is it really worth it?

[cobra2222]

Hi all,

Ive just got myself a tmobile wizard. ive been looking all through the wm6 pages and was just wondering is it worth me updating my wm5 to wm6. im sure all the new users would like to know this (is there speed improvements etc) and is there a rom that is stable and 99% working? as ive had alot of problems in the past when updating my blueangel to wm5

apologies if these are stupid questions

[achick]

IMO, there's not enough extra in WM6 to justify the little problems it has. I'd suggest a stable WM5 like Farias 3.3

[peterson65]

farias 3.3 is awsome , all of the wm6 roms have issues but i am using the clean wm6 from faria thats in the rom kitchen and it seems just as stable as the wm5 3.3

[funman]

farias 3.3 is awsome , all of the wm6 roms have issues but i am using the clean wm6 from faria thats in the rom kitchen and it seems just as stable as the wm5 3.3

I would 2nd that!!! Now that we have the Ir button working 100%, i dont think there is other problems

[rverriotto]

I know it's kinda aging now but I have been running NotTooSmart's Vanilla Rom for a while now and I have no issues whatsoever. I use my device constantly all day every day and though there was some trick to getting it to work just how I wanted I was comfortable enough to put the same ROM on my wife's Wizard as well (If you only knew how big of a step this was.... god forbid something goes wrong there I will never hear the end of it) .:)

Overall, here is the list of things that I do with rom if you are contemplating using it yourself and want to know if it will work for you.

Exchange activesync (heavy use)
Pocket IE
AIM 2.0 for PPC (osed once or twice)
Watching movies with TCPMP
( SEE TCPMP NOTES BELOW )
I use WMP as my only MP3 player with a couple of SD cards
WIFI works fine
Bluetooth headset with my HT850 works fine
Phone works okay. I mean, nothing is perfect and I do miss a call on occasion but so far it's acceptable. I have found, despite my previous posts, that 2.19 UK actually is more reliable. 2.25 US is better for data in my area but 2.19 UK causes me to miss a lot less calls.
I use internet radio via TCPMP at the gym every day reliably.
Sirius Sat Radio via SiriusWM5 works great although on occasion I do get the odd program error - NOTE: happens in WM5 too.
I DO NOT OVERCLOCK AT ALL as I really have no need for it.
Ewallet latest release works great
Listpro works great
I use a whole bunch of networking apps (tracert, pocket ping, etc...) from way back in the WM2003 days that still work just fine on WM6.
Terminal services works (though most people will not use this).

TCPMP NOTE: In order to do internet radio and most video you will need to DL and install the WMV9 codecs. This is a known issue and can be found by searching through back posts here in the WM6 forum.

Overall, I say yeah, it's worth it. It's more of an evolutionary upgrade than anything but it's a "nice to have". Plus, HTML email is real nice if you have EXCH 2007.

[cobra2222]

ok thanks all for the help!

i think i will give it a go, can anyone give me a direct link to the faria 3.3 rom (i cant seem to find it)

also is there anything i must be careful of when updating the rom so i dont brick it!

[k2e15]

farias 3.3 is awsome , all of the wm6 roms have issues but i am using the clean wm6 from faria thats in the rom kitchen and it seems just as stable as the wm5 3.3

How is the battery life with this rom?

[k2e15]

ok thanks all for the help!

i think i will give it a go, can anyone give me a direct link to the faria 3.3 rom (i cant seem to find it)

also is there anything i must be careful of when updating the rom so i dont brick it!

I think this is the correct link: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=303406

Make sure you have either G3 or G4 device as downloading the wrong version will brick your device.

[mfrazzz]

ok thanks all for the help!

i think i will give it a go, can anyone give me a direct link to the faria 3.3 rom (i cant seem to find it)

also is there anything i must be careful of when updating the rom so i dont brick it!
If you are wanting to give WM6 a go, then the Faria 3.3 rom is not the correct one. That is a WM5 rom.

The Faria Clean / Vanilla is the WM6 one. You have to download the entire ROM Kitchen, but there is a flash rom directory that has a default rom already built (or you can go through the build process to add and remove the stuff you want / don't want.

The link for the Faria WM6 is here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=303406 (same as given above, but that is NOT the AKU 3.3 Faria ROM)

If you really want Faria AKU 3.3 (again, its a stable WM5 ROM) then its here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=291806

And then use this link to step you through flashing...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=298613

[cobra2222]

ok thanks alot for the help....i have to wait 90mins for rapidshare to let me download the downgrade rom :(

will let you know how it turned out!

