A review of Wanamlite – a stable, light, and m...

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A review of Wanamlite – a stable, light, and mess free ROM

A review of Wanamlite – a stable, light, and mess free ROM

When it comes to custom ROMs, you are not sure what you are going to get until you really try it. As with many other things in this world, some things just work for you, while other things just don’t. Still, there are those that work best for a lot of people, and that kind of choice is really worth looking at.

 

Wanamlite is one of those custom ROM ‘dynasties’ in a sense that it is a custom ROM that has been developed for more than one type of smartphone. These kinds of Custom ROMs offer a bit more confidence since they really know what they are doing.

I am not saying that trying out a custom ROM from a first time developer is bad. There are some pretty good gems out there waiting to be discovered. For me though, Wanamlite does the best job at giving me the most stable, light and mess free experience.

Wanamlite

Stable

Wanamlite’s ROMs tend to just work. Just like most of the ROMs that are being developed for the Samsung Galaxy S3, Wanamlite’s ROM features all of the latest Stock ROM releases, and he tweaked them to give the best of the best in terms of stability and speed.

One thing I liked about his build is the fact that the Jelly Bean 4.2 camera and gallery worked perfectly with the ROM. This allowed me to make proper photospheres and tiny planets without crashing like it did on other ROMs like Omega.

Unlike other ROM makers, he doesn’t just throw in whatever new stock ROM comes in. He makes sure he checks the ROM itself for stock stability, features and changes. If they are to his liking, it is incorporated into the next build.

Light

Wanam feather

The Light in Wanamlight means that the ROM was meant to be as light as possible while keeping all the necessary apps and leaving the bloat out. Some of the Apps removed include:

  • ChatON.apk
  • Dropbox.apk
  • DropboxOOBE.apk
  • FotaClient.apk
  • GameHub_2.0_ICS.apk
  • MH_20_ICS_HHP.apk
  • MoreServices.apk
  • SamsungApps.apk
  • SamsungAppsUNA3.apk
  • SSuggest.apk
  • WfdBroker.apk
  • YahoonewsDaemon.apk
  • YahoonewsWidget.apk
  • YahoostockDaemon.apk
  • YahoostockWidget.apk

Most if not all of these apps are useless and considered bloatware. There are plenty of alternatives in the market that are better and more efficient with your data. Many of these you may not even use and want to remove if you had the chance.

Of course, Wanamlite also offers a choice. Installing the ROM involves the use of the Aroma Installer, which offers the list of apps you want to remove or include in your installation. A little tip to improve the overall speed of your experience is to remove the S-Voice app in the install list if you are not using it. In most cases, Google Now has you covered, so you won’t really need it.

Mess Free

Somewhat in the category of light, this ROM is mess free because it doesn’t add a bunch of other apps in the process. Other ROMs may try to impress you by building in apps that allow you to manually tweak the ROM yourself. While that may be better for power users, other users who just want a ROM that is built to work without the added hassle would love to have something like Wanamlite.

Wanamlite also tries to keep things as close to the stock ROM experience in terms of interactions. While cool features like skipping music by pressing and holding the volume button exists, it doesn’t have features that intrude on the regular functions of a key (such as the annoying task killer in Omega which was assigned to the menu key).

Battery Life

Battery life with the Wanamlite ROM is pretty fair. It doesn’t break any records, but it lasts the day perfectly with moderate use. It uses a modified version of the Perseus kernel, to maximize the battery life without sacrificing performance.

Fast and Easy updates

Wanam is known to work fast on his ROMs when a new build comes out. He also tries his best to make his ROMs easy to update by making “No-Wipe” versions. This means that you won’t have to fully wipe your data again just to make the ROM work properly. Since updates come in hot and fast, this is very helpful so ROM installers won’t have to spend the whole day reinstalling apps or getting everything back into shape again.

KIES

KiesUnlike most developers, Wanam respects KIES integration, even though it is hated my many. It is still a great backup tool and a great file transfer and media sync utility that works in the same way as Apple’s iTunes. It may not be perfect, but it does make you feel like your device isn’t so alien to your computer when it connects.

 

Disadvantages

One disadvantage I could say about Wanamlite is historically, his ROM is not the best to get for a hardcore gamer. High resource games tend to stutter when on Wanamlite, but normal day to day apps and lighter games work perfectly on this ROM. Of course, if you really want to get your game on, you can install other tweaks and kernels to boost the performance of Wanamlite.

Conclusion

Wanambar

Wanamlite’s ROM is heavily recommended for those who like having the stock experience, only faster and more stable. It is perfect for those who like to avoid controlling the ROM too much and messing things up in the process. It may not be recommended for heavy gamers, but as a daily driver and market support, this ROM rocks. If personal theming and tweaking is your thing, you may be better off with the heavier ROMs out there.

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