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by Joe Levi | May 14, 2013 12:15 PMRead OnWe've shown off the Paranoid Android Custom ROM before. This is the ROM that enables phone, phablet, and tablet mode regardless of whether you're using a phone, phablet, or tablet -- and you can change the way your device displays any app. Paranoid Android also includes a very functional Pie-shaped control and notification area that we've shown you as well. Recent builds of Paranoid Android include a Halo-styled notification system. When a new notification comes in, it's presented to you in a small circle that floats above whatever app you're in. Once you've seen it, it slides out of the ...
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by Joe Levi | April 2, 2013 7:04 AMRead OnAndroid users aren't forced into a life of running just one ROM forever like owners of some "other" devices are. Users can change the way their device looks by changing wallpaper, widgets, and even the launcher (the app that is used to start every app). But Android takes that one step further: after rooting, users can flash almost any ROM they want on their device. The reasons for flashing a custom ROM are as varied at the people doing the flashing. Perhaps they want to change the look and feel of their device. Maybe they want to get rid of bloatware. They might want to get rid of their ...
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by Stephen Schenck | March 13, 2013 4:27 PMRead OnThe DMCA sure has been a thorn in the side of smartphone enthusiasts in the US lately, first getting a lot of attention for its role in restricting the ability for smartphone owners to carrier unlock their handsets, and now today we see it used to disrupt a number of custom ROM projects. A company called DxO Labs recently sent out a DMCA takedown notice to GitHub, requesting that files related to a number of code repositories be removed for violations under the Act. Those includes some work that's part of CyanogenMod. Things get a little confusing when we look at just why this request was ...
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by Joe Levi | January 28, 2013 1:31 PMRead OnParanoidAndroid is one of the most novel and interesting custom ROMs that you'll find today. Unlike other ROMs that simply add cool goodies to Android, ParanoidAndroid lets you change your smartphone, phablet, or tablet into one of the others -- or even a mix of phone, phablet, and tablet, depending on your preferences. Imagine your phablet running in tablet mode, or your smartphone running in phablet mode. With ParanoidAndroid, it's easy! It doesn't stop there! ParanoidAndroid lets you specify which mode you want each of your apps to run in. Your Nexus 4, for example, might look best in ...
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by Joe Levi | January 22, 2013 1:06 PMRead OnThe Android Open Kang Project (AOKP) is one of the front-runners when it comes to Android custom ROMs. Many have lauded their forward-thinking and rapid development schedule -- especially when compared to CyanogenMod. For those of you who don't remember, back when CyanogenMod was in its infancy we would see new features, tweaks, and changes being added to the ROM very frequently. Today the goals of the CM team have changed. They're aiming for a robust but stable feature-set, and compatibility with many devices as possible. AOKP, on the other hand, are much more like CyanogenMod of ...
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by Joe Levi | December 19, 2012 7:08 AMRead OnOver the past several days we've shown you CyanogenMod 10.1 running on the Nexus 4, Nexus 10, and even the Samsung Galaxy S III. These were official "nightly" builds, straight from the CyanogenMod team. Nightlies, as you likely know, are works in progress. They have known bugs in them. They are not feature complete. They haven't been tweaked and polished. They are, however, sometimes stable enough for use as a daily driver -- at least if you're one of the more adventurous among us. What about older devices? Where's the love for them? Even Google has cut off Jelly Bean support for their ...
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by Joe Levi | December 18, 2012 7:01 AMRead OnThe Samsung Galaxy S III is one of our favorite devices, despite its super-slippery back and pentile display. Within 100 days of its release back in May 2012, Samsung reported that it had sold an impressive 20 million units. Some people love the Touch Wiz user interface that ships with the SGS3, some people hate it. We had to knock a few points off it's score in our full review due to some frustrating behavior in the launcher and the horrible email client that Samsung included. Some of Samsung's built-in apps were extremely useful, while others were cheesy after the novelty wore off. ...
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by Joe Levi | October 9, 2012 11:07 AMRead OnAndroid is made up of a small collection of "images", each with its own specific job. Last time we talked about the Recovery Image, today we're going to dig into the System Image -- the funnest one of all! What is the System Image? In desktop and laptop computers, the System Image is basically the operating system (Windows, Mac, Linux, Unix, etc.) that you spend all your time in. You turn on your computer, wait while it boots, then run all your apps and do all your work on the desktop which lives inside the System Image. On Android it's not that dissimilar. When Android boots up it takes ...
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by Joe Levi | October 8, 2012 10:45 AMRead OnPimp My ROM is not a custom ROM, rather, it's an installer-based script that let's you quickly and easily pick from dozens and dozens of tweaks, mods, apps, themes, and various features -- which it then adds to your current ROM. Before you get started you need to have a custom recovery image (Clockwork Mod is my favorite) and an unlocked bootloader, but other than that you can apply these "pimps" to virtually any ROM. To get started, download Pimp My ROM from XDA Developers and copy it to your device. Reboot into recovery, backup your current ROM, and flash Pimp My ROM. After that ...
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by Joe Levi | October 3, 2012 9:14 AMRead On
ClockworkMod Recovery, generally shortened to "CWM", is one of the most popular custom recoveries for Android-powered smartphones and tablets. Originally developed by Koushik Dutta, or "Koush", CWM lets power users do all kinds of really powerful tasks that aren't included in the stock recovery on most devices. What are Images? No, we're not talking about pretty pictures that are worth a thousand words, in this context an "image" is essentially a self-contained operating system. Most of us are familiar with the "System" image, it's the part of Android that we use every day. There is also ...
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by Joe Levi | September 25, 2012 2:10 PMRead OnODEX and DEODEX are terms that are thrown around a lot when we're talking about Custom ROMs. Some ROMs are DEODEXED, others are not. What does that mean and why do we have them? If you haven't already watched the last couple episodes of Android Power User, you might want to. In those episodes we talk about the JIT Compiler, and the Dalvik Cache and Dalvik VM. If you've already watched those or have a solid understanding of them, let's dive right in! Android apps are stored in .APK files (that stands for "Android Package", in case you were wondering). Like we talked about, the files ...
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by Joe Levi | August 17, 2012 11:43 AMRead OnIf you're running the ROM that came on your phone you've probably seen at least one update come over-the-air (or OTA). These updates are built, tested, refined, packaged, and eventually pushed to your smartphone or tablet by the device's manufacturer. Sometimes updates come quickly, other times they can take forever -- or may not come along at all. Regardless, if you're running stock, you don't really have to do anything to get whatever updates may come. They just magically show up one day on your phone and give you the option of installing them. People who run custom ROMs, however, aren't ...
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