Related
Hi folks, today I was lamenting the fact that my Hermes (and many other HTC phones for that matter) has no automatic brightness control. This results in me using it on max brightness all the time, which of course eats through the battery and is mostly unnecessary (except in bright sunlight). Then the thought occurred to me that an app could be written that used the 3g camera in order to detect brightness.
While I have an IT background (including a large amount of programming), I have no experience with Windows mobile, and think this is probably not the place to start doing WM apps. However, I thought that perhaps someone else would think this is a good idea, so thought I would make the suggestion. Reading the camera would of course use some battery, but not nearly so much as running the screen at high brightness to avoid having to adjust it manually all the time...I also read the other day that MS is planning to use the camera for orientation control (instead of an accelerometer) in WM7, so I guess this would indicate that they don't suck batteries that badly...at any rate, you wouldn't need to read it constantly...once every second or two would no doubt be sufficient...
To extend the idea further, you could also use differences in brightness between the main and 3g camera to do things like proximity sensing to switch off the screen when the phone is next to your head or in a pocket automatically.
Any thoughts?
Nice idea, but I think that the amount of battery saved will be much less than the amount consumed be having the camera on all the time plus CPU processing power required for the camera.
Now a dedicated light sensor would of course be a different story.....last time I enjoyed one on a WM device was on the good old Ipaq 3970.....brilliant device at the time (hardware wise, at least)
I did have a think about this, is there a way we can test battery consumption with camera on? Remember that nothing would be drawn to the screen by the app, and you wouldn't actually have to run the camera constantly necessarily, just long enough to get an image (you wouldn't even have to do all the auto adjustment it does when you're trying to take a picture like gaining up the sensor in the dark etc...you'd wanna open it up with constant settings each time). I'm pretty sure that the camera can write directly to memory without accessing the CPU (DMA)...and you wouldn't need to actually process the image at all...
Very off-topic...but are you "est in horto"????
haha took me a minute but LOL been years since I took the course...sadly my idea isn't getting the kinda interest i'd hoped though...maybe one of these days i'll have to learn wm6 development after all :-(
I suspect with anything using the camera will be the power-drain. For it to be responsive enought it will have to have the camera on either constantly or very frequently. The kaiser battery is bad enough as it is.
Yeah, good old caecillius. Shame that vesuvius got him. shed a tear I did. ;D
It needn't constantly test the camera...
I have such an application on my palm OS treo 600.
It's called BrightCam and you can assign a hotkey to run it.
It only runs on command,
checks the ambient light using the camera (regular not 3G in this instance),
adjusts the screen brightness accordingly - et voila...
could be nice to have this functionality in WM too.
would u be kind enough to share it
http://mytreo.net/downloads/brightcam,236.html
RunEveryDay
Maybe it can be done by RunEveryDay.
Not as elegant as the camera solution....but maybe easier to realize.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=2558219#post2558219
Hi, I own a Vibrant for some months now and I'm using its 5MP camera quite a lot. In fact I find it quite decent for a phone cam in well-lit environments...
Lately I've opened the phone to apply the Hardware GPS fix. It worked (now it locks almost instantly), however the whole trial bequeathed me with a less than working camera (I swear I touch nothing close to there). Now all my images are blurry, case in point: http://img24.imageshack.us/img24/7028/picua.jpg (the original is in full 5MP glory supposededly "adjusted" for the given lighting and taken with a very steady hand).
Do you know what may caused this? Also did anyone else face the same problem (after operning the phone or not)? If so is it a problem that it can be solved?
I grew quite accustomed to my vibrant's camera, and I'll hate if I'm to lose its function now.
Thanks for your attention...
Erm, go to settings> applications> camera > erase everything cache, data etc.
That should make settings default.
Then try it, if it still does it.. erm find a camera app from market, and use that, then you know if its camera, or software.
thats not blurry, more like foggy. I had this same problem when i installed my ffc. I had put the phone back together before I let it fully dry. It might just be the inside of the glass that needs to be wiped off or something. good luck
I upgraded from stock + root MDL to stock + root MF9. Now sometimes when I take pictures, it says Processing and takes a bit to get back to being able to take pictures. I'm not sure what it's doing and it doesn't do it all the time. Any one know what's going on? Taking pictures of my son and that delay is causing some missed opportunities.
