AlphaRev S-OFF, MoDaCo r9/r10 w/Sense minimum /cache size needed?

[Guest castroak]

Hello,

I have been running MoDaCo r9 for a while now. Just recently had switched from a a2sd+ version to non-a2sd (all apps on internal flash ), my reason and finding is that I personally do get better battery life out of it, but just my personal observation so far, nothing to scientific to hold that claim. But either way I would like to gain some more /data space.

My question is if I do the S-OFF using the AlphaRev, I want to use some of the other HBOOT images that have a bigger /data partition, the QUESTION is how big of a /cache do I need for r9 to run as intended?

There is a Bravo Data++ image, which has big enough /system and big /data, BUT only 10M of /cache

Then there is a Bravo Sense, that also has big enough /system and little bigger /data then stock, BUT a 90M /cache

I would like to use the Bravo Data++ but not sure if that's enough /cache space?? If nothing I guess I will use the Bravo Sense, but I would hate to waste all that /cache space if not needed.

Name - /system - /cache - /data

Bravo Stock 1.5 - 258M - 41M - 152M

Bravo Data++ - 180M - 10M - 261M

Bravo Sense - 180M - 90M - 181M

Any help of comments would be appreciated, thanks.

Edited December 27, 2010 by castroak

[Guest bpivk]

I think that cache is needed for OTA updates, radio updates and I do get some marketplace apks in there sometimes. You can't use OTA on a rooted phone, you can use fastboot to push radio updates to the phone and it's enough for Marketplace (if that's the reason I find an occasional apk in there).

Personally I use Bravo Sense.

Edited December 27, 2010 by bpivk

[Guest castroak]

I just loaded the Bravo Sense as well. I kind of wish that there was an image that was in-between the Data++ and Sense. May be the original 41M in /cache, 180M in /system and 230M /data. I think that would be a good balance for the r9 MoDaCo, well at least for me.

Sounds like the 180M is enough for you as well in the /system. I keep looking at the cache and I really only get up to about 25M nothing higher.

Anyway to make a custom image that can be flashed using AlphaRev?

[Guest ascot17]

I just loaded the Bravo Sense as well. I kind of wish that there was an image that was in-between the Data++ and Sense. May be the original 41M in /cache, 180M in /system and 230M /data. I think that would be a good balance for the r9 MoDaCo, well at least for me.

Sounds like the 180M is enough for you as well in the /system. I keep looking at the cache and I really only get up to about 25M nothing higher.

Anyway to make a custom image that can be flashed using AlphaRev?

If you have a nandroid backup of your ROM, have a look at the size of the folders to see if a different partition will work. My r9 nandroid backup has the following sizes:

System: 183230784 b (179Mb)

Cache: 12517824 b (12.2Mb)

Data: 111065856 b (108.5 Mb)

This suggests that a 10Mb cache might be a little bit too small. The actual size of yours will depend on the number of apps that you have installed and where they are...

[Guest castroak]

If you have a nandroid backup of your ROM, have a look at the size of the folders to see if a different partition will work. My r9 nandroid backup has the following sizes:

System: 183230784 b (179Mb)

Cache: 12517824 b (12.2Mb)

Data: 111065856 b (108.5 Mb)

This suggests that a 10Mb cache might be a little bit too small. The actual size of yours will depend on the number of apps that you have installed and where they are...

Thanks I appreciate the info, I did look at that but wasn't sure if the backup was at all compressed. I was of the same thought that the 10MB would be too small before this confirmation. That's why I think if we had a AlphaRev image with 40M /cache partition it would be good, then the rest would be in /data.

[Guest ascot17]

Thanks I appreciate the info, I did look at that but wasn't sure if the backup was at all compressed. I was of the same thought that the 10MB would be too small before this confirmation. That's why I think if we had a AlphaRev image with 40M /cache partition it would be good, then the rest would be in /data.

The alternative would be to create your own partition sizes with ,say, a 15Kb partition for the cache, 190-200 for system and the rest available for data.

This thread tells you how (not tried it myself though - am sticking to A2SD+ for now):

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=806321

[Guest renegade027]

Hi,

For about the same reasons I switched from an APP2SD+ setup to an everything-on-internal-memory one a couple of days ago. A few issues I experienced:

* Using the Data++ from alpharev - it was not possible to restore any of the nand backups - constant bootloops - so I had to cook a new ROM, flash, flash Sub501's kernel, flash framework-res.apk mods, restore apps & data from Ti Backup. Now everything works OK.

