yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] cougar11:
Yea, I have both. I actually like the z ultra more due to the size. 1st Android phone for me was the og note 1. Just have around 1 week with it and love the z ultra. My only complaint is battery life on the z ultra. But still my daily since I got it.View attachment 3231745
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] leo5111:
So how bad is battery compared to note 3? And how fliud is phone with custom ROM? And is screen good in daylight? Thanks
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] Tommy-Geenexus:
I am getting ~5hrs SOT with medium usage and a bit gaming (cm12 + my kernel), i'd say the Ultra does pretty good.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] cougar11:
well with the note 3 i get about 4-5 hr SOT with heavy to moderate usage. on the z ultra, i get about 2 hrs lol. but still choose this over the note 3 as i have chargers at work, car and home. Screen is good in daylight, just bump up the brightness.

How in the hell are u getting 5hr SOT??? i barely get 2 hrs and my device is dying lol, can you let me know what rom and kernel you are running (links if possible, or pm me)? Thanks!
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] egzthunder1:
I haven't honestly measured sot but I get substantially more than 2 hours. The big thing is not how long but rather doing what. Touch screen drains the battery substantially more than simple sot such as watching a movie. This is something that has been like this since the first Z came out...

I have no issues using it outside either.

There are two rules in life for being successful:

1. Never reveal everything you know;

2.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] Tommy-Geenexus:
The most important thing is to never maximize brightness. I mostly keep it at half of the maximum, which is mostly enough.

My kernel is not released yet, still in testing stage. But i can tell that qcom's mpdecision kernel/userspace hotplug service uses a lot power, as it constantly boosts the CPUs frequencies.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] leo5111:
can this version do LTE for At&t?? http://www.ebay.com/itm/Sony-XPERIA...ffType=OrderSubTotalOffer&_trksid=p5731.m3795 i think it can i found site says for LTE they use 1700,1900,2100 and that Ebay link shows it use those bands but id rather ask people who know more then me about it
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] egzthunder1:
Just to be on the safe side, I'd go for the gpe version as I believe it supports more bands. I know mine has no issues with tmo LTE (haven't tried it with att)

There are two rules in life for being successful:

1. Never reveal everything you know;

2.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] leo5111:
gpe?
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] Tommy-Geenexus:
Go for the normal, much more community support.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] leo5111:
is the 1 i showed from ebay it or is it this 1? http://swappa.com/listing/EHX054/view
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] cougar11:
I was one the same boat as u...I have ATT LTE as well and was doing research before I bought it. I originally thought I got a gpe as I need LTE on ATT and read that only the GPe had the ATT LTE band, 17 I believe, so I bought the C6806, found out it was a SONY C6806 and not a GPe C6806, see attached pic for LTE bands
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] leo5111:
bummer the c6806 is more money :(
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] cougar11:
http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&id=281626716199&alt=web

About 15$ more from the other link u posted. Luckily I found a refurbished one for $276.

Edit: or this one, cheaper and has LTE Band 17 for ATT

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Sony-Xperia...086?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4192434fae
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] adfurgerson:
I am not sure if anyone has done this successfully on a Z Ultra, but here it is if anyone wants to look into it further.

http://xdaforums.com/crossdevice-dev/sony/thread-progress-please-leave-im-updating-t2871269
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
But then what's the point to have such a nice screen with bravia engine and only use 50% brightness?

Don't get me wrong, I agree with you but whenever you watch reviews and people boasting about how nice, colourful and bright the screen is yet everybody has his screen brightness set to low and constantly crying about battery life. :D
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tsiros:
To answer the original question, hardware is great, software is horrible.

kanej2006 brightness should be set according to environment and content. reading a book in the dark, vs trying to see the map in broad daylight.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] ShadowVlican:
love the giant screen when web browsing (which is what i use the phone for 90% of the time)

not so great carrying it around... half of it sticks out of my back pocket... i'm always scared to snap the darn thing in half
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] egzthunder1:
Been there, done that. Word of the wise, don't carry it in your back pocket.

