[HTC Desire S] PVL_93_RU:
This is a thread for all users of HTC Desire S with a screen panel by Hitachi

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A quick review:

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As you probably already know, the Desire S came in 2 different parties that had 2 different screen panels. One was made by Sony, which consists of the most devices produced, and the second - was made by Hitachi.

It does not affect the user experience or does not upgrade/downgrade the quality of the display, and, unless you are staying on ROMs with HTC Sense UI or official ROMs, you'll never actually feel or notice that you have either of these two panels.

So why was this thread created in the first place? Let me explain

First signs of the issue:

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As I said above, if you enjoy using the official firmware provided by HTC, or you use a custom ROM that has HTC Sense UI (it doesn't matter whether it's a ROM with Sense 3.6, or 4.0, or 4.1, etc.) - you'll never even think about having a different screen panel

But let's say that you want to try a ROM that's based on Android 4.0.x (a.k.a. Ice Cream Sandwich) or 4.1.x / 4.2.x (both a.k.a. Jelly Bean). That's when which screen panel your phone has matters.

You see, the 3.x kernel from the Google AOSP source of Android 4.x seems to not support the screen panels that were made by Hitachi, the reason for that is probably in the drivers that HTC's kernel has in it, but Google's one does not.

Hitachi panels also apply to MDDI screens category, so if a device has that type of screen panel - any ROM that's built from Android 4.0.x, 4.1.x, and 4.2.x and uses the 3.x kernel that is provided by Google along the source of the OS will NOT boot since the kernel doesn't support MDDI panels.

Sadly, this has become a problem for all users of Desire S that came in the party of devices with MDDI screen panels made by Hitachi.

The original method for Hitachi panels:

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For quite some time, the first builds of custom ROMs with Android 4.1 came with an older 2.x kernel, which had support for MDDI panels built into it. As far as I know, that kernel was from HTC, and it came from Android 2.3.x (a.k.a Gingerbread) source back when that version was the most recent one for this device.

But later on, the developers started using the 3.x kernel by Google, which, as mentioned above, did not have MDDI support built into it. So, when users with Hitachi panels came back home to find a new ROM or a new version of an existing ROM that came with 3.x kernel - they simply could not use them, because either their device won't boot after flashing the ROM, or they would only see a black screen instead of the boot animation.

That was the moment when the Hitachi/Sony panels problem arised.

A team of developers of ROMs known as "Andromadus", which initially brought Android 4.0.x (a.k.a. Ice Cream Sandwich) to HTC Desire Z, made an actual 3.x kernel specially for Hitachi screen panels, also known as "74n" kernel.

Later on, there were 3 newer kernels made - which were 77n, 80n and 82n.

The 82n saga kernel by Andromadus was the one used for the longest time, and it actually supported all the newer ROMs based on Android 4.1.x up until November, but it had its own problems, too.

One of the most arrogant of them was an inability for users to chance the screen brightness, which was set at ~70% all the time. You can imagine what awful user experience it created, and the lack of any solution other than getting a device with a screen panel by Sony just added some oil to the fire.

Alas, nothing else was invented to somehow fix this issue until December.

"So, what do I do now?", you may ask

Here's the answer:

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Thankfully, after a couple of first builds of Android 4.2, the same Andromadus team developed a 3.x kernel for Hitachi screen panels, that could be used with any ROM based on Android 4.2.x.

What's also important is that it brought the full functionality, so now people can access all the features that latest 4.2.x ROMs provide. The only major downside is that people still can't change the screen brightness, which still results in a serious battery drain, but at least now we can enjoy the full-fledged 4.2.x on our device, which is quite delicious!

This means that you can go straight to development section of Desire S forum and get yourself a ROM based on Android 4.2.x!

Pretty sweet, huh?

Well, before you start flashing this and that, you should at least find out which screen panel you have.

I don't think you'd like to download and flash a new ROM and sit and look at "HTC Quietly Brilliant" screen until your device runs of of battery charge, right?

So below awaits a manual for all of you that will help you to determine the type of screen panel and the possibility of flashing new ROMs without thinking about whether it will boot or not.

The Instruction:

Step 1. Find out which screen panel your device has:

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1) Download and install Android Terminal Emulator from Google Play Market

2) Open the application and type in these commands:

(WARNING: to use these commands - you must be rooted with either Superuser or SuperSU AND have BusyBox installed on your phone)

su

dmesg | grep -i panel

If the app shows you any text with word "sony" in it - then your device has a screen panel made by Sony (obviously). If that's the case - you can just close this thread at once and don't worry that your device might freeze at "HTC Quietly Brilliant" screen after flashing a ROM. Otherwise, proceed forward.

