looking at phones has come down to a couple brands.
1. Google
2. Motorola
3. OnePlus--
4. Samsung
I don't need the latest and Verizon is my carrier. Being able to root and make it mine is very important, especially when the updates stop. It would be nice to hear from people who own a phone from the above list. thanks.
Im a poor mf, so I dont buy expensive phones or top of the line stuff, my budget doesnt get above 100 USD and thats just if the phone is particularly better than the rest of options under 80 USD, so consider Im tlking about this budget zone.
Samsung is the most reliable one, they simply know what theyre doing, most of them are amoled wich is always nice, and they are fast for their price, dont have too much bloatware (your carrier might add it on his own tho, so be careful of that), all the ones I had could be rooted but none of them had Custom roms, so what you can do with them is very limited, but rooting at least is almost certain.
OnePlus, Ive only ever had two on my hands, they are kinda slow to my taste, I dont like them very much, both of the ones I had had zero options for anything, not even rooting IIRC wich sucks.
Motorola, I remember a time when everyone had a motorola and had them rooted, they loked very similar but where different modelss, I was poorer than I am now back then and I had a phone with buttons at this point, nowadays they seem to have fallen out of fashion but I dont know how they are rn.
Google, havent used them, but Some custom ROMS ae entirely based around the Pixel, so bloatware must be at minimum, Im guessing heyre good.
I would go for Samsung, theyre sturdy, will almost certainly be rootable and probably have custom roms, but I would also recomend xiaomi phones, I have a redmi 9a, and let me tell you, it has lots of custom roms that improve the performance of the phone a lot, and once you unlock bootloader, they become """""easy""""" to unbrick, (if you dont unlock bootloader is almost imposible)
I've had Motos in the past, and liked them, but they have not been as reliable recently. My last company phone was a Z-something, and it started to bow the battery and screen in an awful way, after about 2 years. That's just terrible.
I've had Samsungs in the past, and currently have an S10+. I also don't want to buy the latest, and bought these (two S10+ - one for me, one for my wife) last year. I've been happy with the Sammys. We're also VZ users (via MVNO).
However, the S10+ are the first phones that we have not rooted (Snapdragons are not rootable and updatable). I agree that rooting is one way to make the phone your own, but honestly I have gotten tired of the ROM situation. In the V30, for example, you lose VOLTE, which makes it useless IMO, particularly on VZ. But the problem I had with ROMs was that you had to keep tinkering and stuff to keep things working... and I didn't see much of an "improvement" with the ROMs. I installed Nova Launcher, and get enough customizability from there.
As for debloating, I don't see the point... it's not an obsession I have, and too much of that can break things. IMO, if you leave those apps alone, they don't take up performance, so why bother? Sure, they take up some space on the system partition, but you can't access that anyway, so I don't see the obsession, but to each their own. That said, you can still remove things via ADB very easily, and that's enough for me. In my case, I disabled auto-updates (I can still update manually). I did that because I don't always like newer updates when they break things... for example, I'm still on 11 because I've heard that 12 breaks the ability to record phone calls, which I really want to keep.
Anyway, that's my take - we're very happy with our S10+ phones. We chose the + because we wanted the bigger battery, and we chose the S10 because we wanted to keep the headphone jack (not available after this model). And, it's not an expensive phone these days (we paid like $300). If they last 3 years, that's $100/yr which is a reasonable place for our needs...
I like OnePlus, but I've also read it has Chinese spyware? Idk?
Goodbye LG..
No need to "goodbye" LG... they already said goodbye as they don't make phones anymore.
Related
Hi,
I have been planning to move away from my SGS2. And I'm gonna ask if it's a good time now?
Actually, I don't need a new phone. SGS2 handles everything I do, fast enough. Problem is, I hate this phone to it's guts. I mean, it is decent and works mostly fine but I had too many problems to even like it or keep it. It just like a bad luck charm in my pocket. Now, if I get hit by a bus, I'm gonna blame this phone. That's how I hate it.
Guess it's this particular device, with bunch of hardware problems and stuff, not the whole line. However, combined with ****tiest ever customer support, I just want to get rid of it by flushing it into a toilet.
That said, I decided that I would not even pay a cancerous tumor to Samsung for SGS3 or something new. Gotta look somewhere else.
I have been thinking about One X, looks like a decent device. I guess the biggest problem is battery life but I'm not sure how bad is it compared to SGS2 or 3? Anyone had a chance to use one after SGS2, would you suggest it?
BTW I'm neutral about iPhones, used 2 of them before, good devices. I could switch back, but it looks like the new model will take a little more time to get released and I don't want to buy a 4S weeks before the iPhone 5 release.
