Have been 'having fun' with my various Android devices in the last few days/week (?), after keeping ajour with CyanogenMod CM12 status.
The Galaxy Nexus from Samsung is a solid workhorse, too slow on startup for me to love it, but, when CM11 nightlies started dropping off in frequency, it was clear that things were moving fast on the CM12. Actually the developer had trouble with his own GNex too..
So, when a new Beta was released for the GNex I downloaded it, with a special Gapps version, read through the experiences others were having on XDA, and set at it with gusto. Its amazing where the time goes when playing with these things, so I had a couple of late nights and early mornings during the last week or so..
The CM12 beta installed OK, but there was space trouble for the first versions of Gapps I tried. Finally, I had success with the Pico version, and the long process of restoring apps began. Finally got things the way I like, using the Google Now launcher, though startup still suffers delays which I believe is related to sorting out the Carrier (Telenor). Will try it without a SIM, and see if that helps.
Lollipop was now running on the LG G3, the Nexus 10, Nexus 7 2013, and the GNex.
This left the Galaxy S2 running very fast on Stock 4.1.2. There was really no need to upgrade this device to Lollipop other than to see how it ran, but after quite a lot of preparation I downloaded various suggestions from old GS2 YouTubes aimed at getting my Recovery to a version required for CM12 installation.
Lots of the above were great for installing some kernel to get root status, but the only one that included a very old version of CWM was the Siyah kernel I had used a year or so ago.. When I had got the GS2 into a pretty hopeless state, the Siyah saved my bacon :)
Now I had the old CWM version it was possible to Restore what I believe was CM10 from the middle of last year. This restored slowly, but it got me to a state allowing Restore of CM11 from around Christmas. I then had CWM 6.0.4.5. Enough to install the CM12 Beta from lysergic, which awaited with the same Pico Gapps.
The CM12 Beta installed with no problems, and I was able to run Nandroid after setting things up the way I like. I am really impressed by how well Lollipop runs on this very old device. Equally as well as the GNex, and with 200+ MB free ram!
There we are then, all Lollipopped :)
This by the way is written on my new N20p 13" Chromebook from Lenovo.
