Does anyone know the difference in the KDB, KDD, and KDF firmware? From what I can tell these contain (?) different CSC's which are for different countries and carriers...so they would be configured differently (i.e. KDB supposedly doesn't have the Hub apps)?
Would there be any major differences between these that I should favor one over the other?
EDIT:
Ok, I think I was asking the wrong question. Mods can delete this thread now.
Related
Hello,
very short question: Does there exist any differences between the different S III models 16- and 32-bit when i aim to flash custom ROMs on the device?
I want to flash at least CM 10 or CM 10 based ROMs (hopefully paranoid ROM for example) on it.
I really searched on google for it and did write "xda" behind it to find topics on this forum about it but maybe this question is too trivial that noone asked that question yet.
But in germany we say: There are no stupid questions... just stupid answers!
PS: Sorry for the title!
No differences!
Rom will works on both variant
I'm not understanding how kernels and ROMs connect. Can someone give me some extra insight?
[Hardware] <-- Unique to every phone
--
[Kernel] <--- Tells the OS how to talk to the hardware
--
[ROM] <--- Slightly confused. Is the OS in the Read only Memory, or has this term changed its "street" meaning?
I understand that most ROMs (e.g. CM7 and CM9) include both the kernel and the ROM, but can you flash these separately too?
I have a 1.5 year old thunderbolt that's rooted, and has CM7 which is based on gingerbread. I believe HTC has also released the kernel as open source, which is probably the reason I have CM7
Anyway, I guess what I'm looking for is an answer/guide/forum that explains why I can't install newer versions of android onto the already working/open source kernel I'm already running. Is it accurate to view the kernel as all the phone's drivers, or just the CPU driver? If that statement is true, why can't I load ICS or Jelly Bean onto my already existing set of drivers?
I'm thinking about starting a Wiki on this if 1) it doesn't already exist, and 2) I can wrap my brain around it enough to share with others!
Thanks to anyone with a response!
shadowrelic said:
I'm not understanding how kernels and ROMs connect. Can someone give me some extra insight?
[Hardware] <-- Unique to every phone
--
[Kernel] <--- Tells the OS how to talk to the hardware
--
[ROM] <--- Slightly confused. Is the OS in the Read only Memory, or has this term changed its "street" meaning?
I understand that most ROMs (e.g. CM7 and CM9) include both the kernel and the ROM, but can you flash these separately too?
I have a 1.5 year old thunderbolt that's rooted, and has CM7 which is based on gingerbread. I believe HTC has also released the kernel as open source, which is probably the reason I have CM7
Anyway, I guess what I'm looking for is an answer/guide/forum that explains why I can't install newer versions of android onto the already working/open source kernel I'm already running. Is it accurate to view the kernel as all the phone's drivers, or just the CPU driver? If that statement is true, why can't I load ICS or Jelly Bean onto my already existing set of drivers?
I'm thinking about starting a Wiki on this if 1) it doesn't already exist, and 2) I can wrap my brain around it enough to share with others!
Thanks to anyone with a response!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You are correct about the ROM, but ROMs also include the kernel (if it didn't, or no kernel was flashed separately, the device would not boot). Yes, other kernels can be flashed on your existing ROM, but it's not necessarily going to be compatible.
Sort of, but there's a lot more than that. See here and here. Later versions of Android will require newer drivers,etc. which the existing kernel won't provide (they'll be outdated). Back porting and additional coding is theoretically possible, but insanely difficult (many times). Even after this some things may still not work.
Thanks for the insight, I was able to get a lot deeper into this with those links. For anyone else wandering down a similar path, you might as well stop now! Here are a few links:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1039217&page=2#17
http://www.cs.uwc.ac.za/~mmotlhabi/avmk.pdf
http://www.iteachandroid.com/2012/01/what-is-firmware-rom-and-firmware.html
So, if anyone else is still listening, I do have two more questions:
Do any phones have truly open source drivers? (a.k.a. higher probability of allowing old hardware to work with new android OS)
Is there any way to determine which phones will be supported by the custom-ROM community early on? I know the Nexus line doesn't have vendor modified code, is that the direction which would have the highest probability to stay at top of the Custom ROM curve without upgrading devices every year?
Thanks again for any insight! I hope I'm posting this in a Newb-Friendly forum!
shadowrelic said:
Thanks for the insight, I was able to get a lot deeper into this with those links. For anyone else wandering down a similar path, you might as well stop now! Here are a few links:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1039217&page=2#17
http://www.cs.uwc.ac.za/~mmotlhabi/avmk.pdf
http://www.iteachandroid.com/2012/01/what-is-firmware-rom-and-firmware.html
So, if anyone else is still listening, I do have two more questions:
Do any phones have truly open source drivers? (a.k.a. higher probability of allowing old hardware to work with new android OS)
Is there any way to determine which phones will be supported by the custom-ROM community early on? I know the Nexus line doesn't have vendor modified code, is that the direction which would have the highest probability to stay at top of the Custom ROM curve without upgrading devices every year?
Thanks again for any insight! I hope I'm posting this in a Newb-Friendly forum!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For both your questions, the Nexus-line devices would be the way to go. They usually have everything working on new Android versions the soonest, and Google always releases their code, etc.
Hi
i can use linux kernel (zimage) to update android kernel if yes ,how ?
thnx
OK, so here's the thing... I'm kind of new in the Android acknowledgement, so I hope that here will be the place where I will get my answers. So here's what I know...
