HTC’s Android Lollipop update roadmap

According to the HTC-Vietnam site, Android 5.0 Lollipop update with the HTC Sense UI on board is suppose to land on multiple HTC devices in 2015. Thanks to HTC's impressive update timing we can already enjoy Lollipop taste on the HTC One M7 and the HTC One M8 in both Sense and Google Play Edition flavours. Earlier in 2014 we already wrote about possible roadmap in this article: "HTC devices to receive Android 5.0 "Lollipop" update". Here are some fresh details:

January:

• HTC One M8
• HTC One M7

February:

• HTC One E8
• HTC Desire Eye
• HTC One M8 Eye
• HTC Butterfly 2

March:

• HTC One Max
• HTC One M7 Dual SIM
• HTC Desire 816
• HTC Desire 820u
• HTC One Mini 2
• HTC One E8 (China)
• HTC One M8 Eye (China)

April:

• HTC One Mini 2 (UL)
• HTC Desire 610
• HTC Desire 820s
• HTC Desire 510
• HTC One Mini

As you can see, HTC is about to update all of the high-end and most of the middle-end devices. Well done, HTC!

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How to: Fix no access to the virtual SD card after Android Lollipop update

This solution is based on the experience with some HTC and Nexus devices, however it will work on any device running Android Lollipop or newer/older Android OS with SELinux (Security-Enhanced Linux) kernel security module.

What's the problem? Sometimes you might not be able to access the content of the internal userdata memory, also known as "virtual SD card" - located as /data/media/0 on the userdata partition. The "bad" workaround is to boot the device in a recovery mode and gain the access to all files from there, but this doesn't solve the problem at all.

Repair Process
Note: root required!

1. Download this mini-sdk package and extract it to c:\mini-sdk
2. Connect your device to the PC
3. Start up the device normally, wait until system is fully loaded
4. Open a command prompt on the PC (cmd.exe), type and confirm each command with ENTER:
5. cd /d c:\mini-sdk
6. adb shell
7. su
8. restorecon -FR /data/media/0
9. exit

What's going to happen? Restorecon is a program used to restore file(s) default SELinux security contexts. It can be run at any time to correct errors or to add support for new policy. With a corrected SELinux security context for the /data/media/0 you will be able to access the content of the virtual SD card again.

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HTC One M8 received Android 5.0.1 Lollipop with the HTC Sense 6 UI

The best smartphone of the 2014 – the HTC One M8 is already running Android 5.0.1 with the HTC Sense 6.0 interface. Thanks to the OTA update package from the 13th January HTC One M8 owners can already enjoy all the goodies that comes with one of the biggest Android platform update – Lollipop.

The UI is slightly refreshed, but it’s still HTC Sense 6.0 after all. However, HTC is already working on the HTC Sense 7 update that will become official together with the HTC One M9 premiere (if that’s the proper name).

Currently only the HTC One M8 Developer Edition is getting Lollipop OTA and it’s tagged as 4.16.1540.8. WWE Edition (.401) is around the corner too, and it should appear later this week. It will be tagged as 4.16.401.8. But don’t be disappointed, you can already have Android 5.0.1 Lollipop running on your device, even if it’s not the Developer Edition. Just head to this thread and install the latest Android Revolution HD 30.1 based on the 4.16.1540.8 update. It should work on most variants of the HTC One M8, except the U.S. models.

One of the biggest changes in Android 5.0 is ART (Android Runtime) - an application runtime environment used by the older Android mobile operating system. ART replaces Dalvik, which is the process virtual machine originally used by Android, and performs transformation of the application's bytecode into native instructions that are later executed by the device's runtime environment. ART brings improvements in performance, garbage collection, applications debugging and profiling. Among with a tones of security fixes and other major changes, Android 5.0 Lollipop also contains major new platform features for developers, with over 5,000 new APIs added for use by applications.

It's definitely one of the most important system update in the Android history. And since HTC One M8 is the best Android device up to date, it's a must have update for every HTC One M8 owner.

Android 5.0.1 Lollipop with the HTC Sense 6.0 for the HTC One M8 (4.16.1540.8) - link

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HTC One M8 after 6 months of use - "With a great power comes a great responsibility"

Being one of the lucky owners of the HTC One M8 I decided to write a few more words about that Android powered beast. It’s been already 6 months since I use it as my daily device and during that time I believe I discovered all pros and cons of the HTC One M8. My previous full review can be found here - HTC One M8 - My point of (re)view. Below I tried to summarize all my thoughts about the best Android device of the 2014.

1. The design. It's always been one of the strongest point of the HTC products. Looking back in time I remember the HTC Desire HD, HTC Sensation or HTC One X being one step ahead of the competition when it comes to the design. Nothing changed since then - HTC One M8 is the best looking Android phone up to date. Even tho there is just a little space for the creativity because 90% of the front panel is a touch screen, the HTC designers did a great job planning the remaining 10%. The aluminium uni-body construction has no competition among other Android devices. It just looks great and it feels amazing in the hand. What can I say about the competition? I like Sony Xperia design and that's all. Samsung Galaxy S5 looks no different to Galaxy S4 and Galaxy S3. It's just equipped with an extra aid kit. It seems that Samsung is somehow still in the 2012.
   Design: +1





2. The fragility. Aluminium is your friend when it comes to the design, but on the other hand it suffers from a painful disadvantage - it's very delicate. Even tho I've been using two different, both original HTC covers (HTC Flip Case and Translucent Hard Shell) I was not able to save my device from a few little scratches and two deeper ones. However, I haven't dropped it even once. Furthermore, my HTC One M8 never touched a keys or anything that could leave a mark on it. Yet it's not in a perfect condition, which hurts my eyes badly. In addition, there is this very thin black, plastic frame between the alu-body and a screen (including speakers). I think it's the most delicate part of the device. It deforms really easily and quickly.
   Fragility: -1





