[Samsung Infuse 4G] sbjaved:
I just wanted to note down a few things that I wished I knew before flashing my Infuse.

Substituting your official Samsung build for unofficial ROMs like CyanogenMOD (CM) is a double edged sword. On one hand you get to play with the latest and greatest stuff...but on the other hand you have no guarantees of any kind. I'm not sure but you may be in violation of your warranty. In other words you're on your own.

Now there are forums like the Official CM forums and XDA where you'll get help if you run into issues but the bottom line is:

You flashed your phone on your own responsibility

. Nobody is liable for that. Nobody has any duty to resolve your issues. You may get a response, you may not. Sometimes the level of solution varies with the technical level of the person trying to help you. I may not be able to fix your problem... My suggestion may even f*** it up worse.

In my opinion, if your phone has critical data that you depend on (contacts, appointments etc)... it would be wise to stick with the OS build your phone came with. It may be old...but it has been tested by qualified engineers. All aspects of the phone are functional. And if you run into an issue, you can always pick up the phone and call somebody. When you flash your phone, there's always a minimal chance that you may lose your data (I'm not saying it always happens...but it can). You also lose the privilege of support provided by your carrier or anybody else.

Secondly, your Infuse ships with OS that has been modified by Samsung to provide you with a better experience. These are things which I'll list down at the end, that you'd lose with a custom build like CM. So you'd gain some features by trying the latest version of android but you'd lose a few features too! Because they were provided by Samsung, not by Google.

Things like:

1. No quick view in Calendar. You have to go to Agenda view in options where all entries of all dates will be visible. You cannot see daily appointments on the default Month view. Also there's no option for persistent alarm for your appointments. In the stock build my alarm for tasks used to ring for 15 minutes...now there just one ring and silence. Its a little thing but I sometimes miss the alarm and the whole purpose is lost.

2. Contacts applications is modified by Samsung. Joining contacts from different sources (facebook, twitter) into a single contact is much easier. You can do that in CM too but I had to search the Internet for that option.

You'd also get alphabets on the side of the screen while scrolling contacts. Tap an alphabet and you quickly jump to contacts that start with that alphabet. That's missing in CM too.

3. There are some widgets provided by Samsung like Running Applications widget which I absolutely loved. It would show number of running applications and a quick option to close them all. CM has a task manager and the market has applications that can replicate that functionality but I haven't found one as nifty as that little widget. Then theres a Dual Clock widget, which was important to me as I have contacts in different timezones. I could easily check their time at a glance. In short there were some gems that I miss... and I can't get with CM.

4. Messaging app was modified by Samsung to allow quick addition of a particular group (e.g. all the contacts in Family group) to senders list.

5. There was a very nice Memo app that you could store notes in for offline use. There are tons of alternatives in the market like Springpad, Evernote etc but I kinda liked that app. It had a very nice yellow legal pad template. Its a minor gripe but hey! :)

6. There's no swype in CM7! Samsung preloads your Infuse with swype. If you've not used swype, its an awesome way to input text. I found that I could sign up for Swype beta and use it in CM but then again....beta is a beta. It has problems.

7. Bluetooth (currently) doesn't completely work in CM7. You can transfer data but audio pairing is an issue. It doesn't bother me but it may be something you use.

8. Wifi is fine but try using Mobile Data on CM. I still haven't figured how to set up my mobilink GPRS internet. I tried setting up the APN with the same settings as on the stock build but it doesn't seem to work. It worked fine under Samsung. But YMMV. It may be particular to my network and CM build.

9. There's no voice search in google search widget. I had to install an apk from net to get it working. It wouldn't even show up in the market.

10. Also you'll lose all your settings in applications. You'll get your apps back from the market (Even the Paid ones...you won't have to re-purchase) but you'll have to set them up all again just the way you want. That may not be such a big deal for some but it may irk you. Also don't use Titanium Backup to restore you app data. I tried that and every f***ing app would crash every ten minutes. I had to reflash again.

11. Your partitions will show up different in the file manager. For example your internal sd card (as it showed up in stock build) will be mounted under 'emmc'. I had to look online for that. Now that may not be a major thing but it screwed up a lot of app data links.

12. Lastly CM isn't even official for Infuse yet. All you have are volunteers packaging builds for Infuse. Hats off to their hard work! But as a user.... you are the tester! So if you're comfortable running untested beta grade software only then go for CM7 on your infuse. Otherwise stick with the stock build.

I'll keep adding other differences as I remember and discover them. You guys can pitch in too.

This post is by no means an attempt to belittle CM. Its an excellent ROM. It has its own advantages which you can read up on its website. I'm just highlighting some tradeoffs so that new users like myself exactly know what they're giving up.

So if you still want to go ahead and flash your Infuse, full power to you. At least you'll be making an informed decision. Just please backup your critical data. Sync your contacts with Google. Back up your music and videos, messages, downloads etc.

Go here: http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1400375 for the latest CM7 build for Infuse.

Enjoy the CM awesomeness! Best of Luck