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Hello,
I dont know if my topic fits here in the category (General)
But i have a fuw questions about my new smartphone (Xiaomi Mi3 WCDMA version)
Because i have always used a Google phone (android) MIU5 is a hole diffrent OS.
So my question is there a possible way to install Google Play, and that is very stable on it?
Because i know xda-board is a very advanced board if it is something about phones, so if somebody can help me out here.???
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My Xiaomi Mi-3 Review.
New phone:
Since Xiaomi had released the Mi-3, there was an outbreak.
With the specifications and the low price Xiaomi had set an smartphone that is not only in China so populair but abroad the country to.
And you can see it with sales they made everytime the new stock was out.
In serval minutes there was a bunch of them sold out. The biggest one was more than 100.000 units in less than 90 seconds. You can see how populair the phone was. Because the new version with the latest highly clocked Snapdragon800 in it. Xiaomi set up an new variaty of people to there market.
Xiaomi is still out of stock in the most versions, and will be for a fuw moths.
Design:
The design of the Xiaomi Mi-3 is one of the most beuutifull phones ever made. The roundings the buttons the ultra-thin magnesium alluminum alloy gives the phone a very nice look. The roughness of the phone with his big 5 inch screens feels so nice in your hands. You dont have trouble with using one hand (only if you have big hands)
Hardware:
Xiaomi haves two versions of the Mi-3. The tegra4 TD-SCDMA only can be used in China, and the Snapdragon WCDMA an European/American/others parts of the world. Both CPU’s are diffrent clocked. the Tegra4 is clocked to max with 1.8Ghz, and the Snapdragon800 is clocked 2.3Ghz. The driffrence in the speed of the phone is actualy the same. Both versions are smooth tasking. There is no lag or something bothering you. With his 2GB on both version you are for now a happy guy. You can play the latest games on your phone as you want. With the new amazing LG Full-HD resolution IPS screen it makes the so beuatifull. The colors of the phone pop out. The angles on the screen are nice, somebody next to you will not having trouble to not see the screen.
Software:
Mi-3 is running on two diffrent android version. The tegra4 runs at an 4.2.3 android. And Snapdragon800 runs on an 4.3 newer version of the android. When you recieve your phone you can choose if you want to use it in chinese or English. If you choose english you still will see some chinese signs at the screen. This is one thing that the developers dont have chainged. But i cant hurt. You will not recieve Google App store on it, you must download it by your self. Xiaomi is very smart if you wanna use Google services, you must have an Xiaomi account, and trough the account you can download google installer. And from there you can use any google app you want.
Yes, it is possible!
djbosanac said:
Hello,
I dont know if my topic fits here in the category (General)
But i have a fuw questions about my new smartphone (Xiaomi Mi3 WCDMA version)
Because i have always used a Google phone (android) MIU5 is a hole diffrent OS.
So my question is there a possible way to install Google Play, and that is very stable on it?
Because i know xda-board is a very advanced board if it is something about phones, so if somebody can help me out here.???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know if this is the right category for you question, but I'm not a moderator so I don't need to know that actually.
What I know on the other hand is that you can easily install Google Apps (GApps) on your Xiaomi Mi3. You won't need any experience with flashing gapps from internal storage or SD-card, it is easy as pie!
Once you have your phone open the MIUI Store and search for "Google". The developer Eric Xiang has put together an excellent Google Installer app. The name is in Chinese, but just search for it in English and you will find it. The installer will take care of everything else.
If that doesn't work, you should try rooting your device and flashing Gapps manually.
thank you in advance.
The GAPP store is in english right? Not chinese.
Hope i will can fix it. Uhm are there customroms made for the XIAOMI or not? So i can try that to if it doesent work for me...
How do you like the phone so far?
Sent from my SM-N9005 using Tapatalk
check out my review
The playstore runs absolutly perfect!
check out my video review of the mi3 wcdma (snapdragon 800) version:
and let me know if you like it!
top115 said:
The playstore runs absolutly perfect!
check out my video review of the mi3 wcdma (snapdragon 800) version:
and let me know if you like it!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
and yet another one by a friend of mine:
I have the phone for about 3/4 days right now.
And the MIUIV5 launcher, if you using it for the first time. Its a little bit strange.
But after using it for a while, you learn fast and see how powerfull the launcher is.
The 1ste you always do is install gapps on your phone.
I Had to make some questions an supported boards, to get it work. But now i am pleased with the usage of the phone and the powerfull hardware whats in it.
Love the phone for now, will definitly stay at the MIUI community.
One thing: i hope they can fix an Android Stock 4.4 Kitkat OS with multi-lang....
I dont know why Cynogenmod doesent come for Xiaomi Mi-3, or other custom roms for it.
XDA-developers are the moest anticipated people for smartphones, i hope they will be release an Xiaomi mi-3 miuiV5 or later v6 CUSTOM ROM OR SOMETHING.
i tough there will be alot of them because it is Androind but nothing
A nice review. I have a great apetytna this smartphone. Are you able to compare its screen with LG G2 or HTC One? I wonder if it is comparable to, or better or worse.
Motonick said:
A nice review. I have a great apetytna this smartphone. Are you able to compare its screen with LG G2 or HTC One? I wonder if it is comparable to, or better or worse.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
review: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=49086774&postcount=1
The phone by it selfs is great, but there are some issues that i must solve before you can use the phone.
My issues are:
1. 3G not working well <- not solved
2. Ram is filling quikly <- not solved
3. Google account had some problems (was my fault because did not install google contacts.apk) <- solved
If these things are solved, than you have an bad-ass phone..
djbosanac said:
review: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=49086774&postcount=1
The phone by it selfs is great, but there are some issues that i must solve before you can use the phone.
My issues are:
1. 3G not working well <- not solved
2. Ram is filling quikly <- not solved
3. Google account had some problems (was my fault because did not install google contacts.apk) <- solved
If these things are solved, than you have an bad-ass phone..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you found the solution,to 3G probelm?
Seems otherwise to be a really good phone.
stone age said:
Have you found the solution,to 3G probelm?
Seems otherwise to be a really good phone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm using the latest MIUI version: 4.1.24 in Polish and I have no problems from the department in both the 3 and 2G. Everything in my MI 3 WCDMA works perfectly.