First time I started camera after upgrade to MF9, it said something about updating camera.
Thanks.
I noticed this happened a couple days ago to me and found that when I was zoomed in that is when it would say processing, but if I was zoomed all the way out there was no processing lag. Not sure why it has the processing time while it was zoomed in.
Never used zoom on the pictures that say Processing.
Turn off "auto night detection" should do the trick.
Sent from my Nexus 10 using xda app-developers app
Going to give that a try. Thanks.
What mode are you in? Many of the modes require extra processing time like HDR, Drama Shot, Animation, etc. If you are in Auto, then something else might be wrong. Are you saving to the external sdcard, if so, is your card full or slow?
I've searched around and I could not find a way to fix my problem.
Its quite simple to explain I guess... whenever I move my phone around to take a photo, it gets very laggy. The image preview that I see at the screen gets very laggy and out of time (it takes a few seconds to show up on the phone after something moved).
I have tried all the modes and the weird thing is that I haven't experienced lag on the Shot and More mode. However that's not convenient (at least for me) since it's gonna take forever to take the picture since it takes a few of them. On the auto mode and the beauty thing mode the picture preview on the screen provided by the camera is still very very laggy.
Photo stabilization IS off and HDR mode is off as well. Picture quality is set to HD (16 mp)
Soooo any ideas? Thanks in advance.
Your description is a bit vague. To the limits of the information you provide, it sounds like normal behaviour. You imply that it works fine before you move it. And as one would expect when you change the scene, the camera has to recalculate focus, exposure and everything else which takes a finite amount of time. Moreover you are using the camera at it's maximum resolution where such adjustments would take the maximum amount of time.
And plausibly the effect is minimized when you use a multiple shot mode where you would expect the camera to be optimized for sequential adjustments.
Unfortunately you didn't give us any details of whether it changes when you select lower resolutions, type of scenes shot, lighting, type of focus used or any other details. Looking for a pattern or even having a more detailed description would help eliminate some possibilities an d more accurately characterize the issue.
Based on the limited information provided, it sounds normal. Just the limit of the camera design.
.
fffft said:
Your description is a bit vague. To the limits of the information you provide, it sounds like normal behaviour. You imply that it works fine before you move it. And as one would expect when you change the scene, the camera has to recalculate focus, exposure and everything else which takes a finite amount of time. Moreover you are using the camera at it's maximum resolution where such adjustments would take the maximum amount of time.
And plausibly the effect is minimized when you use a multiple shot mode where you would expect the camera to be optimized for sequential adjustments.
Unfortunately you didn't give us any details of whether it changes when you select lower resolutions, type of scenes shot, lighting, type of focus used or any other details. Looking for a pattern or even having a more detailed description would help eliminate some possibilities an d more accurately characterize the issue.
Based on the limited information provided, it sounds normal. Just the limit of the camera design.
.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually, to me, it doesn't sound normal at all!
I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding him or you are, but what I got from his message is that it's not a focus lag, but the the actual image that appears on the screen that lags behind what the camera is currently being aimed at.
He says that if something moves, it will take a few seconds before you see that it has moved on the screen.
In addition, the fact that in Shot & More mode, it doesn't happen seems to confirm that something's wrong.
xPedroo said:
I've searched around and I could not find a way to fix my problem.
Its quite simple to explain I guess... whenever I move my phone around to take a photo, it gets very laggy. The image preview that I see at the screen gets very laggy and out of time (it takes a few seconds to show up on the phone after something moved).
I have tried all the modes and the weird thing is that I haven't experienced lag on the Shot and More mode. However that's not convenient (at least for me) since it's gonna take forever to take the picture since it takes a few of them. On the auto mode and the beauty thing mode the picture preview on the screen provided by the camera is still very very laggy.
Photo stabilization IS off and HDR mode is off as well. Picture quality is set to HD (16 mp)
Soooo any ideas? Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To good thing (hopefully) is that it seems that it's a software problem, and not hardware, because otherwise you probably would have the same issue in Shot & More mode.
I don't know if you have a custom rom, or if you're still stock, but you might want to try to reflash your rom over the current one first, and if that doesn't work, you may have to do a full wipe.
