[Q] Best ROM / Kernal - DInc

[ogkhaze]

Hello XDA,

I'm swapping out my BlackBerry Storm2 today, for an HTC Incredible.

I have been lurking around on Droid forums for a few weeks now, especially here.

I want to put CM6 on my DInc, but I have a lot of people telling me it's really buggy.

Which is the best ROM out right now? The least buggiest, preferably.

Also, which Kernal works best with which ROM?

Sorry for the seemingly stupid questions.

Thanks in advance!

Edit:

One more thing I don't quite fully understand. Do some themes only work with some ROM's?

 

[khanam]

Virtuous 2.7 ROM + powersaving kernel + rEVOlution theme is my recommended combo and believe me I have tried a bunch! Its incredibly stable - you get to remove a good amount of the crapware and manages to keep the best of sense widgets too. I have tried many others - Ruby/CM in ROMs, King's kernels and various themes (yes they are ROM specific) and this is what I keep going back to.

My 2 cents.

 

[PhillyCheez]

I use Virtuous 2.7 Power Saving as well and absolutely love it.

I added the SexyRosieBrowser Mod and Rotary Lockscreen Mod and deleted a lot of the bloatware and widgets I never used from HTC and Verizon.

I also added the EVO Camera

It's pretty much the best of BOTH worlds... a mix mash of Vanilla and Sense UI!!!

very stable and only a few minor bugs that aren't that big of deal.

 

[ogkhaze]

Virtuous 2.7 ROM + powersaving kernel + rEVOlution theme is my recommended combo and believe me I have tried a bunch! Its incredibly stable - you get to remove a good amount of the crapware and manages to keep the best of sense widgets too. I have tried many others - Ruby/CM in ROMs, King's kernels and various themes (yes they are ROM specific) and this is what I keep going back to.

My 2 cents.

I use Virtuous 2.7 Power Saving as well and absolutely love it.

I added the SexyRosieBrowser Mod and Rotary Lockscreen Mod and deleted a lot of the bloatware and widgets I never used from HTC and Verizon.

I also added the EVO Camera

It's pretty much the best of BOTH worlds... a mix mash of Vanilla and Sense UI!!!

very stable and only a few minor bugs that aren't that big of deal.

Thanks for the quick replies guys,

I will definitely be trying Virtous out before anything else.

Some people told me CM6 was great but it was made with a heavy code. So i'm guessing it's buggy and slow at times?

It's just weird coming from a BlackBerry device that all you can do is throw on some Hybrids and .cod files :/

@PhillyCheese What are the benefits of the EVO camera? What does the SexyRosie mod do?

 

[ardax]

I will definitely be trying Virtous out before anything else.

Definitely recommended. Virtuous is the most stable ROM I've used on my Inc so far. Cyanogen and Ruby both do this random reboot thing on my phone -- I haven't tried any other AOSP-based ROMs.

Some people told me CM6 was great but it was made with a heavy code. So i'm guessing it's buggy and slow at times?

I don't think it's "heavy" per se, but it has far more mods to the AOSP base than Ruby does. That also doesn't mean it's more or less buggy than other ROMs either.

What are the benefits of the EVO camera? What does the SexyRosie mod do?

The Evo camera app has an onscreen shutter button. At least, that's the only significant difference I can find.

 

[ogkhaze]

Definitely recommended. Virtuous is the most stable ROM I've used on my Inc so far. Cyanogen and Ruby both do this random reboot thing on my phone -- I haven't tried any other AOSP-based ROMs.


I don't think it's "heavy" per se, but it has far more mods to the AOSP base than Ruby does. That also doesn't mean it's more or less buggy than other ROMs either.


The Evo camera app has an onscreen shutter button. At least, that's the only significant difference I can find.

Awesome thanks for the tip man.

So when I get the Incredible today it probably won't be running Froyo right off the bat, correct? Should I update it right away?

Also, does using ROM Manager reduce the risk of bricking your phone? That's the only thing I'm scared of.

 

[StirCwazy]

Based off of your recommendations I'm going to give Virtuous a try for the first time. Got it queued up in ROM Manager as we speak, let the fun begin!

 

[ardax]

Actually, it probably will be running Froyo already.

Personally, I'd spend the first few days running the phone as stock as possible to make sure there's no weird hardware problems. Once that's out of the way, root (Unrevoked 3) + NAND unlock (Unrevoked Forever) + stock backup.