I have the CDMA version with miuiV5. It works great. No problems encountered. I just wish I knew how to make a custom ROM. I have a developer rom and the V5 rom. Tried both and they both work fantastic.
Maybe you know how to turn off the meter data. After exceeding the set limit further changes cause complications itelefon off my data transmission. I do not need to set this limit, I enclosed it with curiosity, and I have no problem.
I just wish I knew how to make a custom ROM
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, me too.
It's very sad that there isn't a real development community for this great phones.
In my opinion the mi3 offers the best hardware on the whole market to a fantastic price. I can't understand why there are no developers for roms like AOKP or CM or AOSP.
When it will come to indonesia?
Sent from my GT-I9500 using xda app-developers app
Quick question - Is this a 4G capable phone?
iamth3man said:
When it will come to indonesia?
Sent from my GT-I9500 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes it is
chrno1004 said:
Quick question - Is this a 4G capable phone?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is not. Perhaps it's successor - the rumoured MI3S - might have this feature.
Btw. I have a 64GB Mi3 and so far I am very happy with this phone; even without LTE-support.
I am very happy with my phone. It is a 64GB Grey Mi3. The 3G on AT&T is fine but slow.
The Data speeds are not that fast but it gets the job done. I get some time out errors from time to time.
I like to be able to get the Temp that displays on the lock screen and home screen(default) to display current location instead of in China. Can't seem to get the default Maps app to work in the US even with it locking in on GPS it displays China. Google Maps works fine but a little show and sometimes has defaulted back to a Chinese location first until a signal lock happens and then it will find my current location.
Starbucks app doesn't work on my phone.
When I click on an autocorrected word that has a red underline on it the app will crash and send me back to home. Bug has been reported.
When saving pictures from the internet it doesn't default to a standard folder. It uses the cloud folder and even with sync to cloud off I have to move it to the main local folder to get the pictures available to send or attach to email.
Speedtest.net doesn't connect to show download speeds. It will show a slow upload speed.
Visual VoiceMail doesn't seem to work on AT&T's network. If I give them my old HTC One IEMI number the visual voicemail works but the DATA does not. I can live with it for now.
Anyone got the Visual Voicemail to work with connecting Data on AT&T? If so what phone did they put in the system to make it work? the HTC One does not work. Confirmed this twice.
If they release an LTE version that would work with AT&T here that would be killer!!! I really do like the phone. The size, the weight, the shape. I would love to see this one in White or Silver 64GB.
BrainChecker said:
Yes, me too.
It's very sad that there isn't a real development community for this great phones.
In my opinion the mi3 offers the best hardware on the whole market to a fantastic price. I can't understand why there are no developers for roms like AOKP or CM or AOSP.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There will be very soon, devices squad on snapdragon 800 SoC : xperia z1, zr (?), LG G2, Note 3 and more ... mean we can start poke their code to used as "base" to start write device tree on cm / aosp/ aokp. I have also very limited skill to write android code ... let us learn together. Mine on stock MIUIv5 and I satisfy with the phone performance. Miui serve what we need for basic computed including archiving/extracting files. It's handy i did not need to carry my laptop anymore when travelling
Hi! This is my first post on XDA.
As a user of CM for more than a year ago on my i9300, and after enduring a lot of bugs, I wonder: What happens to CM?
It's a known fact that the Exynos platform is a headache for developers because there is no documentation or open sources from Samsung. So, things like the camera, the sound system, the HDMI output and the GPU do not work as they should.
However, here are many good developers who have fixed these bugs, or at least improve them a bit. And most of these fixes are open source and accessible by everyone on Github.
So, what is waiting CM to implement them? Giving credit to their authors, obviously.
CyanogenMod announces itself as an alternative to the stock firmware that lets you take full advantage of your smartphone, making it better and more stable. Now they are also a company: Cyanogen Inc. As a reputable brand, it should offer a higher quality firmware. ROMs like Nameless (I'm using it right now) works better even being "not official".
This is just an opinion as a user. I'm not criticizing or forcing anyone to do anything. But if there are hundreds of people using a ROM with bugs that were fixed, why not implement them? I would be the first to help, but my skills are just about webdev.
Respect and thanks for i9300 developers on XDA, and sorry about my bad English. When I use my native language I express myself MUCH better. Trust me. lol
Thanks for reading.
There's no i9300 maintainer, and they accept pull requests (on gerrit) when somebody sends them.
Also, the fact that there's no i9300 maintainer is directly connected with what you already said - lack of proper documentation. Nobody wants to fix the mess that has been created since whole this time. The amount of hacks required to make AOSP work on i9300 is too damn high. I'm slowly fixing this mess, making i9300 a bit better supported, but it's still a long way until it's done. Take a look at ArchiKernel for example, why I had to create my own kernel? Because smdk4412 sources were so much outdated that they finished around update7, right after sudden death fix. XXELLA, 4.1.2 Android times, hello. So first thing was to cleanup the kernel mess, use up-to-date samsung sources (used for stocks) and make them work with AOSP. Now, if I commit my work to CM, they'll deny this instantly because new kernel supports only i9300 and this commit would break all other exynos4 variants from compiling. Yes, together we COULD fix it, make it work with other devices. But I have better things to do than trying to fix whole exynos4 family, I focus on i9300.
This is one of the reasons why we won't see any official cm12 nightly for i9300. Because nobody is going to maintain that. Even if we can fix something, nobody is going to commit that, unless we put serious effort for making it universal across all supported devices.
That's a real shame the device is in such a mess.
Actually, to be fair, using Omnirom 4.4.4, I'm finding that the only thing that doesn't work properly is the notification led (no one seems to know why it only works 3 times out of 4).
I'll probably end up buying a new phone next year, anyway, since buy this time next year the i9300 will be almost 4 years old. In smartphone terms, that means it's getting along a bit.
(oh, and thanks for all your work on it, JustArchi!)
JustArchi said:
There's no i9300 maintainer, and they accept pull requests (on gerrit) when somebody sends them.
