Upgrade your HTC Magic to Android 2.3 Gingerbread

I love my HTC Magic (myTouch 3G in the US). Even though it is a model that was released more than 2 years ago and practically today costs nothing (assuming you can find it in order to buy it), I still love it. Ok, it might not have an Nvidia Tegra in, or 8 megapixel camera plus a front one, or an AMOLED WVGA screen but none the less is a very capable phone that has proved to be an excellent familiar. And lets face it. Spending 500 euros per year for a new model of your favorite smartphone family is plain stupid. Of course 2 years in the smartphone industry is a really long time. When HTC Magic came out more than two years ago it was running Android 1.5. Today the latest incarnation of our favorite mobile OS is 2.3 which is light years ahead of 1.5. Unfortunately HTC and the operators have stopped supporting the phone for many versions now(I am assuming to force us to buy newer models). Only a handfull remain that still provide updates, but for the vast majority of Magic users there has been no official update since 1.6 which was a long, long time ago. Of course many users rooted their phone and upgraded it with custom firmware provided buy the ever excellent community but for more than a year now we are stuck with 2.1.

Finally a stable 2.3 firmware was released by the guys in xda-developers forums. I upgraded last night and I can testify that is working great. Everything works and it is significantly faster than my previous ROM Smoki X2. Do not get me wrong, I was happy with Smoki but it is stuck in 2.1 and it is a bit slow. Being intentionally slow though meant that Magic needed a charge every 4-5 days which was amazing. In addition smoki version included the HTC Sense. Thus if HTC Sense is very important to you do not upgrade to this version since it is the stock Google interface(which I like by the way).

Before upgrading you need to have a rooted phone. If you haven't it will not be possible to upgrade. How to root your phone is beyond the scope of this guide. For rooting you phone search specific instructions on the xda forums. Also make sure you have the 32a and NOT the 32b version of the phone. If you have the 32b version and you try to upgrade you might brick your device.

Assuming you have backed up your data and you have connected it to your computer with a USB cable:

• Shutdown phone
• From you computer: download the new firmware and the Google apps bundle
• From you phone: hold down Home button and press power momentarily.
• Menu:Partition SD card
• go back
• Menu: Select wipe
• Wipe/Factory Setting
• Go back
• Menu:Toggle USB
• Copy the two zip file to your sd card
• Flash the firmware first
• Flash the google apps bundle second
• Reboot your phone(it might take 5 minutes for first boot)
• Enjoy Android 2.3.4

If you brick/damage your phone following the guide above you are the only one responsible so please do not send me your lawyer/boss/mom/girlfriend/boyfriend to scare me.

Enjoy your 'brand new' HTC Magic!!

Rift account gets hacked. Slow response from Trion Worlds

A friend of allroundgeek informed us that his Rift account got hacked. One day he logged in to find his characters stripped from all his items and gold. This is not a situation a player that put hours into advancing his character wants to find himself in. Our friend contacted Trion Worlds immediately explaining to them the situation. It took a full week before he got his stuff back. In addition the customer support gave him some special in-game items and a month's subscription to compensate him for the trouble. Despite that, the fact is that his account got hacked in the first place, which is Trion Worlds fault. In addition, it took them a whole week to reinstate the characters. For a new MMORPG trying to break it into the market this is not good at all.

At the end of the day MMO accounts are not simply game accounts that you 've put hours into. Any MMO account is not less important than any other e-shop account were you put payment and personal information in. You do not want to be in a situation where it is compromised.

Our friend was kind enough to provide us with the email conversation he had with Trion Worlds customer support.

Customer (xxxxxxx)	03/15/2011 11:35 AM
Hello i logged in to the game just now and i noticed most of my chars are naked and and dont have any money one them... Could you please check out what has happened.. Customer (xxxxxxx) 03/15/2011 12:15 PM i just found out that some of my chars on another server are as well naked... do i need to contact a gm there or this ticket is enough?

Response Via Email (GM XXXXXXXX)

03/16/2011 07:45 PM

Hello XXXXXXX! Thank you for contacting us regarding Rift! We do apologize for the delay in responding to your hacked account inquiry. Hacked account appeals are our #1 priority and we are attending to each ticket as quickly as possible. While waiting for us to respond to your petition, we recommend NOT playing on the affected characters until your account has been secured. Once we have investigated your account, we may offer you one of two options. Based on how severly your character was altered, we could restore your character to the most recent back-up we have prior to the account becoming compromised. The second option would be restoring any coin which may have been lost. Again, we do apologize for any inconvenience this has caused you, as well as for the delay in responding to your inquiry. I want to assure you that your inquiry has not been lost and we have not forgotten about you. We are taking steps to both increase our account security as well as increase our customer support staff in order to reduce these wait times. Thank you for your patience while we continue to strive to provide the level of customer service that you should come to expect from Trion. If you have any additional questions or concerns then please don't hesitate to let us know. Thank you for your continued support of Trion Worlds and for playing Rift. Your reference number for this question is 110312-xxxxxxx Sincerely, GM XXXXXXXXX Trion Worlds Inc. Customer (xxxxxxx) 03/17/2011 01:18 AM i would prefer for my characters to be restored from a backuped state before i got hacked... last time i logged out before i got hacked was 4.30AM (GMT +2) on 15/3/2011 around that time at least:) i hope those information help Customer (xxxxxxx) 03/22/2011 12:23 AM five days and no reply...... Customer (xxxxxx) 03/22/2011 03:36 PM And you expect people to renew their subscription with this kind of support? Response Via Email (xxxxxxx) 03/23/2011 01:20 PM Hello XXXXXX! Thank you for contacting us regarding Rift. We are very sorry to hear that your account's integrity has been compromised. We advise that you immediately run a virus/malware scan on your computer, as well as changing your account password in an effort to safeguard your account. After reviewing your issue, I have gone ahead and rolled your characters back to a point in which they seem to look in good shape. This means that all data would be lost between from when your character was compromised to now if you played your character during that timeframe. Please be sure to never visit any questionable websites or open mail that looks questionable, as they could be phishing attempts by seedy websites attempting to siphon off your account information. Remember, never share your account information with anyone to help prevent issues such as this from arising. If you have any additional questions or concerns then please don't hesitate to let us know. Thank you for your continued support of Trion Worlds and for playing Rift. Your reference number for this question is 110315-xxxxxxx Sincerely, Game Master Trion Worlds Inc.