So, what would you do? Go for HTC or wait and see if the new iPhone turns out to be something I'd like more than others?
Thanks..
I've been waiting for the Lumia 920 to be back in stock at the H3G shop here in my town. Now it's back but I've been feeling some bad vibes around the forums lately. I hear about users having reboots, lockups, dead phones, dust underneath the ffc, bad battery life, buggy browser, lag, light leaks, creaks, herpes and whatnot, so this got me wondering...is this stuff mostly bs or there's actually something wrong with this phone? Has anyone regretted his purchase badly so far? Did the Portico actually help or it's just too little and too late? Please let me know, because reading all of this stuff really puzzled my will. Keep in mind that at this point Android is no longer an option for me, so the only other phone I could go for right now instead of this one would be the iPhone5. I wouldn't mind waiting for something else to come out, but honestly this 800 feels a bit EOL right now and I'd really like to drop it, my battery is also starting to suck a bit so...
Looking forward to hear from you guys, I'm really starting to feel that itch, I've been using this phone for almost a year now, this is kind of a record to me lol.
You are unshure ... why should you by excatly this phone?
You mentioned all the negative threads but you could finde more positive threads about this phone.
It's just your focus. Go into a shop and test the phone.
If you buy and it serves the first week in a good way you can keep it otherwise return it.
I'm happy with my Lumia 920
I have my Lumia 920 (AT&T) for two months and I really love it!
I got the Portico update I the very first day and during the first week of use my phone hung up once. I was worried just like you because I read in the forums many users complaining about the stability issues they had, but honestly that's the only issue I've had with this device! No light leaks, reboots, dust, lag, etc..
There is strange rattling sound when the phone vibrates, but it's nothing to worry about and I got used to it anyway.
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsw3cwkNRng)
Hope this helps
@Anis108: Actually I always liked the phone, I love the design, the sturdyness, the screen, the camera, wireless charging, Nokia goodies, and overall I'm just in love with the platform. However I'm also concerned about the reliability of the phone in the software department and I'm also concerned about how the thing can hold up through an extended period of time, since I'm planning on keeping it for a good while. Holding a phone in my hand for a few minutes can't really tell me much about these things, and even a week may not be enough to me, since I tend to be quite picky. Getting a new device is always a big leap of faith for me, especially on contract.
@Boshko: thanks, this is the kind of feedback I'm after...I just wanna hear the good, the bad and the ugly about this phone, because obviously reading topics made by people having issues will make the phone look bad, whereas those about how great the 920 is will gather mostly hardcore fans. I just wanna hear some random opinions to make up my mind here
AW: Is this phone really THAT bad?
Portico fixed my random reboots...
Sent from my Windows Phone 8S by HTC using XDA Windows Phone 8 App
I've had mine since it was released. Love it. Great design, functions beautifully. Haven't had any of the issues posted. I must be living right.
Have mine since it was released last October. No major problems. I've rebooted twice because I think something was sucking my battery too fast. Uninstalled couple of stock apps (stock portfolio, finance apps) and things are back to normal. Love the camera even though I don't use it everyday. Battery life is awesome for me - I routinely get close to two full days (about 40 hrs or more).
All in all, I'm a happy customer.
As far as forum problems, you have to remember that you're more likely to hear what's wrong with the device rather than the positive. Those who have problems come and post their issues so that they can be resolved with other people's help. If you are happy with device and have no problems, you're less likely to post your positive experience.
I'd say don't go by the forums - try the phone yourself and see if you like it or not.
My $0.02.
Using the phone for month and a half I can say it was a good purchase:
Depending on the use that you have intended for it, it may be what you are looking for.
If you are a person who likes to hack things, and wants to see how can you make the phone more customizable via tweaks and those stuffs, then this may not be the ideal for you as this thing is very encrypted and secure(for now).
If you are a corporate guy office and exchange will suit you because are optimized for the platform and consume very little battery.
If you are a globetrotter (travels a lot) then the GPS Navigation apps will suit you.
For the battery life there are two points:
on the first 2 weeks the battery will calibrate itself and you may see that after that time battery life is considerably better.
All the apps that runs on the background only runs for 2 weeks if not opened by you, WP8 has this by default, to enable background running again or to reset the counter just open the app (Microsoft did this for battery life)
I don't have dust on my ffc, camera is very good, phone is solid and at first feels kind of heavy but one gets used to it.
the WP8 is still an ongoing project, so many things are missing on the software side, but are on their way.
Overall I like this phone because I bought it and fulfilled my expectations: Sunlight readability, screen usable with gloves and true offline GPS Navigation, those are what I need for doing my job and the phone is very good at it.
