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Samsung Galaxy S II gets an early ICS ROM with TouchWiz

Posted: , by Michael H.

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Samsung Galaxy S II gets an early ICS ROM with TouchWiz
Good news! There is a working (albeit buggy) ROM for non-US Samsung Galaxy S II devices based on Ice Cream Sandwich. Bad news! It's got TouchWiz, which kind of defeats the purpose of Ice Cream Sandwich.

TouchWiz isn't the worst custom UI to be put on Android devices, but it is starting to look a little old and boring. Of course, Matias Duarte and team went to great lengths to make sure that Android 4.0 looks great. It's expected that Samsung is in the process of updating the TouchWiz look with version 5.0 to fit with Ice Cream Sandwich more. Unfortunately, the first custom ROM built on ICS for the Galaxy S II has TouchWiz 4.x slapped on top of the ICS goodness. 

The ROM looks to be working fairly well, but is still in the early stages, so it probably isn't going to be a good day-to-day ROM, but it has promise. If you don't mind TouchWiz, or a fairly unstable ROM, you can give it a shot. Provided you have a non-US Galaxy S II that is. 


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1. jamrockjones posted on 14 Dec 2011, 11:25 8

TouchWiz makes it look like Gingerbread. Hmmmm, maybe I'll have to get stock Android when I get ICS.

2. mozes316 posted on 14 Dec 2011, 11:36 4 2

Yea, they can definitely just cool down with the TouchWiz, Sense and most definitely with the MotoBlur on ICS. Just my opinion.

7. iankellogg posted on 14 Dec 2011, 12:05 2 6

Motoblur is a pretty terrible rom considering it is bloat filled and doesn't add anything over stock. At least with touchwiz you get the nice pulldown toggle. Touchwiz should look mostly like stock android but with the pulldown toggle and the touchwiz widgets. I know this won't happen since they think people actually want touchwiz's launcher, same goes with sense. They really think people will be unable to use their phone if it looks different.

10. zfly9 posted on 14 Dec 2011, 12:10 1

Having the music toggles on the lock screen? That's one thing that's nice.

11. MorePhonesThanNeeded posted on 14 Dec 2011, 12:40 7

Is that so? Please explain, I find motoblur on the DX to be just fine, does what I need it to. Has very useful widgets built in that work much better than the crap you get off the market so I really would like to know what you are talking about. Complain complain, yet have nothing to really say why you are complaining.

12. KingKurogiii posted on 14 Dec 2011, 13:02 5

have you even used any of the new Droids or the Atrix 2? "Motoblur" is really nice.

13. ledbetterp3 posted on 14 Dec 2011, 18:09 4

Yeah, you obviously haven't recently used a Motorola phone, which Motoblur no longer exists on any them made this year. The new Motorola UI is much better than Motoblur and imo touchwiz.

14. live7373 posted on 14 Dec 2011, 20:10 1

I have the Droid Razr and also had the Bionic. Moto's new UI is great to me. Both phones I had were lightning fast and very smooth. I've only had minimal experience with older Moto phones but the newer ones with Moto's new UI are fantastic (IMHO)

3. protozeloz posted on 14 Dec 2011, 11:38 3

I think they need to get rid of that launcher, the new TW 5 should be based on the new ICS launcher that's far more useful and with new TW widgets, but probably the core apps modification aren't cooked yet so they decided to use the 4.0 apps instead since they should work as well

Hope the TW 5 is more based on TW UX and not TW 4.0

4. PimpStrong posted on 14 Dec 2011, 11:50 1 1

TouchWiz 5.0 will be re-designed for Android 4.0 unlike TW4.0

5. henrickrw posted on 14 Dec 2011, 11:52 1

Touchwiz fine with me

6. aravinddr posted on 14 Dec 2011, 11:53 1

When will the official update of ICS for the Samsung Galaxy S II will be released with TouchWiz version 5.0 From Samsung....?

8. twenti7 posted on 14 Dec 2011, 12:06

I personally love the icons and colors on TouchWiz 4.0 because the Super AMOLED Plus screen really makes them pop. The only thing about TouchWiz that I can't stand is the 4 icons on the bottom. Ever since I got my first Android phone, I've used custom launchers that put 5 icons on the bottom, with the app drawer icon in the middle, and that is probably going to be my favorite change with Ice Cream Sandwich.

9. edpad90 posted on 14 Dec 2011, 12:09 1

Really mad... I cant believe that Huawei as a company already has a phone that will run on ICS coming out next week on US prepaid carrier. but lets wait until it comes to our phones to be the hottest smartphone of 2012 bet money it will be ;)

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