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December 5, 2012 By: Joseph Hindy
Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve been bringing you news of mskip’s toolkits making it to the Nexus 4 and the Nexus 10. It’s a popular and well known toolkit with extensive features. There is a second toolkit making its way around to Nexus devices, known as Wug’s Nexus Root Toolkit. We brought you news that it was released for the Nexus 7. Now, it’s available for the Samsung Nexus S and Nexus S 4G, the Nexus 4, and the Nexus 10.
XDA Recognized Developer WugFresh has been busy this month. The toolkit has made to five different Nexus devices in just a few weeks. The core features of the toolkit are the same for all releases, and include:
This program will automatically bring together all the files you need to unlock and root your device in a few clicks, or flash it back to stock and re-lock it. You can also use this program to backup/restore all your important data, flash zips, set file permissions, push and pull files, install apps, and much more! With the included file association options, you can perform tasks like flashing zips, installing apps, restoring android backup files, and flashing/booting img files with just a double click! The program includes a full featured interface for automating tasks in TWRP, enhanced restore features, an in-built auto-updater/notification system, ‘any build’ mode, and quick tools utilities. All the latest Android builds and Nexus devices are now officially supported, including the new Nexus 10, Nexus 4, and 3G Nexus 7 (with full 4.2.0 support).
The premise of this toolkit is to make rooting easy and provide a few extra features like installing applications and pushing files. For those looking for a root-bringing toolkit, you should give them a shot.
To learn more, check out the Nexus S thread, the Nexus S 4G, the Nexus 4 thread, or the Nexus 10 thread.
December 4, 2012 By: Joseph Hindy
Ports are quite popular around these parts. Aside from offering an often times vastly different experience, users can experience all new features not available on their stock firmware. The more unique the port, the better. Now, the Samsung Nexus S has a Kindle Fire 8.9 port.
The port was released by XDA Senior Member GalaxyUser. As can be expected with an early port of something so different as the Kindle Fire HD ROM, there are quite a few things still wrong. They include:
Camera (there is no camera app and camera from CM does not work
Bluetooth (not present in settings)
SDCard
Sound
Some option in settings
Call
Others things
Reboot because of libaudioflinger
This is by no means a daily driver. However, it is a really cool concept. In most cases, developers are trying to get other ROMs to the Kindle tablets. It’s not very often that a Kindle tablet ROM gets ported elsewhere. This ROM is an initial release, so users can expect the ROM to get better as updates come out. If you’re into the Kindle Fire HD and want to see what it’s all about, this is an awesome ROM to try.
For more info, check out the original thread.
December 2, 2012 By: Joseph Hindy
Earlier, we brought you news that the universal naked driver received a well deserved update. For those who are unaware of the universal naked driver, it is a project that fits as many drivers as possible into a single driver install to save new users hassle. It’s been updated once again, and this time for the newer Nexus devices.
The new update supports the Nexus 4, Nexus 10, Nexus Q, and—even though it’s a little late—the Nexus S. XDA Senior Member 1wayjonny posted the update in the Nexus 4 forums. The drivers are supported on Windows XP, Vista, 7, and 8.
For most Windows machines, it’s a matter of installing the drivers like any other driver, which is install and go. Windows 8 users may have a more complicated time installing it, but it’s still pretty easy. 1wayjonny posted a tutorial for Windows 8 users to disable driver signature enforcement, so that the drivers can be installed correctly. Once installed, all your devices should be supported under a single driver. For anyone who has a number of devices or plans on adding a member of the Nexus family to their device list, this is definitely something to check out.
To learn more, check out the original thread.
October 31, 2012 By: Joseph Hindy
Most ROMs typically seen on Nexus devices are derivatives of AOSP. That’s to be expected, as the developer friendly nature is a selling point for many. Sometimes, though, it’s fun to see software typically found on OEM-skinned devices on a Nexus. Such is the case with the Samsung Nexus S, which now has a LG SU660 port.
