[Q] Impression i7 Tablet

Have been reading through this thread and thought I'd share some tips.

First, the easiest way to root the device is to use Z4root. The reboot screens never appear, but the exploit does successfully run. Upon reboot, install SuperUser and you're all set.

As far as getting ADB connectivity, that one's a little trickier, but not impossible.

You'll need the standard Android SDK w/ JDK. Open up the SDK and download the the "Google USB Driver package", along with the "Android SDK Tools".

Once the driver has been downloaded, open "C:\<User Profiles>\<Username>\.android\ADB_USB.INI" and add the following line:

0x18D1

Save the file and then open "C:\<Program Files Folder>\Android\android-sdk\extras\google\usb_driver\android_winusb.inf".

Add the following lines:

;Impression i7
%SingleAdbInterface% = USB_Install, USB\VID_18D1&PID_1F00
%CompositeAdbInterface% = USB_Install, USB\VID_18D1&PID_1F00&MI_01
;


Save the file and then restart ADB.

Make sure your Android Device is in Debugging mode and connect it to your computer.

You should now be able to run "adb devices" and it return something similar to:

In Windows:

List of devices attached
InfoTMIC-MID device


In Linux:

List of devices attached
???????????? device

A lot of features can be added by downloading the CyanogenMod's bundles of Google Apps. Voice Search works after getting the framework installed. IRIS even functions, but the TTS engine beeps randomly when encountering punctuation.

The camera only seems to work with the pre-installed photo app. Any other programs get a smears/deinterlaced version of the image on the screen and the device slowly begins to slow down eventually needing a reboot.

The most exciting part of this device for me is the USB port. The device accepts USB flash drives and recognized a Kensington Micro USB Bluetooth adapter's PNP id, but did not load the necessary stack/drivers to make the device useful. If we could get USB Bluetooth Adapter support, bluetooth would allow GPS support and this would be one heck of a device. I would be interested to see if there is support for a USB keyboard. I was reading that the stock Google Bluetooth driver stack support up to 250 different chipsets. If there were a way to get these drives and stack/UI loaded, omg. Freakin' potential.

There's a lot this little tablet can do by simply rooting it. I can't wait 'til the professionals get ahold of it. If you don't like the InfoTM Home screen, download LauncherPro and HomeSwitcher for a more traditional feel.

The latest version of YouTube from the Android market gives an error 400, not sure what causes it. I'm sticking with 2.0.26 with minimal quirks.

Personally, I'd like to see if we could come up with a custom 2.2 or 2.3 ROM for this and start pushing some envelops.

Happy modding!

Chris S.

if you can connect with adb, try running

adb reboot recovery

this should wipe out most of the changes you've made.

if that doesn't work, undo your previous root procedure and run z4root.

good luck!

-------------------------------------
Sent via the XDA Tapatalk App

also, install SuperUser.

-------------------------------------
Sent via the XDA Tapatalk App

My roommate, girlfriend, and I are thinking about getting these for Christmas. Mostly they will be used for reading with Aldiko, and light web browsing. Anyone tried either of these features yet?

Poking around, discovered the following specs:

cat /proc/cpuinfo
Processor : ARMv6-compatible processor rev 5 (v6l)
BogoMIPS : 1055.12
Features : swp half thumb fastmult vfp edsp java
CPU implementer : 0x41
CPU architecture: 6TEJ
CPU variant : 0x1
CPU part : 0xb36
CPU revision : 5

Hardware : IMAPX200
Revision : 0000
Serial : 0000000000000000

---
---

lsmod
8192cu 371419 0 - Live 0xbf090000
permfd 1246 0 - Live 0xbf01a000
galcore 66040 0 - Live 0xbf000000

---
---

lsusb
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 <- USB Hub
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 <- USB Hub
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 0bda:817a <- Realtek WiFi

---
---

ls /system/lib/modules
8192cu.ko
8712s.ko
rt2070sta.ko
ubi.ko
wlan.ko
permfd.ko
galcore.ko

Couldn't figure out how what the camera was made of.

It runs a GC600 Vivante! Sweet! Currently running stock ROM OpenGL ES-CM 1.1

BMA150 Accelerometers.


Hopefully this will give someone enough info to get a custom ROM going. It'd be neat if there were an ASOP already made that one could just flash on here.

