Several days ago, I flashed my HD2 with the HotMod ROM by Hannes HD2. So, here’s my experience.
The ROM works very well for the most part. These are the issues that I have had with it so far:
- Occasional reboots for no reason — it doesn’t happen often, but it is annoying when you feel your pocket vibrate and you pull out your phone only to find it on the boot screen. (This didn’t seem to happen until the Market application upgraded)
- The browser quite working. It force closes before it opens a page. It worked at first, but again, sometime after the market upgraded, the browser quite working.
- Sound is quiet on phone calls
- Battery usage isn’t as good as CM7
Note: I installed version 0.4. Currently, 0.5 exists, and I have not had the chance to try that yet. According to the
Change Log, version 5 is supposed to have “Cleaned up Ringtones to fit 300 mb partition”
Important: These are just my installation notes. There is no warranty with them intended, nor are they really instructions for installing a ROM. They are just meant to supplement what others have already written. Maybe they will provide a good starting place, but please be sure to read through the links.
First, I followed the cLK from Dummies instructions.
Step 1: HardSPL. I already had HardSPL 2.08, so I skipped this step. You can see what version you have by starting with your phone off. Then, hold the volume down button while you turn your phone on.
If you need to install HSPL, visit this thread.
Step 2: Task 29.
I wasn’t sure if I needed to do this since I have already done it once, but I went ahead and did it again. I visited this thread for instructions, but I downloaded it from this thread.
Basically, I prepared the phone by turning it on with the Volume Down key. I plugged the phone into the USB port. Then, I had to run (from Windows unfortunately) the .exe program included with the zip file. I had dusted off an old copy of Windows Vista, and to make it work, I had to right click on the program and choose to run it as administrator.
Step 3: Install the Radio.
I downloaded Leo_RADIO_2.15.50.14** from here. Again, I held the Volume Down key as the phone booted, and connected it to the USB. Finally, I ran CustomRUU.exe.
Step 4: Run the HotMod CustomRUU.exe
I downloaded the HotMod utilities v0.1 [cLK 1.4.0.1 +partition layout + CWM 4.0.1.4].zip file and extracted it to a directory in Windows. Then, I held the Volume Down button while the phone booted. Finally, I ran the CustomRUU.exe in what I extraced from the zip.
Note: for reference, I extracted the zip file into c:\temp\hd2, so all paths will be relative to that.
Step 5: Installed Google USB Drivers
When the “Found New Hardware” dialog displayed, I chose “Locate and install driver software”. Then, I had to choose “I don’t have the disc. Show me other options”, and “Browse my comptuer for driver software (advanced)”.
For the software location, I chose: “C:\Temp\hd2\HotMod utilities v0.1 [cLK 1.4.0.1 +partition layout + CWM 4.0.1.4]\google-usb_driver”.
The install did take quite a while, but when it was done, I finally got: “Android ADB Interface device installed correctly”. Finally, I had to reboot before the driver seemed to work.
Step 6: Flashed the Recovery
I opened command prompt (cmd.exe). Then, I had to change to the zip directory — First, “cd \temp\hd2”, and then, cd “HotMod utilities v0.1 [cLK 1.4.0.1 +partition layout + CWM 4.0.1.4]”
To do this, the ROM includes a utility called FastBoot. You can read more up on it here. So, I typed:
fastboot flash recovery recovery_leo4014.img
Unfortunately, the recovery that came with HotMod didn’t work for me. Instead I downloaded recovery_4.0.1.4_leo_CWR.zip from here.
Note: you can use the command “fastboot reboot” to reboot the phone when your done.
Step 7: Copied the ROM to the SD Card
I copied the ROM to the SD Card by booting into recovery on the phone. That is holding the Power Button/Hang up button while the phone boots. Then, I used the menu option “mounts and storage” > “mount USB storage”.
At that point, I could access the phone as a drive, and I copied the HotMod_v0.4.zip file to the root directory of the SD card.
Step 8: Flashed the ROM
Again, in the recovery, I used the following menu: “install zip from sdcard” > “choose zip from sdcard”.
Next, it asks for the zip file to flash. I chose the “HotMod_v0.4.zip” that I copied previously. And, it asks for confirmation … “Yes – Install HotMod_v0.4.zip”.
