JKeene Reviews-BlackICE Toro Kangerade ROM For Galaxy Nexus!!
So this week we will be looking at Travp624′s BlackICE ROM. He has been one of my favorite themers on the GNex and when I saw his name on a ROM I knew I would be checking it out. This ROM is based on the AOKP source with alot of awesome extras thrown in. When the ROM is coming from a developer who is also a talented themer you know it will have sex appeal as well as performance and Black Ice does not disappoint in either category.
As I mentioned BlackICE has alot of extras so lets take a look. Of course there are the usual AOKP ROM extras you have come to expect (click here to see my review of that ROM) so they are on board as well as these mods,
- Fully built from AOKP source
- Added Cyanogenmods FileManager! (CM)
- Added DSPManager (CM)
- Replaced stock Mms with CM Mms (CM)
- Custom DroidTh3ory “Gofaster” Butter (DroidTh3ory)
- Custom MasturModsSettings Built-in (Mastur Mynd)
- Custom Dark Ass theme (Me)
- Imported handle_compcache latest from CM9 (CM)
- Removed the Japaneses IME stuff (Me)
- Removed status bar notification icons dimming effect (me)
- Custom BlackICE boot animation (Kwesley1020)
- All Inverted Gapps Gmail, Gtalk, etc. (Me)
- Custom Toggles (AOKP)I just restored icon on/off state and other minor tweaks
A while ago I did an article on travp624′s Blacked out Google Apps here and I am happy to report that they are alive and well on this ROM. Under the MasturMods setting you can find my favorite part of this ROM. Here you can do crazy with your visual mods, You want baked in themes? Got them! You want 8 battery icon mods? Got them! How about baked in one click soft key mods? Yes, they are here as well. Take all of the ways you can visually customize the ROM and combine them with the speed and stability of AOKP and I think we might have a winner here. All of the Blacked Out GAPPS are amazing and work just the way that Google intended them too. I am talking about blacked out Google +, Messaging, GMail, and Contracts. They look great with the native ICS theme and personally I am not sure I can go back to stock Google + after using it all blacked out!
1. App Test
Here I put all of the homebrewed Blacked GAPPS and all of them worked like a charm. I used Brothers In Arms, Anamoly HD, and Osmosis HD to check out the gaming power of this ROM and am happy to report that all the games worked great. There were no hiccups with the graphics and all three games loading smoothly and easily. The stock YouTube app gave me no trouble at all and with my area’s new-found 4G service I am glad that I am still on Verizon’s unlimited plan because I was using YouTube to full effect. Tweetdeck was its usual self and did not give me any headaches except to wear down my tolerance of tweets about Peyton Manning. The only app that gave me any issues was the stock Gallery which occasionally crashed but nothing that made it unusable.
4 out of 5
2. Launcher Responsiveness
BlackICE comes with Apex Launcher along for the party and I used Nova Launcher as well for testing purposes. Both of these launchers are great and offer alot of different ways to customize you ICS experience. For the purpose of the ROM both worked very well during daily use and over the course of a week I did not have any FC’s or reboots that seemed to be coming from the ROM. I only mention this because a few ROMs I have tested in the past did not play well with certain ROMs so it is nice to see one that does.
5 out of 5
3. Battery Life
Here is another win for BlackICE. One thing that I have noticed in testing all of these ICS ROM’s is that unlike some Android 2.3 ROMs I have seen pretty consistant battery life across the board with the different ones I have tried. BlackICE is no exception. No I did not get an entire day out of it but 17 hours on WiFi with medium use and 8-1o hours on 4G with moderate use is not half bad at all.
5 out of 5
4. Sound Quality
The sound here was quite loud as I found out. My GNex stepped in for Navigation duties when my dad’s GPS went to pot during a 7 hour roadtrip. Besides Google Navigation amazing him by working much better then his Tom-Tom, we can both attest to the fact that the Voice Navigation volume came through LOUD AND CLEAR. There was obviously no problem with the external speaker and headphones worked just fine was well. All of the games sounded great and YouTube movies were fine as well.
5 out of 5
5. Browser Testing
Here I used the stock ICS browser and the Chrome Browser as well. While I find myself using Chrome more then stock they both work very well on BlackICE. I just happen to like the layout on the Chrome better but if you like stock better don’t worry both will work well here.
5 out of 5
So here I am with another ROM that really did not disappoint me in any way. So what set’s BlackICE apart from the rest of the ROM’s out there? If you are someone who loves to mess with the look of your ROM then you have found a potential new favorite. Being able to use MasturMods on the fly to change the look of multiple aspects of my phone was great. Having it all baked in is one stop shopping at it’s best. You will not have to go hunting for certain mods, they are all right here. Keep in mind that this ROM is based right off of AOKP so everything works very well. AOKP it’s self is smooth, swift, and above all stable. Now throw in all of that eye candy and I can say for a fact that travp624 did not disappoint here in any way. So head over to the link below and flash away. Let me know what you think in the comments!
Source-Rootzwiki
JKeene, AndroREV Editor
We Are AndroREV, WE ARE!!!!