Also, the fact that there's no i9300 maintainer is directly connected with what you already said - lack of proper documentation. Nobody wants to fix the mess that has been created since whole this time. The amount of hacks required to make AOSP work on i9300 is too damn high. I'm slowly fixing this mess, making i9300 a bit better supported, but it's still a long way until it's done. Take a look at ArchiKernel for example, why I had to create my own kernel? Because smdk4412 sources were so much outdated that they finished around update7, right after sudden death fix. XXELLA, 4.1.2 Android times, hello. So first thing was to cleanup the kernel mess, use up-to-date samsung sources (used for stocks) and make them work with AOSP. Now, if I commit my work to CM, they'll deny this instantly because new kernel supports only i9300 and this commit would break all other exynos4 variants from compiling. Yes, together we COULD fix it, make it work with other devices. But I have better things to do than trying to fix whole exynos4 family, I focus on i9300.
This is one of the reasons why we won't see any official cm12 nightly for i9300. Because nobody is going to maintain that. Even if we can fix something, nobody is going to commit that, unless we put serious effort for making it universal across all supported devices.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for answering my topic. The opinion of a developer like you is very appreciated.
This situation only seems to give more reasons for not buy a Samsung phone again. This lack of support from the manufacturer is a disrespect to the user's investment. And fragmentation strikes again. Sad but true.
Thanks again for your great work of keeping this device alive for all of us.
StephenJSweeney said:
That's a real shame the device is in such a mess.
Actually, to be fair, using Omnirom 4.4.4, I'm finding that the only thing that doesn't work properly is the notification led (no one seems to know why it only works 3 times out of 4).
I'll probably end up buying a new phone next year, anyway, since buy this time next year the i9300 will be almost 4 years old. In smartphone terms, that means it's getting along a bit.
(oh, and thanks for all your work on it, JustArchi!)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tried OmniROM few months ago, but it had some annoying bugs (like camera crashes) and I missed some customizations of CyanogenMod. Anyway, I'll try it again. My next buy might be a Motorola phone. The AOSP support is priceless.
ouch01 said:
I tried OmniROM few months ago, but it had some annoying bugs (like camera crashes) and I missed some customizations of CyanogenMod. Anyway, I'll try it again. My next buy might be a Motorola phone. The AOSP support is priceless.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had the camera crash on CM11 M11, and switched over to Omnirom shortly after that. I'm using Google Camera with an Omnirom nightly from November, and I've never had a camera crash.
Agree with you about getting a Motorola. I'd love it if the next Moto G refresh (if there is one) came with some more RAM, increased storage (16GB instead of 8), 4G, and a multicolour led. Being able to customize the colours to suit the category of app is something I love about custom ROMs. That should be baked into Android, to be honest (but at least there's LightFlow).
JustArchi said:
There's no i9300 maintainer, and they accept pull requests (on gerrit) when somebody sends them.
Also, the fact that there's no i9300 maintainer is directly connected with what you already said - lack of proper documentation. Nobody wants to fix the mess that has been created since whole this time. The amount of hacks required to make AOSP work on i9300 is too damn high. I'm slowly fixing this mess, making i9300 a bit better supported, but it's still a long way until it's done. Take a look at ArchiKernel for example, why I had to create my own kernel? Because smdk4412 sources were so much outdated that they finished around update7, right after sudden death fix. XXELLA, 4.1.2 Android times, hello. So first thing was to cleanup the kernel mess, use up-to-date samsung sources (used for stocks) and make them work with AOSP. Now, if I commit my work to CM, they'll deny this instantly because new kernel supports only i9300 and this commit would break all other exynos4 variants from compiling. Yes, together we COULD fix it, make it work with other devices. But I have better things to do than trying to fix whole exynos4 family, I focus on i9300.
This is one of the reasons why we won't see any official cm12 nightly for i9300. Because nobody is going to maintain that. Even if we can fix something, nobody is going to commit that, unless we put serious effort for making it universal across all supported devices.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i feel you
SlimRoms is the answer
unlike CM, Slim has a I9300 maintainer, has support, every weekly update works properly.
Devs should really take a look at Slim's Gerrit and Freenode/#SlimDev
StephenJSweeney said:
I had the camera crash on CM11 M11, and switched over to Omnirom shortly after that. I'm using Google Camera with an Omnirom nightly from November, and I've never had a camera crash.
Agree with you about getting a Motorola. I'd love it if the next Moto G refresh (if there is one) came with some more RAM, increased storage (16GB instead of 8), 4G, and a multicolour led. Being able to customize the colours to suit the category of app is something I love about custom ROMs. That should be baked into Android, to be honest (but at least there's LightFlow).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The thing with Motorola is that their stock roms are basically just stock android. No laggy touchwiz skins, just a google launcher. Bloatware is at a minimum. A low spec phone like the moto G still is great because of how vanilla its experience is.
Rumours have it that the galaxy S6 international variant will have an exynos processor. I found a thread comparing the leaked info of the snapdragon 810 vs the next exynos processor and it seems that the exynos is getting a lot of popularity from users on the thread and it ain't no slouch. As it is now, phone's are so fast, that it's very hard to find a way of improving them. Like who compares app opening times nowadays? That will be much the case for 2015's flagships as well. I doubt I'd be disappointed if I had the next Samsung release if I thought I'd be in for a laggy UI, it's just whether I can tolerate the touchwiz experience or if I wanna switch to a vanilla aosp rom. That's where the problem arises.
arashvenus said:
SlimRoms is the answer
unlike CM, Slim has a I9300 maintainer, has support, every weekly update works properly.
Devs should really take a look at Slim's Gerrit and Freenode/#SlimDev
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
But only in your imagination. There is noone at slimrom. Just check their gerrit.
whatsgood said:
Rumours have it that the galaxy S6 international variant will have an exynos processor .... I found a thread comparing the leaked info of the snapdragon 810 vs the next exynos processor and it seems that the exynos is getting a lot of popularity from users on the thread and it ain't no slouch.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Aren't the Exynos processors the cause of much grief in the open source community, though? Aren't Qualcomm processors, such as the Snapdragon, much more popular because they're easier to work with..?
StephenJSweeney said:
Aren't the Exynos processors the cause of much grief in the open source community, though? Aren't Qualcomm processors, such as the Snapdragon, much more popular because they're easier to work with..?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Correct.