If you're using a custom rom, you might want to try a different rom altogether (+ full wipe) to see if it makes a difference.
If you decide to go down that road, please read the corresponding thread(custom, stock, ... for your model) to avoid bricking your phone..
Mithrandir007 said:
To good thing (hopefully) is that it seems that it's a software problem, and not hardware, because otherwise you probably would have the same issue in Shot & More mode.
I don't know if you have a custom rom, or if you're still stock, but you might want to try to reflash your rom over the current one first, and if that doesn't work, you may have to do a full wipe.
If you're using a custom rom, you might want to try a different rom altogether (+ full wipe) to see if it makes a difference.
If you decide to go down that road, please read the corresponding thread(custom, stock, ... for your model) to avoid bricking your phone..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, you got it right. Thanks.
Uhm, I'm using the default rom (the one that came with my phone when I bought it)
By the way I could not log in back to my old account so I created this second one lol, sorry about it.
Anyway do you need any more info?
How do I reflash my rom? Sorry I don't know these terms too well :c
xPedrooo said:
Yes, you got it right. Thanks.
Uhm, I'm using the default rom (the one that came with my phone when I bought it)
By the way I could not log in back to my old account so I created this second one lol, sorry about it.
Anyway do you need any more info?
How do I reflash my rom? Sorry I don't know these terms too well :c
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You could go to the Android Development section and read all about it, but if you've never done it and are not comfortable with it, it might be better to just do a factory reset of your device (make sure to backup everything you want to keep first), or check if there's an update (Software update in the settings).
Hello, i am getting this phone tomorrow and i would like info from existing users.
1) person i am buying the phone from said it has second latest firmware and that it has a bug where cores dont idle properly and therefor battery runs out faster. Anyone has this problem and how to solve it ?
2) i would like to avoid as much hassle with unofficial software, but will use it if it will really help the phone. What official or unofficial updates do you recomend ? What proved best for this phone ?
3) what is the easiest way to root this phone ? On my S4 mini phone i used 1 click root (kingoroot). I need this for phone call recording app.
To help you with your answer i will write how i plan to use the phone and what i want it to do.
1) i will mostly use it for calls, messages and camera.
2) I will rarely use it to browse internet, youtube, check facebook and gmail.
3) apps i will use are: sms backup and phonecall recorder
4) i will occasionaly use google maps or something similar
5) i will NOT play games on it, watch movies on it or run any cpu/mem intense operation on it.
6) i will use camera on it very often, for images and videos. I would like it to open fast and take images and videos as good as possible. I would like advices on what to install and how to tweak to accomplish this since reviews say camera is not very good on this phone.
Bonus question: Would anyone here dare to say how this phones camera will compare to camera on Samsung S4 mini and S5 mini ? Will camera on Z5 compact be worse, same or better than those 2 phones ?
Was user of this phone for around 2 years. Just upgraded from Z5C to Mi Mix 2.
Mine's battery got swell, but luckily back cover glass not broken, so I carefully removed cover and put needle on battery to take out pressure from battery. Put back cover, and it seems to be good so far. Keeping it as backup phone.
For idle / cpu sleep, disable movie maker app, its discussed in old threads as well.
Camera is just okay, and biggest let down on camera is, it takes photo after a second when you click the camera button.
On my new Mix 2, camera is super fast. It takes photo as soon as button is tapped.
2nd drawback is heating issue. It gets hot really quickly when using any app that uses more cpu, like recording a movie. You can cool it down by killing the app.
Sent from my Mi MIX 2 using Tapatalk
I've used the Z5C as my primary device for almost 3 years now and own two in case I need a backup. I can't address all of your concerns but I can definitely provide some input based on my experience.
Hello, i am getting this phone tomorrow and i would like info from existing users.
1) person i am buying the phone from said it has second latest firmware and that it has a bug where cores dont idle properly and therefor battery runs out faster. Anyone has this problem and how to solve it ?
The latest stock firmware from Sony is Android Nougat 7.1.1 (if that's what you mean by second latest firmware). I did experience a severe battery drain issue in my first Z5C and had to replace it, may or may not be related to the bug you describe. My current two devices do not have this issue.
2) i would like to avoid as much hassle with unofficial software, but will use it if it will really help the phone. What official or unofficial updates do you recomend ? What proved best for this phone ?
