[Q] Motorola A855 viable? - Motorola Droid and Milestone Q&A, Help & Troublesh

Hello all, Quick question about the Motorola Droid. I have heard that this is/was a popular phone for custom ROMs. I found a new one locally for $40 and am thinking about purchasing it. I have am currently using a Galaxy S3 which has limited possibilities due to the know that came with 4.3 OTA. I also have been playing with a Samsung Charge but that never really had a lot of ROMs developed and traffic on that forum has come to a standstill.
So my questions, Does the the Motorola Droid forum still happening and functioning? Are there many custom ROMs to play with? A quick glance at post dates lead to mixed data.
Second, the phone I found was a A855 with slide out keyboard. When I see a reference to the 'Motorola Droid' or even the Motorola Droid 1' as in this post http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1098483 are they referring to the A855 or the A853 for even some other phone? Seems confusing.
Thanks for any help!

You know it was a great phone and still is (build quality, screen, qwerty, etc) but it is really outdated.
I mean RAM is the bottleneck of Android and this phone has only 256MB.
If you want a phone to mess around with it, then go ahead, if you need a qwerty Android phone, buy a Moto Photon Q.
Afaik, there are no active developer on the Droid (the development on the Milestone halted a year ago).
Btw, A855 is the NA edition but you can look it up on wikipedia.

It was a great phone while it lasted, and there are a ton of roms out there, but as far as I know there aren't any with active development. I still get mine out every once in a while to mess with, but it isn't really good for anything except a toy at this point.

Related

Should I Get a Droid?

Hi guys(and girls), in 2011, should I get an original Droid? If I bought one it would be my first android phone, i've flashed a custom rom on a windows phone before but i don't know how to root yet, but would it be good for me to get a Droid now? With the newer phones that are out?
Honestly just get a newer and better phone for free. There are many free phones out there that are better hardware and software wise like the inspire 4g(which I have)
I'll pass on a contract.
Juanito216 said:
Hi guys(and girls), in 2011, should I get an original Droid? If I bought one it would be my first android phone, i've flashed a custom rom on a windows phone before but i don't know how to root yet, but would it be good for me to get a Droid now? With the newer phones that are out?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yes! I have one aswell and I can show you or message you on how to
and how to flash roms just like i did
no.
i think a nexus is way better supportet.
google is developing right on the nexus phones. i would by one of these. and not a doird again.
Thanks for the replies, I might wait to get something more advanced. Good things come to those who wait.
GodT2 said:
no.
i think a nexus is way better supportet.
google is developing right on the nexus phones. i would by one of these. and not a doird again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That thing is freaking expensive
Sent from my Droid using XDA Premium App
If I was buying my first Android right now (I bought the Milestone in September of '10) I might look at the Nexus one. I think Amazon has it for around $280, new. The screen size is the same but I think it's a little faster and is obviously better supported.
Consider buying a device with more RAM than droid.
Also you should answer a question, whether you are confortable with touchscreen virtual keyboard or not - I'm not, so I took Milestone
I would consider a keyboardless device ie EVO/HD2/Thunderbolt(big screens), my sister had a Cliq XT at one time and i tried texting on that, my thumbs were kind of big for the buttons?
Well guys, I got a Droid X today.
I've had my Droid for 2 years now and it's been a great device. The development community has been great and there are still a lot of good ROM a currently being developed and supported for it.
While it might not have the most memory, most apps can be pushed to SD. The processor overclocks to 1g (and usually even higher), so it can still match the quadrant scores of many newer phones.
If the price is right, and you want to experiment with rooting and flashing ROMs, not many other phones have as much community support and it's next to impossible to brick a Droid.
I have my Droid (Milestone, actually) for more than a year now and can't say anything bad about the device itself. When it comes down to Motorola, we're talking about a different sport
Motorola's update policy had me waiting for FroYo for months and when it came out, it was a beta-versions, months old that gave a lot of people WLAN-problems. Also the use of the bootloader is a real pain.
If you're willing to install a custom ROM, you're fine, there are good ones out there (I'm using FroyoMOD), but due to the company's update (and bootloader) policy, my next device won't be a Motorola.