The downsides: Some apps make the phone really hot (not optimized GPS Apps, like "Navigation 3D"), the battery consumption increases way more than other smartphones in low coverage areas and drains the phone quickly (30% more o less), still many software features missing.
So far after portico I have had 3 reboots(1 freeze but occurs on specific hardware calls, like turning "bluetooth on" on very rare conditions).
I plan to stick with this phone for a while, after 3 years with android I felt that the platform was not bringing nothing new, new physical design yes but the OS was always the same and nothing new since android 2.3.
Montastic said:
Have mine since it was released last October. No major problems. I've rebooted twice because I think something was sucking my battery too fast. Uninstalled couple of stock apps (stock portfolio, finance apps) and things are back to normal. Love the camera even though I don't use it everyday. Battery life is awesome for me - I routinely get close to two full days (about 40 hrs or more).
All in all, I'm a happy customer.
As far as forum problems, you have to remember that you're more likely to hear what's wrong with the device rather than the positive. Those who have problems come and post their issues so that they can be resolved with other people's help. If you are happy with device and have no problems, you're less likely to post your positive experience.
I'd say don't go by the forums - try the phone yourself and see if you like it or not.
My $0.02.
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Couldn't say it better..
I've had mine now for about 3 months. Came from (Smart phones) HTC OneX, HTC Evo 3d, Samsung Galaxy S, Moto POS, HTC G1. The 920 is without a doubt, for me, the best phone I've had yet. Everyone's analysis is subjective. Mine is no exception obviously. I will say only this. I have no qualms what-so-ever about recommending this phone to others. Both the hardware performance and the OS for me have been exceptional. Maybe I'm lucky or the exception.
Unfortunately, I'm one of the victims here. To start off, I LOVE this phone - I really do. It has everything I could want, and when it does work it is amazing (wireless charging, NFC, beautiful screen). However I personally am on my 3rd phone. The first 2 had problems locking-up forcing me to do the "power + volume-down" reset. The second phone also got a large piece of dust under the front camera. Fortunately, the 3rd one seems to be working. My wife is on her 2nd phone - same locking-up problem however hers only seemed to lock-up when being wirelessly charged. Now, a friend of mine who just got one is having the same wireless charging lock-up problem.
So I have to ask - what the hell is going on with this phone? By now, Nokia should have all of the "kinks" worked-out, Portico has been delivered and we're still seeing this crap? Oh - and I forgot to mention the "rattle" when vibrate is turned on. Grrr.....
I'm now using an HTC 8x for a while as I moved to China and haven't gotten my 920T yet, and guess what? The 8x works like a champ. Just wish I had wireless charging and more flash storage and I wouldn't go back to the 920T....
Is it just me or does it sound like that people that have flashed from a non stock ROM are the ones that are talking about the most issues? Is debranding and unlocking really worth all the issues this seems to be creating?
I have had mine stock for 3 months now and have not had one single issue that anyone in this entire 920 section has complained about. There is one very tiny light leak if I look down at the screen from the speaker end at an angle that I would never normally look from so it is irrelevant to me.
It just seems that the one common thing that most of these issues have is they are all on flashed phones.
I don't see the point of unlocking and debranding if the phone works for you as it is. We all know from past models that even unlocked there is very little you can do to one of these to customize it.
I have always been taught that if it is not broken, then don't fix it. If it works and does what it needs to as stock then why not leave it stock? Seems a lot more dependable that way to me.
I had rebooting Issues with me german Lumia 920 until I flashed it to the Austrian Portico ROM (I live in Austria). I didn't want to wait for the Update. But I have not had any issues since so flashing seems not to be the culprit. Many of the other issues did not occur on my phone at all.
I'm very happy with it since Portico . Before Portico I had some reservations but that was mainly due to the anxiety that it might reboot again (happened every few days).
Let me just tell you now, I am a perfectionist in the worst kind of way. I have issues with this phone but for some reason, they don't bother me. I'm willing to put up with them, I LOVE this phone so much. I have the light leaks but they're not apparent unless you put your eye very very close to the screen, in the dark and inspect the inside edges of the phone. If I press on the SIM card tray, the chassis of the phone creaks a bit but it's also the thinnest part of the phone so it makes sense. My phone locks up in standby every now and again so I have to reboot it but volume down + power but it only started happening AFTER the portico update. Also, ALL the Lumia 920's rattle when they vibrate because of the OIS in the camera. It's normal. I turned off vibration anyway, cause I don't like it.
