[Advantage X7500, MDA Ameo ROM Development] Sogarth:
Now introducing... the HyperCore Athena ROM Kitchen!

First, though, props to anchillus and his HyperCore kitchen. I took it, and made a few small modifications so that it's built for the Athena instead.

Feature Highlight:

Since this is a full-blown ROM kitchen, you can tweak your own ROM however you like. You can do anything that you've seen other people do with their ROMs! All that customizability is at your disposal.

Prepopulated with Windows Mobile 6.1 from the HTC Diamond (5.2.19915).

Prepopulated with applications from the HTC X7501, HTC X7510, and HTC Diamond.

Pictures are not being posted because you already know what Windows Mobile looks like - it's up to you to make it look pretty. :D

Installation:

Unzip. The "Core" folder goes in as C:\Core. The "HyperCore" folder can go wherever you like; the default HyperCore installer puts it on your desktop.

If you're on SPL 1.2, you'll need to copy an SPL 1.2 OS.nb on top of HyperCore\Build\ROM\OS.nb.

Instructions:

If you want to get your hands dirty right away without reading through the HyperCore instructions, here's the extremely quick version (if you already know how to handle a ROM kitchen):

Make changes in HyperCore\Build. SYS contains the base Windows Mobile 6.1 files, while OEM contains folders that HTC or you provide.

Once you've tweaked SYS and OEM to your heart's content, under HyperCore\Panel\Build, run BuildOS. You'll need to run [1] and [2] to build OS.nb in HyperCore\Build, and then [3] to convert OS.nb to RUU_signed.nbh.

Flash your ROM onto your phone.

...

...

Profit! (j/k) :p

If you encounter the endless customization loop problem, edit HyperCore\Build\OEM\OEM_Lang_0409\initflashfiles.dat, then find and remove the section for AutoRun.

Known issues/concerns:

The XIP is the XIP from AP 5.0 beta (build 19588.1.1.4, which was from the Sony X1 Xperia ROM). I've tried to generate a matching XIP for the ROM, but it won't boot. Anybody around here know how to create a good XIP? :D

There seem to be some issues with the Bluetooth OBEX service not being able to start. That's true of this ROM as well. It's able to send files to a PC without a problem, but it can't receive files (although it can copy them).

Even though screen rotation works both in the operating system and in HTC Album, HTC Album's screen rotation has the chance to screw up the operating system's screen rotation. A workaround is to use an application that can restart services (such as the FdcSoft Task Manager) to restart HTC Sensor Service (Athena).

Although the phone skin does work on 128 and 96 dpi, the speed dial application can act flaky and start drawing itself off-screen, which can trigger an error. One workaround is to dial a single number, then rotate the screen, which forces a redraw, after which it functions properly.

The VGA HTC Home plugin could be in slightly better shape. The TabSetting registry entry doesn't seem to work (or at least nobody's responded to me here yet), and the Profile tab shows a keyboard vibration option that, naturally, doesn't work.

The enlarged start menu has some icon overlap on 128 dpi.

The nifty System Status popup on 96 dpi seems to trigger just to the left of the connectivity indicator, while not triggering on the connectivity or signal strength indicators. It does work, just a little strangely on the other dpi settings.

Sym-A now generates the _ character instead of the $ character.

During phone calls, the number keypad is active instead of the alphabetic keyboard.

NOTE:

Much as with Athena Project Kitchen, this ROM kitchen is not to be used for releasing ROMs. It's for personal use only. We really don't need twenty-billion ROMs flooding this forum from everybody who wants that one little tweak.

Exceptions can be made for people who have demonstrated a solid history of producing ROMs. Ask if you feel like you have a strong case for why your ROMs need this kitchen. The current exception list: irus.

Download links:

Megaupload

RapidShare

Other file sharing site suggestions welcome.

Fixes/patches:

Attached to this post. Replace:

HyperCore\Tools\RUU\Athena_RUU.exe with the one from Athena_RUU.zip

Core\ACK\Settings.txt (Updated: July 20, 2008)

I'll be adding additional information to the next few posts over the next several days as time permits (and questions pop up).

P.S. The restriction about personal use isn't about elitism. It's about keeping the forum organized. I just don't want to see every other thread in the forum being a ROM release thread, and there's no reason to make sergiopi's job harder by making him keep track of dozens of minimally different ROMs. ;)