Samsung Galaxy Express I8730 Q&A

[petraru1]

@petraru1: First off i 've seen that the main discussion is on the development post but i can't post in the development sections yet so i must reply here:

According to the Wikypedia article on Snapdragon (soc) (sorry, can't post links yet, google it), the Samsung Express uses a Snapdragon S4 Plus MSM8930 proccesor like the one found in HTC One VX, HTC One SV (4G Version) and Nokia Lumia 625.

The Samsung S4 Mini uses the Snapdragon 400 8230AB processor found also in Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini Duos.

I'm afraid that the S4 Mini is a dead-road because it's quite different inside.

i`ve made a quick search on gsmarena, they tricked me , i will look into htc, thnx for the tips. sadly, i said that i am not a developer before even getting the phone, and people shouldn`t get the hoppes to high, but i am trying my best to find a solution.
building cwm from source requires some knowledge, there are some tutorial to build cwm from source, but sadly i don't have allot of free time... but the most important step is to build a cwm, because making a ROM is much simpler, i only have to make a adb pull and deodex some apps, then i can make some tweaks etc. but first thing is cwm sadly

edit: i allmoust forgot, even if s4 mini has different cpu the boot.img should be similar to the i8730

 

[aureljared]

i`ve made a quick search on gsmarena, they tricked me , i will look into htc, thnx for the tips. sadly, i said that i am not a developer before even getting the phone, and people shouldn`t get the hoppes to high, but i am trying my best to find a solution.
building cwm from source requires some knowledge, there are some tutorial to build cwm from source, but sadly i don't have allot of free time... but the most important step is to build a cwm, because making a ROM is much simpler, i only have to make a adb pull and deodex some apps, then i can make some tweaks etc. but first thing is cwm sadly

edit: i allmoust forgot, even if s4 mini has different cpu the boot.img should be similar to the i8730

Tried your recovery, display doesn't always work. When it does, the screen puts on a bluish tint, and the options are cut off at the left side (i.e. "ckup and restore" is visible instead of "backup and restore"). But I guess everything is okay, except for the recovery log. It says something about an error with outputting the recovery.fstab file.
Anyway, when the display doesn't work, what happens is that the Samsung branding becomes distorted and the screen lights up abnormally.

Sent from my GT-I8730 using Tapatalk 4

 

[petraru1]

oh, i feel so helpless...htc one sv guys got a kernel with OC... http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2395292
nice benchmarks

 

[doarmga]

Just my two cents:

My guess would be that the options seem to be cutoff because that recovery is meant for 540 x 960 resolution not 480 x 800 like our Express has.
If i may i would suggest trying to port a cwm that matches our display size and resolution. The At&T variant (i437) has those specs but uses a Snapdragon MSM8960 which comes equipped with Adreno 225 GPU vs our Adreno 305 (so different video driver).
I still feel that our best bet would be trying to follow the path taken by the HTC One SV developers...

 

[petraru1]

ok, today I tested intensively the governors and i/o
according to my feelings the best performance i was getting from ondemand and noop, it really fells much more smoother
just use no frills cpu from playstore, it works good

 

[plantunes]

Hi there.
Can anyone tell me which is the code to enter ENGINEERING MENU? I'm trying to SIM unlock my Galaxy Express, but the code shown on the first menu (S3 method) does nothing on mine.
Thanks

 

[KINGbabasula]

Test Cwm Recovery

My test cwm is ready http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=44735557#post44735557

 

[jek20]

how can restore it to original recovery if i try your cwm?

 

[KINGbabasula]

how can restore it to original recovery if i try your cwm?

If you click on link you see explanation. Flash update.zip from stock recovery and test it. After reboot it is gone. If it works flash the tar.md5 via odin and flash the firmware to restore the original

Inviato dal mio GT-I9070 con Tapatalk 2

 

[jek20]

ok thanks for explanation!