[Q] Droid 3's Future / Current Status

Have a few questions for people on the Droid 3, since I haven't been able to find anything elsewhere. Currently have an Epic 4G on Cricket and was thinking about buying a Droid 3 and going to Page Plus to save money (I don't use a LOT of data, and if I do, I'm usually at work/home, so 100MB should be fine if/when I'm on the road or away form home). I had an original Droid, but needed something with a slightly larger screen, better keyboard, front facing camera, etc (which the Droid 3 now has).
1. Is the Droid 3 locked like the Droid 2/X was? I believe it was an encrypted bootloader or something like that. I know HTC apparently is getting away from using locked bootloaders after massive public backlash. It looked like there were a few bootloaders in the development section. In the end, I'll likely want to jump on the CM train and get their firmware, which may take a while. But like most people at XDA, I don't like running stock ROMs.
2. How is the development area for Droid 3? I know Samsung actually has a public portal for releasing source code to kernels, etc, after the OTA (sometimes right before) is released. Does Moto open source its stuff? Just trying to get a feel for how long it'll be (months vs. weeks) for some ROMs, even if they're just deodexed.
3. Is there a better phone to get than the VZW branded one? I saw one from some nigelelectronics or something like that, which was unlocked (the x860 I believe). I don't mind VZW, since I could put it on PagePlus for $30 a month. Is the $200 extra worth it? Does that mean it'd work on AT&T/T-Mobile (I like T-Mobile's month-to-month plans best) and be capable of getting updates for stuff like CyanogenMod, AOSP ROMs, etc? i.e. are they all really the same hardware and can accept flash's from each other's ROMs, but they have hardware locked in different places (i.e. VZW locks out US GSM carriers in the radio, I thought?). I know Samsung Galaxy S's phones share similar core stuff, but modems, keyboard, cameras, etc, are all different and/or not present, so it makes a common ROM for them all impossible.
Sorry for the novel! Just trying to understand where things are at... Thanks in advance!
The bootloader is encrypted. There will be custom roms for it, but we will be unable to use any kernel other then Motorola's. DX and D2 eventually were hacked with 2nd-init which allowed roms like Cyanogenmod and MIUI to run on them. As far as development for the Droid 3 so far, it's pretty much non existent. We just got our hands on some fastboot recovery files that will allow us to recover from any bricks. Now we need a custom recovery and then the roms will begin to roll out.
Thanks for that! Just a few other quick questions.
Given that -- 2nd init I assume is another kernel (or maybe emulator) that runs after and connects into the encrypted one? Is CM a possibility for Droid 3, I think is the real question (and not a "anything is possible... someone might break the encryption or Moto might unencrypt it).
Also -- any thoughts on the different versions of the phone hardware? All mostly same hardware so the ROMs all work on the same phones? Or totally different? Just curious if anyone has thoughts on this from the differences between Moto Milestone 2 vs Droid 2 (but Droid 3 is the Global version as well, since it has SIM enabled by default... so comparison may not be as good)?
Thanks!
2nd init is not another kernel. Its in the name. it is a second init process over the original init that gives us control over the initialization of the system.
Does that same process work for the Droid 3? Is that a possibility, then? Or is that something known that Moto patched (or maybe potentially left in for developers)?
It took a couple people over a year to successfully get 2nd-init to work properly. I wouldn't expect CM7 or MIUI for quite a while. We will have other roms though. Apex and Liberty used motos kernels on the DX and I have to say they were amazing roms.
Sent from my DROID3 using xda premium
I think CM7 will be adapted to the D3 sooner then many would expect. The Droid X already has it and the bionic has similar hardware. I do not think we will have to wait as long as the Droid X did.