At first I didn't know that Android was Java-based, using a modified Linux kernel which we all know it's C-based (entirely). After a while, I found that there were different firmwares (ROMs) from the original ones, called Stock ones and also different kernels. After reading lots of info about how things actually are, I've decided to root my stock and then I moved to a custom MIUI for my SGSII with a JB implementation. At first it was great, but I had some issues which left me disappointed. Then I moved on to the official MIUI (China - English one). Things got better after I got used to it. The major bugs disappeared, only small ones left and a few crashes, but in time most of them got fixed. Later it crossed my mind, "Why are there so many different kernels and which is the best one for my phone or ROM to be precise?" Well this is where I need your help. I've read some topics that siyah kernel is probably the best kernel, which fits the MIUI rom. The pointing of concrete kernels isn't the kind of answer I was actually searching for. To be honest, I need answers to questions like:
How many kernels are there ?
Which ones are safe ? (I've read that there are badly written ones, so yeah, it needs to be asked)
Statistically, which is the best kernel and is it for the MIUI rom ?
How can I tell that it's suitable for the MIUI rom ? (Since I've read that not all are)
What are the risks of changing the kernel?
How can you test the kernel's behaviour, an app which makes statistics in time or some other methods ?
Believe me, as annoying this topic might seem, lots of us (the newbie users) are burning up the google servers, just to find these answers. I'm really hoping for a reply spam with answers (if possible , spare the trolling ones). Thanks for reading my annoying topic, anyway
Since most of the source is available, basically anyone can build their own kernel at home, so it is hard to tell how many kernels are there.
what isn`t available as open source are most of the OEM-specific drivers. Samsung, for one, doesn`t make most of the drivers' source publicly available, so kernel developers have to make a binary kernel around the binary drivers and literally pray their work well together.
Siyah is safe, but I prefer the stock kernel (I like the stock ROM... go figure). The stock kernel is the only one that is sure to work properly with all the hardware in the phone, because it is the only built from sources for the drivers as well (read my previous paragraph).
Which ones are safe (other than stock and Siyah): you gotta try them for yourself, read other users' remarks and feedbacks, and so on.
Risks:
Very low. As long as the bootloader is good, if the kernel totally malfunctions, just reboot in download mode and flash something else.
Some app may work very well in one kernel and bomb in another. It may crash in some kernels. It is very empyrical.
The problem is that custom kernels don't undergo the same type of quality testing as stock kernels. Developers have very limited resources to do that, and some developers are more interested in having a short time-to-market than a quality product (well, many large corporations act like that as well). At the end of the day we - power users - are the beta testing and quality assurance teams for the kernel developers.
EDIT: Excuse my ignorance, haha. I read this http://lwn.net/Articles/480055/ after finding a thread on ION vs. PMEM here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2078504. I was searching for the wrong things!
I'm going to flash iHateWebOS's HIRO kernel (http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2080526), but in the Dropbox folder (https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ean5mee1bxyhr65/WZ_Tm9QRd0) there are different zip files: HIRO_5_8.zip, PLUS_5_13.zip, and PLUS_ion_5_13.zip. What's the difference between these packages? Am I right in assuming:
- HIRO_5_8.zip: Stock HIRO kernel, released on the 8th, long term sort of release.
- PLUS_5_13.zip: Part of a nightly release? Includes overclocking / whatever HIRO+ includes (aka Stock+?)
- PLUS_ion_5_13.zip: Released every 5 days, what does it have?
I can't find anywhere that explains this, aside from people asking for the ion package. Help guys? Thanks!
I've just updated my GP5 to the BEANSTALK KK ROM. As with the other KK ROMS I've tried, the MAC address is set (and can be changed) in the nvram_net.txt file in the vendor folder, rather than by the EFS folder. The question I have is about the country code (ccode)in the same nvram_net.txt file. In the three KK ROMs I've tried, it is set to KR. Does this overide other settings on the GP5, and would changing it to US cause any problems?
jcmcg1 said:
I've just updated my GP5 to the BEANSTALK KK ROM. As with the other KK ROMS I've tried, the MAC address is set (and can be changed) in the nvram_net.txt file in the vendor folder, rather than by the EFS folder. The question I have is about the country code (ccode)in the same nvram_net.txt file. In the three KK ROMs I've tried, it is set to KR. Does this overide other settings on the GP5, and would changing it to US cause any problems?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
it might due to the fact that the international and american versions of the device have different hardware.
jcmcg1 said:
I've just updated my GP5 to the BEANSTALK KK ROM. As with the other KK ROMS I've tried, the MAC address is set (and can be changed) in the nvram_net.txt file in the vendor folder, rather than by the EFS folder. The question I have is about the country code (ccode)in the same nvram_net.txt file. In the three KK ROMs I've tried, it is set to KR. Does this overide other settings on the GP5, and would changing it to US cause any problems?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am not 100% on this info but as I understand it, the country code, as it pertains to wifi, determines the regulatory domain. Some other countries use 14 frequencies ( or bands ) for Wifi and here in the U.S. we only use 13 frequencies. Basically, setting the country code causes the wifi driver to be compliant with the radio frequency regulations of that country.
From a practical stand point, I doubt that you'd notice any difference in changing the country code at all. The wifi driver simply would omit signals running on the 14th frequency which are not used by wireless routers sold in the U.S. anyways...
The reason that it's set to KR, is most likely because, during the initial bring up from Gingerbread to ICS, someone pulled that nvram_net.txt file from a Korean device, and we've been using it ever since.
Edit: more info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_WLAN_channels