There are two rules in life for being successful:

1. Never reveal everything you know;

2.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] leo5111:
to double check the C6806 version is the 1 good for at&t right?
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] cougar11:
Yea...at least for me, I got the c6806 and get lte on att
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] leo5111:
thats what ive been getting from ebay sellers and members that, the c6806 does LTE on AT&T fine, im just making triple sure before i pull the trigger :p
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] cougar11:
U'll love it bro! I've only had it for about 2 weeks and love it!!
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] leo5111:
what rom you running?
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] cougar11:
Currently on Scrubber Port GPe Lollipop 5.0 stock rooted with xposed, awesome... Very smooth.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] leo5111:
does it have issues with apps? for instance 1 of thing that made me want to change phones so bad is this phone model, not just mine any grand x max+ the record audio function does NOT work in FB messenger and i message my friend back and forth using it so for me its important :p
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] cougar11:
Lol yea it works, I just tried it lol
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] leo5111:
seriously i was like WTF i had the ZTE Grand x max and it worked then i upgraded to the Grand X max+ and after asking on forums found out my phone was not alone, anyone with same model had same problem :( not only that is there is no root :mad:
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
I tried Scrubber port as well as many other Lollipop roms. There were no perfect ones, unfortunately. For the time being I'm back on 4.4.4 Kitkat since it is superior in battery life to any Lollipop rom and 100% stable and almost no bugs.

That said, Scrubber port had the best battery life, better than any other Lollipop port.

The Cyanogen roms offer further enhancement, customization, themes and further optimized and faster, however, battery life is not as good as Scrubber port.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] leo5111:
ah so for stability for now, stay on Kitkat?
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
Yes. Stick to the latest 4.4.4 version. No issues or bugs since it's the last and final update.

Perhaps once 5.01 and 5.02 Lollipop has been released we should get great battery life and stability.

For now Kitkat is rock solid, stable and offers excellent battery life.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tchsvy:
I got XZU couple of months back, I just love the touch sensitivity of the screen. Covered it with GadgetShieldz and use pencil/pen/keys and what not.. this is something that i was able to draw few days back

I know people do a lot better with Autodesk Sketchbook and Sketch apps on this, but not bad for a starter. On the whole I am just loving this beast. Battery backup is something that I would happily live with, with Wifi, Data always on and with heavy usage getting around one day. with moderate use one and half day. How do I like it? I like it every way!
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tsiros:
you do know that it can't even play music without glitching out, right? You might not notice it easily, but it is there...
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
Is that using the stock player? I use PowerAmp and never use the Sony Player...
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tsiros:
Nope. Just tried poweramp. Same exact behavior. It's not the player's fault.

so far, all the players i have tried, have the exact same behavior: walkman, DeadBeeF, PowerAmp and VLC

always two samples missing, 3.333 ms apart... which is very interesting. it's *exactly* 1/300 of a second.

If you want i can try other players...
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] E90 Commie:
I think I have forgot about KitKat.;)

Joke aside. BlissPop is an excellent LP ROM and I have used for a month approximately and it is now a stable daily driver even if I am thinking about trying the new Resurrection Remix 5.4.0/Android 5.1.0r3.

The first LP ROMs I flashed had their share of issues but I must say that BP runs with similar power consumption to GPe 4.4.4 on my device with full configuration.

I have been very happy with my Ultra the whole time but Lollipop brings it to a totally different level. It is just great and those who care about the camera: get a DSC-QX series one and everything is all set.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
How is the battery life in BlissPop Vs Scrubber 5.0 GPE Port? I tried several Lollipop roms including resurrection Remix & BlissPop. All were fantastic and I cannot pick the best one.

BlissPop offered great customization/settings and stable. Resurrection Remix was similar if not slightly better. Battery life was average I'd say.

On the other hand, Scrubber 5.0 GPE rom was not as fluid/fast as the other AOSP roms, did not offer much customization or themes. However, battery life was superb and far better than any other Lollipop rom to date...
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] E90 Commie:
With my configuration, I experience similar power consumption on the latest BP nightly as I did on the GPe 4.4.4 and I use Greenify, Amplify and Tasker (per-app-underclocking) in order to extend the life. No abnormal consumption noticed but I have a very heavy configuration of the device with a lot of Xposed modules and apps.