Berni's alternative Lineage Build is the best rom and comes with the latest security patch from Google. Highly recommended over stock.
3) what is the easiest way to root this phone ? On my S4 mini phone i used 1 click root (kingoroot). I need this for phone call recording app.
Follow the guide on how to root. It's not as easy as using Kingoroot but it's the best available method to date. Note that if you choose to root this phone, you have to unlock the bootloader, which also results in a loss of the DRM keys, which are tied to the camera's ability to process photos. This isn't a huge issue anymore since the camera on unofficial roms is more or less the same quality is stock now.
As for the camera, it's pretty subpar by today's standards. It takes decent photos in daylight but the sensor is terrible for low light photos. There is no tweaking that I know of that can fix this. In fact most of Sony's phones suffer from this problem - I believe they only truly improved the camera with the Xperia XZ2 Compact which came out last year. The Z5C does support the 4K video though, which is nice. I use Footej Camera pro on my Z5C and have not come across a better app for taking photos.
While I much prefer the design of the Z5C over the Z3C, the Z3C supports working unofficial builds of both Oreo and Android P - the hardware is also more or less the same as the Z5C. So if the firmware version is important to you the Z3C is a good option too.
chall3ng3r said:
Was user of this phone for around 2 years. Just upgraded from Z5C to Mi Mix 2.
Mine's battery got swell, but luckily back cover glass not broken, so I carefully removed cover and put needle on battery to take out pressure from battery. Put back cover, and it seems to be good so far. Keeping it as backup phone.
Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i saved my battery used only the original slow charger ,
mostly ive charge from 20 to 90%
and disconnected the phone from the charger when done chargering ,
not using the phone while is charge's
the result my phone is over years
if i put *#*#service#*#* in the dialer its saids my battery is 2400 instead of 2700 (only 300ma damge over 2 yrs!) stiil good to use
Don't use custom roms if you are going to use the camera very often.
The image quality on custom roms is much worse than the stock one. (Expecially with videos, you loose the extra smooth stabilization)
I raccomend you to use stock rom + root (magisk) + green kernel
I still use my Z5c as a daily driver. I keep a phone as a daily as long as possible but I plan to switch when something I like comes to market. 2018 sucks when it comes to new smartphones, IMO. I enjoy having front facing speakers and NO NOTCH.
- Stock ROM specific to my country (E5803_Customized PH_1298-5099_32.4.A.1.54_R1E). If you are in the US, I think flashing a stock ROM other than the US specific one enables the fingerprint scanner. I have tried Berni's Lineage 14.1 build and I would highly recommend it for an AOSP-based ROM. Unfortunately I loose camera features like digital stabilization in video and 60 fps recording so I went back to stock. With all the bloatware disabled, Sony's stock ROM is not bad.
- I was able to backup my TA partition when the Dirty Cow exploit was a thing. I was able to flash it back when I finally had TWRP, keeping the DRM stuff needed for the best camera performance.
- Magisk-v18 for root. But unlocking the bootloader and adding a recovery is a whole different story.
https://forum.xda-developers.com/z5-compact/general/guide-how-to-root-z5c-painful-using-t3549388
- Z5 FSC (Fast Smarter Cooler)
https://forum.xda-developers.com/xp...d-fsc-1-0-dont-sacrifice-performance-t3670586
- Xposed mod so I can use RootCloak and hide my rooted status from banking apps.
Thank you all for replies, i didnt get my phone this friday, i am getting it on monday, i am anxious I am getting the latest technology of 2015 Yep, right now im on midrange 2013 phone, moving to highend 2015
I am not playing with anything that could harm my camera, its the most important thing to me. Basicly all i care about is rooting the phone. That rooting guide looks long and painful and im a software enginer
I guess i will have to do a little reading because right now i dont even know the difference between ROM and kernel. Maybe you could point me to some good reading ?
