How to Update Galaxy S II GT I9100 with Root Box ICS 4.0.4 Custom ROM Firmware

LG Launcher lovers can now be enjoyed along with the Galaxy S3 theme right on your Samsung Galaxy S II smartphone with the help of a custom ROM firmware which is dubbed as Root Box. This Root Box custom ROM firmware ropes in the latest ICS Android 4.0.4 firmware version. Over a period of this article we will be checking out on what are the various features this custom ROM firmware comes along with the detailed pre requisites and tutorial to guide you on how to apply this firmware. This firmware can only be applied on the Galaxy S II smartphone which is GT I9100 unlocked model. There are many firmwares apart from this, but the best part of this firmware is that it’s highly stable.

Rooting Information: To install this custom ROM firmware update in your phone, you need to root the device. The root access can be revoked by applying the Official or stock firmware in your device.

Features of Root Box ICS 4.0.4 Firmware:

• AOKP Based ICS 4.0.4 IMM76I (Built from Source – Github)
• Fluxi ICS Kernel, Siyah ICS Kernel, CM ICS Kernel
• Unread Notification Count for Missed Calls and Messaging (LG Home Launcher)
• Multi Waves Lockscreen (Multi Waves Style + 2-8 Target Apps)
• Nova Launcher
• Apex Launcher
• LG UI Launcher (240DPI +SGS3 Theme)
• TouchWiz UX Launcher (180DPI and 240DPI)
• ES File Explorer
• Solid Explorer
• Google Play Music
• Sony Walkman Music Player
• Apollo Music Player
• Sense 4 Task Manager
• Beats Audio
• DSP Manager
• Lockscreen Vibration Option
• Default or Dark Theme Google Apps

Highlight Features of Root Box Custom ROM Firmware:

• Merged remaining updates from B39 (Including weather refresh bug)
• Redesigned Aroma Installer – Easier to select options
• Added CM9 Kernel – Compiled from source
• Added Back Apollo Music Player
• Added Google Play Music
• Added Beats Audio
• Added TouchWiz UX Launcher
• Added Toggle Option
• Added Background Option
• Added Lockscreen Vibration Option
• Added 3G tweaks in build.prop
• Upgraded Fluxi Kernel ICS XX.02-beta6
• Upgraded xxTweaker0.3.9_rc1
• Removed LG Memo App
• Fixed Battery Drain Issue

Let’s get started with the detailed list of pre requisites and then followed by which we will be checking out on how to apply this custom ROM firmware in your Galaxy S II.

Pre Requisites:

• In the process of installing custom ROM firmware, since the data and cache needs to be wiped, you need to ensure that you have backed up all the data present in your device manually with the help of below instructions. Don’t use KIES to back up the data as it won’t detect the S II in the custom ROM firmware.

SMS – Use “SMS Backup & Restore app”,
Contacts – Sync with the Gmail application,
Call Log -Call Log and Restore
Images, Songs, Videos, Files – Copy to internal / External SD Card,
APN and MMS Settings – Note down from the path “Applications > Settings > Wireless and Network > Mobile Networks > Access Point Names”

• From the path “Settings > Applications > Development > USB debugging”, enable the USB Debugging Mode. USB Debugging option should be ticked. Ensure that the minimum battery left is 50% plus so as to ensure that the phone doesn’t get turned Off in the middle of firmware update.

• Download “Root Checker” app from the Google PLAY Store and check whether the device is rooted or not. Also, disable / uninstall all the security suites installed in your device as it may interrupt the process of firmware update.

• Ensure that you have Updated your phone with Latest XWLPD firmware and rooted S2 on XWLPD firmware by following the mentioned instructions in the respective links.

So assuming that you have followed all the above mentioned instructions, you can now proceed to the next page where we have summed up a detailed tutorial to install this update.

Procedure to Update Galaxy S II GT I9100 with Root Box Custom ROM Firmware

• Download Root Box Custom ROM Firmware Package from here to your computer. Once downloaded, connect your device to the computer and place the same in your device. Once you have placed the firmware zip file, you then will have to then turn Off the phone to enter the device in the recovery mode.

• Recovery mode in Galaxy S II I9100 can be entered by holding the Volume Up button + the Home key button (the middle button). While holding these both buttons, turn ON your device. In recovery mode, select “Wipe data/factory reset” & “Wipe Cache partition”. Additionally, select “advanced” and clear the Dalvik cache too if you are on the custom ROM firmware.