XDA Senior Member GalaxyUser released the ported ROM. While we’d like to tell you that the ROM is fully functional, it unfortunately isn’t. As it is an initial release, there are some issues. The not working list includes:
Can’t unlocking sim card correctly (see screenshot)
External SD
Wifi
Vibrator (i think i know how to fix that)
android.process.media is force closing sometime (because of External SD)
Camera (because of External SD)
Sometime blocking status bar and home
It was also mentioned that phone calls and text messages aren’t currently possible either. These are issues that are being fixed currently, though, so it is only a matter of time before the ROM is usable. As always, anyone who wants to help out should feel free.
For additional details, check out the original thread.
September 11, 2012 By: jerdog
As we’ve discussed before, the allure of the Google Nexus devices are their timely updates to the latest and greatest versions of Android. However, that has hardly been the case for the CDMA Nexus devices. With the Verizon Galaxy Nexus receiving test builds of Jelly Bean, Sprint users have been wondering when their official Jelly Bean update would be coming for the Samsung Nexus S 4G and the Galaxy Nexus. After the OTA update was put on hold last week, Sprint is now officially rewarding their customer’s patience.
According to Sprint, the Galaxy Nexus update brings:
Nexus Software Update – L700.FH05
Enhancements/Fixes:
Operating system upgrade Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. Below is a list of a few changes:
- Notification Bar – Expanded view of emails
- Meeting Makers – more information to notification bar. Provides the ability to snooze and dismiss meetings from the notification bar.
- Addition of Google Now (online search):
- Voice search
- Integrated approach to search features within Google services
And the Nexus S 4G update brings:
Nexus S Software Update – JRO03R
Enhancements/Fixes:
Operating system upgrade Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. Below is a list of a few changes:
- Notification Bar: Expanded view of emails
- Meeting Makers: more information to notification bar. Provides the ability to snooze and dismiss meetings from the notification bar.
- Addition of Google Now (online search):
- Voice search
- Integrated approach to search features within Google services
As always, applying the update will remove root. So if that is important to you, make sure to watch for a rooted update from one of XDA’s talented developers.
August 30, 2012 By: jerdog
It’s T-Minus 30 seconds and counting on a beautiful, sunny day. The launch vehicle stands on the launching pad, ready to take the latest NASA satellite into space. And you stand a mile away, ready to see this amazing event. You are handed a pair of binoculars so you peer into the distance to see the rocket, and… wait! What’s this? A green Android emblem on the side of the rocket? Is Google now in the space rocket business? What gives?
This may seem far-fetched, but NASA, in an attempt to cut budget while still achieving its core mission parameters, is ready to make this a reality. While the rocket may not have an Android emblem on the side, it will be an Android-powered mission. They have recently begun a PhoneSat project, combining a Google Nexus handset with a satellite. This project will be the cheapest and easiest satellite project ever, and will cost just $3,500 to build. Contrast that to the typical uber-billion dollar projects we’ve become accustomed to, and it seems like a win-win for NASA.
The first project, PhoneSat 1.0, will combine a Google Nexus One, with its sole purpose being to beam pictures of space back to ground control. At the same time, the tiny satellite will be monitoring its own health and keeping NASA informed about any ill-effects space has on its hardware. Assuming the mission is a success, future missions will utilize newer Google Nexus hardware, with PhoneSat 2.0 being run by a Nexus S and featuring a two-way radio (for controlling the satellite from Earth), solar panels for longer flight, and a GPS transponder for accurate positioning.
The goal of the PhoneSat project is to allow NASA mission designers to launch satellites for a vast array of purposes, which keeping the cost down to something very inexpensive. And by embracing agile development principles of “release early, release often” NASA will be able to respond to needs quickly.
Who else wants to get ahold of the OS build used to power the satellite?
August 18, 2012 By: jerdog
We recently told you about the CyanogenMod team beginning work on CM10. Now, a significant milestone has been reached: CM10 Nightlies have appeared for select devices. For those who aren’t familiar, a nightly build is an automatic build incorporating the latest changes in CM source for a device. Yesterday, CyanogenMod released the list of those devices that would be getting the first round of nightlies:
# The US SGS3 variants (AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint)
# The Galaxy Nexus variants
# The Nexus S varaints
# The Nexus 7
# The Transformer and Transformer Prime
# The SGS1 variants (Vibrant, Captivate, International, and i9000b)
# The SGS2 i9100g
# P3 and P5 tablets
That list will grow as other devices become ready and receive the blessing from their maintainers to begin nightlies. Be sure to keep your eyes open for when your device joins the list.
