ROM upgrade question

[Guest greekislandlover]

You guys must hate these newbie questions sometimes! I have been doing some reading here before posting, and would be grateful for some advice.

Got an Orange SF and am thinking of a rom upgrade. Firstly, I am staying with Orange so, do I need to unlock the phone? Would a ROM upgrade do this anyway, is it required to do before upgrading or is it just a no-brainer?

Secondly, the reason for upgrading is to have a fix for the wifi not coming on when the phone is taken out of standby and AGPS updating. Would a new ROM give me these without having to load additional apps?

Thirdly, what ROM for a Gen 1 phone? The guide on here says go for the R12 if you can't decide (that's me!!). Is that still current best advice?

Lastly (and most importantly for me) I have a load of apps I've purchased. I can obviously reinstall the freebies from Android Market, but I am concerned that the paid ones won't reinstall without paying again. Are they recoverable? Also, I really like the way the desktop looks. Is there any way of saving the configuration to reload it after the ROM has reinstalled correctly? I'm not concerned about having problems with the ROM upgrade process. There is shedloads of advice here - just concerned to keep my desktop if possible, and not pay again for the apps.

Many thanks

[Guest albal]

You guys must hate these newbie questions sometimes! I have been doing some reading here before posting, and would be grateful for some advice.

Got an Orange SF and am thinking of a rom upgrade. Firstly, I am staying with Orange so, do I need to unlock the phone? Would a ROM upgrade do this anyway, is it required to do before upgrading or is it just a no-brainer?

Secondly, the reason for upgrading is to have a fix for the wifi not coming on when the phone is taken out of standby and AGPS updating. Would a new ROM give me these without having to load additional apps?

Thirdly, what ROM for a Gen 1 phone? The guide on here says go for the R12 if you can't decide (that's me!!). Is that still current best advice?

Lastly (and most importantly for me) I have a load of apps I've purchased. I can obviously reinstall the freebies from Android Market, but I am concerned that the paid ones won't reinstall without paying again. Are they recoverable? Also, I really like the way the desktop looks. Is there any way of saving the configuration to reload it after the ROM has reinstalled correctly? I'm not concerned about having problems with the ROM upgrade process. There is shedloads of advice here - just concerned to keep my desktop if possible, and not pay again for the apps.

Many thanks

I have a similar question on http://android.modaco.com/content/absolute.../changing-roms/

I think it should be a FAQ. I think a lot of modders are well into putting on different ROMs but for me my phone is a tool so it has to be usable. I'd like to be able to try some of the newer ROMs but I don't want to lose all I have saved.

To answers one of your questions you do not need to unlock your phone from the network to put on new ROMs but you will need to do something called Rooting the phone (this allows you full access to the phone). You should read some of the guides out there on loading a new ROM to get an idea of some of the steps involved. There are also some cool videos on youtube.

[Guest k0zmic]

You guys must hate these newbie questions sometimes! I have been doing some reading here before posting, and would be grateful for some advice.

Got an Orange SF and am thinking of a rom upgrade. Firstly, I am staying with Orange so, do I need to unlock the phone? Would a ROM upgrade do this anyway, is it required to do before upgrading or is it just a no-brainer?

Secondly, the reason for upgrading is to have a fix for the wifi not coming on when the phone is taken out of standby and AGPS updating. Would a new ROM give me these without having to load additional apps?

Thirdly, what ROM for a Gen 1 phone? The guide on here says go for the R12 if you can't decide (that's me!!). Is that still current best advice?

Lastly (and most importantly for me) I have a load of apps I've purchased. I can obviously reinstall the freebies from Android Market, but I am concerned that the paid ones won't reinstall without paying again. Are they recoverable? Also, I really like the way the desktop looks. Is there any way of saving the configuration to reload it after the ROM has reinstalled correctly? I'm not concerned about having problems with the ROM upgrade process. There is shedloads of advice here - just concerned to keep my desktop if possible, and not pay again for the apps.

Many thanks

No you don't but it's free and easy. ROM upgrade won't unlock your phone. You might as well just unlock anyway since it's fairly quick.

I recommend Swedish Spring RLS5.

They will, they're tied to your Google account. They'll be at the bottom of the Market listed as 'Purchased'.

Not really, best to take photo's of home screens and then restore manually.

[Guest k0zmic]

I have a similar question on http://android.modaco.com/content/absolute.../changing-roms/

I think it should be a FAQ. I think a lot of modders are well into putting on different ROMs but for me my phone is a tool so it has to be usable. I'd like to be able to try some of the newer ROMs but I don't want to lose all I have saved.

To answers one of your questions you do not need to unlock your phone from the network to put on new ROMs but you will need to do something called Rooting the phone (this allows you full access to the phone). You should read some of the guides out there on loading a new ROM to get an idea of some of the steps involved. There are also some cool videos on youtube.

Nandroid Backup in recovery makes an image of your phone in it's current state. You can revert and not lose anything. Always nandroid before flashing or modifying things.