LG Optimus L3

Android smartphone more affordable prices. The vendors are starting to spend a lot of Android phones at low cost. South Korean manufacturer LG is presenting its latest low-cost Android handset Optimus L3.

Installing Google applications

If all has gone well, you should now be staring at the Android home screen. It will look rather bare, as the CyanogenMod installer doesn't set up any large friendly homescreen widgets, like you might expect to see on a screen this size.

It also doesn’t install familiar applications such as Gmail or Facebook - and nor do you get the Android Market app to download other applications from. So one of the first things you’ll want to do is install these.

To do this, connect your TouchPad to a wireless network (I’m assuming you know, or can work out, how to do this); then browse to the “Latest Version/Google Apps” page on the CyanogenMod wiki. The table at the bottom of the page contains links to various Google Apps packages: tap the download link for CyanogenMod 7 and let the zip file download onto your TouchPad.

To install this application package, you need to reboot into the ClockworkMod recovery environment. This is very simple: hold down the power button on your TouchPad for a second and you’ll see a menu with (among other options) a Reboot option. Tap it, select Recovery and tap OK.

In a few moments you’ll be at the ClockwordMod menu. ClockworkMod is a very simple interface for installing system ROMs and updates. You navigate it using the volume up and down buttons; press the Home button to select a menu item.

(You may also notice that your TouchPad now has a boot menu that lets you choose whether to boot into webOS or Android when you start it up: this uses the same buttons as ClockworkMod.)

To install your freshly-downloaded Google Apps package, navigate down and select “install zip from sdcard” from the main ClockworkMod menu, then select “choose zip from sdcard”. Browse into the “download” folder and select the Google Apps zip file.

You’ll then see a confirmation menu, offering one option to install the zip file and ten options simply saying “No”, just to make sure you don’t install the wrong file by accident. Go ahead and install the zip file – it only takes a few seconds. When that’s done, go back to the main menu and select “reboot system now”.

When you land back in Android you’ll be walked through the process of setting up your Google account and installing various apps, just as you would on a brand new Android phone or tablet.
<<Before
For more general information about the CyanogenMod team, visit the official website
Tutorial by PC Pro

Preparing PC For Installing Android

The next thing to do is download the installer to your PC. The file itself is called ACMEInstaller.zip. Once this file is downloaded, unzip it and extract the two files inside to a convenient folder on your PC. The README file in this archive contains more information and instructions for the installation process, but you can work from this feature instead.

The only other thing you need is a tool called Novacom, which is used to control the TouchPad from the Windows command prompt. This doesn’t seem to be available to download on its own anywhere, so it looks like you’ll have to download the entire 273MB webOS SDK to get it.

You’ll find the SDK here (scroll down the page a bit to find it). Don’t bother installing Java or VirtualBox, as recommended on the page – those are only needed for actual application development. When the SDK installer runs, choose a Custom installation and install only the "Command Line Interface Tools”).

Once this is done, I suggest you go into your Program Files directory – or Program Files (x86) on a 64-bit system – browse into the installation folder and copy novacom.exe into the folder where you unzipped the ACME installer. This isn’t necessary but it will save you a bit of typing later on.

Putting the TouchPad into recovery mode

Now just need to put the TouchPad into the right state to receive the Android ROM. To do this, make sure the TouchPad is connected to your PC by USB; then restart it. You do this by pressing the menu button at the bottom right of the screen, swiping right to the Settings tab, opening Device Info, clicking Reset Options and pressing Restart.

Once the screen goes dark, hold down the “volume up” button until the device reboots and you see a large USB logo appear on the TouchPad’s screen. Windows will complain about being unable to install the driver, but that’s normal.

Launching the installer

Open a command prompt and cd to the folder where you saved the installer, typed: cd desktop\your folder
Then, enter this line exactly as it appears here: novacom boot mem:// < ACMEInstaller
If you didn’t copy the novacom tool into this folder you’ll need to provide a full path to it, which on a 64-bit system means you’d type: "C:\Program Files (x86)\HP webOS\SDK\bin\novacom" boot mem:// < ACMEInstaller

If all is well, your TouchPad should spring to life and you’ll see the installer start to unpack and install Android. If not, check that your TouchPad is properly connected and in the right mode, make sure the novacom and ACMEInstaller files are in the right place and try again.

The whole installation should take only a minute or two: you might see the screen pause from time to time, or the odd error message scroll past, but don’t worry about that. Very shortly you should see the CyanogenMod splash screen, and your TouchPad will boot into Android for the first time.

If something goes wrong at this point, you can always reboot the TouchPad back into recovery mode and try again. In the worst case, it should always be possible to restore your TouchPad to its factory settings using webOS Doctor.
<<Before Next>>

For more general information about the CyanogenMod team, visit the official website
Tutorial by PC Pro

Preparing TouchPad for Installing Android

You could simply clear out your personal data and apps. To do this, press the menu button at the bottom right of the screen, swipe right to the Settings tab, open Device Info, click Reset Options and press Full Erase.

If you decide not to clear out your data, you should at least ensure there’s 2GB free on your TouchPad’s internal storage, so the Cyanogen installer can create the Android system partition. When you’re ready to install Android, the first thing to do is connect your TouchPad to your PC and create a folder in the root directory called “cminstall”. Into this folder, you need to download several software packages: you can find links to them all on the official alpha release page (scroll down to the bottom of the long introductory post to find the links). You’ll also find more information, advice and FAQs on that page, as well as videos to help you out, so if you have trouble with any of the steps in this feature, that's a good place to start.

The package links are headed “CM7”, “Clockwork Recovery” and “Moboot”. The files themselves, which should end up in the “cminstaller” folder on your TouchPad, are called:

update-cm-7.1.0-tenderloin-a1-fullofbugs.zip

update-cwm_tenderloin-1012.zip

moboot_0.3.3.zip

Let the name of the CyanogenMod 7.1 package serve as another, not too subtle reminder that the operating system you are about to install is not release-quality software!
<<Before  Next>>

For more general information about the CyanogenMod team, visit the official website
Tutorial by PC Pro

Installing Android On HP TouchPad

Install Android on the HP TouchPad using CyanogenMod's alpha release. CyanogenMod team, perhaps the web’s most respected Android hacking group, has released its alpha Android build for the device.

The CyanogenMod 7.1 alpha release is unofficial, alpha-quality software. Installing it on your TouchPad isn’t supported or recommended by HP, CyanogenMod or PC Pro. If you want to install it you do so absolutely at your own risk, and with no guarantee that your TouchPad will be stable or even usable once you’ve done so. The instructions given below assume a degree of technical expertise. If you do hit problems, don’t expect anyone to help. You’re on your own.

If your TouchPad crashes or freezes during or after the installation, you can normally reset it by holding down the Home and power buttons together for ten seconds. If your system gets seriously messed up, you can perform a complete factory restoration of webOS using HP’s webOS Doctor tool.
NEXT>>

For more general information about the CyanogenMod team, visit the official website
Tutorial by PC Pro