After that, it's all up to you.

2 other tips that bit me in the ass at first:

1. HTC's People app (contacts) has a distinction between "Google Contacts" and "Phone Contacts". Only "Google" contacts are synchronized to the Google Account linked to your phone. It sounds obvious in retrospect, but the first time I entered all my contacts they went in as "Phone" contacts by default. That made for a nasty surprise the first time I wiped my phone.
2. There was some extreme weirdness with synchronization between People and my Google Contacts online. The only way I ended up with all my contacts showing up in People (and the Dialer) correctly was to make sure they were entered into the "My Contacts" group in Google Contacts. Those warts seem to have been ironed out with Froyo though. It's still probably significantly easier to enter your contacts online though than through your phone, particularly if you dump a CSV from your Blackberry first.

 

[ogkhaze]

Actually, it probably will be running Froyo already.

Personally, I'd spend the first few days running the phone as stock as possible to make sure there's no weird hardware problems. Once that's out of the way, root (Unrevoked 3) + NAND unlock (Unrevoked Forever) + stock backup.

After that, it's all up to you.

2 other tips that bit me in the ass at first:

1. HTC's People app (contacts) has a distinction between "Google Contacts" and "Phone Contacts". Only "Google" contacts are synchronized to the Google Account linked to your phone. It sounds obvious in retrospect, but the first time I entered all my contacts they went in as "Phone" contacts by default. That made for a nasty surprise the first time I wiped my phone.
2. There was some extreme weirdness with synchronization between People and my Google Contacts online. The only way I ended up with all my contacts showing up in People (and the Dialer) correctly was to make sure they were entered into the "My Contacts" group in Google Contacts. Those warts seem to have been ironed out with Froyo though. It's still probably significantly easier to enter your contacts online though than through your phone, particularly if you dump a CSV from your Blackberry first.

Thanks a ton man, unrevoked took his tool down, i've been checking back to see when it'll go back up.

Thank you for telling me about the contacts as well.

 

[PhillyCheez]

I recommend spending time on stock froyo non-rooted for at least a month.

You will have much more wisdom when moving to a new ROM because you will know what you like and don't like, want to add, want to remove...etc.

ALSO, it will give you enough time to find out if your incredible is defected! i thought i had a defected one cause i was having speaker issues but a nice hard reset did the trick. you will also know how your phone SHOULD work.

SexyRosieMod gets rid of the ugly sense ui at the bottom of the phone and replaces it with what you would find on vanilla android.

So far the only difference (but a very nice difference) in the EVO Camera is the adding of a shutter button on the screen. i hated having to long press the screen or use the track pad to take a picture.

I tried CM6.... it was nice and there are a few things i enjoy about it but there were things in sense ui that i just couldn't live with out. Also, CM6 was definitely buggy. I do miss being able to change the color of the android sleep clock, the power widget and the awesome wallpapers he included.

As far as Contacts go... I was lucky enough to have them backed up on Verizon already. But if you are a ROM switcher you want them backed up to your google account. I was lucky enough to figure out that i was able to import my verizon contacts as a .csv file straight into my google contacts.

 

[PhillyCheez]

Thanks a ton man, unrevoked took his tool down, i've been checking back to see when it'll go back up.

Thank you for telling me about the contacts as well.

if you go to that page and click the IRC channel you can easily download it in there at the top.

 

[ogkhaze]

I recommend spending time on stock froyo non-rooted for at least a month.

You will have much more wisdom when moving to a new ROM because you will know what you like and don't like, want to add, want to remove...etc.

ALSO, it will give you enough time to find out if your incredible is defected! i thought i had a defected one cause i was having speaker issues but a nice hard reset did the trick. you will also know how your phone SHOULD work.

SexyRosieMod gets rid of the ugly sense ui at the bottom of the phone and replaces it with what you would find on vanilla android.

So far the only difference (but a very nice difference) in the EVO Camera is the adding of a shutter button on the screen. i hated having to long press the screen or use the track pad to take a picture.

I tried CM6.... it was nice and there are a few things i enjoy about it but there were things in sense ui that i just couldn't live with out. Also, CM6 was definitely buggy. I do miss being able to change the color of the android sleep clock, the power widget and the awesome wallpapers he included.

