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Launcher Pro - A few questions

T

TheTrueSpin

Android Enthusiast
I'm using Launcher Pro on my HTC Desire and I have a few questions. I can't believe how much faster LP is compared to Sense. Everything is so much smoother with LP and it has really made me consider rooting so I can use vanilla android.

- Has anyone noticed decreased battery life with LP? I understand that sense is still running in the background and I wonder whether this is the case.

- Message / e-mail notification seems to be broken. With sense I get a little number next to the relevant icon on my home screen, indicating how many messages / e-mails I have. With LP, this does not happen, or the numbers don't update. Is this just a limitation of the Launcher?

- If I like Lancher Pro more than sense, would I probably prefer vanilla android?
 
TheTrueSpin said:
I'm using Launcher Pro on my HTC Desire and I have a few questions. I can't believe how much faster LP is compared to Sense. Everything is so much smoother with LP and it has really made me consider rooting so I can use vanilla android.

- Has anyone noticed decreased battery life with LP? I understand that sense is still running in the background and I wonder whether this is the case.

- Message / e-mail notification seems to be broken. With sense I get a little number next to the relevant icon on my home screen, indicating how many messages / e-mails I have. With LP, this does not happen, or the numbers don't update. Is this just a limitation of the Launcher?

- If I like Lancher Pro more than sense, would I probably prefer vanilla android?
Click to expand...

there are various threads about LP and battery life. and one option maybe to choose the "clean slate" scene in Sense. this removes all widgets so they probably won't run in the background and then activate LP.

for notifications in LauncherPro:

menu > preferences > dock settings > check the missed call count/unread sms count/unread Gmail options.

which ROM. not sure as i'm not rooted.
 
Yes, if you never use Sense, and you can live without the HTC people and mail apps, go vanilla. Faster and makes sense (no pun intended) if you dont care about sense.
 
I am thinking of rooting my Desire Hd but it is on contract I am currently using LP Pro and it is very fast. Will my phone become a brick if I root it. Does LP Pro offer any benefits over the regular LP?
 
LP Pro offers a few widgets of its own and the option to resize widgets (can be handy if you use a grid size other than 4x4). Plus it gives a couple of quid to the devs for their work.
 
Rooting your phone won't make it a brick - wouldn't be many of us doing it if it did! :) Just read up and make sure you know what you are doing first. Plenty of people in the root subforum who can answer questions.

It will void your warranty, unless you unroot before returning for any repair, so in that respect it's at your own risk. I'd recommend doing a bit of research and deciding whether it is for you.
 
Hadron said:
Rooting your phone won't make it a brick - wouldn't be many of us doing it if it did! :) Just read up and make sure you know what you are doing first. Plenty of people in the root subforum who can answer questions.

It will void your warranty, unless you unroot before returning for any repair, so in that respect it's at your own risk. I'd recommend doing a bit of research and deciding whether it is for you.
Click to expand...

With DHD, their permroot method is visionary+, so they're flashing with ROM manager. No custom recovery flashed.

Providing they can uninstall Visionary+ (and remove perm root) and keep a backup of their stock rom, unrooting for them would be much easier than with ours.
 
Don't want to turn this into a "should I root thread", but it is looking more and more tempting. Only concern is the warranty, although I think rejecting a warranty because of rooted software is legally dubious.

There is something clean about vanilla android that really appeals to me. I am wary of stability issues if I start using custom ROMs.
 
There are some good ones about. Stability is mainly due to the kernel you use is not ideal for you. But there are always others you can try.

Pop into the root forum and ask us some questions if you like ;)
 
Thanks - learned something there. No use to me, but if my friend who owns an HD ever feels like rooting (unlikely I think) it might come in handy :)
 
I've installed LP today (and a Home switcher) but in all honesty I've not noticed any change in speed (I think the Desire is pretty nippy anyway).
LP does give me some new options to play with and I do like the dock at the bottom of the screen.

However, I miss some of the widgets HTC offer, like an agenda view calendar, bookmarks, etc and the default Android clock is awful. I guess there are some apps I can get to do replicate those things but I'm running out of storage.

What apps do LP users tend to go for to replace the Sense widgets?
 
LauncherPro Plus has some good replacement widgets for the people, bookmarks, calendar, messaging, twitter, facebook and friendstream.

fancy widget is a copy of the sense clock.
 
Never noticed battery usage difference with LPP, only times is when I switch or upgrade ROMs and change radios. Seems CM7 is sensitive about which radio you have flashed in, Oxygen 2.0 is much better on battery with the 5.11.05.27 radio and CM7 seems to run better with the 5.09.05.30_2 one.

As mentioned earlier, if you have multiple launchers, make sure the ones you aren't using doesn't have any widgets and icons on them- they consume memory and CPU cycles.
 
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