Eleve11 said:
Correct.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well then, no more Samsung phones for me, then. Not unless they use Qualcomm..!
StephenJSweeney said:
Aren't the Exynos processors the cause of much grief in the open source community, though? Aren't Qualcomm processors, such as the Snapdragon, much more popular because they're easier to work with..?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, that's what i thought but people are showing interests due to how powerful the processor is. I think they're saying it's more powerful than the snapdragon 810. I'm not that techy but they were mentioning that the new exynos will be smaller in size or something, whilst the snapdragon will be bigger. Apparently smaller is better, but yes the problem is open sourcing. If you want to install a stock android custom rom, it will be difficult for developers to build a rom that can push your phone to it's full potential. Snapdragon doesn't have this problem.
Basically if you love flashing different roms that are fully functional a snapdragon 810 phone is for you. If you like what Samsung offers in it's next flagship and won't be tempted to flash other roms then the exynos is for you
whatsgood said:
Yes, that's what i thought but people are showing interests due to how powerful the processor is. I think they're saying it's more powerful than the snapdragon 810. I'm not that techy but they were mentioning that the new exynos will be smaller in size or something, whilst the snapdragon will be bigger. Apparently smaller is better, but yes the problem is open sourcing. If you want to install a stock android custom rom, it will be difficult for developers to build a rom that can push your phone to it's full potential. Snapdragon doesn't have this problem.
Basically if you love flashing different roms that are fully functional a snapdragon 810 phone is for you. If you like what Samsung offers in it's next flagship and won't be tempted to flash other roms then the exynos is for you
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I prefer to have less powerful processor, with full documentation how it works, rather than exynos and big giant hackish black box, which noone understands.
The problem is not with the exynos, but with Samsung. Judging from Exynos4, their kernel sources and own experience, exynos may look like it works, but amount of hacks and dirty workarounds to make it work, is too damn high. This could all be solved if Samsung changed their policy from "respect GPL, f*ck the rest" to "respect developers, show them that our SoC can be developer-friendly, too".
The problem is that we're not even 0.01% of Samsung sales, so why should they care. I'm not going to buy Samsung phone again, regardless if it has Snapdragon inside or not. The problem is not with the Exynos, the problem is in Samsung's policy.
JustArchi said:
I prefer to have less powerful processor, with full documentation how it works, rather than exynos and big giant hackish black box, which noone understands.
The problem is not with the exynos, but with Samsung. Judging from Exynos4, their kernel sources and own experience, exynos may look like it works, but amount of hacks and dirty workarounds to make it work, is too damn high. This could all be solved if Samsung changed their policy from "respect GPL, f*ck the rest" to "respect developers, show them that our SoC can be developer-friendly, too".
The problem is that we're not even 0.01% of Samsung sales, so why should they care. I'm not going to buy Samsung phone again, regardless if it has Snapdragon inside or not. The problem is not with the Exynos, the problem is in Samsung's policy.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah +1 for that. My next Phone will be definitly a Sony or a One plus. I think both are the developer friendliest in android ...
what for get android with huge ram but still lag? i won't go for android for sure. just stick with ios better. with android 8gb & asop, cm etc still can't fix the bugs. android received update so slow than ios.
khanmein said:
what for get android with huge ram but still lag? i won't go for android for sure. just stick with ios better. with android 8gb & asop, cm etc still can't fix the bugs. android received update so slow than ios.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah you are right but i think the most decent phone is the htc one......i would buy a windows phone rather than an iPhone
http://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/2qn8s4/new_impressive_lollipop_touchwiz_gives_nexus_line/
This is an interesting article on the new touchwiz that appears in android lollipop on the galaxy note 3. Surprisingly I can see nothing but praise from this person, apparently it seems to be running very well in comparison to touchwiz on KitKat. Is Samsung finally doing something good?
whatsgood said:
http://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/2qn8s4/new_impressive_lollipop_touchwiz_gives_nexus_line/
This is an interesting article on the new touchwiz that appears in android lollipop on the galaxy note 3. Surprisingly I can see nothing but praise from this person, apparently it seems to be running very well in comparison to touchwiz on KitKat. Is Samsung finally doing something good?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
its useless even if they port it to our i9300..1gb of ram..maybe its time to upgrade to more stronger phone..
Hi!
I have been a heavy user of custom ROMs for more than three years now on all my Android devices. Lately, although I have a phone that not so long ago was still Samsung's flagship (the galaxy S4, I9505), the pictures I get with it really suck. A couple weeks ago, the phone could not detect my SIM card (pure hardware issue), so I re-installed the stock firmware and took it to the repair shop to get the warranty repair. They fixed it and I got my phone back. Just to make sure it was working fine, I decided to use the stock ROM for a while, and oh surprise: the camera takes much better pics in low light conditions or indoor than the same camera with any custom ROM app (usually AOSP-based, AOKP or CM-based). I tried to download the Google camera, and the low light pictures really suck. Then I tried a bunch of camera apps from the Play store, but I invariably got similar results to what I got with my custom ROMs.
That got me thinking. I'm no dev nor programmer, so I won't get technical, but it seems to me that there can be two reasons for the samsung app to work better:
- Either it has access to (proprietary) hardware drivers that other camera apps cannot access, and therefore it can get everything out of the camera hardware
- Or Samsung (which is not known to be great for its software) has developed a great camera software.
I would think it's something along the lines of the first reason. So does that mean I am either stuck with a ROM I cannot stand (Touchwiz is awful, has always been, and may always be) and a decent camera, or a decent ROM but a camera that is kind of useless when I'm indoor?
If so, how are the cameras on other similar phones (I'm thinking Nexus 5, Sony Xperia, etc.), running on custom ROMs compared to the stock camera apps? Is there also a noticeable difference, or is it just with Samsung?
I understood that you cannot run the Samsung camera apk on a custom ROM (even one on a Samsung phone), because the camera relies on some kind of Samsung proprietary framework.
Does this mean I should be looking for a phone that is running not only on open source software, but also open source hardware, does that even exist?
Anyone has noticed something similar? Am I the only one to be bothered by this?
