time is not really enjoyable. Also the screen is almost too small if you do use the touchscreen-controls (you can use a ps3 controller).
Lack of prestige? You gotta be kidding, right?
If you have the money for the u8800, go get it. If you have slightly more money you can go for a used galaxy s. I would have bought the galaxy s but I wanted a phone with 2 years warranty. If you have a lot more money you could be a galaxy s 2 for example, it will have a dualcore (no problems with emulating n64, that i can assure you) and a bigger screen.
XphX said:
Actually Android 2.2 is pretty old already, that would be a bad thing. But we already have a stable 2.3.5-ROM so it is no big deal at all. Not the best aesthetics? I think it looks pretty expensive if you ask me. The galaxy s of a friend of mine does not look any better than the u8800. As far as I know the camera is not that great, and the megapixel do not provide any information about the quality (my old camera with 3MP makes better photos than any phonecamera, simply because it has a real object lens and a bigger sensor).
In my opinion the real advantage of this device is that you get the speed of devices that cost twice as much. Of course those devices have a much bigger screen, do not forget that.
There is one situation in which the processor will be too slow: Playing some n64-games; for example Zelda - Ocarina of time is not really enjoyable. Also the screen is almost too small if you do use the touchscreen-controls (you can use a ps3 controller).
Lack of prestige? You gotta be kidding, right?
If you have the money for the u8800, go get it. If you have slightly more money you can go for a used galaxy s. I would have bought the galaxy s but I wanted a phone with 2 years warranty. If you have a lot more money you could be a galaxy s 2 for example, it will have a dualcore (no problems with emulating n64, that i can assure you) and a bigger screen.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your input. Updated list accordingly.
XphX said:
Lack of prestige? You gotta be kidding, right?
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Click to collapse
Just to clarify, from lack of prestige, I meant it as if somebody asks you what phone you have, and you say Huawei U8800, they'd probably think that you have a cheap chinese model. It's not really a big thing for many people but I thought it was worth mentioning.
Pro:
- Good specs for the price
- Good battery life on 2.3.5 (unofficial)
Con:
- Low quality components (crappy Bluetooth, Mic, Camera, Internal Memory - big but useless without hacking)
- Real problems with official Froyo Roms, which should have never go out on the market with so many bugs/issues (not going to sleep properly, unstable wifi etc etc)
- No official Gingerbread support, even Huawei actually owns the 2.3.5. license
- Lack of knowledge/customer support from Huawei (if you have an issue, they replace the handset and you get an identical handset with the same problem)
I would like to say, that this phone would have been one of the biggest fails on the market, if there was no support from excellent developers.
It's only because of people like Dzo, Stockwell and Genokolar, that I didn't throw this phone in the bin.
Huawei is fresh in the phone manufacturing industry and this handset reflects this aspect loud and clear. This is why no one really heard about it...
huawei is everything but fresh in the phone industry
darkado said:
huawei is everything but fresh in the phone industry
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Click to collapse
I said phone manufacturing, not telecommunications (I know that they are major manufacturer of WCDMA backbone and access network elements), there is a small difference...
katu2006 said:
I said phone manufacturing, not telecommunications (I know that they are major manufacturer of WCDMA backbone and access network elements), there is a small difference...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for your input. It's very disappointing that you get such a great value smartphone which is spoiled by basic features and low quality components. I'm really doubting if I should get this now.
everybody has a set of pros and cons on this phone, and i dont think its a good idea to make ur buying/non-buying decision purely basing on others comments..
for me, its only mattering "pro" is the high price-performance ratio..
(and one more now, after seeing such an active on-going development effort to make this phone better..)
and no "con" at all (as this is what i expect from a product of this price..)
thus if u think single-core cpu is a "con", no official support is a "con", little brand recognition (outside china) is a "con", u can alway pay a few bucks more to get dual-core, famous-branded models..
and honestly speaking, this phone is indeed NOT intended for everybody..
its just not as idiot-proof as iphone (as with most android phones..), not as good-looking (to some) as sensation, not as ego-boosting as sgs2, etc..
but its definitely easier to hack with, to manipulate with, and to brick with (not sure on this point though, as more flexibility does not necessarily imply easier brickability..)..
imho, its more suitable if u r the kind of person who would like to play with android instead of just using it..
as usual, the above represent my opinion only..