• Up next, Select “install zip from sd card” > “choose zip from sd card” and then select the “Root Box Custom ROM Firmware” which you have placed in your device. Once the process of firmware installation is done, the device will land back on the recovery mode screen.

• In the recovery mode screen, select “Go Back” and select “reboot system now” for rebooting the device.

• Please note that once installed, you can check the same from the Settings > About Phone path where it will show as Root Box Custom ROM Firmware.

Note: If your Galaxy S II GT I9100 refuses to boot up or fails to get started, then you will have to re insert the battery and reboot the device so as to start your phone. If thefirmware update gets failed, then you need to again re try the whole process.

So there you go, you have now successfully install the firmware in your Galaxy S II. Do let us know in the comments section just in case if there are any issues faced in the process of updating this firmware.

How to Use QR Codes to Share Contacts and Install Android Apps

Did you ever come across those square barcodes and on website, visiting cards and on products? Did you ever wonder how they actually works and why are they meant for? Well today we will go through the barcodes ie., the QR Code and where we use this barcodes.

QR Code basically are the two dimensional square barcodes which has data inside it, it may be a website link or phone number or the text but mostly users use to refer to a website. Many phones comes with bar code scanner application, one you ON that it will go through camera application so that it can scan the QR code. Many sites provide QR codes so that users can quickly scan through the code and visit the site without typing anything. So you just need an Android phone with built in camera and barcode scanner application which can be found on the Android PlayStore for free. Its quite easy to create a QR Code on the web and there are various sources by which you can generate QR Code for your site, product, application, link or picture or anything which is one the web in the URL format. Some of the major applications that we have gone through usage of barcode are the installing of Android Apps.

Using the Bar Code

First you need to install the application dedicated for scanning the QR Codes. There are numerous number of Android applications available on the Android Play Store for free and paid as well. We recommended using the Norton Snap Android applications on your device because this application protects you from scanning the dangerous and harmful QR codes. Since you don’t know what might be the source URL, you should stay with secure and safety and so is whyNorton Snap is the recommended one. Along with that there are other applications such as Barcode Scanner, Barcode reader and ShopSavvy Barcode Scanner.

Installing Applications using Bar Code

Once when you see a Barcode, open the barcode application on your mobile phone and the place the camera towards the QR code.

When you points towards the square barcode, flashing red lines are been displayed on the screen of your phone. You need to centre the QR code and please don’t move your camera too much as it will require a constant few seconds scanning.

When the barcode is finished reading it will identify the QR code and will show the option to open browser, share via email and share via SMS.

It’s clear with those terms and if you have an Android App you will be forwarded to Android Play Store to the app link. Now you just need to click on Install option. For your easy understanding I have the Android Birds Rio Android applications by Rovio and here I am through that QR code.

You can share the QR code using Bluetooth, Email, Gmail,  Google +, messaging, Social hub, Wi Fi direct.

So that quite easy to share with your friend but I think there will be not much applications for sharing. The QR code can come good when you have a advertising phamplet or broucher given to any one and the instead of provide URL, the bar code will provide quick access to the site.

Its just the beginning of the exploring the new world with Android and the bar code.

How to Block Phone Balance USSD Updates as Popup Messages on Android

With the Samsung Galaxy S Plus is ruled out of the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich update officially by Samsung, I find that there are lots of custom ROM available which are more often same as that of the official ROM. Unofficially there are dozens of Android 4.0.3 ROM’s available for various Samsung handsets and particularly I see few like Cyanogen Mod 9 ICS, Dark Knight custom ROM ICS, SLIM ICS, Stable and Stunning Android 4.0.4 Beta 10 update and lot more at Android Advices itself. I am thinking to install the Dark Knight custom ROM on my phone to make it look new but I am worried whether my phone willn’t be bricked away with those custom ROM. It’s OK for me to try out those updates and I understand that warranty will get void with those updates but I am actually worried what if I am strucked in the middle of upgrade and what is the case if the latest installed ROM doesn’t work on my phone perfectly i.e., is there way by which we can potentially backup the existing firmware on my phone and restore it whenever required with what I had earlier? I am looking forward for step by step procedure to get the canonical answer for this rather than a one word or one sentence answer for this from the team Android Advices.

Android Advices Team Answer : Officially there is nothing like backing up your current ROM, etc., because the stock firmware upgrades always goes with the higher versions always and there is no look back. However if you are looking to move towards custom ROMs and firmware’s then you need to head to ClockworkMod recovery famously known as the CWM which is a custom recovery on the Android phones and tablets provides users to perform several advanced options like backup the existing ROM, installations, test out various ROMs and others.