NO ICS For Us :(

Just checked the updated Motorola page... looks like this device is stuck at android 2.3 forever.
That really sucks, it's gotta be the 512mb memory that's in the device. I knew that would possibly be an issue when I first got the phone. Maybe we can put more pressure on moto to unlock our bootloader so we can get a fully functional ICS (even if it's hacked) on our devices.
Check the link:
http://forums.motorola.com/pages/00add97d6c
PFFFFFFFFFFFFF
I just saw this as well, very disappointing. I wish they would open up development to the community on devices they no longer plan on upgrading/supporting. I know it will never happen...but I can dream
Droid4 and Bionic get the ICS
maybe Hashcode or some one try to do what he can, and pull out from this phones something for us and for CM9 on D3
niko99 said:
Droid4 and Bionic get the ICS
maybe Hashcode or some one try to do what he can, and pull out from this phones something for us and for CM9 on D3
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Just got a response back from hash regarding this on twitter:
" @danifunker @dhacker29 I have 1 more trick up my sleeve for the D3. And if that doesnt work, then ill drop back to cm7.2 or something. "
Let's hope the tweak works out... but either way I think I could live with CM 7.2, although I would REALLY love running ICS on this phone.
What ever happened to Kexec for the D3? I'll sacrifice a core for a new kernel that could even OC that one to 1.2.
I started to believe that motorola doesn't want anyone to buy motorola products.
calash said:
I just saw this as well, very disappointing. I wish they would open up development to the community on devices they no longer plan on upgrading/supporting. I know it will never happen...but I can dream
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sure would be nice if they would just open up phones when they started considering them legacy devices. Other than 4G which I don't particularly need anyway, the D3 is a great phone that could keep going for a long, long time just like my D1 did (I skipped the D2 and went directly from 1 to 3).
Part of the reason the D1 lasted me so long was that I could keep getting updates for it from Cyanogen. In fact I still have it. Though its no longer on the Vzw network I can test various things on it like security software, remote wipes etc over WiFi.
Verizon is probably against unlocking the D3 because they don't want to have the support issues and that's probably why we will never see it. How many people on these forums do you hear about that are constantly returning/exchanging phones that they have managed to kill through tweaking? Then its those same people who complain the loudest when the Motorola and the carriers won't unlock the phones. So, while I wish it was not so, we will probably never see them unlocked unless someone finds a way to hack them. Motorola isn't going to help and particularly VZW is not going to help.
danifunker said:
Just checked the updated Motorola page... looks like this device is stuck at android 2.3 forever.
That really sucks, it's gotta be the 512mb memory that's in the device. I knew that would possibly be an issue when I first got the phone. Maybe we can put more pressure on moto to unlock our bootloader so we can get a fully functional ICS (even if it's hacked) on our devices.
Check the link:
http://forums.motorola.com/pages/00add97d6c
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
HTC just released the HTC Desire C with a 600Mhz processor and 512MB ram. It runs Android 4.0
If they can do it with that, surely Motorola can too
ChristianPreachr said:
HTC just released the HTC Desire C with a 600Mhz processor and 512MB ram. It runs Android 4.0
If they can do it with that, surely Motorola can too
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's possible that the HVGA screen on that device needs far less memory - HVGA is 480x320 which is 70% less pixels to push than the qHD on the Droid 3. Also, Moto is pretty terrible at software, Blur runs a lot slower and chews up a lot more memory than a lot of its competitors.
What Moto should do is release a plain vanilla, non-blur ICS as an optional upgrade. I have to think that would take a minimal amount of time to port vanilla ICS to the Droid 3 if there is no need to get it working with Blur - just need the drivers which should be substantially similar to Droid 4.
---------- Post added at 05:22 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:18 PM ----------
ratman6161 said:
Sure would be nice if they would just open up phones when they started considering them legacy devices. Other than 4G which I don't particularly need anyway, the D3 is a great phone that could keep going for a long, long time just like my D1 did (I skipped the D2 and went directly from 1 to 3).