My screen on drain is similar to what I had on GPe 4.4.4 and it means approximately 1% per 3-5 minutes, which is what I have experienced normally with everything configured.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
Not bad then! I've used Greenify before but recently uninstalled it since it did not make any difference in battery life...

However, having recently installed Battery Doctor, I'm manually able to stop apps from starting and automatically terminating them once I lock the screen.

It's good to see Lollipop is now on par with Kitkat with regards to battery life. Some of the earlier roms were not so good and there were memory and battery leaks...

Have you heard of an app called 'Per App Hacking' ? It is similar to 'App Terminator' . You are able to manually select any apps including system programs and prevent start service, wake lock and wake up alarms. It proves very effective in my opinion. You can get this as a free add on from Xposed. It's worth a try if you want to save every bit of juice out of your battery!
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] E90 Commie:
I installed Per App Hacking and it seems to work well; just blocked a couple of services. Amplify is also great when it comes to restrictions on wakelocks and alarms and I track power consumption with GSAM Battery Monitor and Battery Monitor Widget Pro.

It is possible that a light configuration would see a difference between LP and KK in terms of power consumption but in my case, the drain is similar. I was able to play a movie for 1 hour and 45 minutes approximately with 26% left until the device turned itself off. That is similar to what I had on KK (GPe 4.4.4).
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
One other thing just came to mind. Kitkat takes 2 hours and 4 minutes to fully charge.

On the other hand, Lollipop takes over 4 hours. Why so long? Such a huge difference...
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] E90 Commie:
I have not noticed this with my own charger. According to Battery Monitor Widget Pro, my device usually charges with around 985-1095 mA and those values are the same as I had on KK.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tsiros:
Lol it says 396 mA on mine, that can't be right
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
Very strange indeed, a mystery. Despite trying several chargers, it still took over 4 hours to charge my Z Ultra.

Using the very same chargers when charging 4.4.4 Kitkat, charging took only 2 hours.

With regards to the app 'Greenify' , would you recommend an alternative program which does the same thing?

I've tried Greenify many times but noticed no difference with regards to battery life. If anything it was worse since the app is constantly working and causing alarms and wakelocks...
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] egzthunder1:
I think the issue here is that your battery might be dying. Have you tried going back to 4.4.4 recently? If so, do you still get a full charge in 2 hours? Based on all your posts about battery consumption and long charging times, I think the issue might be the battery itself.

There are two rules in life for being successful:

1. Never reveal everything you know;

2.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
I am on 4.4.4. Charging the battery takes 2 hours. Previously, on ANY Lollipop rom it would take 4 hours.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] E90 Commie:
It is surprising, on my device I just don't notice such a difference and I have been on 4.4.4 GPe for several months and now two months of LP without seeing such a difference.

I am charging my device with the CP12 cover attached and the charger I use is the 1500 mA Sony original.

The only thing I can think of is if you use a Sony stock ROM (not GPe). I can't compare since the last time I used a Sony ROM was October 2013.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] egzthunder1:
What about before jumping to LP?

There are two rules in life for being successful:

1. Never reveal everything you know;

2.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
I tried various Lollipop roms over the past few months. The very first was Scrubbers 5.0 GPE port. Prior to that I was on Sony stock 4.4 Kitkat rom...

After Scrubber, I tried Blisspop, Resurrection and several other AOSP Lollipop roms...

Now, I'm back on 4.4.4 Kitkat StoneUI custom rom using Doom Kernel.

Reason for downgrading to Kitkat was:

1 - Battery Life - In my case, the battery in Kitkat was superior to Lollipop (except for Scrubber GPe port which had amazing battery life)

2 - Stability/Bugs/Performance - We are STILL waiting for 5.01 and 5.02 for many weeks and it keeps getting delayed. Until Sony has updated Lollipop to 5.02 and improved battery performance, bugs, memory leaks and speed, I'm sticking with Kitkat.