I can tell you, the camera is NEXT-TO-NONE, stills and video. The call quality is excellent. The display is awesome and the durability is excellent and I love the cleanliness of the OS. NFC works on this phone the way it SHOULD work. Intuitively. I'm really good with phone as I used to work for a carrier but I couldn't for the life of me get NFC to work on my galaxy nexus, or my S3. They will be updating the phone this holiday season and it can only get better from here! :good:
I have no problems at all from mine. Fantastic device.
well the core functions work flawlessly as compared to other smartphones.
catches gps signal easily for me, camera starts in instance, typing is comfortable and more accurate than android and entire UI is fluid as opposed to android and iphone5 for me.
only problems are the light leak, battery life (but almost all phones have battery life issues unless u use blackberry on 2g signal).
and the dust settles between screen and chassis very easily.
I love mine, the camera is great so is the screen.
Don't have any of the problems that others have had, the only issue for me was once I updated the nokia apps to the here versions, my battery life died a death. a quick uninstall fixed that. but now I only have the map app, will try the others one at a time to find the culprit.
"We were unable to determine the media usage rights for this content" error Lumia 920
americasteam said:
I have no problems at all from mine. Fantastic device.
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We were unable to determine the media usage rights for this content" error Lumia 920
Hello there , I need some help , I am new on the Lumia 920 ,I have downloaded through XBOX and paid music songs but now suddenly and after one month I cant listen
to these songs and get instead : "We were unable to determine the media usage rights for this content" error Lumia 920" Its DRM related I think...Does anyone have a fix ? thanks for the help and sorry if its the wrong thread...
Thanks for your insights guys. Actually I kinda made up my mind, I'm getting the 920 either tomorrow or early next week, still can't decide between white and black tho, any suggestions? Are there any differences in terms of durability?
No problems here.
Go into a hospital and you'll see people with problems, you shouldn't assume humans are rubbish.
Go onto a forum and you'll see people post with problems, you shouldn't assume everyone will have problems.
I just picked one of these up yesterday, the LG Tribute, the Sprint version which is model LS660P (same hardware with the Virgin Mobile version). It's a Snapdragon 400 SoC quad core powered smartphone - it's basically a mix of features between a 1st gen Moto G LTE (the SoC) and the Moto E (removable battery and microSD slot) - it's a CDMA/LTE device only so it's more akin to the Sprint/Boost/Cricket versions of the Moto G I suppose - it does have a SIM card slot but since there's no GSM radio I suppose that's a dead end. It has Sprint LTE support for LTE bands 25, 26, and 41 - it's Spark-enabled as well.
So far in using it I've been extremely pleased with the performance overall considering it's $39.99 right now at many retailers like Fry's and Best Buy (retail is $79.99).
The biggest downside is the 800x480 display resolution but honestly I could care less these days. I just owned an LG G2 and loved it but I had to sell it to cover some bills, and when I saw the Tribute specs and that low price I figured it couldn't hurt to mess around with it a bit.
But in terms of getting it up and running, the first time I powered it up I was pleasantly surprised when I saw this on the Apps screen:
Just that, and nothing else - this thing has zero Sprint bloatware on it, absolutely nothing, and nothing from LG either. Yes it just has 4GB of internal storage leaving about 1.45GB for the user but it's got the microSD slot for storage. I've done all the requisite Google stock apps updates and installed all the apps I've purchased and the free ones I regularly use and I still have 435MB left so I'm good to go. Put my 32GB microSD card in it with 6GB of Opus-encoded audio files, a couple of movies and TV shows, and so far it's been fantastic.
Current battery is showing 37% left from a 100% charge, 12 hours and 3 minutes on, 5 hours and 14 minutes of screen on time so far (and still going because I'm watching Captain America: The Winter Soldier on it and there's 1 hour and 45 mins left in the movie), Wi-Fi has been on the entire time (it's in Airplane mode, however), screen brightness using MX Player is set at 12 (of 15), volume at 15. I use Google Hangouts with Google Voice to make "phone calls" using Wi-Fi so it's in Airplane mode most of the time when I'm at home.
I expect to hit the 7 hours of SOT and this is the first full charge on the device so, consider me a very happy camper.
I know requests have been put into place for Stumproot support so a root could be possible on this device, and I know that LG has posted the 4.4.2 ROM and kernel source code (I grabbed that last night). So here's my question:
Is there anyone out there that might be interested in attempting to develop any recovery for this (assuming we get root at some point), and then perhaps developing some custom ROM for it - seems like it should be a relatively easy thing considering a) we have the full ROM and kernel source even though it's just 4.4.2 at the moment (I would guess LG has no intentions of boosting this to 5.0 so that'll most likely never happen) and b) it's so close to the architecture of the CMDA/LTE version of the Moto G LTE that some kind of port might be possible towards Lollipop if and when that happens...?
Long sentence, sorry about that, I get wordy at times.