OP, just tell us what you are looking for and how much money you want to spend.
XphX said:
OP, just tell us what you are looking for and how much money you want to spend.
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Between £150 - £200 is my budget. The U8800 is more towards the lower end of my budget and as I can get it at that price brand new, it is quite appealing. However, you can get other phones like a second hand Galaxy S for a bit more while still being within reach of my budget.
What I'm looking for is killer hardware as well as a good community which makes the phone easily hackable and 'tweakable.' Regarding the U8800, it has exactly what I'm looking for at the price point but if it falls short of basic things like the touch screen, then what can you do. Being a previous ZTE Blade owner, I was extremely impressed as basic functions were not sacrificed.
There are a lot of people that switched from the Blade to the U8800 and are quite happy it seems. I think you do not have much choices here - luckily. You can either get the galaxy s or the U8800, as you already said yourself.
If the galaxy s is in a good condition and if you can live with a phone that has no warranty anymore, I'd say go for it. For me, none of my phones ever had any hardware-problem, so I could have easily bought all of them in used condition.
It is just that buying something off ebay is risky. I do buy little stuff there every now and then, but no expensive stuff - if the seller just lies about a "little" problem and you want to return it, you probably won't see your money again. If a friend of yours sells you his used galaxy s, take it. That would be the best choice in my opinion. Either get a galaxy s that you can inspect and try out before you buy it or go for the u8800.
katu2006 said:
Low quality components (crappy Bluetooth, Mic, Camera, Internal Memory - big but useless without hacking)
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Bluetooth was reported to be problematic, yes; some people reporting it to be fine (I just use the headset sometimes and it works perfectly well). Mic also works perfectly fine for me. Camera is not as good as with other handsets, yes. It takes 10 minutes to make the memory useable, but I admit, what Huawei did there makes not even sense.
katu2006 said:
Real problems with official Froyo Roms
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Froyo does not matter to me as it already is old and I would not recommend anybody to buy this phone if he wants to install Froyo.
katu2006 said:
No official Gingerbread support
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Click to collapse
That with Gingerbread is a shame, right now I hope for support in the future. Worst case: You won't get the new features... but: it works fast and stable already, so you won't miss more than the new features (whatever they are and will be...).
katu2006 said:
Lack of knowledge/customer support from Huawei
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Click to collapse
Instead we got the community. As long as everybody stays here at xda-devs or at modaco we will get support. When everybody leaves in one year or maybe in two, then you are pretty much f...on your own. On the other hand, in a year all the problems should be sorted out.
katu2006 said:
this phone would have been one of the biggest fails on the market, if there was no support from excellent developers
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Click to collapse
Exactly, and now it is a fast and stable phone with android 2.3.5 - at least for me it works perfectly well.
Noob here....
I have this phone and bought it about 3 weeks ago. It's my first smartphone and did a little research on the reviews.
From my perspective, being a total noob, so far I've been really happy with the X5. Sure, battery life is horrible and the camera could be better but I've managed to take some nice shots and some OK video. For me it's great to have this capability in my pocket and liberating to be able to catch up on the day's news and podcasts siting by the pond in the backyard in the morning.
Strangely perhaps I haven't been having problems with the reported wifi problems nor any problems with the Hi Suite software from Huawei.
I have had a couple of little glitches but nothing a quick re-boot hasn't fixed.
My first android has exceeded my expectations but I come from a point of nothingness.
Towards the end of it's 1 year warranty I plan doing all what seems to be the fun things to do like rooting and other fiddling around
Even after reading about the X5 shortfalls I'm still happy with what I have and don't feel inferior at this stage.
I bought the phone for $AUD260. Have spent around $25 on apps and around a further $25 on accessories...like extra mini USB cables for my various stations where I can charge the phone, a in-car charger just in case, a case and some screen protectors.