Backup via ClockWorkMod Recovery

The ClockWorkMod recovery is the right tool for your to perform backup of existing ROM and there are various methods by which you can install ClockWorkMod recovery on your phone depending on the devices that you use. We have recently spotted one touch clock recovery for Galaxy Nexus, Motorola Droid Bionic, Droid X, Google Nexus S, Samsung Galaxy S II and lot more devices with procedure on Android advices itself.

By installing ClockWorkMod Recovery on your phone you can get back the original stock ROMs on your phone whenever you want it. This not only allows you to backup Stock ROMs but also the custom ROMs as well. To install ClockWorkMod Recovery on your phone it’s quite essential that your phone should be rooted first and it involves further more procedure. Here is the general procedure on how you can backup your phone existing ROM.

• The first and the most important thing you should consider is to take root your phone and this gives you various advantages. Understand which smartphone you have and follow procedure mentioned at our blog with respective tutorial.
• Once you are ready with rooting on your phone, now you are ready to start the process of backing up the ROM. So further we need to proceed and install the ROM Manager Android Application, which can be easily downloaded from Android Apps Labs for free. Reminding you that ROM Manager will be installed on the rooted phones only.
• Open the ROM Manager Android application on your phone.
• You need to flash the ClockworkMod Recovery option present in the ROM Manager.
• Now among the options you need to select Backup Current ROM and this will ask you to provide the name for the new backup name.
• This will further ask for SuperUser permissions on your phone and you need to grant that.
• Once that is done, the backup of your existing ROM will be done after your phone restarts.
• So now if something goes wrong in any of the custom ROMs which you are running you can easily restore then ROM backup which you have taken it earlier.
• To do this, you need to open ROM Manager again, then select “Manage and Restore Backup” and then click on “Restore”.
• Pick up the backup that you want to restore among the listed backup that you have performed earlier.
• The phone boots up and you will get the backup of your original stock ROM.
• That’s it.

Supported Handsets : ClockworkMod is supported only to limited devices. To checkout thesupported devices. Please look through whether your device is supported or not. If you apply it to the wrong handset or the handset not mentioned in the list, your will end up bricking your phone.

Manual Backup in Stock ROM

When you are looking for the manual backup on your phone and you don’t want to go with custom firmware’s and stay safe, then full backup of your phone is not possible and you need to take backup of individual functions. The good things is contacts can be backed up using the Google Account and can be restored easily but for the SMS, call logs, APNs you need to find the suitable applications for that. You can find many free applications intended for each purpose in the Android Play Store.

How to Block Phone Balance USSD Updates as Popup Messages on Android

The USSD / MMI requests are something that could be done when you wanted to perform some network related functions, like checking the balance of your phone, or the IMEI code of your phone and a few internal functions of the phone, but when these requests happen automatically and you see the balance updates every time you make a call or send SMS, it gets annoying. Especially in the Indian networks, once a message is sent, or even when the phone loses the data network connection, the balance is sent promptly and this keeps coming when the connection is glitchy. Apart from that, when you are using some messaging offer and have free messages to send, there isn’t any need at all to get the balance update when you know you are not going to get any deduction in the account balance.

There are several applications in the Google Play Store which would help in blocking the SMS messages or notifications but none of those have been successful in blocking the USSD messages that are sent by the network. One of them which would be making things easier for people is the Balance Update / USSD blocker which targets the notification and message blocking by specific keywords and strings.

    

Using this app, you could block the messages:
- Which contain a particular string that you want to block
- Which contain a list of keywords that are separated by comma
- Which contain specified regular expressions that can be matched to block the messages

The Balance Update / USSD blocker app has got a message log of itself, which stores the latest 25 messages and these come with an indicator whether the message was blocked or allowed to view.

One can choose to show the notifications / balance once a day or week and this would show you the first balance update and then block the other ones for the entire day. This would come to good use when you have got the free message offers and would want to keep a check once a day whether the offer is still active or has expired.

    

The app is free of ads, and you get to see the options page only when you want to make any changes, or else it would work in the background and you don’t need to be worried about anything once you have set the things up for blocking the balance updates.

Once you install the app after downloading it from the Google Play Store, you need to restart your phone once before configuring or start using it.

Tip for using: To configure or block the balance status messages, you need to specify the keywords that come in those messages and whenever the app notices a message with the same keywords, it would block them. The blocking includes even the USSD message apart from the normal SMS.

The app is available for free in the Play Store. Download it from here.