But I just figured I'd ask if there's any interest at all. Yes, it's weak on the resolution, yes, it's not a powerhouse device, yes, it's fairly cheap but it's functional and could be an awesome little smartphone with a little "help" thrown its way like a potential for a custom kernel as well to get the quad core and the governor a bit more under control.
I fully suspect this device is easily capable of 7 hours of SOT with such "upgrades" if anyone is interested. I lack the technical know-how and skills to get buried in ROM development much less kernels, so I figured I would toss the question out considering it shares so much common with the Moto G LTE variant + the Moto E's microSD slot potential.
Just curious... any responses are welcome and appreciated, thanks.
Update:
It's even better than I'd hoped...
Almost 8 hours of screen on time - that was a full movie (2 hours 15 minutes long and I let it play the entire thing, first frame to final), 4 TV shows (about 42-45 minutes long each), music playback for almost 1 hour, a few Wi-Fi phone calls using Google Hangouts/Voice, and some web surfing using the stock browser.
$40... absolutely amazing.
I'm just concerned about the amount of CPU time the Android OS shows there - it apparently used as much battery as the screen being on for 7 hours and 38 minutes did so there's something amiss hiding inside. Will be using Wakelock Detector to see if I can detect anything I can disable on the next go considering this was the first full 100% charge and battery test. Just for the record, the Keep Awake time listed on the Android OS battery usage page is 11 hours so it's not idle, there's something going on in there that's using the battery, now I just have to find out what it is. The CPU total time was 4 hours 17 minutes for Android OS.
I'm pretty satisfied, now I wonder what this thing could really be capable of in terms of battery life with a proper custom kernel and ROM. I wonder...
I've been waiting for something to pop up for this phone. I've had it for 2 weeks now. Its great. I agree the battery life is awesome on this thing.
I have the VM version and would be willing to test if someone came up with something.
sigh
Coming from an iPhone so I'm totally new to the android platform but the storage in this thing is severely lacking. I got a micro sd for it, but barely can even get any apps to download due to lack of space. I'm assuming something like this would be helped by a root. It's driving me bananas and making me yearn for my Apple days
Tribute
I also just switched to a Tribute, with KitKat. Was incredibly pissed off to find that Android had crippled the external SD's role. I mean, WTF guys? So now I am on a mission. Every day I scour the interwebs looking for hope that someone has figured out a root exploit for this. I would even settle for being able to flash a custom ROM like Cyanogen. Just so long as I can get PodKicker to save 'casts to the friggin SD card. Is that too much to ask? Anyway, nothing i have attempted so far has worked at all.
Oh, and you got lucky with the no bloatware thing. I got mine through Boost Mobile, and they clotted this damned thing chock full of B.S. To the point that OUT OF THE BOX I couldn't install apps from Playstore without uninstalling previous updates to all the big Google apps. And without Root, I can't get rid of this BoostZone ****e.
I have my doubts as to whether or not this device will get any support here at all at this point (yes I know it's just been a day or so since I made this thread). I didn't even know about the LG L90 till earlier today and when I checked out the specs I realized that it's a better device overall than the Tribute, of course the price reflects the differences as well (larger higher resolution screen, just qHD 960x540 but still it's larger at 4.7" also), with NFC support (I actually make use of that myself), the removable battery/microSD slot, and it's got support here with its own subforum now with a lot of activity (well, a lot for it I suppose) and it even has an IR port for QuickRemote too which is pretty awesome: my Wife is deaf so anytime we go someplace like a Doctor's office or hospital with TVs on, if the captions aren't enabled I turn 'em on with the smartphone. Used to do that with my Galaxy S4 Active in the past, nice to see LG and some other companies are hopping on the "remote control" bandwagon now too.
There's root available and also a bootloader unlock apparently, source code is out and there's work being done so... I wish I had known that before yesterday basically. Fry's, where I got this Tribute, won't do a return on it because I opened the box (and obviously I've done more since I got it too) so that's a wash I suppose. It's still a damned fine little device for $40.
The L90 is "on sale" through T-Mobile's website for $100 with a coupon code right now, I would have grabbed that if I had known about it and the development in progress. Guess I'll have to keep my eyes out next time, might find one used on craigslist soon so we'll see what happens.
I'll keep the Tribute, of course, and keep hoping for a root at some point. I did ask in the Stumproot thread for someone to take a look at it and see what might be possible so, let's keep our fingers crossed.
As for the bloat, I had someone at HowardForums tell me if I activate the phone with Sprint (which I haven't done) that'll install all the Sprint bloatware so, fat chance of that happening I guess. I'll keep it as is and hope for the best.
Anyone working on this? I tried stump, and there are a ton of requests, but no one has said a word about it.
Thanks!
