Why to install Custom Roms?
Android is a very popular Operating System. It provides very high customization to the phone. The UI is quite brilliant. Android is an Open Source Project, that means it is available with its source code. Any developer can use this code to create its own version of Android. Google provides a new version of android every year.
But many phone companies don't provide that stock android experience made by google. They use thier own themes on that android version which many users don't like. Also many phone companies don't provide android updates in thie phones. For example old phones may stuck on old version of android.
Thats why many developers have come across to make the latest android version available for many smartphones by porting roms from another devices and making changes in it. Its called Custom Roms. Custom roms can be made by developers officially for a smartphone which may not contain any bug or unofficially which is called porting a rom which may contain minor bugs. It upon the popularity of handset that a developer makes a rom for a device officially.
How to install Custom Roms?
- There are various steps for installing custom rom. For this your device needs to have a custom recovery. If you don't know what is custom recovery, you can visit here to know more about it. I have created an article for custom recoveries. Custom recoveries are not universal. You cannot flash a custom recovery of any smartphone. You need to download and flash a custom recovery which is made for your smartphone. Just Google and type 'Custom recovery for <your device name>' and download it.
- If you don't know How to flash a Custom recovery, you can visit here.
- Once you have flashed a recovery than now its easy to flash a custom rom to your smartphone.
- You need to download a custom rom which is meant for your device. Custom roms are device specific. If a custom rom is available for your smartphone, you can download it directly. But, if you try to flash a a cutom rom which is not meant for your device, then it may result into bootloops and bricked phone. You also need to download the gapps for your rom (Some roms have gapps inside them, or particualr gapps can only be flashed for that rom. Just make sure you download the right gapps). Some list of famous custom roms are:
- Cyanogen Rom
- Resurrection Remix (also known as RR)
- lineage OS
- AOSP Rom
- Paranoid Rom
- Viper OS
- All roms provide different kinds of UI and customization. Based on your need and like, you can download any Rom.
- After installing proper rom and gapps, its time to flash a custom rom. Place both the rom and gapps in memory card or internal at desired location so that you can find them easily during rom flashing. Now boot the device into recovery mode on your phone by pressing some key combinations (generally 'volume+ and power button', 'volume- and power button', 'volume+ volume- and power button'). You can google it if you don't know the button combination.
- I will show the images of TWRP recovery but the process is the same in any recovery you download so don't worry.
- Once you have booted into the recovery mode it is important to take the backup of the current rom incase if something goes wrong. You can do it by clicking on the backup option in your recovery. Just click on backup and swipe to take a backup. You can restore the backup whenever you want to revert to your stock rom by clicking on the restore option.
- After successful backup, now you need to wipe or do a factory data reset. Click on Wipe option, then select advanced wipe, then select 'system', 'cache', 'dalvik cache', 'data' and 'internal storage' (if you want). Don't wipe internal storage if you have placed the rom and gapps in internal storage of your phone. Swipe to wipe the selected options.
- After successful wipe, now its time to flash the rom and gapps. Go back and click on 'install' option. Then go to the path where you have placed the rom and select the zip file. Now click on 'Add More Zips'. Again find the gapps (if your rom needs gapps) and select the file. Once you have selected both the files 'swipe' to flash the files. The flashing process will start. It may take time to flash the file.
- After successful flashing the rom and gapps, its time to reboot the phone. Just click on 'Reboot System' option to reboot the phone. The first boot may take some time so be patient. If you see any issue like bootloop than again go to recovery mode and wipe everything and flash the rom again. If the problem still persists, than it can be a problem in the rom. Just download another rom and try again or you can restore the previously backed up stock rom,
- Done!! You have successfully flashed a custom rom in your device.
- I hope the steps were clear and I have tried to explain the whole process in very short.
|
|