Team-BHP - Android Thread: Phones / Apps / Mods

Quote:

Originally Posted by phamilyman (Post 4278640)

... ... ... @Thad - just unroll back to the ROM it came with. If it ain't broke ........ Dont root it!

It's rooted already, and has been since soon after buying it. It is still the stock ROM though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by civic-sense (Post 4278801)

Don't. The first thing you are going to spoil is the camera quality. Then there are the bugs. You will find a lot of them. Better do a system reset, and if that doesn't help downgrade to an earlier stock ROM.

Somehow, not being rooted seems unnatural. One thing is that I don't believe in my phone being a place that I should suffer advertising. I always pay for good and often-used apps, but I want no advertising at all.

Putting Cyanogenmod on my Defy+ did nothing but improve the phone in every way. I guess it's phone/ROM dependent. Mind you... I don't have the enthusiasm for techie-tinkering that I used to. Even assuming no major problems, flashing a ROM and getting the look and feel that I want on my phone is at least half a day of work. And if it is a disaster, then, assuming I haven't bricked it... it's another half a day to restore it.

Advice taken on board. I'm still thinking about it. That stage itself may last for some time! :uncontrol

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom (Post 4278822)

It's rooted already, and has been since soon after buying it. It is still the stock ROM though.
Somehow, not being rooted seems unnatural. One thing is that I don't believe in my phone being a place that I should suffer advertising. I always pay for good and often-used apps, but I want no advertising at all.

Putting Cyanogenmod on my Defy+ did nothing but improve the phone in every way. I guess it's phone/ROM dependent. Mind you... I don't have the enthusiasm for techie-tinkering that I used to. Even assuming no major problems, flashing a ROM and getting the look and feel that I want on my phone is at least half a day of work. And if it is a disaster, then, assuming I haven't bricked it... it's another half a day to restore it.

Advice taken on board. I'm still thinking about it. That stage itself may last for some time! :uncontrol

I am pretty much same as you in the sense that most of my phone purchases result in me rooting them within a few hours of buying them. I currently own the S7 Edge and still regret rooting it because of missing out on the Samsung Pay. When I buy my next phone I have decided not to root primarily for the following reasons -

1. There are decent options to block ads without root.
2. Stock ROMs now offer enough features and customizability almost making the need for a custom Rom or Xposed redundant.
3. Samsung Pay is a must for me. Eventually when NFC based payments take off in India it is going to become even more difficult as manufacturers have started taking steps to block root users.
4. If you are on Samsung, there is now even a rootless theme engine called Substratum.
5. There was a time when I had patience and love for tinkering with my computers and gadgets. Trying out new Linux distributions, formatting windows almost every few months was a norm. There was a time when I used to flash new ROMs every few weeks, try unstable Xposed plugins, brace myself and recover from bootloop. I now have no time or inclination to tinker with my gadgets as much as I did then

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom (Post 4278822)

One thing is that I don't believe in my phone being a place that I should suffer advertising.

Quote:

Originally Posted by pathik (Post 4278901)

1. There are decent options to block ads without root.

I use a nexus, so I guess the ads that we are talking about is a OEM thing. Do these devices show pop up ads? I had been in an S3 long ago, but don't remember ads. The iPhone in my other pocket too. No ads...

What ads are we talking about here?

Quote:

Originally Posted by civic-sense (Post 4278964)

We are taking about ads that show up inside the browser and the third-party Apps you download on the stores. Unless you download shady apps or visit suspect websites, there usually aren't popup ads on a phone.

Yes, that exactly. I'd be very worried if I started to see ads coming "from nowhere." I have seen this on my wife's tablet after children have been playing with it. I have tried to convince her that her elctronics are not the grandchildrens' playthings, and she may suffer in a bad way if she allows it.