* At the end I managed to fit MCR r9 on a 180 MB /system partition - just barely - basically with 0 HTC widgets (I only need Sense for the contacts-FB syncs and a few other indispensable features, but use LauncherPro as a main launcher) So, yes, a very slim MCR r9 from the kitchen + removing everything that is not going to be used from the ROM zip + moving a few apps out of /system/app to /data/app allows one to have a fully booted phone with just under 180 MB in /system. The net effect would be an extra 60ish MB of free space on /data.

* Flashing the RILs for my radio version causes a boot loop (???? - never figured out how and why) - so no RILs - anyway I don't believe the RILs had any effect on reception or time to obtain GPS locks in the first place.

* Apparently some logging to /cache is going on in recovery mode, because after a few operations a message appears saying something to the effect... /cache is full.... this does not, however, affect the phone's normal operation in any way. So, after all, /cache is not really used for anything important. Indeed in the XDA thread mentioned above (http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=806321) some people report success in running their devices with /cache partitions as small as 5 MB.

* Finally, because of the evacuation of large apps from /system/app to /data/app the net gain in internal storage was not as great as I expected and I still need to use FroYo APP2SD for a few apps, which kind of defeats the purpose of the whole exercise - I was a bit bothered by the 20-30 sec. extra startup time necessary to mount the SD card and read apps from there - this is still an issue for me.

* I, too, might be imagining, but it seems to me that battery life is a bit better if everything stays on internal memory.

Nick.

[Guest castroak]

I am getting actually much better life on my device since I have switched from the SD and did few little tweaks. It used to be when I left to work in the morning at 8am phone would be at 100%, when I got back home by 6-7pm, I would be lucky to have 20%. Today just now, I took the phone of the charger at about 8pm, and now it's 9:30pm and I'm sitting at 71%, I used it pretty good last night for 3-4 hours until about 1am. Now I am able to get about 24 hours of actual use of the phone, but even getting 18 hours for me is good, before this I was lucky if I get 10 out of it.

This is what I have selected in my r9 kitchen bake if anyone is interested, with this setup I have 13.7M of Free space on /system:

Required Options - Core, Core Additions for Desire

Google Apps - Mapps/Street View, Voice Dialer, Voice Search (Gmail installed as well)

HTC Apps - App Sharing, Calc, Flashlight, FM Radio, Lock Screen, Sense, Voice Recorder, Weather, World Clock

Modified Apps - HTC IME ( Modified )

HTC Sense Widgets - Battery Widget, Quick Recorder

Third PArty Apps - jbed Java, Quick Office

MoDaCo Additions - AdFree, ROM Manager, Titatnium Backup, Spare Parts, WiFi Status Indicator.

Boot Options - Disable Boot Sound

Trackpad Wake Options - Trackpad Wake with Power

Wifi OPtions - Standard WiFi

Expert Options - Disable IPv6, Disable Vibrate on shutdown

Expert Option Additional Modules - Custom Governor, CFRQ IO Scheduler Module, Undervolt Module.

Putting the cache to such low number as 5M, kind of bothers me, as mine is sitting at 21.1M right now, not sure if the stuff in there is being used but here is the output from the adb shell

# cd /cache/dalvik-cache

cd /cache/dalvik-cache

# du -ha

du -ha

10.5K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

1.6M ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

25.0K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

76.0K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

59.5K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

5.0K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

7.0K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

9.0M ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

21.5K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

613.0K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

5.3M ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

7.0K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

1.1M ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

2.1M ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

88.0K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

26.5K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

41.5K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

659.0K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

14.5K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

189.0K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

210.5K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

20.0K ./system@[email protected]@classes.dex

21.1M .

#

Other things I have done to minimize the battery life and really be MUCH MUCH happier with the phone, I have turned off Display Auto Rotation (read some place that helps), set animation to none (I really don't see much difference between none and all), screen timeout to 30 sec, my mobile data is always on, sync weather every hour, Gmail on instant sync as well (background data on).

Sorry for long post, but hope this helps other people as I have been hatting the fact that I could always barely get through the day with my phone dying. I think I have found a happy medium by doing this. I had even tried Oxygen ROM, I figured may be non-sense would give me a better life, but that really didn't happen, plus I was constantly trying to find good looking replacement for Sense Calendar and just how things worked, that I just gave up and came back to MoDaCo and did a custom build.