OnePlus releases Custom Android Lollipop ROM (Alpha), Moving away from CyanogenMod

It has been clear that OnePlus and their software partner Cyanogen have been experiencing the communication difficulties. To jog up your memory, OnePlus found out that the Cyanogen has inked a deal with Indian mobile vendor Micromax, which in turn doesn’t allow them to ship the OnePlus One to India running Cyanogen’s software. Then to clarify the details, Cyanogen released a statement saying they will support the device updates outside India. As if that was not enough, a few weeks later, the OnePlus One was completely banned in India, all thanks to a deal between Cyanogen and Micromax. Though, after about a week the ban was lifted and eventually allows Indian users to begin the purchase of the phone again.

Now because of this entire debacle, the OnePlus has put together a team of software developers and is now on its way to release their own ROM independently with no help from Cyanogen. Earlier today, the company announced the Alpha release of their first ROM, which is also going under a contest to name the ROM.

This new alpha release from the OnePlus One Team is based on the latest Android 5.0 Lollipop. This new software build is in very early stages of development, so there is naturally a ton of known bugs with software already. For now, there are no extra features baked into the OS, so it is basically a bare-bones AOSP Lollipop for now. Although, company promises that this is just the base that will lead to the customization and improvement of core functionalities on the latest firmware updates.

The ROM can be flashed to your OnePlus One using the instructions on company’s site. Note that all the instruction should be carefully followed, even though that the flashing ROMS is covered with warranty, but any bad behaviour that result from doing so are not. So, it is highly recommended to backup all the data before flashing the ROM. Or otherwise if you aren’t so keen on flashing the Alpha software to your device, then you should give it some time, as you will receive the stable software from the team in the next couple of months.

Here are the known bugs in the software so far:

• Data roaming is on by default. Make sure to turn if off to avoid potential charges.
• As always, flashing a custom ROM incurs the risk of bricking your phone. Make sure you know what you’re doing and backup everything.
• Camera and video may be unstable. This build supports 4k video; however the quality may be low as we are still fine-tuning the camera.
• Capacitive keys do not turn off when you enable software keys.
• Clock crashes periodically.
• If using a new app pinning feature in L, make sure to turn on the software keys first. Otherwise, you will have to reboot your machine.
• On first boot, start up time will be a bit slow. Rest assured we would speed things up in the future.
• Wi-Fi may be unstable.

Note that this build is not eligible for OTA updates. If you are interested in flashing this alpha release on your OnePlus One, then head over to the below link.

Source: OnePlus