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Ask NerdGirl: The Family Line of the G1, Boolba Labs on iPhone? Rant About Rooting, More Backups, and PDAnet!

Posted Tuesday, June 29th, 2010 at 4:21 am by n3rdg1rl 1 Comments

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After some much needed personal maintenance off the site, I’m back on! Several articles will be posted today to make up for my missed time! Thank you everyone for your support!

What is the next step from the G1 T-Mobile phone?

I currently have a G1, but I know it has limits and was curious what the next step up is in the G1 series? G2? G3? What is the name that is being used for the T-Mobile folks for the next G1 cell?

Thanks…

SpazticDeath

The HTC Dream, also known as the T-Mobile G1, would be the predecessor to the HTC Magic, also known as the T-Mobile myTouch 3G. After the Magic comes the HTC Hero, also known as the T-Mobile G2 Touch, followed by the HTC Legend, also known as the HTC Hero 2. The newest one in the family is the HTC Desire which isn’t out in a ton of markets right now but should be spreading it’s reach further pretty soon.

Can Toss It by Boolba Labs be put on an iPod? And if so how??  Probably dumb question but niece and nephew love it and they have iPod and it’s on my LG Ally.

Thanks

cg

You’re lucky! One of my best buddies, Bove, is right next to me with his iPhone. However, after searching his Marketplace I found out that Boolba doesn’t make games for Apple at all. So at this time, no this will not go on your niece and nephew’s devices. However, the holidays are not far off so maybe an Android device is in their future. *wink wink*

And before anyone asks, he does realize that Android is better than the iPhone!

Hey NerdGirl,

I wanted to get your opinion on why phone producers make it so hard to unlock, root and flash a custom ROM to a phone. I understand if you have bought the phone on a contract and the carrier needs to lock you in to using themselves, but in that case why not lock down the GSM/CDMA part of the phone, and let geeks do what they want to their phones.

I’m on my second android phone now, the first was an HTC Hero and the second is a Nexus One. Both phones I’ve bought for the full price, SIM unlocked, because I live in Zimbabwe. I’m also a geek and the hoops I’ve had to jump through to install custom ROMs on them is unnecessary.

What are your feelings on this?  Do you know of any way of contacting manufacturers directly and ordering an unlocked phone?

Stay 1337

John

I personally do not have a rooted phone. Mainly because it’s an Eris and it’s processor is a little on the slow side.  However, if I did get my hands on something newer I would jump through a ton of hoops to root it as well. Part of me finds it ridiculous that phones are locked down so tight. Part of me understands.

I’m a modder of most of my electronics. My camera has games loaded on it and my GPSr displays a tank on the screen instead of the arrow. I will admit I break Terms of Service (TOS) agreements with some of my electronics as well. Pirating is bad.  But in the same light, I don’t want to pay $60 for a game just to find out that I hate it and end up only playing once! I never have to pay for games on my Wii, but I willingly bought Super Mario Galaxy 2 because I LOVE the game. I don’t have to pay for music ever again, but if System of a Down or Mindless Self Indulgence comes out with a new album I’m going to buy it. Do I take pay apps off of torrents so I don’t have to pay $.99 for them. No!  Most of these apps have free versions I can try. If I like it I’m going to support the developer and pay for them. Do I download torrents of free apps because a lot of them are no longer on the Market? Totally!  What I’m getting at here in my rant is you have to draw a line in the sand where you’re morals aren’t being bent just to save a few bucks.

Now, let’s take Verizon Wireless for example, just because it’s what I have and it’s what I’m most familiar with. If I root my phone I will no longer get updates on any software or firmware. I think this is wrong. If I change my OS, why shouldn’t I get updates for the actual phone’s hardware? They’re not losing money because I have a custom layout on my home screen and can change the file structure. Fine. Don’t send me Over the Air (OTA) updates for the Android OS (if I root, I probably don’t want them anyway) but if you update your radio firmware, I need that!

Verizon sees $$$$ with everything, as any for-profit company will. I am a business woman. I appreciate that. They don’t want me rooting my phone and tethering it without paying for that option through them. They lose money with this. But on our side of things, we already pay for an unlimited data plan. Let me use my unlimited data how I want.

As far as unlocking your phone, there are some cell phone manufacturers that will unlock it for you if you call. Sony Ericsson is one of them. You can buy unlocked phones pretty easily at this point. Even Amazon.com offers them. Branded phones are really the only exception, like the T-Mobile myTouch series. But if you look you find that they almost always have another name and you can buy THAT version unlocked.

NerdGirl

I’m sure this has already been asked but I couldn’t find it.

I have spent some time setting up and tweaking my new HTC Legend. I know my next phone will also be an Android. Is it possible to backup up or copy my old settings, contacts, applications, etc to the new phone?

It just seems so damn tedious to spend a couple of days resetting up everything… and the inevitable missing the rarely used applications.

DubiousVirtue

Some of this is possible. Some of it is not. As far as settings, many of these are phone specific so unless your next phone is another Legend, that won’t convert too well. Program settings tend to be app specific. Some let you back it up to your SD card and some don’t. You can try a program like OnTheFly Backup to save your apps to your SD card regardless of what the app wants to do.

Contacts are tied directly into your Google account, so on your new phone, when you setup the phone with your Google, it will import all your contacts, as long as they’ve been syncing to Google all along.

I use WaveSecure which backs up my SMS, MMS, contacts, and phone log by itself. You can also use Mobile Backup II which does the same thing but saves to the SD card and also includes the calendar.

If your phone is rooted, this can be a very easy process as there are apps out there made to just totally back up your entire phone.

Hi, I have downloaded the PDAnet app on my Droid, and I have the Icon on my computer, but not on my phone. Can you help? Thanks! Page

Well, I use EasyTether, but I will help where I can. According to the site, it’s very similar to EasyTether. When you install it on the computer it will walk you through how to connect your phone. I would run the installer again and follow the instructions. Usually the computer needs to load the information into the phone via USB to work.

~n3rdg1rl

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