Part of the reason the D1 lasted me so long was that I could keep getting updates for it from Cyanogen. In fact I still have it. Though its no longer on the Vzw network I can test various things on it like security software, remote wipes etc over WiFi.
Verizon is probably against unlocking the D3 because they don't want to have the support issues and that's probably why we will never see it. How many people on these forums do you hear about that are constantly returning/exchanging phones that they have managed to kill through tweaking? Then its those same people who complain the loudest when the Motorola and the carriers won't unlock the phones. So, while I wish it was not so, we will probably never see them unlocked unless someone finds a way to hack them. Motorola isn't going to help and particularly VZW is not going to help.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Couldn't they just do what HTC did - online based bootloader unlock tool, which builds a list of unlocked IMEIs which are then voided of their warranty, and people calling for support will be checked against this list. Of course, the most enterprising guys with bricked phones will try to change their IMEI sticker, but that wouldn't match their Verizon account records.
This is so sad... Cant believe that Dual Core Processor phone is not eligable to receive Ice Cream Sandwich... Media shall be contacted, so they could make fun from Motorola... I'm never going to buy Motorola products again.. Ever.
Rlin5741 said:
What Moto should do is release a plain vanilla, non-blur ICS as an optional upgrade. I have to think that would take a minimal amount of time to port vanilla ICS to the Droid 3 if there is no need to get it working with Blur - just need the drivers which should be substantially similar to Droid 4.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Im pretty sure all we need is a compatible kernel and hashcode will take care of the rest. If Motorola could do that, it can extend the life of our phones.
Sent from my XT860 running ICS
Time to do some more Facebook trolling, I may even make an account over on the Motorola forums and do some spamming/trolling.
In July 2011 when I bought my phone there were 2 new Motorola smartphones out there the Droid 3 and Droid X2. Both had dual core processors and felt mid-high end at the time. But somehow an Android OS upgrade that was released less than 6 months after the Droid 3 was released is skipped by Motorola.
This was my first Android phone and I bought it because I wanted a keyboard and really liked the feel of a friends OG Droid. The OG was probably built better but I have still been mostly satisfied with the Droid 3 hardware wise. But I just can't see myself buying another Motorola device. I will have to see what is out there in 2013 when I upgrade, hopefully some nice QWERTY non Motorola devices.
Damn it Verizon
This is the Fourth phone that I've had from Verizon that has been abandoned before the end of it's life cycle. Although I am sure this is Motorola's fault I will curse Verizon for all time and remember to get the latest and greatest for top dollar right off the bat to ensure that I will get updates when dealing with a cell phone company or maybe get a landline and tell jerks like Verizon to stick it where the sun don't shine. The real pisser is that I am finding this out the day after I spent the money that could have been used to buy out my contract. Color me angry and frustrated.
I'm going to start reading up about custom roms for this phone I might as well since support is all but gone from this model.
Return the phone and tell them you want out. Can be done.
Sent from my DROID3 using xda premium
spunker88 said:
Time to do some more Facebook trolling, I may even make an account over on the Motorola forums and do some spamming/trolling.
In July 2011 when I bought my phone there were 2 new Motorola smartphones out there the Droid 3 and Droid X2. Both had dual core processors and felt mid-high end at the time. But somehow an Android OS upgrade that was released less than 6 months after the Droid 3 was released is skipped by Motorola.
This was my first Android phone and I bought it because I wanted a keyboard and really liked the feel of a friends OG Droid. The OG was probably built better but I have still been mostly satisfied with the Droid 3 hardware wise. But I just can't see myself buying another Motorola device. I will have to see what is out there in 2013 when I upgrade, hopefully some nice QWERTY non Motorola devices.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Please don't troll that forum. The mods there aren't actualy affiliated with moto like you think.
I did some of this back in the day about the d2 and learned the hard way.
Sent from my DROID3 using xda premium