As far as Contacts go... I was lucky enough to have them backed up on Verizon already. But if you are a ROM switcher you want them backed up to your google account. I was lucky enough to figure out that i was able to import my verizon contacts as a .csv file straight into my google contacts.

if you go to that page and click the IRC channel you can easily download it in there at the top.

Yeah I suppose I should probably run the phone stock as it is my first HTC device, and my first Droid device, coming from a BlackBerry.

So you go into their IRC site and then its the link they have at the top, it says not to distribute it so I'm not going to post the link here.

Edit: Yeah that's the link, going to get my DInc now, and play around with it!

Any other tips?

 

[PhillyCheez]

Yeah I suppose I should probably run the phone stock as it is my first HTC device, and my first Droid device, coming from a BlackBerry.

So you go into their IRC site and then its the link they have at the top, it says not to distribute it so I'm not going to post the link here.

Edit: Yeah that's the link, going to get my DInc now, and play around with it!

Any other tips?

I used that link before... reflash.exe

worked like a champ!

as far as tips...

read: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=739428

I used this guide quiet a bit...

http://wiki.cyanogenmod.com/index.php?title=Full_Update_Guide_-_HTC_Incredible

I never installed ADB before rooting nor did I mess with the radio (risk of bricking). your DInc should have the latest radio anyways.

Have fun and good luck!

enjoy stock froyo sense ui for awhile... seriously!

 

[ogkhaze]

I used that link before... reflash.exe

worked like a champ!

as far as tips...

read: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=739428

I used this guide quiet a bit...

http://wiki.cyanogenmod.com/index.php?title=Full_Update_Guide_-_HTC_Incredible

I never installed ADB before rooting nor did I mess with the radio (risk of bricking). your DInc should have the latest radio anyways.

Have fun and good luck!

enjoy stock froyo sense ui for awhile... seriously!

I will definitely spend some time on stock, maybe root it at least, but I will for sure get used to it, and get to know what I want changed.

Thanks again for all your tips man.

 

[luvit]

Hey,
I'm unrevoked forever.
I'm thrilled with the leaked Dinc 2.2 rom and hydrakernel.net v0.5 kernel (under volted,but same clock speed).
This will give you enjoyment of a stable rom with root.

 

[FlairDevil]

Virtuous 2.7 ROM + powersaving kernel + rEVOlution theme is my recommended combo and believe me I have tried a bunch! Its incredibly stable - you get to remove a good amount of the crapware and manages to keep the best of sense widgets too. I have tried many others - Ruby/CM in ROMs, King's kernels and various themes (yes they are ROM specific) and this is what I keep going back to.

My 2 cents.

This ^

Just switched to the virtuous ROM 4 days ago from SkyRaider's 2.5.2 (never quite got 3.0/1 working to my liking) which taking nothing from the SkyRaider ROM, it was by far the most bug free, smoothest ROM I had used to date on my DInc. However, there is always a new shiny around the corner, and Virtuous is it for me. There are far better choices though if you want to strip your phone down to nothing and have none of the "wow-factor" features or visual effects installed, but generally thats restricted to the Linux diehards that still think we have to use a terminal to operate a PC. =) I keek i keed!

 

[slak?]

I have used Frankenrom (b6) and Virtuous (from 2.1 through 2.7) fairly thouroughly and had absolutely no problem with either of them. I tried ruby for a few hours a couple days ago and was really enthusiastic with how stripped down it was. The camera didn't seem to go up to the full resolution and I was getting tired so I flashed back to Viruous and went to sleep. I'd be willing to try Ruby again though. I'll probably be giving Redemption a try too in the near future.

 

[ogkhaze]

I have used Frankenrom (b6) and Virtuous (from 2.1 through 2.7) fairly thouroughly and had absolutely no problem with either of them. I tried ruby for a few hours a couple days ago and was really enthusiastic with how stripped down it was. The camera didn't seem to go up to the full resolution and I was getting tired so I flashed back to Viruous and went to sleep. I'd be willing to try Ruby again though. I'll probably be giving Redemption a try too in the near future.

Has anyone had any experience with Uncommon Sense or CM6?

 

[techie_babel]

I'm currently using Ruby 1.1.1 with adrynalyne's alternate kernel and have been very pleased. My previous rom was Virtuous... and I agree with what others have said, it is a great, stable, trimmed down rom that ran great.

 

[ogkhaze]

I want my DInc to look like this:

(Cyanogen Mod 6)

Is there anyway to get this look without using CM6?