I've been having fun on my X5 and that's what it all comes down to for me.
seems this phone doesn't support UMTS 850/1900Mhz
so it may only use 2G data service in North American
policeman0077 said:
seems this phone doesn't support UMTS 850/1900Mhz
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Someone said that he got an answer about that from Huawei and they told him they just forgot to write this on the description page... someone could try it out to make it clear.
Clevo89 said:
Sure, battery life is horrible
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Click to collapse
Hold on, I get 2-3 days of standby when I do only use the phone for about 1 hour calling per day and about 20-50 sms per day. If I play n64 or something it lasts a day, maybe another half day. Actually this is the best battery life I ever encountered with a handset. I use 2.3.5 which seems to have a good battery management and SetCPU has 245min and 806max, scaling conservative.
XphX said:
Someone said that he got an answer about that from Huawei and they told him they just forgot to write this on the description page... someone could try it out to make it clear.
Hold on, I get 2-3 days of standby when I do only use the phone for about 1 hour calling per day and about 20-50 sms per day. If I play n64 or something it lasts a day, maybe another half day. Actually this is the best battery life I ever encountered with a handset. I use 2.3.5 which seems to have a good battery management and SetCPU has 245min and 806max, scaling conservative.
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Click to collapse
You're exaggerating with 3 days... The most I ever got on this phone is 51h and that without using it at all, mostly on stand by the whole time...And I've tried ALL Roms available till today.
I'm 100% sure that NOBODY got 72 h of this phone.
You probably didn't had many phones and don't have a good term of comparison...This phone has average battery life and only on Gingerbread Roms. On any Froyo Roms, you'll be lucky to get 20 h out of it.
Pros:
If you can root it and install a good ROM, it can become really fast, faster than many android phones (except dual core).
Very nice price.
It seems expensive and has a really sturdy exterior. The screen crystal is also very hard and resistant to scratches.
It is fully featured (sensors, very nice screen, high resolution, etc).
I had not the slightest problem with any of its subparts (bluetooth, GPS, camera). (Maybe I am lucky, though).
If you root it and install a good ROM, video recording becomes very good.
If you dont play with it all the time, battery lasts for one day or two.
You catch friends with iPhones 1 and 3G looking at it with envy.
You catch friends with iPhones 4 looking at you with envy, as soon as they hear its price and find out about the prices of apps at android market. (They paid for many of the apps you will get free).
Cons:
As with all smartphones, if you play demanding 3D games, in 2-3 hours you will need to find a wall socket (so this is not really a con).
Something with the multitouch doesn't seem perfect. I don't know why.
It's not an iPhone.
It has not a dual core CPU.
It's not a tablet.
If you are amongst some friends with iPhones, you will still not have one.
Conclusion: I am very happy with the X5. My wife wants to steal it from me, and she plays with it all the time. She already has finished many games on it (Angry Birds, Angry Birds Rio, Diversion, Cut the Rope and others). I managed to read two books on it, while on vacations.
It was a good buy.

[Q] HD2 - Still Worth Buying This Awesome Monster?

Hey guys. I'm looking to buy a phone, and the new ones have failed to impress me much, especially due to their price.
Now, I'm looking at the oldies here, and I know this Monster has practically all OSes. And I'm getting a brand new one for cheap.
Please let me know whether this is still worth buying, or should I look at another phone?
Budget: 20K INR tops (~$363)
Lt. Win said:
Hey guys. I'm looking to buy a phone, and the new ones have failed to impress me much, especially due to their price.
Now, I'm looking at the oldies here, and I know this Monster has practically all OSes. And I'm getting a brand new one for cheap.
Please let me know whether this is still worth buying, or should I look at another phone?
Budget: 20K INR tops (~$363)
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I don't see why not? Specially if you're into customization and I don't mean just the themes for Android, I mean changing your roms weekly...I cant seems to stop flashing new roms over and over lol. With that said tho, it's never going to perform as good as a stock device, and being that the HD2's stock is a dead system you might wanna think about it.
Other then that, it has a huge screen, it does everything that most of new devices do, cept the really graphics intensive games, and some minor rom bugs, but what you get is pretty much best of both worlds of Windows Phone and Android, you dual, triple, quadruple boot it. Heck I'm still using it as a daily driver...threw my HTC Radar away and went back to HD2.