Still hoping but no progress has been reported. It's common knowledge these days that root on newer devices is going to continue to get more and more difficult with the potential that someday we're just not going to be able to do it on most anything. The low price of this one and lack of the high end specs makes most devs (at least in my opinion) not even give a crap about it so, if someone does and we benefit from it, that's awesome.
If nothing happens, it wasn't a complete waste, it's a fine little device with decent processing power and damned great battery life as noted so, $40 was nothing I guess.
Still looking
Still looking for root to the LG Tribute and nothing works. Has anyone heard anything new about it???
Just bumping this to revive interest.
sweetbsting said:
Coming from an iPhone so I'm totally new to the android platform but the storage in this thing is severely lacking. I got a micro sd for it, but barely can even get any apps to download due to lack of space. I'm assuming something like this would be helped by a root. It's driving me bananas and making me yearn for my Apple days
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You so realize you bought a low to mid range prepaid phone right?
I realize that but there has been quite a bit of interest in the model on the internets so unless you have something helpful to add, kindly ignore my post. Thanks.
aburn95 said:
You so realize you bought a low to mid range prepaid phone right?
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You do understand that your comment takes away from the actual thread content, right?
Here is more information about the phone for anyone interested in development:
LG LS660 (LG Tribute) Virgin Mobile.
http://www.lg.com/us/cell-phones/lg-LS660-Virgin-Mobile-tribute
Should I buy this phone and wait for a root?
Or are there other similar price and spec phones that are easier to root?
Do some phones never get rooted?
-snip-
br0adband said:
There's root available and also a bootloader unlock apparently, source code is out and there's work being done so... I wish I had known that before yesterday basically. Fry's, where I got this Tribute, won't do a return on it because I opened the box (and obviously I've done more since I got it too) so that's a wash I suppose. It's still a damned fine little device for $40.
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Can you inform us where you found root & bootloader unlock? I've been on Android for years, but am relatively new to the root/mod side of things.
LiquidRabbit said:
Where did you download this? I am pretty curious.
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I don't own the LG Tribute any longer but the source code was at LG's open source repository for the LS660P (the Sprint variant, but it should be identical to the others I would guess):
https://www.lg.com/global/support/opensource/opensourceList?types=NAME&search=ls660p
emarkp said:
Can you inform us where you found root & bootloader unlock? I've been on Android for years, but am relatively new to the root/mod side of things.
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Honestly I can't even remember now, I saw some post at one of the other forums (AndroidPolice maybe) that said someone had discovered a working bootloader unlock, I could be wrong in that but honestly I can't recall the specifics at the momemt. As stated, I no longer own a Tribute (nothing at the moment, my sig always reflects what I own at any given time, for the record).
Good luck... it's really a fantastic smartphone for the $40 I paid for it (and Fry's still sells it for that price). I wish there was a GSM model 'cause I'd be all over it in a second flat; can't do much of anything with the CDMA model in terms of getting service here in my area. I won't deal with Sprint for service, and Boost/Virgin Mobile/etc don't have plans that come anywhere near what the $30/month T-Mobile plan does so...
For $35 a month, you get unlimited everything on Virgin Mobile...
For $20, you get 300 minutes and unlimited everything. I stuck with the $20 plan at unlimited everything as I was grandfathered in many, many years ago.
Possible root method?
Hello! I have been using android for a while and just got this phone (LG Tribute, Virgin Mobile). I was researching rooting this, and I found this: youtube.com/watch?v=ZBdrVa_bo5o
It seems to be advertising legit software, etc, but I wonder if this successfully roots the Tribute. On their website (androidphonetransfer_DOTCOM) ,they have a free trial for the software.
I'd like to try it, but I'm not sure if it would mess up my device or not (I'm new to rooting). anyone want to give this a try?
It does not work.
I am also interested. I was looking for a android phone with at least 4.5 inch screen to act as a dedicated gps navigator. LG Tribute fit the bill perfectly. Quad core processor is fast, would be nice to get rid of Sprint activation and clean the device up with a root.
I'm surprised there is not more interest in this phone. The sale price of $40 happens pretty regularly, which IMO is a great deal for this phone.
I've been using my incredible 4g LTE ever since it came out and still love the form factor. It is starting to become a little slow and the camera could certainly be improved. Better battery life would be nice too.
I will probably keep using this phone until it completely breaks down on me or it just becomes too slow, but I'm wondering what phones former inc 4g lte users have moved on to. The main issue I have is that most phones are much larger. I like the 4" size, it fits comfortable in a shirt pock or my pants/jeans pocket. I know a 5" phone wouldnt fit very well and the whole point of a phone is that its portable.
I share your pain! I have had this phone since it released and it has hold up through every test of durability I could put it through. Today is the day that I move on to another my phone myself. Enricong, glad we could enjoy this awesome device even though it didn't have the biggest dev following it was still a great phone. I will continue to run this phone until the wheels fall of it.