How to Update Galaxy S Advance I9070 with Official XXLE2 Gingerbread 2.3.6 Firmware

Advance your Samsung Galaxy Advance I9070 as in the due course of this article we will be checking out on how you can upgrade your device’s firmware with the latest Gingerbread 2.3.6 firmware which is dubbed as XXLE2. This firmware comes at a time when there are still many bugs which needs to be fixed, it was the last time when we saw on how you can update your SAMSUNG Galaxy Advance I9070 with Gingerbread 2.3.6 Firmware which is dubbed as DDLD4. This all new firmware fixes all the bugs related to the camera and Bluetooth along with some issue with incompatibility of the apps too have been addressed.

Disclaimer: Neither Android Advices, nor developer should be held responsible for any damage happened to your device in the process of following the instructions mentioned in this article. It’s very unlikely that there will be any issues but just in case if at all there are any issues then we are committed to help you in solving the same.

Let’s proceed to the detailed list of pre requisites which you need to follow so as to facilitate smoother firmware update process. As of now this firmware has been only rolled out in the Nordic countries, but since this is a global release, anyone can apply this update irrespective of from which country you are from.

Express Pre Requisites:

• Back up all the data with the help of below mentioned steps, ensure that you aren’t backing up the data with the help of KIES as it may or may not detect the KIES PC Suite.

SMS – Use “SMS Backup & Restore app”,
Contacts – Sync with the Gmail application,
Call Log - Call Log and Restore
Images, Songs, Videos, Files – Copy to internal / External SD Card,
APN and MMS Settings – Note down from the path “Applications > Settings > Wireless and Network > Mobile Networks > Access Point Names”

• Enable the USB Debugging in your Galaxy Advance from the path “Settings > Applications > Development > USB debugging”. The USB Debugging option should be ticked as shown in the below screen capture. Also, ensure that the battery left in the device is minimum of 60% so as to ensure that it doesn’t get turned Off in the middle of firmware update.

• Disable all the antivirus suites in your computer and uninstall the same in your device as these tools generally tend to interrupt the process of firmware update.

So assuming that you have followed all the above mentioned instructions, you can now proceed to the next page where we have summed up a detailed tutorial on how to apply this update.

Procedure to Update Galaxy ADVANCE I9070 with XXLE2 Gingerbread 2.3.6Firmware:

• Download the XXLE2 Gingerbread 2.3.6 firmware Package and Odin from here to yourcomputer. Once downloaded, you need to extract the firmware package and open the Odin in your computer.

• Download mode in your Galaxy ADVANCE can be entered by pressing Volume down Key, Center button, and holding both simultaneously press the Power Button after which a green robot will be shown indicating the Download Mode has been entered.

• Now, connect your phone to the computer and open the Odin in your and then ensure that the ID : COM section is turned yellow.

Note: If the ID : COM section doesn’t turn Yellow, you need to check with two things which are mentioned below,

• Install the USB Drivers in your computer & Go to the Path “Settings > Wireless & Network > USB Settings” and
• Ensure that “Samsung KIES” option is ticked before connecting the phone to the computer.

• In Odin click on “PDA” to select the PDA file which you got after extracting the file and then click on “Start” to start the process of firmware update. As soon as the update is applied successfully, the device will be rebooted on its own.

• To check on the firmware has successfully applied or not, you can check the same from the path “Applications > Settings > About Phone” where you will find the firmware versionas XXLE2 2.3.6 Firmware.
• If you face any issues like force close error, then you need to clear and wipe the data from the recovery mode.

• In recovery mode, select Wipe data/factory reset and also you need to select Wipe Cache partition and then reboot your device by selecting reboot system now with the help of Volume rocker keys. Once it’s done, you then will have to select the option of “reboot system now” for restarting the device.

Tip: Due to some reasons if the update process gets failed or interrupted, then you need to apply the update again by following the steps again from the start. Don’t forget to restore the backup which you have taken in the initial steps.

Congratulations, you have now updated your Galaxy S Advance I9070 smartphone with the latest version of Gingerbread 2.3.6 XXLE2 firmware. Let us know if you face any issues as we will try our level best to sort out the same.

How to import contacts into android

How to import contacts into android

Export contacts from Outlook or Outlook Express (or any other application) to csv format and thenimport to gmail. That should do it for most users.

If you have your contacts on an old GSM phone, you could export them on to the SIM card and then import them to your new phone.

Google Contacts

While you are there, try the “find duplicates” functionality. You can also add contacts into groups. The groups show up on your phone too after the sync.

Now on your android phone, browse to Contacts>Settings>Display options>Select “Only contacts with phones”, and also Google>Select all groups.