 

[HattoriShinsan]

Hi, I'm considering buying the Express, but I'm still doubtful (the alternative being the SIII mini). Has someone tried them both? Any practical insight? My main concern is that the Express would be too big (but on the plus side it has LTE)... thanks a lot to anyone who will bother to reply
PS: of course if I'm going to choose the Express I'll be available for testing

 

[rjlouro]

Hi, I'm considering buying the Express, but I'm still doubtful (the alternative being the SIII mini). Has someone tried them both? Any practical insight? My main concern is that the Express would be too big (but on the plus side it has LTE)... thanks a lot to anyone who will bother to reply
PS: of course if I'm going to choose the Express I'll be available for testing

I too had that question, and decided to go with the Express because of NFC. Where I work we are experimenting with NFC and it would be a plus. After 3 months I wish I had bought the 3 mini, the express is huge and the software is extremely buggy. Until a custom rom is available this thing is a terrible phone, crashs, reboots, all sorts of problems. If the only plus you get from the express is LTE, I'd say forget LTE and go for the mini.

 

[KINGbabasula]

I made new build of cwm. Can anybody test it? http://tinyw.in/DrQE

Inviato dal mio GT-I9070 con Tapatalk 2

 

[HattoriShinsan]

I too had that question, and decided to go with the Express because of NFC. Where I work we are experimenting with NFC and it would be a plus.

Wow, thanks, for some reason I was sure the 3 mini had NFC too... Anyway that's not something I actually need (even if I'd like to play with it ).

the express is huge and the software is extremely buggy. Until a custom rom is available this thing is a terrible phone, crashs, reboots, all sorts of problems.

I'm really sorry to hear that the size was one of my main concerns, but I never heard of bugginess before... Well, thanks for the advice, at this point I'll probably go with the SIII (that's also cheaper atm).

 

[rjlouro]

Wow, thanks, for some reason I was sure the 3 mini had NFC too... Anyway that's not something I actually need (even if I'd like to play with it ).


I'm really sorry to hear that the size was one of my main concerns, but I never heard of bugginess before... Well, thanks for the advice, at this point I'll probably go with the SIII (that's also cheaper atm).

Depending on the market, some S3 mini have NFC, not here in Portugal. The galaxy express is pretty much the same size as the regular S3, a little smaller but fatter. I compared both and I wish I had the money to the S3 =(

 

[HattoriShinsan]

Depending on the market, some S3 mini have NFC, not here in Portugal.

Neither in Italy (as far as I've seen until now). Actually, all S3 mini NFC I've seen on ebay came from UK...

The galaxy express is pretty much the same size as the regular S3, a little smaller but fatter. I compared both and I wish I had the money to the S3 =(

yep, apparently all the phones that have what I want are either huge or way out of budget XD For a while I did consider also some "exotic" phones (like the new Oppo or the Fairphone) but in the end seems like mainstream devices are the way to go I hope you'll manage to build some good roms for the Express anyway (my current phone is a very cheap huawei and it wouldn't have lasted this long without custom roms)

 

[petraru1]

I too had that question, and decided to go with the Express because of NFC. Where I work we are experimenting with NFC and it would be a plus. After 3 months I wish I had bought the 3 mini, the express is huge and the software is extremely buggy. Until a custom rom is available this thing is a terrible phone, crashs, reboots, all sorts of problems. If the only plus you get from the express is LTE, I'd say forget LTE and go for the mini.

dude, you have problems with your phone, go to service center because my phone works perfect i have 45 apps installed, 8 accounts synced and i am left with 577 MB out of 807 and never go higher than 650 MB. The phone works great i have no lag, crashes, reboots or any other problem.

 

[Relativedegree]

The same with mine, absolutely no issues, works lagless.
Any news about an android update to 4.2.2?

 

[HattoriShinsan]

Good to know... I went for the SIII mini (and I'm happy about it, the express would have been really to big for me) but if you say the Express it's not so bad I'll seriously consider it for my father

 

[rjlouro]

dude, you have problems with your phone, go to service center because my phone works perfect i have 45 apps installed, 8 accounts synced and i am left with 577 MB out of 807 and never go higher than 650 MB. The phone works great i have no lag, crashes, reboots or any other problem.

What firmware version are you running? I'm running I8730XWAMB8, tried I8730XXAMB7 and it's worse. Haven't tried the latest I8730XWAMG6 though.