3 - Sound - Apart from Scrubber Port, we are missing sound enhancements such as ClearAudio, ClearPhase & Xloud - This is a must have since I'm an audiophile and these settings make a HUGE difference in quality and loudness. Viper4Android has never worked for me so that's not able to replace any audio enhancements. Sound quality is horrible in Lollipop.

Stereo sound mod - I'm using StereoMod V10 made by dontbelieve. This is fantastic and not only further improves audio quality, bass, treble & loudness, but when using the loudspeaker, I get true stereo sound. This is another feature not yet possible on Lollipop since no one has ported the mod or made a new one for scratch.

4 - Since we have 4.4.4 Kitkat, this is the last and final update, meaning it's 99% bug free and completely stable. There are no memory leaks and battery drain issues which have been reported by many Lollipop users including myself...

I think once Lollipop has been officially updated, it should be what Lollipop was supposed to be at launch. Battery life should be improved, speed and performance increased, stability should be perfect, speed and smoothness improvements...

Think of Windows Vista versus Windows 7. Basically the same thing only Vista was buggy as hell, sluggish, memory hog and poorly optimized. Shortly after, Windows 7 was released. What a huge difference in every possible way. Stable, faster and no more memory leaks.

Same with Kitkat and Lollipop. Once Lollipop has matured, updated and current issues fixed, I'm sure it'll be stunning and we'll get the true looks and feels of Lollipop. There is more it can give and needs time before it's released.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tsiros:
Uh you say you're an audiophile... have you noticed anything funny with audio playback on android?
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
Such as? What am I missing? :confused:

I've tried both Kitkat & Lollipop. However, sound quality was far better in Kitkat which was why I'm now back to 4.4.4.

---------- Post added at 08:24 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:16 AM ----------

Forgot to mention something. I am running a custom sound mod, also giving stereo sound from the loudspeaker as well as many improvements such as much higher quality, more bass, louder sound. The mod uses drivers taken from Xperia Z3 to give us the best possible sound...

I've also edited the mixer_paths to get even better sound. This could be the reason I've not heard anything funny yet. :)

Otherwise please tell me what I'm missing or is there some test I can run? I'd be more than happy to test the sound and upload my results as you recently did.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] E90 Commie:
Here are my experiences based on two months "Lollipopping"

1. I have used Scrubber GPe 4.4.4 for months and is now on BlissPop and with my configuration, there are no difference in battery life. I have similar on-screen times and battery drain with that ROM as I had on GPe 4.4.4. It is possible that a light configuration would be a bit different but I notice nothing out of the ordinary with my device. Around 1% every 3-5 minutes is what I have on BlissPop and had on GPe 4.4.4 (Xposed with a lot of modules in both cases, more on GPe than now, though).

2. BlissPop is stable and reliable on my device. The memory leak is fixed by the Xposed module "Fix Lollipop Memory Leak" and I can assure you that Sony 5.0.2 isn't necessarily patched either. It seems like it will be Android "5.1.1" that will include the patch. The Xposed module is a life-saver because of this. I have no issues with the battery or anything else.

3. I don't know what headphones you are using but with my Grado's, I just don't notice a difference between the audio quality of PowerAMP under GPe 4.4.4 vs BlissPop. I fiddled with ClearAudio and so on and don't like them (I am audiophile myself and the only EQing I can accept is PowerAMP, otherwise I use a flat curve). When I use my SBH20, the audio quality is similar to what I had with GPe 4.4.4 as well. I assume your audio mod require a Sony stock ROM, which is a no go to me because of the inability to use 240 DPI (breaks the notification bar completely on Sony based KK).

4. GPe 4.4.4 was perfectly stable and reliable on my device and I can agree that early LP ROms two months ago suffered from some issues (for example BT audio) but the latest BlissPop gives a similar experience to me in this regard as I had with GPe.

Lollipop 5.0 wasn't up to the standard but 5.1.x is a noticeable improvement and even if 5.0.2 works well now, I will flash 5.1.x soon.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tsiros:
same question: have you noticed anything funny with audio playback on the z ultra? So many claim to be audiophiles, i don't think they know what the word actually means
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] E90 Commie:
The most funny thing I have noticed is the change in PRaT when a BT headset is being used; it is less noticeable now but on older ROMs, it could be quite evident.