Just to be safe. When i get my phone. If i do every single official upgrade that the phone offers me (android version, sony stuff, etc.). Will i still be able to use the Magisk-v18 for rooting? The reason i am asking is that if possible, i would like to first upgrade everything and test my phone call recording app and see how it works. If it works, i would save myself a whole load of time doing that painful rooting thing. But, i am afraid that upgrading the phone will make it harder to root (dirty cow and such). So can i safely upgrade everything ?
xperiafan8 said:
Just to be safe. When i get my phone. If i do every single official upgrade that the phone offers me (android version, sony stuff, etc.). Will i still be able to use the Magisk-v18 for rooting? The reason i am asking is that if possible, i would like to first upgrade everything and test my phone call recording app and see how it works. If it works, i would save myself a whole load of time doing that painful rooting thing. But, i am afraid that upgrading the phone will make it harder to root (dirty cow and such). So can i safely upgrade everything ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Updating the phone won't make it harder to root, and it's already extremely easy
you just need to:
1. Unlock the bootloader (Easy process, you just need to follow a few instructions from https://developer.sony.com/develop/open-devices/get-started/unlock-bootloader/)
2. Install a custom recovery (Just a few adb commands)
3. Flash Magisk via the recovery you just installed
TheVan28 said:
Updating the phone won't make it harder to root, and it's already extremely easy
you just need to:
1. Unlock the bootloader (Easy process, you just need to follow a few instructions from https://developer.sony.com/develop/open-devices/get-started/unlock-bootloader/)
2. Install a custom recovery (Just a few adb commands)
3. Flash Magisk via the recovery you just installed
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The part that bothers me is the backup of the keys for camera. I dont even know what this keys are nor why are they needed but i am afraid i will lose them, as ppl tend to lose keys.
xperiafan8 said:
The part that bothers me is the backup of the keys for camera. I dont even know what this keys are nor why are they needed but i am afraid i will lose them, as ppl tend to lose keys.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's the trickiest part. I followed the guides carefully, backed up my keys and later when I tried to restore they keys my phone soft bricked and I was never able to restore them again. Not a huge loss for me because I want to stay on a custom rom with root.
Also is quite easy to downgrade for phone to old firmware if you decided to update it. The Sony flash tool is great. But there is a learning curve to all of this so I suggest you read up and learn it well if you really want to use this device.
Well this is a disapointment. Camera is worse than on S5 mini which is 1 year older, a lot cheaper and "only" 8MP. And battery seems to run down mighty fast even when i am not touching the phone. I decided to use s5 mini until i figure out of there is any worthy upgrade.
Could someone please record video with Z5 compact in silent room and check if there is any background noise ? Because on my phone, there is a lot of background noise when i record video and audio quality is really bad. I tried all 3 compatible android roms so far.
xperiafan8 said:
Could someone please record video with Z5 compact in silent room and check if there is any background noise ? Because on my phone, there is a lot of background noise when i record video and audio quality is really bad. I tried all 3 compatible android roms so far.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi, Yes i have some noise when recording.I only use official stock rom 7.1.1, I also put the phone in a box and closed it to do the recording.
I did not really noticed it before because i usually only take pictures and when i shoot to record something, it is outside to record music or something, so no real silence.
I can hear the background noise (recorded from a silent) when pushing volume level over 50% and i don't think it is that bad.
1) I think, the microphone is on some kind of auto adjustmode and boost its sensibility to pick low noise.
2)Some noise do come from the Z5 circuitry, if you put your ear on the Z5 phone back,you can hear some noise...So i am sure this noise is picked as well.
3) I also recorded the video with the sony NC-750 earbuds (binaural audio) and i got also some noise noise as well.
---------- Post added at 11:47 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:41 AM ----------
Can i ask you which alternate rom are you using?
I don't think Sony's still work :
Radio FM RDS, Noise cancelling with Sony's earbuds, binaural recording, Steady Shot Tm, 23MPX camera...
(Those last two i coud live without if there is a good alternative solution as camera app), not sure about battery life either.
xperiafan8 said:
Could someone please record video with Z5 compact in silent room and check if there is any background noise ? Because on my phone, there is a lot of background noise when i record video and audio quality is really bad. I tried all 3 compatible android roms so far.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Running latest Lineage 14.1 build from Berni without DRM keys. I use the Footej camera app. When recording there is some noise but it's quiet so I've never noticed it before. Audio quality overall is good.
My best camera experience has been using Footej but also CameraMx with HDR enabled. Also if you rooted with Magisk, download and install the Camera2 API Enabler module.