yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Vibrant General] cparekh:
That is the reason I bought it from eBay. It took 15 seconds of my time, and the seller sent it within a few hours. By contrast, I have to figure out whom to email at Tmo, give them time to generate it, and then get it back to me. Certainly not worth my $30 to do more and wait 3 days.
[Vibrant General] lqaddict:
How do you think the ebay sellers get their codes to sell you for 30 bucks?
[Vibrant General] x21chicago:
cparekh...you're pretty dumb....lol
[Vibrant General] mafaesto:
Uhm...you can get one for free even if you don't have tmo? Who do I send this email to?
[Desire General] im_bol2riz:
Hi,

for those who want to really improve the capture with your Desire there is a very simple trick... remove the piece of plastic which "protect" the lens from dust.

Before doing that have a test without the back cover. You should see a noticeable improvement.

With time the plastic became blurry and its not washable (maybe with toothpaste but I didn't try).

I know that it's a protective cover but the Hero doesn't have one and it seem very robust and on the Desire the lens is at least 2 to 3mm inside the battery cover. Therefore it should be quite safe except if you put it with keys or small sharp stuffs.
[Desire General] DavieMarshall:
I tried photos with/without the rear cover, but didn't see any improvement to be fair.
[Desire General] im_bol2riz:
Maybe your desire is brand new and the glass is still translucent. If one day you found that there is a kind of halo around white or bright area especially on stuffs that should looks sharp do the test again you'ld change your mind.

Do the test with 720p recording.
[Desire General] HighSnobility:
Yeah it's a bit of a PITA to make sure that little piece of plastic is clean before taking a photo, fingerprints cause smear marks on the photos especially when using the flash..
[Desire General] im_bol2riz:
I've attached a picture made with a small part of the plastic.

you should clearly see that the picture is altered in the bottom left part (espacially on the notebook and on the earphones) while on the right everything stay quite sharp (for a picture shot with a phone). The colors are also altered (see the lower part of the wooden desktop).

the link to the original file : http://www.sendspace.com/file/t5zo0n

BTW it's just a hint for those wo want ;)

I can share movies too if needed.
[Desire General] im_bol2riz:
Here are 2 samples:

http://www.sendspace.com/file/04yr3i test before mod

http://www.sendspace.com/file/exiq8g test after mod

Both 720p same place, same guy and same foseball :)

Don't tell me there is no difference plz
[Desire General] lambrospower:
hey i took 2 sample pictures and believe me there is huge difference....same conditions in light (not too much light), same scene.

First took the pic with cover ON, then without exiting anything i pulled out the cover and took again.

check the pics below :P

i must find a way to either clean the glass or remove it, but i am afraid of breaking the camera!!!!!!!

there should be a way to clean it up
[Desire General] Joval74:
I found a big improvement, thanks. It also helps to clean the lens itself.
[Desire General] andycted:
hehe, yes, that's a simple trick.

A couple of days ago I've also tested with about 30 shots, whether it would change by much without cover, also because my plastic protection has become strangely ... uhm ... how can I say, it seems like there is some water inside two pieces of plastic pasted together, as if the protection is formed by two sheets of plastic and some air or water leaked inside them.

But to be honest, the biggest improvement came from dismounting the back cover and clean the protector both sides very accurately. Photos taken with it weren't that different from without (for me) to justify removing the piece of plastic ... yet !

But I've also thought that I'd rather buy a new back cover for 15€ when this will happen, I'm more afraid of all the lint that will crawl inside the phone without that protection.
[Desire General] im_bol2riz:
Thanks for joining because to be honnest I felt a bit alone ;)

To remove the plastic I've removed the battery cover and from the inside of it I pull the plastic with a big pen... the plastic broke but I don't care.
[Desire General] im_bol2riz:
Yes I thinks that too
[Desire General] mcgon1979:
hey all,

no denying that the comparisons sample photos the difference is VERY obvious.

I think in this case the cover is scuffed or damaged. The new phone out of the box takes identical quality with cover on or off, but I agree it can get scuffed and then it leaves a smear mark on the cover that will never come off.

this happened to me after I rubbed cover but bit of sand was there and it scratched cover. Then cover basically all turned faded colour like bathroom glass! frosted.