3. The performance. Having Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 (4 x Krait 400 @ 2.26 GHz) on board, together with Adreno 330 GPU @ 578 MHz and LPDDR3 RAM @ 933 MHz means nothing but a pure power. I literally found no game so far that would lag on the HTC One M8. The UI is very fast and smooth, even scrolling the phone book with a hundred of entries there (most with pictures) gives no lags or slowdowns. Everything just works as it should. I think this is my first Android device that has no performance issues. Probably this is not just thanks to the great hardware, but also very well optimized HTC Sense code and Android 4.4.4 in general. HTC One M8 CPU also doesn't throttle too much thanks to the very well designed heat dissipation. But that's the next paragraph.
   Performance: +1
   
4. The heat. Uncle Ben would say - "With a great power comes a great responsibility". That's very true. In Android super-phones world we can paraphrase it saying that with a great power comes a great... heat. And it turned out that this problem is finally solved. The HTC One M8 doesn't overheat at all. That means the CPU doesn't throttle and down-clock which has a very positive effect on the general performance. I'm not saying it's cold all the time, but it's definitely less warm in a stress situations than the HTC One M7. Even tho both devices are built from aluminium in a most part, the M8 must have better heat dissipation solutions inside the body plus the Snapdragon 801 generates less heat.
   Heat: +1
   
5. The UI. HTC Sense UI is known since years to be the best Android user interface. HTC One M8 comes with an HTC Sense 6.0 UI and as a user of every previous Sense versions I must say it's definitely the best one. It expands the features and possibilities of an Android device and gives very clean, simple and aesthetic user experience. It's also very smooth and easy to learn for a beginner HTC user. Having Samsung device (Note P605) on my left I must say these two user interfaces are not even comparable. What's exciting is that HTC Sense 7.0 is already under development and we'll see it officially probably in March 2015 during the HTC One M9 (?) launch event.
   The UI: +1
   
   
   
   
   

Conclusion: The market of Android phones is pretty big. But if you are looking for a decent device, with a great look, feel and performance there is only one choice - the HTC One M8. It has no competition in terms of the design, it has a great performance and it doesn't overheat. What's more it comes with a great User Interface, latest Android version and what's very important it regularly receives software updates from the HTC. The next one coming is with Android 5.0.2 Lollipop and it should arrive any day!

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New Rooting Tools (1.0) for the HTC One M8 (3.28.401.9)

Here it is! Newest Rooting Tools 1.0 for the HTC One M8 3.28.401.9 system software just arrived. Don't want to flash any custom ROM but looking for a root access on your HTC One M8? No problem - it's what Rooting Tools are for! What's included?

• [boot.img] disabled ro.adb.secure and ro.secure
• [boot.img] disabled USB debugging icon on statusbar
• [boot.img] enabled USB debugging by default
• [boot.img] init.d scripts support (system/etc/init.d)
• [boot.img] removed trigger command to execute install_recovery.sh to prevent stock recovery from being re-installed after each system reboot
• latest SuperSu application (Superuser.apk) and binaries (su, daemonsu) (chainifre)
• proper init.d script to run daemonsu binary as a daemon
• special wp_mod.ko kernel module to disable HTC system RW protection (flar2)
• proper init.d script to insert the wp_mod.ko module into the kernel
• busybox
• sysrw/sysro binaries for quick system partition re-mount

Device rooted with the above method should have no problems installing latest official OTA update because:

a) OTA update checks for files integrity, but it doesn't check if any extra files were added to the system partition.
b) OTA update doesn't check the integrity of the boot.img, so you can flash a custom kernel if you want.

boot.img source: 3.28.401.9

target device: HTC One M8 (0P6B10000)

target device OS version: 3.28.401.9

Download:

Rooting Tools are available for download here. More details and discussion about Rooting Tools can be found on my XDA thread.

If you are a power user and a custom ROMs flasher, you can also grab the latest Android Revolution HD based on the 3.28.401.9 update with many extra goodies under the hood.

All above files can be accessed via Downloads Page on my blog.

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HTC Google Play applications

It is now a common practice among different phone manufactures to re-distribute some of the system applications via Google Play store. Today we created a complete list of the HTC apps you can install on your HTC device. Keep in mind that to install and use some of them you might need to have a device running HTC Sense 6 launcher.

Name: HTC Camera
Version: 6.65.837374
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Sense TV
Version: 2.7.832846
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Service Pack
Version: 1.0.835811
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Scribble
Version: 3.1.831220
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Dot View
Version: 1.3.835614
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Transfer
Version: 1.0.20313
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC BlinkFeed
Version: 6.3.835606
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Clock
Version: 6.1.797217
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Gallery
Version: 8.27.808455
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Zoe
Version: 1.20.837872
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Lock Screen
Version: 6.1.808627
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Sense Input
Version: 6.2.795212
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Power To Give
Version: 1.1.799648
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC FootballFeed
Version: 1.4.835533
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Weather
Version: 6.2.836008
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC File Manager
Version: 6.1.835369
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Fetch
Version: 1.2
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC RE
Version: 1.0.836077
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Backup
Version: 4.0.798020
Google Play: click here

Name: HTC Guide
Version: 1.1.828291
Google Play: click here



There are also a few HTC Sense Input applications for a various of different languages, but usually none of them gets any update. The same situation happens to the HTC Speak app, which is also language dependent.

If you are working for a mobile company or some gadgets shop you might be interested in the HTC Specialist app.

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