Don't let this device fall. We just need to reach out to developers that have left this phone in the dust. This is the only good phone that I have owned that I have been able to have an unlocked bootloader. Let's revive this phone with new ROMs and more. Don't leave this phone in the dust.
enricong said:
I've been using my incredible 4g LTE ever since it came out and still love the form factor. It is starting to become a little slow and the camera could certainly be improved. Better battery life would be nice too.
I will probably keep using this phone until it completely breaks down on me or it just becomes too slow, but I'm wondering what phones former inc 4g lte users have moved on to. The main issue I have is that most phones are much larger. I like the 4" size, it fits comfortable in a shirt pock or my pants/jeans pocket. I know a 5" phone wouldnt fit very well and the whole point of a phone is that its portable.
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droid mini--- its qa grate phone mostly google looking ( not much skin, what's there is useful) con no root for newer firmware, no removable battery, no sd slot
htc remix. it's the smallest newest phone ( my wife has one it's a bit bigger, but has an sd slot con bigger ( but not too bad ) no idea about the dev community
both of these phones are upgrades over the fireball
yea there's only 2 small phones even available.
i made hte jump a month ago to the s5. i'm getting used to the size - although still not 100% happy with dealing with a larger phone.
however, i do like the phone. but the s5 is older - so dev has already stopped on it. i can't even root it (phone came with a newer version that is unrootable). sorry, but devs just seem to play with the new stuff, which i can't blame them. there's just not enough people left on the older devices to make it worthwhile. the inc4g never had a strong dev base to begin with.
the s5 is a nice phone if you guys are ready to move on... although no root available for new software i really miss adblock and some customizing... but wifi tether works which is most important to me. s5 still has a sd card slot and removable battery. i may look for a rooted or older software version one on swappa that i can root.
j13smiley said:
yea there's only 2 small phones even available.
i made hte jump a month ago to the s5. i'm getting used to the size - although still not 100% happy with dealing with a larger phone.
however, i do like the phone. but the s5 is older - so dev has already stopped on it. i can't even root it (phone came with a newer version that is unrootable). sorry, but devs just seem to play with the new stuff, which i can't blame them. there's just not enough people left on the older devices to make it worthwhile. the inc4g never had a strong dev base to begin with.
the s5 is a nice phone if you guys are ready to move on... although no root available for new software i really miss adblock and some customizing... but wifi tether works which is most important to me. s5 still has a sd card slot and removable battery. i may look for a rooted or older software version one on swappa that i can root.
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Not rootable? I do not want to imagine life without a rooted phone. I "need" WiFi Tether and the non-rooted options have historically never worked fully for me. That and TiB has been a lifesaver more than once... (Yes, I know we lived without a rooted Dinc4G for a long time until Unlimited was able to crack it open, and I *could* use a USB tether option if need be).
Sadly, I am now at the point with my Dinc4G (running ViperLTE) that I need to either upgrade to a newer phone or install a newer ROM because several apps simply won't update anymore on ICS (including the new expense system app for my work won't install on ICS, )
yep - verizon closed the root exploit with the last update. my phone arrived with the update already installed... should of ordered it a week earlier no dev is going to work on root for that phone now...
luckily foxfi does allow wifi tether without root and works on the s5! that was a must have for me so i'm at least ok with that. there's a bunch that i'd still love to have root for... but at least i'm functioning.
So far I love it. One of the first things I did was download Google Now launcher, as I was coming from a Nexus 6 and had the Nexus 5 before that, and the Nexus 4 before that. So yeah, I was really used to stock(ish) Android. I can deal with most of the software changes I'm dealt with, it's no big deal to change the way I used to do things. Sometimes I think purist Android users can be over the top, but that's like anything else in life.
It's fast as hell once I turned off animations like I always do. WIFI reception seems average, and so does the network. I love the thinness of it. (remember I came from a Nexus 6 which is wide as %$#@) It feels like it was made for my hand.
I'm obviously not going in order here, but even the unboxing experience was very nice. Very neatly packaged in a slick white box that screamed quality. And they included all of the necessary accessories to have a nice first impression. They included a USB-C to Micro USB converter for those that need it, a plastic screen protector, a clear case, a quick charge wall unit, and an over-the-top sim ejection tool that can be attached to your keychain. Nice. Sometimes it's the little things that really matter, and you can tell a company actually cares about its customers. Anker is one of the best when it comes to customer relations. Keep that in mind when buying cables or chargers.
