Exodus 6.0 Review

 

Video Review:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_xGzPyjLnU&feature=em-upload_owner

 

Why I love this ROM?

 

Exodus Papers and Device Profiles stole my heart. If that wasn't enough, then the delta updates and the CM Drag Panel were like Cupid's arrow of love. In this case, it would have been the Exodus' arrow though!

The moment I tapped the "Wallpapers" option from the side menu in settings, a set of beautiful wallpapers occupied my screen in the form of two panels and then that beautiful vertical animation made me say "Wow! Man, that's fu**ing awesome!". Of course, I couldn't have said that in the video though! Next up, when you tap on the wallpaper, you would be able to find another lovely horizontal animation which would make you have a quick glance at the wallpaper, without you even touching your screen. Add on to that, Exodus Papers also allows you to build your own wallpapers collection. You can import wallpapers from other apps, internal memory or the SD card. It also gives you an option to change the wallpapers automatically. Then, you can also show those beautiful wallpapers as a screen saver, similar to the Daydream mode.

 

Coming up next to the Device Profiles, this feature of Exodus allows you to add profiles or edit the five profiles: Home, Outdoor, Work, Meeting, Sleep; which pretty much sum up your day. You can customize the profile icon, it's duration. Next up you can customize the sound settings of the profile. Ring, ring and vibrate, vibrate, only alarms, priority notifications sounds only, give you ample number of options to suit your needs. You can customize the volumes too, of course! Then, you can also control the radios, which are nothing, but WiFi, mobile data, airplane mode, synchronisation, bluetooth, GPS, location preferences. You can also adjust the screen timeout settings, enable or disable the lockscreen and change the brightness. So, say when I am outdoors, I want my phone to be at full brightness, have the ringtone volume at max, disable WiFi and turn on the mobile data. Before Device Profiles, I would have to do all this manually, but now, I can do this all with one tap. Another example, can be, say, "Returning to home". Here, I would like to customize the settings when I am returning to my home from work. I would enable bluetooth, GPS, mobile data, disable WiFi, and have the ringtone volume at max. Then I would also like to launch Google Maps when I have docked up my phone. I can use the voice controls then to navigate to my home. Before Device Profiles, most of this would have been only possible with the help of Tasker, now I can do all this without creating various profiles, actions and tasks, I used to earlier. So, this option will simplify things to a great extent.

 

If you guys have been following my videos, then you would have realised my love for the CM Drag Panel over the AOSP based panel. I love to have many toggles and at the same time I want my quick settings panel to look clean and sleek. This is exactly where the CM Drag Panel steps in. It allows me to have more toggles without changing my DPI to accommodate all those extra toggles in. You might think that this ROM is based on CyanogenMod then. Guess what, NO!! It comes in with Layers. Imagine that now! It is a perfect blend of CM and AOSP. It is based on AOSP or CM. You can take it the either way. For me, the Exodus developers have cherry picked the best features out of both CM and AOSP.

 

Delta updates. I care about updates, a lot to be frank! Delta updates just make the task a hell lot easier for lazy people like me who don't want to download the whole nightly build, just to get those extra bug fixes and more features. If you remain outdoors, and use your mobile data more often, then delta updates won't be a dent in your pocket. Only Mokee, Omni, Exodus offer you the delta updates officially. You can use the Cyandelta app to get delta updates to CyanogenMod too.

 

Hurry up AND tell me where to find it.

Google Plus, XDA and on the official website of Exodus. Official builds are present on the website of Exodus. You can find the unofficial builds on G+ and XDA.

 

The Bugs

Only one. Snap camera. It might be specific to my device only. I am not sure of that. I own a low end sprout4 device, Android One First Generation device. We don't have the snap camera in the CM13 nightlies too. So, I am not sure whether this is a general bug or not.

 

 

Krittin Kalra

Krittin Kalra is a 20 year old Android freak. Striving for passions, chasing down his dreams and living a life without regrets is his sole mantra. A bit moody, he also does custom ROM reviews for AndroGuider. Currently pursuing his B.Tech, he aspires to follow his heart.