Otherwise, I would consider the audio playback to be "normal" for the device. I have heard better sources to put it that way but it is adequate.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tsiros:
so you haven't noticed, either.
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
Thank you so much E90 Commie for your long and detailed reply. I'm glad you mentioned the ''Fix Lollipop Memory Leak'' module, never did I know this existed! Now I'm thinking of going back to Lollipop 5.1x and giving it another shot...

Like you, the only audio player I use is PowerAMP, the other players didn't come close to options, equalizer, settings and quality. Regarding the audio mod, it requires Kitkat. However, I'm unsure if it works on a custom rom/non stock.

I'm using 360 dpi myself, the most comfortable setting for me. There is a brand new rom released by mr.nth.na.vn which I will try as of now. It's the latest BlissPop v3.0 Glade Lollipop 5.1 rom. You seem to like BlissPop roms so give it a try:

http://xdaforums.com/xperia-z-ultra/development/rom-glade-rom-t3069622
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tsiros:
when you say quality, what exactly are you talking about?
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
Audio quality is superb with PowerAMP. Also, there are many options with the player with regards to audio playback and settings.

Best part is the equalizer. There are no other players I've seen with such a good equalizer having so many bands. It starts from 31hz and goes all the way to 16k. Great for tuning bass, treble and the mids/highs.

Since I'm still setting up my phone I've not had a chance to play about with the equalizer. However, this is how it looks:
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] gkm812301:
Yes i like so much the xperia z ultra!!!!!! Why have you Problem whith man??????? Wenn you dont like dont buy..... Its simple....
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tsiros:
Unless you have a spectrum analyzer nearby, you can not know which player has better decoding. And even if you did, all you'd see would be that every media player that plays flac files (or other lossless, ape or whatever) produces the same result.

Moving on, to the equaliser thing. First of all, the moment you touch an equalizer, the audio reproduction stops being perfect. You are directly affecting the audio stream and therefore it is pointless to argue about quality, because you might prefer it with 40 Hz +3 dB, i might prefer it with 40 Hz +2 dB. There is no correct answer and there is no wrong answer: it is completely subjective. You prefer it this way i prefer it that way. That, however, is not an argument for or against audio quality, it is an argument whether a media player has an equalizer feature or not. It is an argument about features, not audio quality.

So I ask you once more: when you talk about audio quality, what exactly are you talking about and how do you measure it?
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] kanej2006:
I guess my ears and a good pair of headphones are the only way to judge quality since I don't have a spectrum analyzer as you mentioned. :D
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tchsvy:
Perception is a key word here I guess, what i perceive as a good device at doing something may not be good for you. Also a person's past experiences with other devices in doing the same thing will also influence in deciding how good the device is doing that particular thing (read: comparative analysis).

My perception and comparative analysis is this: When paired with a good IEM/OTH handset, XZU does fare well in music department, has good volume levels, may not be as high as OnePlus One that I had for a while but certainly not as low as Xiaomi Mi3. Output as mentioned by many may not be as clean as an audiophile wants it to be, but for a basic music lover like me, it's not a deal breaker. Overall I like what I am able to listen to..

On a side note: a basic music lover (like me) should never talk about the technicality of Audio with an Audiophile AND VICE VERSA!
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tsiros:
Even for the simple task of playing back files, the z ultra fails. every 2 minutes and 54 seconds it inserts noise into the music (and for the moment let's ignore the other noises it introduces at pausing, resuming and seeking...).

i'm sorry. i have not seen such spectacular failure since the nappa mp3 player, fifteen years ago. this is unacceptable.

funny thing is, many android devices have this problem but most people are happily oblivious of this problem...
[Sony Xperia Z Ultra] tchsvy:
Like I said, 'being a basic music lover' I don't pick up the noise that it is supposedly inserting. They say after 30 your ears don't pick up all the noises, that might be the case with me :) but I have not encountered such noise until now, I am using Sony MDR-XB30EX IEM.

And good sir, bear in mind that, I am expressing 'my' experience. I don't want to present it as an universal truth. And I am not an audiophile :)