I'll post here a couple pics taken in the same ambient light conditions. One with the Samsung camera (Auto setting), one with Google camera, and one with another camera app from the market (don't remember which one, but I tested about 15 of them and their results were quite similar).
Anyway, even if you don' have a solution to the problem but can point me to information that could help me understand how to choose my next phone, I would really appreciate. Thanks!
Cheers,
Fa
fabecoool said:
Hi!
I have been a heavy user of custom ROMs for more than three years now on all my Android devices. Lately, although I have a phone that not so long ago was still Samsung's flagship (the galaxy S4, I9505), the pictures I get with it really suck. A couple weeks ago, the phone could not detect my SIM card (pure hardware issue), so I re-installed the stock firmware and took it to the repair shop to get the warranty repair. They fixed it and I got my phone back. Just to make sure it was working fine, I decided to use the stock ROM for a while, and oh surprise: the camera takes much better pics in low light conditions or indoor than the same camera with any custom ROM app (usually AOSP-based, AOKP or CM-based). I tried to download the Google camera, and the low light pictures really suck. Then I tried a bunch of camera apps from the Play store, but I invariably got similar results to what I got with my custom ROMs.
That got me thinking. I'm no dev nor programmer, so I won't get technical, but it seems to me that there can be two reasons for the samsung app to work better:
- Either it has access to (proprietary) hardware drivers that other camera apps cannot access, and therefore it can get everything out of the camera hardware
- Or Samsung (which is not known to be great for its software) has developed a great camera software.
I would think it's something along the lines of the first reason. So does that mean I am either stuck with a ROM I cannot stand (Touchwiz is awful, has always been, and may always be) and a decent camera, or a decent ROM but a camera that is kind of useless when I'm indoor?
If so, how are the cameras on other similar phones (I'm thinking Nexus 5, Sony Xperia, etc.), running on custom ROMs compared to the stock camera apps? Is there also a noticeable difference, or is it just with Samsung?
I understood that you cannot run the Samsung camera apk on a custom ROM (even one on a Samsung phone), because the camera relies on some kind of Samsung proprietary framework.
Does this mean I should be looking for a phone that is running not only on open source software, but also open source hardware, does that even exist?
Anyone has noticed something similar? Am I the only one to be bothered by this?
I'll post here a couple pics taken in the same ambient light conditions. One with the Samsung camera (Auto setting), one with Google camera, and one with another camera app from the market (don't remember which one, but I tested about 15 of them and their results were quite similar).
Anyway, even if you don' have a solution to the problem but can point me to information that could help me understand how to choose my next phone, I would really appreciate. Thanks!
Cheers,
Fa
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So here come the pics. Of course XDA compresses them, but you'll get the idea.
Fa
That is the example difference between things that are built for the device over using open-source options. Software will always be better from the OEM. You see the same thing with HTC and Sony devices. Take the m7 and m8. They have great cameras as long as you use HTC Sense. Other wise all you get is a basic 4 mpx camera that sucks. If you want one that works the same no matter the rom then get a nexus. This is something OEM are doing to make people want to use their software
Thanks @zelendel,
A Nexus could be an option, but the screen size of the Nexus 5 was already too large for me (and so is my current phone, the Galaxy S4), so there's no way I'm getting a Nexus 6 (plus it's prohibitively expensive, at least here in Europe). When will Google make a Nexus mini or compact? That would rock, especially if they go the Sony way (not compromising too much on hardware features). The only downside of Nexus phone is their lack of MicroSD card slot, but that's off topic.
Anyway, what about the Google Edition phones? As I understand, they have the same hardware as their OEM counterpart (don't they?), but instead of running on proprietary stock ROMs, they ship with a pure Vanilla Android. Does this mean they ship with a camera that sucks, or is there some kind of tweak included to get the most of the camera with those editions, too? If so, would flashing that ROM help (if I can get my hands on it)? Unfortunately it seems the whole Google Edition concept has not gained a lot of traction (maybe because of the unavailability of the handsets in many places, maybe thanks to the OEM who did not play fair game and rather managed to get their crappy proprietary stock versions in the hands of customers), so I'm trying not to get too excited about this either.
I guess I will have to go to my local phone shop, spend time there with different devices and see if some of them have less heavily customized skins than TouchWiz. That means I'll no longer go for a Samsung, which have been my only devices so far. The end of an era...
fabecoool said:
Thanks @zelendel,
A Nexus could be an option, but the screen size of the Nexus 5 was already too large for me (and so is my current phone, the Galaxy S4), so there's no way I'm getting a Nexus 6 (plus it's prohibitively expensive, at least here in Europe). When will Google make a Nexus mini or compact? That would rock, especially if they go the Sony way (not compromising too much on hardware features). The only downside of Nexus phone is their lack of MicroSD card slot, but that's off topic.
Anyway, what about the Google Edition phones? As I understand, they have the same hardware as their OEM counterpart (don't they?), but instead of running on proprietary stock ROMs, they ship with a pure Vanilla Android. Does this mean they ship with a camera that sucks, or is there some kind of tweak included to get the most of the camera with those editions, too? If so, would flashing that ROM help (if I can get my hands on it)? Unfortunately it seems the whole Google Edition concept has not gained a lot of traction (maybe because of the unavailability of the handsets in many places, maybe thanks to the OEM who did not play fair game and rather managed to get their crappy proprietary stock versions in the hands of customers), so I'm trying not to get too excited about this either.
I guess I will have to go to my local phone shop, spend time there with different devices and see if some of them have less heavily customized skins than TouchWiz. That means I'll no longer go for a Samsung, which have been my only devices so far. The end of an era...
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The GPE device dont come with stock android completely. I have a GPE HTC M7 and the gpe software has some of the closed sourced drivers and such for things like Beats audio and the camera. As I run pure AOSP I wind up with a 4mpx camera that really sucks. While i agree alot of the newer devices have huge screens that make it almost pointless for me. The m7 is not bad at about 5in. But then again it doesnt have an SD card slot but comes with 32gb of storage which I think is plenty for my use. Part of me misses my old samsung devices but I made the mistake once of getting the one with the Samsungs chip and not the snapdragon which killed development.
zelendel said:
The GPE device dont come with stock android completely. I have a GPE HTC M7 and the gpe software has some of the closed sourced drivers and such for things like Beats audio and the camera. As I run pure AOSP I wind up with a 4mpx camera that really sucks. While i agree alot of the newer devices have huge screens that make it almost pointless for me. The m7 is not bad at about 5in. But then again it doesnt have an SD card slot but comes with 32gb of storage which I think is plenty for my use. Part of me misses my old samsung devices but I made the mistake once of getting the one with the Samsungs chip and not the snapdragon which killed development.