HD2 is a great device, but it lacks 4G, which is noticeable to me.
I've noticed the newer phones seem to have a better GPS, I have an HTC MT4G, and the GPS locks a LOT quicker than the HD2s.
Still, I don't really like the MT4G very much, so I starting to think what I would like to get next?
uzziah0 said:
HD2 is a great device, but it lacks 4G, which is noticeable to me.
I've noticed the newer phones seem to have a better GPS, I have an HTC MT4G, and the GPS locks a LOT quicker than the HD2s.
Still, I don't really like the MT4G very much, so I starting to think what I would like to get next?
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4G connectivity is not a huge consideration outside of the US yet, and definitely not in India (where the OP evidently lives).
@OP, I personally don't see the HD2 as being worth it any more. The hardware is too outdated, and whilst it's cheap you should instead get a Nexus 4 which has far better hardware at a very low price. My particular issues with getting a HD2 now would be the awful GPU (can't even run temple run smoothly) and the screen which is now at quite a low PPI and doesn't have proper multitouch. At the end of the day it all depends on the price you can get it for.
you can get them around nashville tn for $65 and at that price i would HIGHLY recommend it.
i just put the nexusHD jellybean ROM on mine (coming from windows 6.5) and it came back to life! it had been living in the bottom of a desk drawer and now its sleek and running an android OS maybe 2% of the world is using.
in fact i might get 2 or 3 more to have as backups...this thing is great just running without a SIM card on WIFI at home for streaming pandora or using as a portable web browser.
Get the nexus 4 from the play store in usa... see the nexus 4 Indian thread in the nexus forum about how to get it to India. ....
scribbled from "the phab" (N7100)
I still recommend
If you want to buy the HD2. My on attention guaranty. Mine was more than 3 times But I think I have god motherboard now and works almost 6 month, Remember this is pretty old device and have only 2 finger to screen control - more don't work and let me think what next. Battery sometimes sucks. If I listing music all the time. Phone keep battery enough 10/11h without using display(control music by volumes buttons) The funniest thing is is still faster than cheap tablets from hypermarkets and have incredible support from xda
Now I only waiting when my HD2 will be broken or see highest battery which can withstand about 1 week :laugh:
yep! i'm thinking of having a couple of these around the house to play w/ new ROM builds and to use as bluetooth devices for my wireless music jamboxes and as a quick web browser and search tool.
no sim card needed! just use wifi
Unfortunately I don't have that much money.
I found an Xperia S for the exact price of my budget, so I'm going with that.
The Awesome Rooted, Customized And Supercharged HTC Wildfire™ S powered by CyanogenMod 10.0

Moto S

Check this out
http://m.gadgets.ndtv.com/mobiles/n...-with-snapdragon-810-4gb-of-ram-report-629471
Sent from my LG-D850 using XDA Free mobile app
It just seems like your average rumors article with no source.
If it is true, then it'll definitely outclass the Nexus 6. But as of now, we don't have any compelling evidence.
Of course there will be a phone coming out next year that will smash the N6. And guess what, there will be a phone coming out in 2016 that will smash that phone.
Sounds similar to the Z4, G4, M9 rumors for 2915!
So... In 6 months (optimistically) there will be a snapdragon 810 version of the nexus with a slightly bigger battery... Cool. This isn't really surprising. Generally phones only stay bleeding edge for about 6 months anyway. Might consider grabbing this in a year (or see what the note 5 and new nexus look like).
biglilsteve said:
Of course there will be a phone coming out next year that will smash the N6. And guess what, there will be a phone coming out in 2016 that will smash that phone.
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Actually not really.... We get big bumps every 18-24 months and everything in between is incremental..... Consider the Note 3 to Note 4....thats not a very significant upgrade at all in terms on the SoC. Ticks and tocks. The 805 was a tick compared to the 800/802. The 810 will be a tock.
4GB of ram... Interesting. Why?
Evo_Shift said:
4GB of ram... Interesting. Why?
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tl;dr - Allows developers a higher ceiling of capability in their apps and content. People are doing more now than they were a year or two ago on their phones.