Unfortunately, she comes from the school of sticking something in the hands of a fractious child. I come from the school of ignoring them! ;)

But rooting feeling natural. Ex-Unix sys admin, and I can't even edit the hosts file on this thing? Uhhh... No. Not acceptible. It'd my thing, right? But a person like me who takes this attitude has to be prepared to mend it if they break it.

The idea of buying anything from Microsoft actually horrifies me. Whilst I know that they don't actually do this with my example, the hosts file, their way was always to hide everything in binary files of a format not readable to anything else.

Our computers in the house are Linux. And even there, as someone who wants to configure, for instance, their network settings, manually, I can say that, in the name of making it more end-user-friendly, they make the manual config harder.

To be fair: the Ubuntu network manager does do just-works stuff like switching to a USB connection, and, I became an [IBM] AIX man, and a lot of that was not just editing text files.

Shades of grey. But to own my device, whether I want to tweak or not, for me, it has to be Linux/Android.

Quote:

Originally Posted by mav2000 (Post 4278759)

Waiting eagerly for the LG V30. And the new pixel phones. I think the LG V30 is the pick of the bunch this time around for me

You’re dead on right with that. Having seen and read multiple reviews, I’m kind of convinced LG V30 should easily be the pick of Android phones this year, unless Google Pixel 2 has the same features & specifications.

Quote:

Originally Posted by deathwalkr (Post 4278804)

Waiting for the v30 as well. Hope it is launched in October before Deepavali at 50k or so :)

Hoping for the same. 50k for the 128gb might be the perfect (yeah, dream) price. One that could have LG see some real good sales.

I was just wondering though as to why LG has been delaying its launch. Since they’re manufacturing the Google’s Pixel 2 plus this year, could they have been told off by Google to hold on their launch of the V30?

Quote:

Originally Posted by pathik (Post 4279002)

Okay, so you are saying that there are ways to block those ads if you root the device. Sounds good. For me the browser ads haven't troubled me much apart from some torrent sites. Maybe my browsing landscape is too narrow.

I have a slightly different view about in-app ads. I'd rather let it run because that brings the devs revenue. And, I have a few apps which I have paid for to remove ads - but only those I use regularly.

I bought Mi A1 during Big Billion Day sale.
Very bad choice coming from Mi4i

Following are the issues
1. No inbuilt call recorder. Mi4i had MIU8 which had inbuilt call recorder. Stock android doesn't has it
2. No internet speed indicator. Mi4i, had this option where I could see the speeds on the top bar
3. Biggest issue - 2nd SIM doesn't support 4G, in my case its running 2G. Its highly frustrating to see 2G on the phone. My older phone Mi4i supported 4G in both the sim slots.

I have 2 SIMs
Jio - Primary SIM
Airtel - Secondary SIM

At some remote locations and when my data for the day is over, I switch from JIO to Airtel for data. Now, I can't do it, as my latest phone doesn't has the feature by which I can use 4G speeds on my secondary Airtel Number.

Also, would not like to use third party apps for the rest two requirements from above. Third party apps are not as good as native OS function. Would always prefer native OS function.

Not to mention, the signal goes way every now and then. Lots of people have reported this issue.

I am going to return this Mi A1. Very bad buy.

Need to find a dual sim phone, which truly supports 4G in both the sim slots at a cost of less than 15k. Any recommendations ?

Quote:

Originally Posted by tanwaramit (Post 4280298)

Being a MIUI user since last 3 years I can understand what you are saying.
Even I extensively use the above 2 features and appreciate that it's neatly intergrated into the OS.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tanwaramit (Post 4280298)

Need to find a dual sim phone, which truly supports 4G in both the sim slots at a cost of less than 15k. Any recommendations ?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Soumyajit9 (Post 4280332)

RedMi Note 3 :thumbs up
Launched last year. Works like new till date for me and wife.

What's the problem with Redmi Note4? True 4g on either of the cards. 12k for the 64gb version I guess. It's one of the largest selling phone in India today and at a great price point. Only thing lacking is Fast Charging for the large 4000mAH battery. But at this price it's a steal.