Does anyone recommend a flashing tutorial? I don't think I've quite got that part down.

Thanks for all the help!

Chris

YmerejO42 said:

My roommate, girlfriend, and I are thinking about getting these for Christmas. Mostly they will be used for reading with Aldiko, and light web browsing. Anyone tried either of these features yet?

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

I've been using mine mainly for web browsing and Aldiko until I can get it rooted properly. Does both things quite well actually.

Only problem I've run into so far is I can't move programs to my SD card. Aldiko is one that should have that function but the option is grayed out no matter what. So when it adds the books from the SD card to your library it's actually adding them to the Aldiko folder on the tablet taking up a ton of space. Could be a problem.

dustomcgee said:

I've been using mine mainly for web browsing and Aldiko until I can get it rooted properly. Does both things quite well actually.

Only problem I've run into so far is I can't move programs to my SD card. Aldiko is one that should have that function but the option is grayed out no matter what. So when it adds the books from the SD card to your library it's actually adding them to the Aldiko folder on the tablet taking up a ton of space. Could be a problem.

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

We've noticed that, too. Seems that the internal memory is named "sdcard", and the actual card is named "sdcard1", which confuses the programs. At least, that's the issue from what I can tell.

If you use File Expert, you can see the issue I'm talking about. If you tell File Expert to go to the SD card, it shows a path of /mnt/sdcard, but it's showing the tablet's internal storage. You have to go into the folder sdcard1 to show the actual card.

Since it has 2GB of internal storage, as long as you delete books once you've read them, I'm thinking that's not too much of an issue, but I'm hoping for a proper ROM to help get it sorted.

trickery?

Woostyle said:

I was recently shopping for a knock-around tablet and came across leaderinternationalinc dot com this little guy at Kmart. Yep, I said Kmart. When I asked the price and they told me $129, I said SOLD!.

So far it's been average in performance and had to do some trickery to get some apps installed (Android/Amazon Market, Pandora, Google Talk, etc.) and am still having some difficulty installing other apps. It seems as if they really want you to use their market and apps, some of which are okay, I guess. I got Netflix installed, but the audio/video isn't in sync and everything is a hue of blue. Might be a Flash Player issue - also which I can't seem to update.

Anyway, the bad news is I can't find a way to get in to bootloader or able to root this tab with oneclick. Hopefully they didn't lock this thing down to hard.

Additionally, since the screen is resistive, using a stylus makes it a bit easier to navigate. Worth the money so far!

I'm praying the brilliant dev brains here at XDA will purchase this one and create a simple root/rom that allows me to take this thing to the next level!

Anybody out there?

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

What exactly did you do to install "Android Market"? Does anyone have a direct download link for the "Market" apk?

turboluis said:

What exactly did you do to install "Android Market"? Does anyone have a direct download link for the "Market" apk?

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

If you Google "android market apk download" you'll see pages where you can download it. For some reason, I couldn't get the newest version to install, I had to install version 3.1.5 instead, then it updated itself.

Also, it'll take a few tries before it runs completely. Took me 2-3 times starting it, if I remember correctly.

For some reason, my i7 tells Google it's in China, so some apps won't download, something else I'm hoping an updated ROM will fix. Oddly enough, my roommate's, bought at the same time from the same store, doesn't have that issue. The serial numbers are different enough that we think they may be from different production runs, so that could be it.

If an app won't install, searching "<app name> apk download" will usually find a manual installer. I use File Expert to install these, it seems to register them with Market properly so that they can be updated after the initial install.

I would like to bump this post. If anyone knows how to customize this tablet (aside from just downloading things to it) feel free to chime in.

Hardware wise, this thing should be upgradable to 3.0
Donations available!

Thanks!

-------------------------------------
Sent via the XDA Tapatalk App

Can someone who hasnt done to much with this thing yet do a dump of the system partition? (i.e. adb shell, su, dd if=/dev/mtd/mtd3 of=/mnt/sdcard/sdcard1/system.img bs=4096)
I jacked it up, and the recovery, (adb reboot recovery) while it says its restoring, doesnt seem to. I cant "Factory reset" because the privacy part of the settings app is not working anymore. Its a Christmas present and I have to get it fixed before I can give it away.
If there is a recovery on this thing, I wouldnt know how to get to it... maybe its in one of these somewhere...