[peterson65]

How is the battery life with this rom?
it seems better than any wm6 i have tried , it does not have battery status installed and i have not installed it yet so without that and no overclocking its holding up as good as it did with farias wm5 3.3.

[mfrazzz]

ok thanks alot for the help....i have to wait 90mins for rapidshare to let me download the downgrade rom :(

will let you know how it turned out!
sometimes you can get around the 90 minute wait by just putting http://anonym.to/? infront of the URL. Doesn't always work but its worth a try.

[edhaas]

I know I'm coming in late to the thread, but I think in general I would be a bit more cautious. The leap from a stock rom to a (necessarily) custom WM6 rom, and then to a rom kitchen is better taken in baby steps in my opinion. In my own view, objectively I don't see any difference in my day to day usage of my wizard from when I was running WM5. In fact, I think because I've become obsessed with tinkering with it, I spend more time trying out different odds and ends, tweaking and breaking and fixing things than I do using it!

If you are primarily interested in USING you Wizard, I would start with a small step to say the Faria 3.3 WM5 rom. Learn to unlock, and flash, load your programs again, etc. Then once that's digested move up to WM6 if you really feel the itch, then try a rom kitchen as a final step.

Whatever you do, Keep it Fun!

[mfrazzz]

Very good points, but unfortunately, Faria did not release his "Vanilla" as a seperate ROM but instead with the entire kitchen (which I agree could be dangerous for someone new). My point was you can use that Vanilla rom by downloading the entire kitchen, but just going to the falshrom directory and flashing what came with it as the default (I understand its basically what we were running in beta which is a very nice ROM). It is a very good WM6 rom with no "cooking" required.

I've thought about making a couple of these Faria Vanilla's up and posting them (with Faria's permission) for those that only want the rom and not the entire kitchen (or the temptation that comes with it).

[cobra2222]

i used to tinker my blueangel so much, but the wm5 roms just didnt work right. with this rom from the kitchen is it just a 'stock' one? will it just have the programs my tmobile rom has? as im happy with my tmobile rom but i just want to have wm6. i dont need all the tweaking tools as long as it works

[mfrazzz]

i used to tinker my blueangel so much, but the wm5 roms just didnt work right. with this rom from the kitchen is it just a 'stock' one? will it just have the programs my tmobile rom has? as im happy with my tmobile rom but i just want to have wm6. i dont need all the tweaking tools as long as it works
No, its a "Vanilla" or "Clean" rom (ie: pretty much stripped down to the core). So you then add back to it just what you want.

If you want a full featured WM6, then look at Faria's "the real thing" but there are issues with that one so you have to dig through the huge thread for fixes (so I don't recommend it). If you want something that feels like a "stock" rom, then do the Faria AKU 3.3 (again, its WM5, but its better than the stock ones IMO).

I like the Vanilla roms though as you just put on it what you want. But not everyone likes that.

[cobra2222]

ive unlocked and my pda is ready for wm6. what file do i run from the kitchen folder to start the update?

[edhaas]

Very good points, but unfortunately, Faria did not release his "Vanilla" as a seperate ROM but instead with the entire kitchen (which I agree could be dangerous for someone new). My point was you can use that Vanilla rom by downloading the entire kitchen, but just going to the falshrom directory and flashing what came with it as the default (I understand its basically what we were running in beta which is a very nice ROM). It is a very good WM6 rom with no "cooking" required.

I've thought about making a couple of these Faria Vanilla's up and posting them (with Faria's permission) for those that only want the rom and not the entire kitchen (or the temptation that comes with it).

I think that's a great idea. Even if you put in all his currently available options, it is still more of a vanilla rom. Maybe with and without Voice Command, as that seems to be a make or break issue for folks. But serve it up the way you like it!

[edhaas]

ive unlocked and my pda is ready for wm6. what file do i run from the kitchen folder to start the update?

Well, if you're going to do this, now its time to start reading that thread.

Good luck!

[cobra2222]

i just want to install the vanilla standard rom, do i just need to run an exe from the kitchen folder?

[cobra2222]

never mind, i worked it out. just want to say the vanilla wm6 works perfectly so far! seems quite faster than wm5.

thanks all for all your help!

[cobra2222]

spoke too soon. only one small problem, all works perfectly apart from that my calendar wont sync through the wire or over gprs. just gives me a report saying the following appointments could not be sync'ed

any ideas peeps?

[rverriotto]

Hey Cobra,

If you are syncing OTA then I am gonna guess that you are doing exchange active sync. What version of exchange are you running? Can you look in your activesync logs and please tell me the error you are getting?

