HTC HD2 (LEO) software and ROMS (Ubuntu / Android)

I bought an HTC HD2 on contract with O2 at the beginning of this year, it seemed like the most badass phone on the market at the time so I thought it would be worth forking out for it.

It turns out I was right! I’ve been incredibly happy with the phone from day one, despite all it’s bugs and glitches (Windows Mobile 6.5 is not the best mobile OS). The only problem with it is the appstore. I’ve heard atrocious things about the Windows appstore, in fact what I heard was so bad I didn’t even bother with it. Instead I scoured the net looking for any bits of software I thought might be useful, here are just a few:

• FPSEce – This is a Playstation One emulator for anything running windows mobile / windows CE. Some games work better than others, but frankly, I think it’s amazing. All the hardware functions of the original PS1 are emulated through software, and the HD2 does a really good job of running it. Do a quick youtube search for “HTC HD2 FPSECE” and you’ll see what I mean.
• TCPMP – Another invaluable program, it’ll play just about any video/audio file you throw at it – think VLC but in the palm of your hand. Now taken over by Coreplayer, but from what I’ve heard TCPMP does the same job.
• Resco File Explorer – Much more functional than the bundled file explorer, it even has a very workable ftp client.

By far the best resource I’ve found for software/updates for the HD2 are on the forums at xda-developers.com. Some amazing stuff goes on there.

Amazing stuff like…

Ubuntu and Android ROMs for the HTC HD2

When I found out about these I had to try them out. The Android ROM only works with the newest radio ROM, so I had to flash my radio ROM from 2.04 to 2.10 – something I was not a little afraid of, I didn’t want rather an expensive brick where my phone used to be. The update worked fine, and Android seems to work ok-ish at the moment (it’s actually more buggy than winmo and a lot of functions don’t work…and it crashes after a couple of minutes) you can follow the progress of the Dev team at the HTC LINUX site or on the XDA-developers forum.

Here’s a pic of the radio ROM getting an update (those who are squeamish about expensive bricks look away now) :

Android running on my HD2:

The Pièce de résistance, Ubuntu running oh so very smoothly on my HD2:

Fantastic work by the HTC Linux team, amazing stuff!

Test

2 Responses to “HTC HD2 (LEO) software and ROMS (Ubuntu / Android)”

1. Bree Jungman says:

   August 6, 2010 at 03:31

   I bought my HD2 virtually month ago, already got lot of apps on it but want extra of course. Nonetheless wish to in finding higher PDF reader, with higher fullscreen mode and multitouch. Making plans install android on it however it’s going to be now not very soon.
2. jsnprtr says:

   December 10, 2010 at 17:46

   Pants