Tumnus convinced me (in another post) to try a newer rom (Sharp 3.13) on my SL-5500.
The good, the bad and the ugly:
The good:
I got networking with Netgear ma701 working. It probably worked when I tried the 3.10 rom too. It works differently though. After setting up the network, it just sits there dead until you click on Opera, or e-mail and you are prompted to \"Connect\". (In the old 2.38 rom, you just plugged in the network card, and it connected without clicking on any other button.) It has a screensaver. (I never noticed that in the old rom.) You can set a picture as your background without having to rename it or copy it to a different folder. You just select the bmp file in the \"Design\" tab under \"Appearance\" (on the \"Settings\" menu). Opera 6 is great. It supports multiple pages, where version 5 had the \"use top\" or \"use bottom\" thing if you clicked on a link. So it would kick you out of this group every time you clicked on a link to view it, and you could not just hit the back button. You had to go and log in again every time you checked a link. Opera 6 also has an icon to select a view that is optimized to show up better on a Z. The \"Files\" menu has a file manager of sorts built into it, where the old rom just seemed to find documents and images if they were in internal storage. You could not look in your SD card, without going into the file manager.
The bad:
Another difference is that the new rom takes up more space. (At least the backups are larger.) I got my first \"running out of memory\" error with the new rom, while opening the second web page in Opera. I never had that error with the old rom. After removing Jeode, and re-installing games to SD card, memory issues improved. If you have been using the Z for a while, it feels warmer, and when you try to \"Disconnect\" the network card, it complains \"the device is busy\" and will not disconnect. However you can just turn off the Z and remove the card, then turn it back on. When the battery is about to die, you get no warning whatsoever. It just dies. The old rom gave a little warning first.
The ugly:
Worst of all, I cannot sync in Linux anymore!! I was using Qtopiadesktop 1.7 in Mandrake 9.2, and could install programs through the cradle as well as syncing addressbook, todo list and calendar. Now I cannot sync except in Windows. Ugh!! I got this thing to escape Windows!! I can ping the Z from Linux, but cannot sync over the wireless network either.
I believe syncing in Linux would work if I could find an old 1.5x version of Qtopiadesktop. Has anyone found that? Also, can I install Opera 6 in the old 2.38 rom if I decide to go back to it?