I bought a new cover for 15euro(plus 12euro shipping) and now I do not RUB the cover hard to clean it. If I have to clean it I blow off any heavy dirt, then very gently rub a microfibre cloth on cover to remove grease and fingerprints. It's fine now 2 months. 100% clear and transparent and photos are sharp and fine.

I wish they have gorilla glass on their next camera phone cover. unscratchable except with diamond!!!
[Desire General] th3:
I was very skeptic about this since I keep my phone and by extension the lens very clean. But recently I noticed my photos having a distinct blur to them with a grainy over-exposed appearance, lack of detail, colour depth and sharpness. These things were present in the HTC 2.1 ROM.

So I just tried some pics and a 720p capture of the same objects with and without the cover... and you guessed it. Heh, the captures are back exactly to the usual quality I was expecting - without the cover. And looking through the lens is blurry due to a very thin layer of what looks like hand oil smeared across it. Thanks for bringing it to our attention :)

BTW, this difference doesn't occur with a properly cleaned lens (I have no scratches or fading on mine).

-----------------------------------

- Sent via my HTC Desire -
[Desire General] th3:
That's a fitting description to what my lens now looks like from the inside in good, clear light. You can't see any problem from the outside until you look through it, and through a clean piece of glass at the same object.

-----------------------------------

- Sent via my HTC Desire -
[Desire General] andycted:
That's what I have too, like some liquid between two sheets of plastic. However I've also found that cleaning the inside of the lens solved 90% of the problem.

Now I was thinking about removing the lens, but besides the obvious risks, I would think that if the lens itself gets dirty you have to open the cover to clean it !
[Desire General] lambrospower:
does anyone knows a way to perfcetly clean the plastic cover ?????? i don't want to break it at the moment!!!
[Desire General] LBTaylor1984:
use Meguires glass cleaner, works REALLY well. you can clean your whole phone with it. no ill effects.

tbh my phone is 4 months old and still the pics are perfect.
[Desire General] mcgon1979:
I would not use any chemical cleaner, just a new clean high quality fibre cloths.

drag it gently over the lens cover inside and out to remove any solid particles like sand or salt (well smaller but hard items). once thats done, a small bit more force (not much!!!) to remove the grease. if the cloth is high quality it will SUCK that stuff up. once its clean, just keep the phone in a pouch and be aware of handling it so you don't grease up the cover with your fingers. :)
[Desire General] vukis:
Today I came accross with this issue. Inoticed problem after removing damned invisible shield. I took the cover of and looked through lens. There was horrible blur and no microfiber or even alcohol helped.. Until i found this topic.

In first post author mentioned toothpaste. It worked like a charm to me. To be honest i resurected some old dvd discs couple years ago with toothpaste. God bless toth paste it saved me ~30$ for new cover
[Desire General] UKseagull:
There's a similar post to this over on androidforums, someone over there suggested cleaning the lens cover with toothpaste. Yesterday I cleaned my lens cover with 'Duzzit' metal polish, applied with a cotton bud, all the scratches have gone. :)

I emailed HTC support regarding the apparent lack of quality with the lens cover, they told me to go buy a replacement back cover! My Desire is less than 3 months old and has always been fitted with a gel case and kept in a pocket without anything that should be able to scratch the cover. :confused:
[Desire General] vukis:
Duzzit you say.

Is this the same as car polish waxes?

If HTC has been like toyota they would cancel phones for bacl cover replacement.

I thought thar htc uses far better materials.. shame to htc
[Desire General] niklz:
I just cleaned both the lens and the cover with isopropanol with a lint free cloth. Picture quality significantly improved, however still a noticeable difference to cover on/off

Someone should make a new backplate, if it worked I'd by one!
[Desire General] davesenden:
Use screen polish!

For everybody who suffers from a washed out lens cover on the back, use screen polish! I wrote this blog about it http://www.androidyeah.com/scratches-desires-camera-lens-ive-affordable-solution/.

It is a cheap and quick fix, worth trying!
[Desire General] andycted:
Today I went out and took 6 shots. You can find them attached below. Respectively:

01 very dirty outside-dirty inside-dirty lens

02 semi dirty outside-dirty inside-dirty lens

03 clean outside-dirty inside-dirty lens

04 no cover-dirty lens

05 no cover-clean lens

06 clean outside-clean inside-clean lens

In fact in previous tests I forgot the most obvious thing: clean the lens itself !