Update: We’ve received various reports from XDA Forum Member Scotto70 and others that the Nexus 7 build is currently nonfunctional. So if you’ve got a N7, we recommend that you hold off for the time being!
August 11, 2012 By: Haroon Q. Raja
With the release of the Jelly Bean source code to AOSP last month, we are seeing more and more of Jelly Bean ROMs ported to various Android devices. Slim Bean is the Jelly Bean variant of the popular Slim ICS ROM, and it is now available for several devices including the Samsung Vibrant, Nexus S, Galaxy Nexus (Verizon, sprint, and GSM variants), Samsung Captivate, and Samsung Galaxy S I9000.
Slim Bean’s predecessor Slim ICS has been quite popular as a very lightweight and fast AOSP-based ICS ROM, with just the right amount of tweaks and mods added to it, including some by the ROM developer and others from AOKP and CyanogenMod. With Slim Bean, XDA Recognized Contributor krarvind aims to bring the same features to Jelly Bean, while still keeping it fast and lean in the tradition of his previous work.
You can download all variants of Slim Bean ROMs from the Slim ROMs website. Below are the links to the device-specific threads for Slim Bean where you can find more details and join the discussion:
July 28, 2012 By: Haroon Q. Raja
Have you updated your Samsung Nexus S to the JRO03E Jelly Bean OTA from a custom ROM? Do you now find yourself looking for an insecure boot image like you had before? We’ve got you covered.
For those unfamiliar, having an insecure boot image allows you to use adb remount and adb push system files. While most custom ROMs ship with insecure boot, stock ROMs obviously do not. So if you updated your Nexus S to the stock Jelly Bean OTA, you likely have noticed that adb remount no longer works and you are now unable to adb push and adb pull files from the /system partition.
Coming from a custom ROM, XDA News Writer HQRaja (that would be yours truly) found this crippling after the JB update, so I pulled the boot image, unpacked it, set it to insecure, and repacked it. You can grab the insecure boot image the original thread or my blog and flash it to your phone using fastboot.
July 25, 2012 By: Will Verduzco
As those of us lucky enough to be running Jelly Bean have found out, Adobe Flash isn’t officially supported. While many no longer care about the dying technology, quite a few of us still have use for it.
XDA Recognized Contributor stempox has found that by simply side-loading the APK, users are able to view media content as always through the native Android browser app. From there, users simply have to enable plugins in the browser settings, as was done in previous versions of Android.
Naturally, this will not work with Chrome Browser, which doesn’t support plugins and has supposedly replaced Browser as the default web browser on the platform. However, since Browser still comes as the default browser on the Galaxy Nexus and (presumably the Nexus S), this still has the potential to help quite a few.
For those running the Google Nexus 7, which does not come preloaded with Browser, you must manually install Browser. Luckily, this is also possible, thanks to a guide written by XDA Forum Member Censura_Umbra. In order to accomplish this, users need to copy over Browser.apk to /system/app using a root-enabled file manager and modify its permissions accordingly. Afterward, users have to remove or rename a couple of files that would otherwise cause issues with the app. What about Flash? According to XDA Forum Member NeoMagus, Flash content works just fine when installing Browser this way. Alternatively, users have reported that side-loading the latest version of Firefox browser works as well.
To get started, head over to the Adobe Flash and Nexus 7 Browser installation threads.
July 21, 2012 By: Joseph Hindy
When Jelly Bean source was first released, it was automatically assumed that the first devices to receive an official update would be the Nexus devices. Not long after, that actually happened for the Galaxy Nexus and Nexus 7, leaving owners of older Nexus devices wondering when it would be their turn. In fact, the Samsung Nexus S forums had a thread dedicated to the countdown of the Jelly Bean update. Luckily, the wait is now over, as the Nexus S Jelly Bean OTA has been released.
The thread above, maintained by XDA Senior Member oldblue910, along with this thread posted by XDA Forum Member ffaiz.m both have download links to the OTA if you don’t feel like waiting for the OTA to get rolled out to you.
