Old School Nexus 5

Love my Nexus 5... Good specifications for not a lot of money and three years down the line it still has good battery life and is not covered in scratches... Better build quality than some and does not burst in flames like others...

And for how little I actually use it as a phone... I sure do pick it up often...

Basically, as my friends will know, I tend to tinker with things and the Nexus 5 is no different...

Left it pretty much stock with Lollipop... Just added and removed apps like you do...

Updating to Marshmallow was the start in basic fiddling... Hated the big white strip that was the "Google says Hi" bar you had no choice in having and could not even make it translucent to ease the blob that it was...

So ended up with KKLauncher which , amongst other tweaks, allowed my to hide it... Quite like KKLauncher and I know their are others out there but, for me, it covered all, well most off, the bases and was unobtrusive and did not seem to affect battery life much...

Playing about with rooting and exposed installer ended up with me bricking my Nexus 7 so I was not going to play, to much, with rooting the 5 until I read that it is no longer going to be supported by Google, as they are bringing out the new "Pixel" line of phones...

So... Searched about on the XDA Forums and realise that rooting and ROM options have come a very long way in the last couple of years... You can still brick things but you have far more chance of something happening that is recoverable these days...

Spent a few days reading up on a few options and read threw many a forum page... Really are a helpful bunch on here, for the most, and the main problems seem to be people that don't read the whole thread before posting a question that has already been answered...

Take the ROM I have ended up using, Nitrogen "N"... which is on it's third stable build and fourth beta/test... Back in the second stable build he clearly stated "Do not root With SuperSU as Superuser is now Included in the build"...

But there are people, almost daily, posting...  Flashed your ROM and then rooted with SuperSU and it does not work... Help/Any Ideas/other comments.... Read, or search, the forum before flashing is a good idea but reading/searching the forum before posting is an even better one...

Pleased with my, for now, build of the NitrogenOS N ROM by Mr.Mex - Testing version 20/10/2016 with Pico Gapps... Love it's minimalism style build and having Superuser root built right into it sort of makes it a noobs dream of a one stop solution...

Also loaded up Viper4ARISE Deuteronomy 2.1 for it's superb, and very tweakable, sound...

The 5 only has one, underwhelming, little speaker and most will simply use headphones instead...

But I was blown away by the difference in sound by, simply, turning on the "speaker optimisation" toggle... Instantly so much richer and made Adele's "Hello", nigh on, stunning..

If you want a simple option for better sound then Arise will do that... But as there are a myriad of other options I'm sure everyone will be able to tune the sound to their ears... Save, and easily switch, settings for different genres of music...

It was really easy to download both items from said forums and a quick MD5 check to confirm all is good with the download before flashing to phone...

So - Why the "Old School Nexus 5" title...

The real fun started after everything was loaded and running well...

For being rooted allows you to play.... Having a modified ROM means there is less there to start with... So I downloaded Solid Explorer and had a "root" round...

Been using Boat Browser for a while now so the stock browser gets deleted and others followed...

Near field... Android Pay... Hate the idea so there gone... Google mail... now is no mail... Don't get enough to worry about that checking on my laptop daily can't cover... Maps are gone too... No Facebook app (don't need the separate messenger app if you go via browser) ... Usable battery life has doubled!!! and "ForceDoze" gives me a standby life of... well if I don't use the phone at all... weeks

Did keep the modified SMS messenger that came with the ROM...

QuickPic Gallery (my go to photo app) plays my videos (basic but smooth playback and the voice sync is good) and the Esira music player that comes with Viper4ARISE means my media needs are covered...

So my Nexus 5 is more an old school phone with no "must tell the world what my dinner looks like being eaten by a kitten/bunny" apps... (and, hopefully, not tell the world everything I do) but... with a touch screen and great sound...

Still working on a good camera/video recorder as they seem to work/not work with each update... but it is a common problem with Hammerhead/Nougat ROM's on the Nexus 5... So a couple of more "test" updates and that should be sorted... Open Camera, for a simple option, is the best I have found to date But the CameraFV range, and similar, do turn a humble phone into a bit of a half decent SLR...