That has also something to do with me swapping battery quite often
[Desire General] spritable:
I've noticed the camera plastic cover being kinda blurry for long time. I was not very happy with photos on a very sunny day. They looked kinda washed out.

Today I saw that the cover is too much blurry and tried to clean it, but I could clean it and finally decided to remove it. So I did. Now the photos and videos I take are damn sharp, no more blurry effect.

The only think that bothers me is since now I have a hole in the back cover, dust can easily get in. Let's hope that this would not be a problem, cause I do not want to spend 15 pounds for another backcover + delivery.
[Desire General] andycted:
I was going to do that, then realized that cleaning the cover very well solved my problem. Fast forward some weeks and the lens cover is getting scratched pretty badly, on the inside too ! So I'm considering removing the lens cover too, I noticed though that probably the lens itself accomodates inside the square pit behind the lens cover, so that would probably prevent lint from coming inside the device ??

Anyway was removing the lens protection hard at all ?

I will hold off removing it for a while I guess, but I will remove it at some point...
[Desire General] spritable:
Removing the lens cover is not very hard. Just use a pencil and apply at first small force in the center of the lens cover. You will see that it starts to peal off. It's not glued, but it is used some kind of a double sided clear tape. Probably you will brake that lens cover, like I did, but if you decided to remove it, you wont need it, right.

About the dust. Maybe you are right that the lens itself kind of touches the back cover, but I still think that there is enough space for dust to come in. If the inside gets a lot of dust, I maybe think about buying a new back cover.
[Desire General] andycted:
Well, probably one could seal a bit better the space around that lens. On the other hand, one could probably gently push the lens cover out without breaking it and put it back if necessary ?
[Desire General] andycted:
Took the plunge and removed it. I was very very careful, but it broke in half anyway... first picture without it:

Album link:

http://picasaweb.google.com/101504838761028525419/CoverOnCoverOffCleanedCoverLens

Sent from videotext, using the remote

Edit:I must admit it feels strange to touch that part of the phone now
[Desire General] jimlad:
The original lens has a thin layer on it, the layer is not very strong and starts to come off after only a few weeks i noticed it and noticed the decline in picture quality.

Plastic is a very poor substitute for glass, if needed you could probably find a small glass disc to stick in place from an old kids microscope perhaps or camera...
[Desire General] bob dylan:
I just removed the lens cover. The difference in pic and vid quality is amazing. My lens cover was badly scratched so no bother to me to throw away. It seems very cheap of HTC to use such crappy plastic.

sent from my mind to yours using the power of suggestion
[Desire General] andycted:
I received my new martin fields screen protection and it includes a small circle for the lens cover

Not having the lens cover anymore, I've put it on the lens itself and, for now, it's not affecting picture quality at all.

I've also kept my old brando in order to cut some pieces from it to replace the small lens protector.

Sent from videotext, using the remote
[Desire General] gens6200:
I ordered the Displex display cleaner, that someone mentioned - It actually worked perfectly by getting rid of all the little scratches that caused the milky staining and blurriness of the lens cover. It cost me 40 dkk - around €5.50 including shipping.

As expected, the inside of the lens cover was in perfect condition - It was just the scratches on the outside that ruined the pic quality.

I still seriously wonder why HTC designed the Desire with a protruding lens cover?
[Desire General] andycted:
After some days without lens cover, no dirt has entered in the phone yet. I'm often at the beach and keep my phone in not-so-clean trouser pockets.

It still feels awkard at the touch sometimes...
[Desire General] Ronok:
That's a good idea. I've got enough screen protectors left.
[Desire General] andycted:
Uhm, yeah, my concern is that the plastic screen protector could deteriorate faster than the previous lens protection, even if behind the back cover...

By the way, isn't Antwerp where Simenon used to stage some of his books ?
[Desire General] andycted:
Just reporting that there is still no dust coming from the hole where the protector was and that I don't see any cons in removing so far, apart from a visual standpoint.