After watching some of the Youtube reviews of this phone, (after I bought it) I was a little worried if I had made a mistake. After getting it and using it for a while, all of those concerns are negated. It's just fine, and a hell of a deal (I got it for $329 from Newegg). Even me being a long time Rommer and rooter, I don't feel the need to Rom. (that may change) Google Launcher works great, so I'm happy.
There's a bunch of tweaks I have to do yet, but so far it's been nice. I have no issues whatsoever. It's just a good solid phone for what you pay. $329 is actually a good price at this point. And even cheaper if you don't mind gently used. Thumbs up on this phone.
Thank you for your review. In particular I did not realize that in the box there is "an over-the-top sim ejection tool that can be attached to your keychain" until reading your review! . I would miss this practical tool, thinking that it was an useless piece of rubber.
dnlilas said:
Thank you for your review. In particular I did not realize that in the box there is "an over-the-top sim ejection tool that can be attached to your keychain" until reading your review! . I would miss this practical tool, thinking that it was an useless piece of rubber.
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I was trying to be semi-sarcastic.
I had much the same experience with mine, loving it at first, and also coming from a Nexus 6. I'm planning on selling mine now though as I've been unable to unlock the bootloader to get root and custom recovery. The stock software isn't bad compared to some, but compared to the freedom you have with the Nexus 6, being stuck on stock unrooted kinda sucks.
It's been kind of a pain trying to sell it again not at a significant loss though, so I'm thinking about trying to give it another go and unlock the bootloader. I was running into the problem of not being able to mount the SD Card in recovery to flash the B20 firmare.
It really is a great phone hardware wise. I absolutely love the bright, vibrant screen and the speakers are great. Plus I like the look of the phone overall. If I could just get the software I wanted on it I could live happily ever after, lol.
wolfen69 said:
So far I love it. One of the first things I did was download Google Now launcher, as I was coming from a Nexus 6 and had the Nexus 5 before that, and the Nexus 4 before that. So yeah, I was really used to stock(ish) Android. I can deal with most of the software changes I'm dealt with, it's no big deal to change the way I used to do things. Sometimes I think purist Android users can be over the top, but that's like anything else in life.
It's fast as hell once I turned off animations like I always do. WIFI reception seems average, and so does the network. I love the thinness of it. (remember I came from a Nexus 6 which is wide as %$#@) It feels like it was made for my hand.
I'm obviously not going in order here, but even the unboxing experience was very nice. Very neatly packaged in a slick white box that screamed quality. And they included all of the necessary accessories to have a nice first impression. They included a USB-C to Micro USB converter for those that need it, a plastic screen protector, a clear case, a quick charge wall unit, and an over-the-top sim ejection tool that can be attached to your keychain. Nice. Sometimes it's the little things that really matter, and you can tell a company actually cares about its customers. Anker is one of the best when it comes to customer relations. Keep that in mind when buying cables or chargers.
After watching some of the Youtube reviews of this phone, (after I bought it) I was a little worried if I had made a mistake. After getting it and using it for a while, all of those concerns are negated. It's just fine, and a hell of a deal (I got it for $329 from Newegg). Even me being a long time Rommer and rooter, I don't feel the need to Rom. (that may change) Google Launcher works great, so I'm happy.
There's a bunch of tweaks I have to do yet, but so far it's been nice. I have no issues whatsoever. It's just a good solid phone for what you pay. $329 is actually a good price at this point. And even cheaper if you don't mind gently used. Thumbs up on this phone.
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Good to go on the write up here. I went with a used one via Swappa, waiting for it to come in and I checked around with some XDA knowledge before hand. And they said it was a good device. I look forward to getting, although these days I dont have much time in "mod'ing / flashing" but I also had a N6P, which sold that via Swappa.
Thanks again for your thoughts here. :good:
Prozart said:
I was running into the problem of not being able to mount the SD Card in recovery to flash the B20 firmare.
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Sorry for totally off-topic, but I have no idea what you mean with flashing the B20 firmware. If it's the same process as the A2017G just using axon7tool (axon7toolkit might do it too, and probably easier) works. After you have TWRP you can spam the SD card option under Mount and it'll mount itself eventually. Or use the USB cable via MTP on TWRP. but again, what B20 firmware?
I don't know if I'll be able to help you, I just read most guides for the A2017G. Try axon7toolkit since it supposedly works for all 3 versions and can unlock your BL.
And the review, I honestly don't know what kind of mind control ZTE uses on the stock ROM, but I'm constantly going back to it after trying other ROMs. It works nicely if you don't count the things they break on every update, but hey, it gives a little of thrill to the whole situation (Will they fix Google Play? Will they even bother to fix exFAT? What about mobile data?)
What about the SIM tool? It is pretty awesome xd
Exfat is fixed in the new update b04 now u can use SD card upto 256gb.