Quite happy with that... you don't need a hundred different ways to talk to people while not talking to them... or kill yourself stepping off a pavement trying to capture an imaginary creature...

But all praise to the good side of more interaction as we need more people planting trees and yarn Bombing in this self destructive world for in the many ways the phone isolates people it also brings like minded communities together and good things happen... As a side note has the majority of our so called ruling elite been taking stupid pills lately???

Phones are great and they will probable evolve into something that, really, is your life... They will definitely evolve further into recording every second of it so others can profit... But remember...Fine by phone can only expand...

24/10/16

Well I am now running 7.1 Nougat... Amazed how quick developers have gotten this out... Who needs to spend ££££ on a pixel phone...

And to be honest the whole "must have round icons" thing strikes me of the old Hi-Fi days... all silver until someone brought out a black unit... and then only black until someone brought out a silver unit... and so on... and on... and I often wonder how much the cry of "red is the new black" has cost the ladies/"insert your PC appropriate term here"  over the years

So it's now on test build 24/10/16 (Nitrogen_Hammerhead-7.1 NDE63P) with Arise Deuteronomy 2.1.5 and Pico Open Gapps (But I like the idea of the new Gapps with Android TV!)

Heathrow... Third Runway... Never gonna hap... Ahh... It is...

Well just heard on the news about the, initial, go ahead for the third Heathrow runway...

There has been no doubt in my mind that a third runway would be built... They have consistently lied to the local people, and will continue to do so...

Maybe the next one will be at Gatwick... in the interest of public concern you understand...

Terminal five... local promise... we will built the terminal but never a third runway... even the three wise monkeys have gone home in disgust on this one...

One problem, though, is that no one wants anything built on their doorstep...

Take the area around the old Bentwaters airbase... Everyone and their relative did not want an airport there... But I wonder how many of those same people travel to another airport for their holidays with barely a "poor locals" thought...

Bentwates had a very long runway as it was a, not so secret, emergency landing strip for the space shuttle... So why did the end of the runway get dug up?... Do a web search on this for the given reason then do another search on what was happening at the time... and make your own mind up...

Many many years ago there was a plan to build an access road from the A12 to Bentwaters with the aim of reducing the traffic through the local villages... The plans showed, pretty much, a straight line between the two...

But as the A12 (North of Ipswich... don't get me started on the A12 south "car park") is such a lovely wide and fast "no queue's" road... Sorry had a moment of rose coloured glasses there... But as the A12 is such a narrow winding "lets spend £1 on it when it needs £1,000,000" traffic jam that effectively shuts whenever there is an accident...

Be nice if that now Norwich is building a northern bypass that Ipswich are shamed into building one too...

So the powers to be want to keep anything money making near to its greedy heart and give more evidence to my take on devolution, that is....

As well as selling off the country the government wants to make itself immune to criticism by giving some of the governments powers to local areas so it can say... "not my fault - your local should have done X"... and walk away saying "suckers"...

Maybe the reason that Suffolk (OK ok... and Norfolk) is left out is that a lot of millionaires live here, for the quiet life...

Still watching the program and just heard someone say...  "Site preferred as secures the benefits for whole of the UK"  How the hell does having an extra runway in London secure, real, benefits for the whole of the UK... 

Oh I get it... All the petrol to drive there... all the coach fares... train fares... pittance for the local area but massive profits for London, well greedy shareholders and massive non tax paying companies...

Shhhh... no one mention pollution, air or otherwise... It will be less in the future.... When the fuel runs out... Makes you wonder if there will ever be an electric jumbo, flying through a lightning storm to recharge?...

And then comes the comment of...

"More cost effective to build here as the infrastructure is already there"... But... But... But... Terminal five was "only" built on the promise that runway three would NOT be...

Nothing more to say really... is there?...

Well there was the comment of "Better connectivity to the whole of the country".... No.... Only more congestion... for which you will probable roll out charges for...

Me feels another Hinckley point coming on... lets pick the worst choice... and make a plan B... just like Brexit...