I manage two exchange environments. My personal here at home and a cluster at work. Both use Windows Mobile Devices.

[cobra2222]

im running exchange 2003. the activesync is just saying that the following appointments failed to syncronize from the server (followed with all my appointments)

plz help!

[rverriotto]

ok, exch 2k3. Easy enough. Actually glad you havent gone to Exch 2k7 because it can be a bear.

It would help me greatly to diagnose this if you had a PC on your same LAN as the EXCH server that had activesync on it. That way, you could partner wiith it and when your PPC goes to perform Activesync (don't worry this will not mess up your server based settings) and the error occurs it should throw an error code. I can get to the root of the problem for you a lot faster with an error code.

Also, one option you do have here since you do sync with an exch server is to do a "clear storage". Now, as I am sure you know this will erase everything on your device and bring you back to where you started from when you flashed the rom but at least you can eliminate the variable of something being wrong with the PIM databases in your PPC. EXTRA NOTE: Equivalent to starting from square one!!!! (Hey, I have had to do this before).

Also, are you getting any of your PIM data from an OTA sync session or is it just failing out as soon as you try to start the connection to your server? Reason I ask is that I am wondering if you might be having SSL or authentication issues at your location. Are you the EXCH admin at your location?

Rverriotto

[cobra2222]

yes i am the network admin, i have tried to sync at home, at a pc in the office. also i have cleared the storage and no luck, i cant sync anything when i have ssl enabled. only when off all works apart from calendar. this only happens when i have a wm6 rom installed. it seems to sync then says processing then just says attention required then shows all the calenddar items followed by could not be sync'ed

hope that made sense lol

[rverriotto]

Ok, but can you still sync other stuff like contacts, tasks, etc? How about email, does that work?

What is your certificate infastructure like? Using WCS? If so, then you might want to try refreshing the CA certificate on the mobile device and see if this helps. Personally, I have never run into this problem on my device on any version of WM6.

Oh, and I am sure that you are running Exchange 2k3 SP2 right? I know that might be a dumb queston but I just had to ask.

**SECOND READ**: i just re-read the post after this and I think I might know what your problem here is. I seee that you are not using an SSL connection. I believe that this is required for Calendar sync to complete successfully. Try setting up Windows Certificate Services (WCS) if you ave not already. Assign an SSL certificate to your Webserver with your external DNS written into it and not the local server address (I.E. mail.whateverdomain.com). Then, you will need to use a PC on your lan to surf to:

http://insert your server name here/certsrv

and request a CA (certificate authority) certificate. Once you have downloaded it (go with DER and not base 64) then you can simply copy it over to your PPC using activesync cable and click onit to automaticly install. There ya go, if you did everything right you will be able to use SSL! Oh, and you will need to have TCP port 443 open to your server for the secure website to be able to communicate to the outside world. This is simple enough, just open TCP443 through your firewall(s).

One final note on this here is that iff you are set up to have a perimeter network in your office then I strongly recommend you to consider front end/back end clustering your exchange system down the road sometime. Look this up. It is a pain to get set up but makes you much more secure when supporting windows mobile devices as you don't have your information stores available in any way to the outside world (in case of ilicit entry).

RV

[The_Wizard]

I manage two exchange environments. My personal here at home and a cluster at work.

Hey rverriotto,

A little off topic, but I also manage 2 exch 2k3 implementations and i was wondering if you have found a way to use your wizard to keep both exch. accounts in sync? Basically make a change to an appt. in one, sync the phone, then have the other exch. sync up either automaticaly or when connecting the device to another compter...

okay, so this was really a lot off topic... sorry...

[rverriotto]

Nope...

Ya know, Blackberry, WM, and Palm can all do this UNTIL you start to sync with an exchange / BES / Good Link Server (yes, I do manage BES too). By design, especially on Windows Mobile, the exchange server is to be the authorative sync source for Calendar, contacts, tasks, and email...and no other.

One option you do have for this use if they absolutely MUST have this is toset up POP/IMAP access (through L2TP/IPsEC if you must be anal about security on your network) on your email server and de-associate with the exchange server. That way, they could sync with AS at their workstation on the LAN locally then repeat at home and also could use built in email app to check for email every 15 mins. (think that there might be a hack for faster though - but do you really need it much faster?)

That's the best that I can offer if you have to have this. Sorry.

[The_Wizard]

Thanks for the info RV... that's what i've been finding everywhere... You'd think that with all the posts on the MS boards about people requesting this that Microsoft would get the hint... Oh wait... that was a trying to apply rational thought to a situation where sometimes it just doesn't exist...:)