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Alright! Well, if I could find the GPE edition for my phone (I9505), then I would get all the camera features and none of the TouchWiz crap, which would already be quite an improvement over what I have now (complete TW stock). I guess another possibility would be to flash a stock based ROM that is rooted and from which I could remove all the bloatware...
OK, the hunt is on for a new ROM!
Cheers!
Fa
fabecoool said:
Alright! Well, if I could find the GPE edition for my phone (I9505), then I would get all the camera features and none of the TouchWiz crap, which would already be quite an improvement over what I have now (complete TW stock). I guess another possibility would be to flash a stock based ROM that is rooted and from which I could remove all the bloatware...
OK, the hunt is on for a new ROM!
Cheers!
Fa
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If you want all the features of the camera then yes I would run a stock de bloated rom. I used to run Samsung devices and you can remove most things which will give you the camera app which has all the best features.
The Z4 Tablet is possibly my dream tablet, it has a great screen, microSD slot, good battery life and it seems dev-friendly.
I've got no Sony experience and I see surprisingly little custom ROM development. How 'dev-friendly' is this tablet? Does Sony provide source codes, drivers? Are they easy in unlocking bootloaders and flashing stuff like radios? Does it seem likely custom post-Marshmallow ROMs will be cooked in 1,5-2 years from now on?
do some research!
e.g. here "Anybody work on root?" much off topic posts unfortunately
there are two section with the title "Development" here ...
look at the phones: Z3+ and Z5 (nearly the same sources)
and all you need with almost useful documentation in SONY's Developer world:
http://developer.sonymobile.com/
DHGE said:
e.g. here "Anybody work on root?" much off topic posts unfortunately
there are two section with the title "Development" here ...
look at the phones: Z3+ and Z5 (nearly the same sources)
and all you need with almost useful documentation in SONY's Developer world:
http://developer.sonymobile.com/
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I admit my question was a bit lazy, but it'd be pretty easy for people like you with lots of experience/knowledge on this Sony platform to give me a general idea.
I ordered a Z4T, but while reading this subforom while waiting for the shipment, things start to itch me a bit.
I'll anwer my own questions the way I see it now: Sony is pretty developer-friendly by providing source code and build instructions, but it's pretty buggy and there are very few developers doing stuff for the Z4T. I guess it's because of the bad availability of the device and the relatively small user base. The people @ FXP build ROMs, but I haven't heard much about how useful these builds are. If anything, I heard people downgrading from the 5.1.1 build. Rooting is only possible by unlocking the bootloader and flashing @AndroPlus' custom kernel. His current TWRP build has a bug that makes it impossible to restore a device backup.
Sony provides the option for unlocking the bootloader, but you'll completely lose your warranty. Furthermore, the TA partition will be irreverably changed and you'll lose functionality.
Marhsmallow has been announced, so there's that.
SONY's devices are good compromise for me
@jelbo
Good summary!
My opinion:
The SONY devices are good hardware. I like them because they are water resistant since I lost a phone after cycling in heavy rain.
I have a Tablet xperia Z with CyanogenMod on it. Android 5.1
The start with that 3rd party ROM was slow and it was quite buggy. Also battery life was worse than with stock ROM.
I have a SAMSUNG Galxy S5 phone. They have Knox-protection on their devices. Quite evil compared to SONY. Because it was released with Kitkat I could root it via exploit and keep Knox untriggered. I could get CyanogenMod, even Marshmallow Alphas for the phone. But the drivers are not that good and the battery life with stock is very good (up to four days for me).
So I will keep that phone on stock and I used Titanium Backup to get rid of SAMSUNG's bloatware.
SAMSUNG do not provide documentation and many of their SOCs are proprietary - no chance to do any development for these devices.
Long post short: SONY is very open and relatively easy to hack on their devices.
Better (now) in price and features than the Nexus devices IMO. I would never buy a device without any chance to do development on it.
I think the bug in TWRP will get fixed soon (has bitten me once).
Thanks for your kind reply
DHGE said:
@jelbo
Good summary!
My opinion:
The SONY devices are good hardware. I like them because they are water resistant since I lost a phone after cycling in heavy rain.
I have a Tablet xperia Z with CyanogenMod on it. Android 5.1
The start with that 3rd party ROM was slow and it was quite buggy. Also battery life was worse than with stock ROM.
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Sounds familiar. In my experience with the last few phones I've had, AOSP-based ROMs were always a tad slower and less battery-friendly than stock or stock based ROMs. For example, the stock 'Google Play Edition' ROMs ran like a dream on my HTC One m7, but others were always less smooth / battery friendly.
So, for the Z4T I'm not partularly worried about the lack of 3rd party ROMs. I'll be fine with stock rooted. But for the longer term, because of the unpopularity, I think it's unlikely to see much going on in a year from now on and that kind of makes me doubt my purchase.
I have a SAMSUNG Galxy S5 phone. They have Knox-protection on their devices. Quite evil compared to SONY.
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Yes, but not more evil than Sony I think. Samsung's bootloader unlock 'trips' Knox and it'll disable features like secure storage and services that depend on it. It's also irreversible. It's an awful lot like Sony's irreversible TA partition 'tripping'.
Because it was released with Kitkat I could root it via exploit and keep Knox untriggered. I could get CyanogenMod, even Marshmallow Alphas for the phone. But the drivers are not that good and the battery life with stock is very good (up to four days for me).
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I could root my Galaxy S6 using an exploit, without tripping Knox. I'm running 5.1.1 with an engineering bootloader, while still having my Knox untriggered. It's a luxury I'm not gonna have on the Z4T, unless an exploit will be found.
SAMSUNG do not provide documentation and many of their SOCs are proprietary - no chance to do any development for these devices.