Phones are starting to become people's sole connected device. I know me personally, if I wasn't developing, I'd almost exclusively use a phone and keep an old dusty laptop around for office related tasks.
Applications are becoming much more complex from a developer standpoint, and having more resources means we can make things even more complex without being so resource-conscious. You figure OS's nowadays on these 3GB RAM phones are constantly eating up 1GB themselves. The whole point of RAM from a user standpoint is to make the phone more fluid by not constantly needing to re-access data. The more stuff you can store in dynamic RAM, the less times a task has to relaunch itself. Provides a more fluid user experience.
Look at PCs. 5 years ago unless you were a gamer, you would have asked "Why on earth would I want 12GB of RAM in my PC?". Now look at PCs. It's impossible to walk into a retailer and find a PC with less than 4GB, and most have 8GB-12GB with a few 16GB models on the floor or on a website. That's because if you compare PC use to 20 years ago, people are running the pentagon off of their PCs.
tl;dr - Allows developers a higher ceiling of capability in their apps and content.
This reminds me when the gs3 came out with 2 modules one with 2gb and the other with faster soc. A lot of people were jealous of the international variant with I believe was a quad-core stating android need nothing more than 1gb of ram... fast forward 2 years later the phone with 2gb was upgraded to kitkat meanwhile the later stuck on JB
Ram matters especially with so many apps running services in the background, gapps, facebook, skype, etc. I have a back up s2 Hercules and in 2011 that phone flew felt like nothing could slow it down...now lag lag, freeze freeze close apps etc.
this doesn't change much for VZW users depending if the bootloader is locked or not.
md1008 said:
This reminds me when the gs3 came out with 2 modules one with 2gb and the other with faster soc. A lot of people were jealous of the international variant with I believe was a quad-core stating android need nothing more than 1gb of ram... fast forward 2 years later the phone with 2gb was upgraded to kitkat meanwhile the later stuck on JB
Ram matters especially with so many apps running services in the background, gapps, facebook, skype, etc. I have a back up s2 Hercules and in 2011 that phone flew felt like nothing could slow it down...now lag lag, freeze freeze close apps etc.
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Hah. I was a GS3 early adopter that pre-ordered mine. I called the advantage of the 2Gb of ram over the faster SoC all the way back then but all the kids could do was post benchmark scores that "clearly made their device better"..... Lol now both are comparatively slow but only one has enough memory to actually be viable.
4GB ram vs 3GB is much less of an impact than when we were going from 1GB to 2GB. The money could be better spent on a variety of other things for a phone being released next year.
Tripsyk said:
tl;dr - Allows developers a higher ceiling of capability in their apps and content. People are doing more now than they were a year or two ago on their phones.
Phones are starting to become people's sole connected device. I know me personally, if I wasn't developing, I'd almost exclusively use a phone and keep an old dusty laptop around for office related tasks.
Applications are becoming much more complex from a developer standpoint, and having more resources means we can make things even more complex without being so resource-conscious. You figure OS's nowadays on these 3GB RAM phones are constantly eating up 1GB themselves. The whole point of RAM from a user standpoint is to make the phone more fluid by not constantly needing to re-access data. The more stuff you can store in dynamic RAM, the less times a task has to relaunch itself. Provides a more fluid user experience.
Look at PCs. 5 years ago unless you were a gamer, you would have asked "Why on earth would I want 12GB of RAM in my PC?". Now look at PCs. It's impossible to walk into a retailer and find a PC with less than 4GB, and most have 8GB-12GB with a few 16GB models on the floor or on a website. That's because if you compare PC use to 20 years ago, people are running the pentagon off of their PCs.
tl;dr - Allows developers a higher ceiling of capability in their apps and content.
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Click to collapse
Most users will not see much benefit in using more than 3-4gb. Manufacturers include the additional hardware because they realize the average consumer is ill informed and will purchase bases on emotion. Even I child can will tell you that 12gb is better than 8gb. I think same applies to phones. Only phone that is justified in adding more than 2gb is the Note. In every other case, the manufacturer is just playing on consumer ignorance and impulse.
So do we have any legit info on this?

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