How To: Speed Up Your Hero ROM
September 5, 2009 in Android How To's, Featured, How To's, HTC Magic How To's, HTC MyTouch 1.2/Fender myTouch How To's, HTC MyTouch 3G How To's
Ok, so we all want Hero to be faster, so here are a few tips and tricks to get it running as smoothly as it can. Keep in mind though that regardless of what we do, we still are short on 100Mbs of RAM that HTC Hero ROM was meant to run on so some lag is expected, but let’s see if we can get it to a bearable level, shall we?
These tips all assume that you have followed our 1 Click Rooting procedure and our How To Load a Custom ROM procedure (including partitioning the card with 3 partitions as in the instructions). If you have not done these things, do them then come back here once Hero is running on your device.
Tips:
I. Make sure you have 3 partitions on your memory card!
I know for most this is a given, but I have to reiterate it as some people skip this step and then complain as to why it takes 30 seconds to get back to the home screen when using a Hero ROM.
So do this first THEN load a Hero ROM. Instructions to do so are in the How To Load a Custom ROM sections for whatever phone you are using.
II. Convert Ext2 to Ext3.
This can be done easily if you have used our procedures and have the Amon RA recovery image.
1. Simply turn off the phone and then turn it back on into recovery mode by holding down Home and Power.
2. On the recovery screen, click on the option to convert Ext2 to Ext3.
3. Once it is done converting, select reboot.
Optional, but recommended -
4. Put the Hero ROM .zip file on the memory card, put it into the phone.
5. Turn the phone on into recovery mode by holding down Home and Power.
6. On the recovery screen, select Wipe Data. Then Select Apply update choose zip, and select the Hero ROM and apply it again now that Ext2 is Ext3.
7. Once it is done, select reboot. Then go through the normal setup process to get back to the home screen.
III. Move cache to SD card.
This can be done easily if you have used our procedures and have the Amon RA recovery image.
1. After you are at the home screen (you went through the initial setup process on the phone), simply turn off the phone and then turn it back on into recovery mode by holding down Home and Power.
2. On the recovery screen, select Move Dalvik Cache to SD.
3. Once it is done, select reboot.
IV. Download Advanced Task Killer (Free) from the Android Market.
1. Goto the Market and search for Advanced Task Killer.
2. Download the free version.
3. Once it is installed, open it and hold down on TouchFlo (if it has shown up, newer versions of this program might automatically ignore it) and select Add to Ignore list. We want TouchFlo to stay running at all times.
4. Once TouchFlo is no longer on the list, then select Settings and turn off the Notification (up to you but it ignores the crap out of me).
5. Then go back and click Kill selected Apps (it will automatically close the Task Killer program, this is fine.
6. Now, whenever you feel the phone slowing down after using it, just click this program and click Kill selected tasks to get it in shape.
With all these in place you should have a quicker Hero. If anyone has anything else to add to this list, please share in the comments with a link! Thanks! Hope this helps!
carissa said on January 3, 2010
I decided to run the donut rom you guys recommended. What I’m trying to figure out now is what is the difference between the standard donut that I was already using before I rooted my phone and the donut rom I now have. Why did I root my phone at all? I still have less available ram then when I started. Keep in mind I’m very much a noob and would like to speed up my mytouch, it just seems that I’ve actually gone backwards in my effort to speed up my phone.
I really appreciate you responding last time, and thank you for putting up with noobs like me.
Please help
TheUnlockr said on January 3, 2010
Carissa,
That is why we recommend that ROM, because it is similar to the original but has root access.
With root access, you can load any app that requires root access (like Wifi Tether which turns your phone into a MiFi hotspot which is great, plus a bunch others, go search through the market for root).
You can also notice that you have more homescreens, the performance has been tweaked to go faster, your apps will be saved to the sd card instead of the internal memory so you can have more apps, etc (assuming you did the partitioning correctly) and a few other benefits like the ability to load free themes. Also you HAVE A CHOICE as to what ROM you load, if you don’t like that one, then you are free to load another and see what benefits the other devs put in their ROMs they are all different.
Hope that helps, enjoy!
patmanz28 said on January 4, 2010
hey i just tried to move the cache in my hero to the sd card(using ra 1.53 i think) and now none of my apps or widgets work i also cant acess the terminal. I have no idea what to do i have been searching all day and havent seen one iota to help. thanks in advance.
TheUnlockr said on January 4, 2010
Paymanz28,
I would do the usual cure for most problems on that.
Reformat/repartition the SD card via recovery, wipe data, then load the the new custom ROM again (Modacos works well in the downloads section). And his ROM should move everything to cache automatically (so long as your card is partitioned).
dimple said on February 3, 2010
Thanks a lot,It helped too much to get faster my htc magic with Hero Rom
Tommy Le said on February 24, 2010
thats wierd, i downloaded the advanced task manager and “touchflo” was nowhere to be found! i even looked in the excluded section, still not there….
ekie said on April 8, 2010
do u need to root to do this???