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Yes, it's one of the reasons I want to avoid a Samsung as my new tablet. Exynos is a black box, so custom, stock-based ROMs will be the best you can get. BUT, I'm doubting now. Custom, stock-based ROMs are fine with me - as you mention, battery life is great. And on top of that, Samsung is so popular that lots of development is being done. I think chances are bigger to see the Marshmallow successor being ported for older Samsung devices than we'll see on this Sony Z4 Tablet in the future. But that's an assumption, I don't have Sony experience, but I see things re pretty dead here, even though the device was released quite a long time ago.
Long post short: SONY is very open and relatively easy to hack on their devices.
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I'm not really seeing that yet, but again, I've only looked at the Z4T now.
Better (now) in price and features than the Nexus devices IMO. I would never buy a device without any chance to do development on it.
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The microSD is an essential part for me. If the Pixel C would have had a microSD-slot I'd have chosen that. Development and future updates are a huge selling point for Nexus devices.
I think the bug in TWRP will get fixed soon (has bitten me once).
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Let's hope so.
Hopefully the Z4T will get some more love soon, as I have just sent my Pixel C back and taken a punt at a open box Amazon warehouse deal last night with 40% off the LTE
I love my Z3CT, Z3C and Ultra, which have had great support from the devs, so am expecting the Z4 to be the best hardware of the lot, but would also love a root method while keeping the bootloader locked for now.
Heres to hoping perhaps MM will lead to some kernel exploits.
scoobydu said:
[...] as I have just sent my Pixel C back [...]
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What made you return your Pixel C?
I love my Z3CT, Z3C and Ultra, which have had great support from the devs [...]
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Did it take a while to get to that point? Do you think the Z4T will have the same support?
jelbo said:
What made you return your Pixel C?
Did it take a while to get to that point? Do you think the Z4T will have the same support?
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Dont get me started on the Pixel C from Google UK pricing error on day 1 and their refusal for a week to refund or swapout 32g for 64g devices, due to their error; then I had a hardware fault with the screen not responding after 24hrs of use. I found their support just awful More issues were being reported in the xda forum and I decided I wasn't going to spend £550 to beta test for google. Nice solid device but heavier that the Z4 and sliding the keybard across the keyboard to remove it, just made me nervous of scratching something everytime I did it.
To be honest the Z4 forums are very quiet, but so were the pixel c's; as a few people were commenting.
I had to root my Z3 Tab by loading the Z3 phone firmware and rooting that, as that had a kernel vunerability and the kernel on the Z3 tab didn't.
Once the Z3 phone firmware was loaded and rooted, I could backup my TA partition and reload the Z3 tab firmware, rooted.
Its generally the phones that get root and the tabs have to utilise what they can, unless of course a dev has the tab.
The tab forums got much busier once the device had a less risky root method.
Sad to see that Nut hasn't got a recovery done, but I am assuming that due to root only being available by unlocking and losing TA, so limited testers, but haven't had time to read the history yet.
I have to say though that the Z4 is fantastic in comparison to the Pixel C and I am very glad I have reverted to the device that I know especially at £360 for the LTE version + keyboard on Amazon open box. First time using and the device is pristine. To be fair the Z4 is many iterations of getting it right and the Pixel is googles first try. Once its at Pixel C v4 it will probably be very good!
Heres to hoping MM is officially released soon, so the chances of rooting may get better.
from Nut
This is the reason why I didn't release XZDR for the Z3+/Z4/TabZ4 yet, too much difference with the Shinano and older device trees.
Edit:
That should be solved with 2.9 though...
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Seems the 64 bits is a material change, so things need to progress in 2.9 from my early readings.
scoobydu said:
Dont get me started on the Pixel C from Google UK pricing error on day 1 and their refusal for a week to refund or swapout 32g for 64g devices, due to their error; then I had a hardware fault with the screen not responding after 24hrs of use. I found their support just awful More issues were being reported in the xda forum and I decided I wasn't going to spend £550 to beta test for google. Nice solid device but heavier that the Z4 and sliding the keybard across the keyboard to remove it, just made me nervous of scratching something everytime I did it.
To be honest the Z4 forums are very quiet, but so were the pixel c's; as a few people were commenting.
I had to root my Z3 Tab by loading the Z3 phone firmware and rooting that, as that had a kernel vunerability and the kernel on the Z3 tab didn't.
Once the Z3 phone firmware was loaded and rooted, I could backup my TA partition and reload the Z3 tab firmware, rooted.
Its generally the phones that get root and the tabs have to utilise what they can, unless of course a dev has the tab.
The tab forums got much busier once the device had a less risky root method.
Sad to see that Nut hasn't got a recovery done, but I am assuming that due to root only being available by unlocking and losing TA, so limited testers, but haven't had time to read the history yet.
I have to say though that the Z4 is fantastic in comparison to the Pixel C and I am very glad I have reverted to the device that I know especially at £360 for the LTE version + keyboard on Amazon open box. First time using and the device is pristine. To be fair the Z4 is many iterations of getting it right and the Pixel is googles first try. Once its at Pixel C v4 it will probably be very good!
Heres to hoping MM is officially released soon, so the chances of rooting may get better.
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Thanks for your reply, good info. I'm glad to hear some reassuring comments on the Z4T. Looks like you had a great deal as well. In the Netherlands they're hard to get. I payed €635 for the WiFi model... I'm still doubting a little bit to go for a discounted Samsung Galaxy Tab S 10.5 for €380 though. I read it'll even get Marshmallow in April. Price difference is pretty big and there's lots of stuff for it already.
I'll have a look in some Xperia phone subforums on XDA.
jelbo said:
Thanks for your reply, good info. I'm glad to hear some reassuring comments on the Z4T. Looks like you had a great deal as well. In the Netherlands they're hard to get. I payed €635 for the WiFi model... I'm still doubting a little bit to go for a discounted Samsung Galaxy Tab S 10.5 for €380 though. I read it'll even get Marshmallow in April. Price difference is pretty big and there's lots of stuff for it already.
I'll have a look in some Xperia phone subforums on XDA.
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Yes there are no deals on the Z4 Tab in the UK and all the new prices are the same retail price.