Sent from videotext, using the remote
[Desire General] kulek:
Does anyone try Brando

I think about buying small brando foil, then cut circle and stick it to the hole on the back. Anyone try this before?
[Desire General] m4a1rifle:
If you have minor smudging, the protective layer on the lens cover falling apart, try to use toothpaste with tissue paper to clean it, works on mine, no more halo in camera shots.

if you have scratches, try use the lightest sand paper (i think #0) the scratch the surface then use autosol or just toothpaste to clean it. try it at your own risk, if you going to buy a new cover or take off the lense cover anyway.
[Desire General] mksplg:
Sapphire glass

I read in a german forum that you can replace the glass in the cover with a sapphire glass, normally used in watches.

www(dot)android-hilfe(dot)de/htc-desire/42428-how-austausch-der-desire-fotolinse-fuer-bessere-fotos-saphirglas.html

The glass shoud be 9.5mm in diameter and 0.5mm thick. You can order it online, but the shipping to some countries is quite expensive:

www(dot)edmundoptics(dot)com/onlinecatalog/displayproduct.cfm?productid=1904
[EVO 4G General] r546:
I cannot find another thread discussing this, but apparently the switch to StageFright in 2.2 ruins streaming music quality. What's the best way to rollback to 2.1? I cannot believe such a basic problem, affecting such a basic feature of the phone that I use everyday, was allowed to be rolled out in 2.2 (I understand this is Google's issue and not HTC's). This sort of lack of quality assurance will easily drive me away from this platform.
[EVO 4G General] Rhys'Droid:
What are you streaming music through? Pandora? You using headphones or through your stereo? I'm just curious, because I have not experienced a (perceived) degradation in quality. Perhaps if I listened back to back between 2.1 and 2.2 I would be able to hear it, but at least in my headphones (full sized..not earbuds) I don't hear any difference when using Pandora in Froyo.
[EVO 4G General] r546:
I'm using Slacker through the aux jack in my car stereo, although I tried Pandora as well with similar results. I'm sure everyone's mileage may vary, but I mentioned StageFright because that is what I've read is the cause of the issue on Google's boards (bug with streaming AAC audio).
[EVO 4G General] Rhys'Droid:
What is making you notice the reduced quality? Just want to know what to listen for so I can corroborate whether or not I have the issue as well...
[EVO 4G General] r546:
Appreciate you checking it out. In the car, it sounds a bit muffled. There is a lack of bass and clear highs. Also quieter. The best way I can describe it is what it would sound like if 3G was lost and the bitrate was suddenly dropped.
[EVO 4G General] 5-6-ACE:
I've been having quality issues with streaming audio (Pandora) on my .3 EVO

It used to be quite crisp and clean but it's fairly horribly muffled now.
[EVO 4G General] Rhys'Droid:
I'll check it out this evening in my car, but I'm not noticing any difference with my can earphones. You running the stock OTA Froyo or a modified ROM? I'm running the stock OTA, I did a factory reset after the OTA installed and reinstalled all my apps (including Pandora). I'm running it (Pandora) with "high quality" enabled. I don't know if that stuff makes any difference, but it is worth noting.
[EVO 4G General] TeknoJnky:
last.fm sounds fine, I haven't noticed any difference there.
[EVO 4G General] rutter9:
I also noticed this with Pandora driving home. I switched to high quality stream back to normal and it fixed it.

One new pain is that if you are using the updated google navigation it completely pauses pandora from streaming.... :confused:
[EVO 4G General] sohr:
This has been mentioned in several threads.

Most recently,

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=743682

(which even though was created yesterday is already on the 10th page of Q&A).

There's a few earlier threads in which people mentioned 2.2 hosed their streaming audio quality, with the usual answer being a link to a thread on the Nexus One forums on how to temporarily disable StateFright because it uses a (supposedly) bad AAC decoder.

I noticed a drop in streaming audio quality myself on Slacker and Yahoo Music when I went to the leaked ROM... sounds like listening to AM radio or a low-bitrate stream.

I'm not sure if it's the AAC decoder, or if perhaps that Slacker/Yahoo do not recognize our device anymore and are sending a low-bitrate stream.

EDIT: I should also note, I do not have any issues with Pandora... it sounds that same as it always has, at least to my ears.
[EVO 4G General] kawasaki00:
Here is the fix for the audio problem with hq pandora and 2.2.
[EVO 4G General] r546:
Yeah I'm not interested in the "fix," I shouldn't have to root the phone to restore basic functionality and it also breaks other stuff. If Pandora's "high quality" setting sounds okay, maybe there's something Slacker could do to restore high quality in 2.2. All I know is, I'm really tired of things that work perfectly fine getting botched in updates. It seems to be a lack of quality control on Google's part, and it doesn't make for a good OS.
[EVO 4G General] kawasaki00:
I totally agree with you. The pandora hq sounds horrible without the fix. To my ears it is worse than the normal on 2.1, unfortunately there is not a system out there that doesnt botch things up from time to time.
[EVO 4G General] daneurysm:
While I agree that this type of oversight is pretty much bull**** I doubt google has anything to do with this. This reeks off htc.