OR

1) Open up a file manager that has an ability of browsing any partition above the default SD-card directory and can access the system partition

I recommend using ES File Manager, Root Explorer, Ol File Manager or CM File Manager

2) Navigate to /sys/android_display

If there is a file called "sony ****** wvga" - then you have a Sony panel. Otherwise - you device has a panel by Hitachi.

Step 2. Download a MDDI kernel developed by Andromadus Team:

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For Android 4.0.x & 4.1.x, use this link

--> http://xdaforums.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=1524452&d=1354294206 <--

For Android 4.2.x, use this link

--> http://tool.anzow.com/Software/tool/saga_mddi_291212.zip <--

For MIUI v5, use this link

--> http://yadi.sk/d/JZ_4DS4w3t98s <--

Step 3. Flash the MDDI kernel:

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If you are S-OFF --> just flash the .zip file with the kernel after flashing the ROM and GAPPS package through "install zip from sdcard"

If you are S-ON --> use the following instruction by mertonzo (be sure to thank him for this;)):

1) Wipe all data

2) Flash your custom ROM

3) Get your MDDI compatible kernel and flash it

--> IF (and only IF) you've this error when flashing kernel in recovery: assert failed:write_raw_image("/tmp/boot.img","boot"):

--> 3a) extract boot.img from custom rom ZIP and put it in the adb directory on your PC

--> 3b) reboot in fastboot mode

--> 3c) execute from PC: fastboot flash boot.img

--> 3d) reboot in recovery and retry to flash your new kernel

--> 3e) Now, flashing kernel is completed and you can continue to Step 4)

4) Get new boot.img: in recovery, attach USB cable and run from PC terminal --> adb pull /tmp/newboot.img (it will trasfer generated boot.img to your PC) <--

5) On your PC rename newboot.img file to boot.img

6) Reboot in fastboot mode

7) Install new boot.img (from PC terminal execute --> fastboot flash boot.img <--)

Step 4. Reboot and Enjoy your newly flashed Jelly Bean ROM!:D

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UPDATE:

As totalnoob34 mentioned in his post on the last page of this thread, Desire S devices with Sony and Hitachi panels have different digitizer flex cable sizes, and their connectors are also placed differently. For further referrence, see this quote:

Credits/Thanks to:

Users:

[MENTION=1406148]mertonzo[/MENTION] - for providing a manual of flashing the kernel manually

[MENTION=1599840]badlife[/MENTION] - for prodiving a link patched MDDI kernel to use with with MIUI v5

[MENTION=4629561]finistere[/MENTION] and [MENTION=3428997]Auke11[/MENTION] - for finding out about an ability to use Lux Auto Brightness and RootDim to set brightness with MDDI kernels

[MENTION=3832677]sun770[/MENTION] - for mentioning about ScreenDimFull as a workaround for MDDI screens [

MENTION=5243583]kaizoku kuma[/MENTION] - for giving a correct link to MDDI kernel for 4.2 ROMs

[MENTION=4665306]jugg1es[/MENTION] and [MENTION=4144597]suku_patel_22[/MENTION] - for leading the users with Non-Sony screen panels to this thread and helping them

[MENTION=4628223]totalnoob34[/MENTION] - for sharing the information about flex cables and placements of digitizer connectors in different DS models (as mentioned above

Developers:

Andromadus Team for bringing us the kernels that we can use the 4.0, 4.1 and 4.2 ROMs with [MENTION=4350964]Flinny[/MENTION] (Andromadus CM10.1 and CM10.2)

[MENTION=4084276]vampire36[/MENTION] (JellyFireBean X)

[MENTION=4177825]Nexx[/MENTION] (CM9)

[MENTION=2781441]Fredericosilva[/MENTION] (CM9)

[MENTION=2683096]ronks888[/MENTION] (CM9)

[MENTION=921807]superkid[/MENTION] (Andromadus CM10.0 and CM10.1)

[MENTION=1673000]nk111[/MENTION]

[MENTION=4244152]blindndumb[/MENTION] (CM10.1, AOKP, PacMan)

[MENTION=4123551]djpbx[/MENTION] (AOKP)

[MENTION=4460055]kesh_33[/MENTION]

[MENTION=2949893]K.Ahm_143[/MENTION] (AOKP Redefined)

[MENTION=5264634]akateha[/MENTION] & [MENTION=4684812]CedArctic[/MENTION] & [MENTION=5180459]LoveSicKWAR[/MENTION] (Xperia Z Port)

- for bringing the joy of pure stock Android, and the goodness of ICS, Jelly Bean, and other iterations of Android to HTC Desire S

These are the guys you might wanna buy a beer for :p​