[Q] Can Windows 7.5 run on the Bionic?

Hello all developers and super flashers, I recently had to depart from my most awesome phone the HTC HD2 when it could not continue ant longer. My loving wife saw that I really enjoyed flashing so she got me this Droid Bionic because the sales pitch to her was Control it and you control everything. Which brings me to this question I have not seen asked or answered. The same way that the HD2 was able to run android and wp7.5 dual boot can anyone say rather if or not this Bionic is capable of a similar task?
No, and why would you want to gimp the Bionic more than it already is?
The Droid Bionic (and every Moto device on the 4 major USA carriers ever since the Droid X) has carried a locked bootloader. This has the side effect of the kernel only being able to be modified by official Motorola updates that contain a heavily encrypted signature.
Nothing except Android can run, and doing anything else is impossible.

[Q] Third party roms? CM, AOKP, Slim, etc?

Hello all,
I am looking to pick up a Moto X (xt1095) to replace my xt1053. I am a little dismayed however at the lack of availability of roms for the device.
I am used to having CM or Slim or at least gravitybox running, and it looks like none of these are working yet for this phone. Is this simply because of the recent release of Lollipop and the scarcity of the Moto X or is there some underlying problem?
Basically, is there hope for the future?
Probably has more to do with most devs not touching Moto because of how developer hostile they were years ago. Also I suspect most are waiting to see if the Lenovo takeover pushes moto into a more "old moto" stance on devs again.
I was wondering the same, the phone has so much potential, why no development at all?
Thanks for the responses. I was hoping I suppose to at least see CM and some other mainstream developers already onboard, but I guess it's just because 3rd party devs haven't built around lollipop yet.
Same problem with Xposed.
Pan Skrzetuski said:
Hello all,
I am looking to pick up a Moto X (xt1095) to replace my xt1053. I am a little dismayed however at the lack of availability of roms for the device.
I am used to having CM or Slim or at least gravitybox running, and it looks like none of these are working yet for this phone. Is this simply because of the recent release of Lollipop and the scarcity of the Moto X or is there some underlying problem?
Basically, is there hope for the future?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Chris123NT said:
Probably has more to do with most devs not touching Moto because of how developer hostile they were years ago. Also I suspect most are waiting to see if the Lenovo takeover pushes moto into a more "old moto" stance on devs again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There's a short thread in the General section with a developer looking for some files so he can start to build CM11 and 12. Several days old.
I got my pure edition on the way, and I also noticed the lack of ROMs. - I currently have an N5, my girlfriend really likes it so I'm going to give it to her for Christmas, was not really looking to upgrade, but oh well.
I really do hope the scene for this phone picks up a bit, otherwise I might just sell it and go back to N5... Unless the phone is so amazing that it will keep me from the ROM scene, but I don't know... I'm a flashaholic.
On the same subject - My friend got the same phone, but he mentioned needing to contact Motorola to get a bootloader unlock code so he could root it, is that a necessary step, or can that be avoided?
I understand the above step voids warranty, could also be why people are staying away from cooking ROMs for this.
Shemploo said:
I got my pure edition on the way, and I also noticed the lack of ROMs. - I currently have an N5, my girlfriend really likes it so I'm going to give it to her for Christmas, was not really looking to upgrade, but oh well.
I really do hope the scene for this phone picks up a bit, otherwise I might just sell it and go back to N5... Unless the phone is so amazing that it will keep me from the ROM scene, but I don't know... I'm a flashaholic.
On the same subject - My friend got the same phone, but he mentioned needing to contact Motorola to get a bootloader unlock code so he could root it, is that a necessary step, or can that be avoided?
I understand the above step voids warranty, could also be why people are staying away from cooking ROMs for this.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You just have to go to their website( https://motorola-global-portal.custhelp.com/app/standalone/bootloader/unlock-your-device-a ) and follow their instructions to unlock their phone.. Contacting them is not necessary. Voiding the warranty has been the case for multiple phones, however it hasn't stopped devs before.. Doubt that is the case
I bought the pure edition yesterday, I did my research and figured it would be better than a nexus 6 (way to big for me) and bought it. I assumed there was plenty of Dev work, I mean its a near stock phone and will likely outsell the nexus 6, but there's not even an official build of CM!!! Even the gnex is getting cm12. I just don't understand it. Z
IRX120 said:
I bought the pure edition yesterday, I did my research and figured it would be better than a nexus 6 (way to big for me) and bought it. I assumed there was plenty of Dev work, I mean its a near stock phone and will likely outsell the nexus 6, but there's not even an official build of CM!!! Even the gnex is getting cm12. I just don't understand it. Z
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's funny cause CM is my least favorite of ROMs, they always seem to break things when they make changes, and ROMs based on CM are always left in the dark trying to catch up, fix whatever broke as result.
If there's not much being developed for this, I suppose I'd probably go back to 4.4 and work around it with xposed.
I think more development will come in time but I think most are waiting for stable 5.0 first. I look forward to gravitybox but personally I have never been as happy on any rom as I am AOSP(ish) and don't see the need with a phone like this to install any roms. It was more necessary back "in the day" to get rid of crapware and overbloated UI's (*cough* Touchwiz *cough*). Phones like the Nexus series, GPE editions, and the Moto X's have made me personally re-evaluate my interest in full ROM's.
If you guys were around when the original Moto x came out, then you'd remember that it also had a lack of roms and dev action when it launched... However now it's getting cm 12 like no one's business... I think it's just a matter of time before the roms start rolling in

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