Thats why I decided to take a chance on the Amazon one, as I could return it if it was damaged or anything; and normal 12 months warranty with Amazon.
For me I haven't had a Samsung since my Tab 7.7 and wouldn't personally have another, but each to their own. The devs were always complaining at Samsung not releasing all the source code to their SoC's, wheereas Sony seemed to be more dev friendly.
The Z3 Tab is fantastic if you didn't mind the 8inch, but I am hoping once the Z3+ root is forthcoming and general 64bit root/recovery is done, then we will have some progress; he says, not being able to help the devs on whats seems a lot of work.
jelbo said:
I've got no Sony experience and I see surprisingly little custom ROM development. How 'dev-friendly' is this tablet? Does Sony provide source codes, drivers? Are they easy in unlocking bootloaders and flashing stuff like radios? Does it seem likely custom post-Marshmallow ROMs will be cooked in 1,5-2 years from now on?
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Click to collapse
It's a shame that such a good device is so low supported by free developers even though it seems it's more open by the Sony in comparison with Samsung.
I noticed that some people think in the thread that not so much users have this device. I have an old phone so called HTC desire HD which was released in the faraway 2010, it is excellent supported as it even has the contemporary android 6.0. I don't believe that there are more HTC decide HD users rather than xperia tablet z4 users. Moreover, I see as my comrade-users of our device crying ? everyday on a Russian 4pda.ru site, that we wait but there's no a good root method, there is no a good description or a video showing us how does the only custom ROM work. What works and what is broken. And just not seeing good news over the course of several months. Of course, I am very disappointed in dramatic fashion, but I hope The change will come.
Thank you for attention!)
cut the drama
- you should not compare a phone to a tablet (numberwise)
- look into the fora for phones Z3+/Z4 and Z5
they have nearly identical SoCs, differences a sometimes build options
- there is a HUGE xperia cross devices forum here with tons of additional info
- the Z4 Tablet became available in June 2015
- the first sources from SONY showed up in .... June 2015
- I rooted the device in July - having done no Android programming or rooting before
- I ordered the device after researching (see below) and before there was root available because my findings showed that there would be sources and documentation from SONY so that if all else fails I would get later a custom rom or could even roll my own
- a video for "seeing" developing/hacking? Dream on...
- there is lots of documentation (even video) available, maybe no video on how to do a web search or an xda search
- searching (and reading and trying things out) worked for me - coming from SAMSUNG phones with no prior development experience on Android ... TRY IT
DHGE said:
- you should not compare a phone to a tablet (numberwise)
- look into the fora for phones Z3+/Z4 and Z5
they have nearly identical SoCs, differences a sometimes build options
- there is a HUGE xperia cross devices forum here with tons of additional info
- the Z4 Tablet became available in June 2015
- the first sources from SONY showed up in .... June 2015
- I rooted the device in July - having done no Android programming or rooting before
- I ordered the device after researching (see below) and before there was root available because my findings showed that there would be sources and documentation from SONY so that if all else fails I would get later a custom rom or could even roll my own
- a video for "seeing" developing/hacking? Dream on...
- there is lots of documentation (even video) available, maybe no video on how to do a web search or an xda search
- searching (and reading and trying things out) worked for me - coming from SAMSUNG phones with no prior development experience on Android ... TRY IT
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Click to collapse
Good summary.
Small point, but the rooting element is by unlocking the bootloader, which not all will want to do. It is though an option that exists and we are thankful for those that have done so in order to progress the dev support.
Out of all of the devices out there that support LineageOS, the Z5 Compact looks the most appealing to me, because of the good audio quality, nice design/build, and reasonable size.
But is it foolish to purchase a Z5C with the intention of using it to run a custom ROMs?
Are people here using custom ROMs purely as a stopgap until they can get a newer phone that supports Oreo? I don't need or want the latest, greatest hardware, but ever since buying my first smartphone (a Nexus) I've become accustomed to using the latest software. Is the Z5 Compact a dead end in that regard? Or is it likely that I'll be using Android P and Q on this device in the next couple of years?
"But Strobelite, if you're worried about being able to use the latest version of Android, why don't you just get something by Motorola? Those have a healthy, active developer community. Or, you could just be a normal person, and buy a new phone."
If it runs GApps, I won't use it
Audio quality is important to me
The Motorola phones are ugly, in my opinion
Hi, since a few weeks I'm running on LineageOS 14.1 with my z5 Compact and I don't miss the stock rom at all. I didn't test all features yet (e.g. MHL), but I'm very satisfied until now. It's stable (didn't encounter any random reboot), fast and battery life is ok for me (I use Amplify and Greenify with xposed).
I only can recommend this and if you want to run without GApps, this is the way to go. I'm using Yalp store and it's even faster updating my apps than the original Play store.
Phone has FM Radio, SD card slot, fast and accurate GPS and enough power (LOS doesn't seem to run as hot as the stock rom (you can choose between performance profiles), so it's another plus for me).
Just try it and see if it works for you.
The only thing that annoyed me is the camera, the quality is just bad and sometimes it doesn't focus (or too late)
If you dont miss the camera then yes.
Strobelite said:
But is it foolish to purchase a Z5C with the intention of using it to run a custom ROMs?
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I can understand your problem but of course it is imo.
Z5 line has never been widely supported by developers and the Compact is the one with less roms now. You can imagine what kind of future it would have.
Luckily in the past we had great guys who made stock rom root/mods/DRM restoration but the AOSP scene is completely different. As always you lose some features with non-stock roms, usually Camera quality (because you lose closed source vendor optimizations/software) and minor ones.
There will be probably 1 or 2 roms for future android versions (thanks to projects like SLim rom, PAC, Resurrection,...) but there are already few mantainers, especially for the Z5c, and some aosp roms are also unofficially maintained by one person...
Sony lost people (and developers) appeal after the Z3 line and this gets reflected in custom rom support for the newer Xperia lines. If you really want the latest OS on your phone for the next 4 years you should go for something else imo.
Z5c is still great device, refined materials and with good battery but don't expect a forum support like Samsungs, Huaweis,... Unfortunately the old days where flagship phones were < 4,5" are gone.
Maybe you already know it but GSMarena has a great phone-finder search engine which can help you refine your search for compact products.