TheUnlockr said on April 8, 2010
Ekie,
You need to be rooted and running a custom hero rom on a non hero phone to use this.
Tommy Le said on April 10, 2010
Hello The Unlockr!
I tried to partition my sd card and it had some kind of error and it told me to
run sdtools on console?
any help would be greatly appreciated! thanks!
BadTom said on April 27, 2010
Hi Guys
Hey Unlockr – I love the dedication to answering questions – I can imagine it is hard to find the time especially with your popularity! I have been in IT for decades and still managed to get it wrong several times until I watched your videos step for step – then I wondered what the hell I had been doing wrong all the time!! Fantastic quality and work!
Anyway – I have one small question: I had the pleasure of playing with Google Maps Navigation before downgrading to 1.5. Now it Google maps is no longer available to me in the Market. A google search says ” You must be running Android OS 1.6 or higher in order to access the Navigation feature.”
My question is:- do we have the option of flashing to 2.x or are we committed to 1.5? I must say that I am not 100% clear on the fundamentals between flashing firmware and loading a ROM. Are we simply emulating the Hero with a ROM on 1.5 in place of using the actual firmware?
anyway – any access to higher firmware versions on a
Magic 32B
Thanks,
Tom
TheUnlockr said on April 27, 2010
Badtom,
Thanks!
The issue with using Hero ROMs is that they are all based on 1.5 Android builds (since HTC didn’t make hero for Cupcake).
You should be able to find a 2.x rom running either with or without Sense UI on top and flash that.
Good luck!
Glock said on September 22, 2010
Hello all,
I already have Froyo 2.2 installed on my MyTouch with 32B. Can I still go back and convert Ext2 to Ext3? Will I lose anything? Will it speed up my phone or should I not even bother?
David Cogen said on September 22, 2010
Glock,
It should help a little, but up to you if you want to do the effort to try. To do it, you’d need to make sure you have the 2.2 Froyo ROM .zip file on your sd card, then boot in to recovery convert the ext2 to ext3, wipe data (factory reset), then click on Flash zip and choose the ROM again.
Ger B said on January 2, 2011
Newbie here…
:-s
I am reluctant to root my HTC MAGIC (Vodafone NL, 32B), but after checking unlocker.com i am willing to give it a go, especially since this tutorial to speed the Hero is referred to for the Magic as well…
Currently i still am on stock, which is very recent auto-update from Vodfone to Froyo/Android 2.2.1 (17dec2010)
Before i proceed to rooting my Magic i wanna make sure this “speeding up thing” actually is gonna work, and i rather be safe than sorry… (don’t wanna brick my phone)
Do i need to be on a custom/hero rom to benefit from the speeding up tips ? Especially the cache to SD option seems appealing…
Is there a way/is it sensible to move a swap file(if there is any) to SD as well ?
Is there a way to obtain the original HTC/Vodafone update = Froyo/Android 2.2.1 ? (Vodafone automatically performs system updates without the option of downloading it manually)
Ger B said on January 2, 2011
Newbie here…
:-s
I am reluctant to root my HTC MAGIC (Vodafone NL, 32B), but after checking unlocker.com i am willing to give it a go, especially since this tutorial to speed the Hero is referred to for the Magic as well…
Currently i still am on stock, which is very recent auto-update from Vodfone to Froyo/Android 2.2.1 (17dec2010)
Before i proceed to rooting my Magic i wanna make sure this “speeding up thing” actually is gonna work, and i rather be safe than sorry… (don’t wanna brick my phone)
Do i need to be on a custom/hero rom to benefit from the speeding up tips ? Especially the cache to SD option seems appealing…
Is there a way/is it sensible to move a swap file(if there is any) to SD as well ?
Is there a way to obtain the original HTC/Vodafone update = Froyo/Android 2.2.1 ? (Vodafone automatically performs system updates without the option of downloading it manually)
Ger B said on January 2, 2011
Newbie here…
:-s
I am reluctant to root my HTC MAGIC (Vodafone NL, 32B), but after checking unlocker.com i am willing to give it a go, especially since this tutorial to speed the Hero is referred to for the Magic as well…
Currently i still am on stock, which is very recent auto-update from Vodfone to Froyo/Android 2.2.1 (17dec2010)
Before i proceed to rooting my Magic i wanna make sure this “speeding up thing” actually is gonna work, and i rather be safe than sorry… (don’t wanna brick my phone)
Do i need to be on a custom/hero rom to benefit from the speeding up tips ? Especially the cache to SD option seems appealing…
Is there a way/is it sensible to move a swap file(if there is any) to SD as well ?
Is there a way to obtain the original HTC/Vodafone update = Froyo/Android 2.2.1 ? (Vodafone automatically performs system updates without the option of downloading it manually)
Jacobportillo02 said on May 28, 2011
Unlockr. i have a Q. my phone kind of lags when i run apps, gamewise. ie angry birds. how can i fix that? in task killer my memory is 30M. i have a Mytouch rooted. and i see my brothers g2 has 255M. any ideas to boost my memory