Now if it's screwed up on the n1 too that's a different story.
[EVO 4G General] i-l-l:
This is also a problem with the Sirius app
[EVO 4G General] drmacinyasha:
Everyone

STOP

!

This is a known bug.

Cyanogen, Sprint, HTC, and Google are all aware of this. Just sit down, shut up, apply the patch, and be patient.

To apply the patch, just open your /system/build.prop file and edit the line

media.stagefright.enable-player=true

to

media.stagefright.enable-player=false

and run the command (or reboot)

adb shell setprop media.stagefright.enable-player false

from your ADB directory, or

setprop media.stagefright.enable-player false

from the shell on your phone via Terminal Emulator or ConnectBot.
[EVO 4G General] neilkarunatilaka:
+1

I did that about a week or two ago.
[EVO 4G General] sohr:
Yes, we know it was a known bug.

What is annoying is that while the fix is known as well, HTC didn't bother making the fix before broadcasting it to every EVO owner on the planet. God only knows how many other tiny things they have probably fixed or updated and held the official 2.2 release off for, yet they let a known bug that makes nearly every streaming music application sound horrible through?

Also, your posted fix requires root access, which AFAIK is not yet available to people with the leaked .3 or the official OTA .6 software. Which, again, makes you wonder why HTC bothered releasing either knowing this was still an issue.
[EVO 4G General] kwajr:
this was supposed to quote so delete this post
[EVO 4G General] sohr:
And you definately lack reading comprehension, as that point has already been made several times in this thread.
[EVO 4G General] SteelH:
What breaks 'other stuff' ? Rooting or this fix? Not sure what you're referring to there.
[EVO 4G General] sohr:
I'm guessing he's referring to the fix breaking mobile youtube among a few other things, supposedly. I think for most people, however, that's an acceptable trade-off.

I don't know first-hand... that's just from the Nexus thread when this issue was first pointed out and the fix described.
[EVO 4G General] drmacinyasha:
Using the setprop command does not require root, AFAIK.

The only thing that "breaks" because of this fix is that m.youtube.com supposedly doesn't play videos properly (have yet to test this) and some benchmarks drop maybe five points. Because we know that benchmarks are the be-all end-all. :rolleyes:
[EVO 4G General] wase4711:
can this be done using a mac computer on a non rooted .3?

thanks
[EVO 4G General] srtpusher:
go figure... people gripe and complain it takes to long to get the new ROMS to us, then they get us the ROMs quickly, but with a few bugs and people complain.

sounds like an old saying from the car tuning - cheap, reliable, fast - you only get to chose two. in this case its reliable, speedy release, free - choose your two...
[EVO 4G General] kwajr:
The problem is this isn't an EVO issue this is a froyo issue look at the nexus one it has the same problems

Also Pandora responded to my email by saying its a known issue that android needs to fix
[EVO 4G General] drmacinyasha:
Yes. Just open terminal, cd to wherever adb is, then use the command:

./adb shell setprop media.stagefright.enable-player false
[EVO 4G General] r546:
This doesn't require root even though you're writing to a file under /system?
[EVO 4G General] drmacinyasha:
You're not writing to system, you're just changing a setting, which will be changed back when you reboot. AFAIK.
[EVO 4G General] r546:
Thanks. I tried the setprop line (unrooted OTA 2.2), and there is no output line in the console. I then ran getprop and it's still returning true. ls and other shell commands do work fine. Any ideas?
[EVO 4G General] xlrdxrevengex:
now i am not trying to start a fight but i was under the assumption that in order for this fix to work you had to reboot. Correct me if i am wrong? But if you apply the fix through adb without root then how does it become active without reboot?
[EVO 4G General] drmacinyasha:
From what I knew, the setprop command implemented the change imeediately, and that has been my experience so far. Build.prop is like a conf file, in that it's not constantly watched, but you have to re-load it (via rebooting) to get any edits to take effect.