# cat proc/mtd
cat proc/mtd
dev: size erasesize name
mtd0: 00200000 00200000 "ramdisk"
mtd1: 00600000 00200000 "kernel"
mtd2: 08000000 00200000 "resv"
mtd3: 0c000000 00200000 "system"
mtd4: 46e00000 00200000 "userdata"
mtd5: 04000000 00200000 "cache"
mtd6: 96800000 00200000 "Local-disk"
mtd7: 00100000 00200000 "panic"

# cat proc/mtd
cat proc/mtd
dev: size erasesize name
mtd0: 00200000 00200000 "ramdisk"
mtd1: 00600000 00200000 "kernel"
mtd2: 08000000 00200000 "resv"
mtd3: 0c000000 00200000 "system"
mtd4: 46e00000 00200000 "userdata"
mtd5: 04000000 00200000 "cache"
mtd6: 96800000 00200000 "Local-disk"
mtd7: 00100000 00200000 "panic"[/QUOTE]

Which of those are boot and recovery?

rooting issues

See I've downloaded z4root installed it and ran both temporary and permanent root. Neither actually is a success. What am I doing wrong? I already have super user downloaded also.

gotti3586 said:

See I've downloaded z4root installed it and ran both temporary and permanent root. Neither actually is a success. What am I doing wrong? I already have super user downloaded also.

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

Ok successfully rooted my i7 with super one click and now it's rooted, but can't seem to put the damn thing in recovery mode to replace it with clock work. Any ideas would help. I've tried all button combos and everything I really don't think there is a recovery on it. Also, I want to put ics on this so I can get the actual market. As of right now, I can only download free apps and Hong Kong apps. No paid. Please help

Well a friend of mine gave me his impression i7 to see if i could root it & i did with z4root,i first tried temporary root(which went smooth) then i did the permanent root & it worked too,but now i can't find any custom ROMs for it sadly,lol I'm glad i didn't buy this tablet due to it's incredibly sloooow speed & lousy touch screen,i mean you really have to press the damn screen for it to respond.At least i got SU installed & working but no recoveries will work i assume

ThaPirato said:

I'm glad i didn't buy this tablet due to it's incredibly sloooow speed & lousy touch screen,i mean you really have to press the damn screen for it to respond.

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

I've owned my i7 since December, I haven't had any issues with it being slow. Then again, I didn't buy it (for $130) expecting iPad-like speeds out of it. Reading ebooks on it works perfectly fine, and it can do more than just books, unlike a straight ebook reader.

On the other hand, I also did my research before I bought it, so I knew that it has a resistive touch screen. And yes, you do have to press on it instead of just touching it. Resistive screens are cheaper than capacitive ones, which was another factor in the reduced price of the tablet. So while I prefer resistive screens, again I didn't expect anything more than what I got.

Sorry if this seems kind of like a rant, I just woke up and wasn't expecting to see a message with someone sounding like they'd been using an i7 and expected it to perform better than it does. It's not a great tablet, but it definitely falls under the "you get what you pay for" clause. If someone wanted better, they'd pay more. Probably quite a bit more, since most tablets cost considerably more than $130. For the price range, the i7 was the best tablet that I could find on the market at the time.

I do wish, though, that it had some custom ROMs, I think it'd work better if all the crapware on it could be gotten rid of.

I suppose I should ask here since I have an Impression i7a and the search offered nothing for that tablet yet. I am curious about getting Google Play running as well as getting Netflix running on it also without having to downgrade to use it. As for specs:

Model: i7a (obviously)
Android: 4.0.4
Baseband: 1.4rc3
Kernel: 3.0.8
Build: crane_i7a-4.0.4-20120712-US

I'm open to suggestions, thanks in advance.

I7

:cyclops: I will give a recovery some thought, although i must admit the I7 has to be the worst model i have come across. I'll do system dump, extract stock boot ,system, and recovery img's when i have a little more time. May take a little time as i am busy with other gadgets that i am porting to ubuntu touch,rooting,etc etc....... and Age of Warring Empires..... On gadgets such as this , sometimes miracles happen and then often not. If any1 at XDA has img's mentioned above, will make process happen faster, as i will have to do trial n error for pull/extract of partitions info. Might not be worth it, meaning no promises :cyclops: