I love the people I work with.
While at a conference in Sacramento, a co-worker noticed me playing with my Google G1 (HTC Dream) and mentioned he was given a free, open HTC Magic while attending the Google I/O conference in 2009. I asked him how he liked it and the outcome of the conversation was that he enjoyed the phone but put it in his desk drawer six months ago since he was not with T-Mobile.
He gave it to me!
Compared to the G1, the Ion lacks a physical keyboard and is a tad thinner. Other than that, the same screen size and inability to auto-upgrade past the Android 1.6 O/S makes it slightly reduced in capability. This led me down the path of finding out whether I could root hack it and install the newest Android 2.2 (aka: Froyo) system.
Searching does you little good if you don’t know what you are looking for. You’ll find all sorts of articles exclaiming that this can be done with little links to any place where details are listed. Like most open-source systems, the Android community has tons of documentation.
This did nothing for me except explaining how due to memory issues, the phone companies have abandoned distribution to certain early phone models.
Open source communities know better. They are inventive and do more with less.
Further reading led me to CyanogenMod, which is a free, community built distribution of Android 2.2 (Froyo).
It wasn’t easy and those aren’t the best instructions in the world. I also had to go back and do the Gapps install twice to clear some errors, but my little HTC Magic is running Froyo at full speed.
Some things I’ve tested so far.
Bottom line — just do it!
Update: Decided to add a photo showing the version.
The hack attack
This article has been Digiproved © 2010
This article has been Digiproved © 2011