If you want to pull social contacts too, install the Facebook and Twitter apps and select to import data from all contacts. You should then see pictures and other address data added to your contacts auto magically.

Top 10 android setup tasks for a new android user

Top 10 android setup tasks for a new android user

Kickstart your shiny new android phone including the Droid family, Evo 4G, Galaxy S or other Motorola, Samsung and HTC android phones.

For the best experience, open this page on your android phone, so you install the apps just by clicking on them.

1. Import contacts:
   • Export contacts to CSV, import to Gmail contacts.
   • Sign in to your phone with your Google account, if you haven’t done that yet.
   • Browse to Contacts>Settings>Display options>Select “Only contacts with phones”, and also Google>Manually select all groups. Then sync.
   • While you are at it, use the Email app to setup your school/office email too. Use IMAP or Exchange settings to ensure that email read status is synced to your phone.
   • Install Gtasks and sync your todo lists with Google tasks. 
   
   
   
2. Facebook and Twitter:
   • Install the Facebook and Twitter apps.
   • Select to import data on your existing contacts. Pictures and other address data are the automagically added to your contacts.
   • Set Facebook and Twitter to update once every 4 hrs to prevent your friends from draining your battery. The Facebook sync setting could be in Contacts>Settings>Accounts or in the app itself
   
   
   
3. Home screen:
   • Install ADW launcher to get a better home screen.
   • Select ADW launcher to open by default when the Home button is pressed.
   • Set the number of screens to 3 and apps to scroll vertically. Thats feels a lot better on the Galaxy S phones.
   • Set desktop rows to 5. Theres a lot more screenspace on large screen phones.
   • Select fade app labels for some nice animation.
   • If you want to reset the launcher for any reason, browse to Settings>Manage apps>ADW launcher> Reset defaults.
   
   
   
4. Home screen widgets:
   • Install Beautiful widgets, one of the best Time and Weather widgets.
   • Try out some clock skins and pick the one you like.
   • Tap on Time to open alarm, Date to open calendar and Weather to open a nice animated weather widget.
   • Galaxy S phones have the WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, 4G, enable/disable buttons in the notification area, but you might want to place Power Control, an android standard widget, on your home screen and have better control over your battery.
   • While disabling the GPS, enable Geo location using WiFi to retrieve current location without sacrificing battery power.
   
   
   
5. Get your phone back if you loose it:
   • Install Contact Owner.
   • Enable the security pattern in settings,
   • Setup Google Voice if needed
   • Add your email and the Google Voice number to your contact. You can use a friends number instead too.
   • Get Contact Owner to show your email and the phone number on the password screen, so the finder can reach you to give back the phone.
   • Also, enable Latitude in maps to track the location of your phone.
   
   
   
6. Find your background:
   • Download a backgrounds app
   • Stylems Backgrounds shows a list of nice backgrounds, one of the oldest in the market.
   • Floating Image lets you set your background in style, while images float away.
   • Look at Flickr Interesting photos too.
   
   
   
7. Change phone settings automatically:
   • Install Timerrific
   • There are apps that use GPS or phone battery levels to change settings automatically, like Tasker and Power Manager
   • Timerrific is better though. It changes settings based on time/day and is nice to the battery.
   • Now you can set the phone to vibrate at office/school and turn off WiFi when not at home.
   • While you are at it, install No Signal Alert, so you don’t miss important calls. Your phone will let you know if it looses signal.
   
   
   
8. Don’t type, scan (or write):
   • Install the Barcode Scanner app
   • Scan any barcodes you see on the web or elsewhere using Barcode Scanner.
   • The app works on Google Product Search too, all you have to do is browse to it on you phone and click on the “Scan Barcode” button. Now you can compare prices on the go.
   • If you have Android 2.2, the Chrome to Phone extension is very nice too.
   • If scanning or extensions are too hard, just try Graffiti for Android. It lets you write instead of typing.
   
   
   
9. Other must have Apps:
   • Music, News and TV apps are always a must.
   • Pandora, Slacker radio or Last.FM: Free personalized radio
   • NYtimes: Award-winning journalism of The New York Times
   • NPR: Listen to NPR shows
   • TV.com: TV shows from CBS, The CW, CNET, ET, Showtime, CBS News, CBS Sports and much more!
   
   
   
10. Last but not the least change your ringtone:
    • Android comes with some nice ones, you can create your own too.
    • Install Ringdroid. Copy any MP3 to your SD card to edit and set it as your Ringtone.
    • You can assign a specific ringtone to a contact too.