The OTA appears to only be for the i9020T and i9023. As reported by PocketNow:
According to reports, i9023 variants of the phone should be able to upgrade and there’s even a link for the file on Google’s servers. It also appears that i9020T flavors can also use the refresh.
Welcome to the official Jelly Bean club, Nexus S owners. For additional information, check out the links above.
July 12, 2012 By: Will Verduzco
Just about three months ago, we brought you news that the Team Win Recovery Project had received a massive update to version 2.1. April’s release largely heralded the start of a new age in recoveries—where one would no longer have to deal with cumbersome menus, instead interacting with a very user-friendly GUI.
It wasn’t simply about the GUI either. In addition to bringing an unrivaled level of UI polish, TWRP 2.1 offered users many advanced features such as update.zip queuing, a basic file manager, and dual storage support for Nandroid backups. Additionally, TWRP added support for the open source scripting engine OpenRecoveryScript, which works in conjunction with the previously covered GooManager.
How do you follow up something as revolutionary as TWRP 2.1? With TWRP 2.2, of course. That’s how! The new release builds on the previous offering by delivering many recovery “firsts.” For starters, this is the first recovery to feature on on-screen keyboard. Why would you want such a thing? How about naming and renaming Nandroid backups! TWRP 2.2 is also the only recovery to split extremely large backups, allowing users to backup and restore /data partitions larger than the 2 GB FAT32 file size limit.
In the words of XDA Recognized Developer Dees_Troy:
- On-screen keyboard in recovery! — supports long press, backspace repeat, and swipe left deletes everything left of the cursor
- Name new backups and rename existing backups
- Rename files and folders in the file manager
- Pseudo-terminal emulator
- Support decrypting an encrypted data partition on Galaxy Nexus (enter password using keyboard)
- Backup archive splitting — allows backup and restore of data partitions larger than 2GB
- Simplified XML layout support between resolutions
- Added dual storage selection radio buttons to zip install, backup, and restore pages
- Improved zip install compatibility
- Updated update-binary source code
- Numerous small bug fixes and improvements
Eager to get started? I know I am. Head to the links below to obtain the appropriate version for your device:
June 16, 2012 By: Conan Troutman
Audio latency has always been an issue for Android, not a massive deal breaker of an issue for the average user, but an issue none the less—especially for those of us who use applications such as VoIP clients or emulated instruments. For those unaware of the problem, audio latency is the delay between an audio event being triggered and the sound emerging from the speaker. For example, if you press a key on a piano application and notice a delay between touching the screen and hearing the sound, that’s latency.
The issue was actually brought up at I/O just over a year ago and the response was this;
“Latency is a big problem. We’re working at, hopefully we hope to be able to do something about it with ICS. As we investigated it it’s actually a pretty complex problem. There are a number of different places where latency gets introduced. Most of the latency is introduced below Android. Basically it’s happening in the drivers or in the chipsets or somewhere in there, and some of these are really obscene amounts like hundreds of milliseconds of latency in the audio path. So, that’s something we’re going to push on. We started/ I think we introduced something in CDD Gingerbread which was a “should” hit certain latencies. But it’s a problem we want to deal with and hopefully the next release will get it. Obviously it’s not going to solve the problems for legacy devices but it’s going to get better.”
Well, unfortunately the next release didn’t get it. Android 4.0 still suffers from this annoying flaw, and for some the problem seems to have worsened. We can only assume that the problem lies beyond the reach of the Android developers, or they simply had more important issues to address. Perhaps somebody will ask the question again this year at I/O. Nudge nudge, wink wink…
However, Nexus S and GSM Galaxy Nexus owners have a modification that improves the audio latency of your device thanks to XDA Forum Members Windows X and vonVideo. The fix is basically a modified version of their respective audio libraries. Although the original mod for the Nexus S is in a much more advanced state than the mod for the Galaxy Nexus, both seem to have had positive effects for users. It’s worth mentioning that these fixes are not applicable to all ROMs and kernels, so make sure to read the original threads and create a backup before making any changes.
You can find the fixes in the Nexus S thread and the Galaxy Nexus thread.
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