[Sony Ericsson Xperia Mini, Mini Pro, Xperia Pro, A] kast:
Good day to everyone,

a small contribution to the community. My own brew of the kernel for Sony Xperia Mini Pro, Mini, LWW and Active smartphones.

Kappa Kernel

The unfortunately mandatory disclaimer:

By installing this kernel you agree that I can't be held responsible for anything that happens to you, your belongings, the people you know, the people you don't know, anything that might be closely or remotely related to you. You install the provided software in your phone and you're sole responsible for what may happen. Can't be blamed if your warranty is now void either. Even coffee may taste different afterwards!

What is it?

This is my attempt at bulding a custom kernel for my needs. To be fast, stable and eat as little battery as possible.

It's mainly "your" kernel, in the sense that it contains contributions/pieces of code / bits of genius by several people, who I wish personally to thank for all they shared. In no particular order:

DooMLoRD

Faux123

an0nym0us_

slade87

nobodyAtall

garwedgess

...and many, many others...

(Listing above people doesn't mean they directly contributed to the kernel nor that they endorse it. I took either piece of their work to include or was inspired by their works)

What's in it?

This production of KaLabs kitchen is prepared with the finest cutlery available, Linaro GCC 4.7.3.

I've taken a well fed Sony stock 4.1.B.1.13 and prepared " a la Ka recipe"

Removed unnecessary kernel components (e.g. Ethernet 10/100 drivers) - Lighter is better

CWM 6.0.3.1k (press vol down when the purple led is On at boot - Updated in 1.6 with Reboot to Fastboot and Shutdown)

CPU Governors (most taken from DooMLoRD sources): boosted (New), brazilianwax, conservative, darkside, hybrid (New), intellidemand (Default), intellidemand2, interactive (Backported from JB), interactivex, lagfree, lionheart , minmax, ondemand, performance, powersave, savagedzen, scary, smartassV2 (Tuned and boost pulse in 1.6), smartass, smartassH3 ((Tuned and boost pulse in 1.6), smoothass, userspace, virtuous, wheatley

IO Schedulers: BFQ, CFQ, SIO (Default), VR, Zen

SLQB Memory Allocator

Added Ext4 support

Swap, ZRam enabled

Cleancache and Frontswap are present too

Google Snappy Compression and Decompression drivers included

Updated Video drivers with Aurora Project's versions

Memcopy included

Tiny RCU is there too

OC up to 1.7GHZ

RO.secure = 0

init.d support

IP Tunneling

Wifi modules in Ramdisk (works right away, no need for reboot)

Boot Boost (Boot in OC 1.6GHZ, reduces boot by a few seconds)

Patched up to 2.6.32.60

Updated Yaffs2 driver

Ramdisk compressed with LZMA

Two-way call recording patch

CIFS Module enabling/disabling via KaMenu (*)

NTFS Module enabling/disabling via KaMenu (*)

FUSE Module enabling/disabling via KaMenu (*)

USB OTG Module enabling/disabling via KaMenu (*)

HFS Plus Module enabling/disabling via KaMenu (*)

Builtin OC/Governors/IOSchedulers choice in KaMenu (*)

Make CPU Governor / IO Scheduler choice stick at boot via KaMenu (*) (New)

Device reset via HOME + POWER keys, need to press keys 3 seconds, can be enabled via sysfs and KaMenu (New)

Wifi works as of first boot of newly installed rom.

This Kernel plays safely with any ROM based on stock ICS.

Battery bug fixed

(*) KaMenu is new with release 1.3

Either via "adb shell" or a Terminal on the device itself, execute kamenu and follow the onscreen menu to enable or disable CIFS/NTFS/FUSE.

Once enabled, they are loaded and automatically loaded at boot too (via init.d script). Follow the same procedure to disable them.

Since Version 1.5, KaMenu allows you to choose the CPU Governor, CPU Min/Max Frequency and IO Scheduler without the need for an additional software. Of course it won't be as pretty as a graphical application but at least you have something to do it shipped with the kernel without having to rely on a rom builtin tool or third-party app you'd have to download separately.

Since Version 1.6 you'll find in KaMenu both in the CPU Governor and IO Scheduler selection menus the option to make your choice to stick at boot (via auto-created init.d scripts).

Supported models

The aim is to provide with builds for:

Mango - Mini Pro

Smultron - Mini

Coconut - LWW

Satsuma - Active

Installation

The installation is no different than other custom kernels.

First make sure you have an unlocked bootloader

When your phone is turned off, press the up vol button and connect your phone to your computer (Fastboot mode)

You must see the led turning blue

Either via Flashtool or via command line (fastboot -i 0x0fce flash boot THEKERNEL) flash the kernel to your phone

You must see "0 bad blocks encountered" in the log. In case you see, it's safe to disconnect and reboot, otherwise redownload the kernel and try flashing again.

There you go...

Downloads

Downloads for all devices of latest 1.6 with the battery bug fix

Kappa 1.6 Battery bug fixed

Update (1.6)

Version 1.4 was reported to be more stable than 1.5. This is why 1.6 has been built starting back from 1.4 and patching up till to achieve a build as stable as 1.4 and including additional features which hopefully will be of your liking.

It took a little time to release it and some of you participated actively in the testing. I would really like to thank who helped me bringing online this new version.

This new version doesn't only include a set of patches and fixes on the kernel itself but also a few additional features and fixes to the ramdisk.

First of all, probably the most significant change in the ramdisk is the inclusion of an "hybrid" CWM 6.0.3.1.

I call it 6.0.3.1k because it's not an official 6.0.3.1 but a patched 6.0.2.1 that includes all the fixes that could be applied while keeping compatibility with a 2.6.32.x kernel and adding additional features compared to the official CWM. This version, upon your suggestion, now includes a separate menu to Reboot into System, Reboot to Fastboot and Shutdown.

Another little feature I'm glad to include in this release is having Wifi to work since first boot of a newly installed ROM. Generally, because kernels that don't alter the /system partition must load drivers from the ramdisk early, Wifi is not available when you first boot a newly installed ROM. Version 1.6 now performs the required Wifi initialisation procedures when it detects the ROM hasn't performed them yet (case of a newly installed ROM) so that Wifi works right away.

Interactive CPU Governor JB edition was backported. This version can auto tune its tunable values by itself. Quarx2k (on Github) ported it.

Couple of CPU Governors more: Boosted which is a tuned version of SmartassV2 and Hybrid; Hybrid is meant to give it's full potential on multicore devices, which isn't our case, but I've included it anyway. Time will tell if worth keeping or not.

Many other changes and fixes were included with the aim to make this release more stable and smooth than the previous. In case you're actually still running 1.5, I'd really advise you to try this one.

Version 1.7 is now being prepared!

For people willing to test ongoing 1.7 Betas... I tried to make it a little easier.

My friend Jenkins is making every night a new build based on the latest committed changes. You can grab the releases here:

Kappa 1.7 Beta Releases

Sources of the kernel available via Github

and the modded CWM too

This is a work in progress, a lot still left to do to consider it fully boosted and optimised!

And that's pretty much it. Thanks for reading and please post any comments / critics / suggestions you may have!

Ka.

XDA:DevDB Information

Kappa Kernel, Kernel for the Sony Ericsson Xperia Mini, Mini Pro, Active

Contributors

kast

Kernel Special Features: Based on stock ICS Kernel, patched all up to be fast and battery friendly

Version Information

Status: Beta

Current Stable Version: 1.6

Stable Release Date: 2013-04-28

Current Beta Version: 1.7

Beta Release Date: 2013-11-15

Created 2013-11-15

Last Updated 2014-08-24