HTC’s design language was probably the most influential in the smartphone industry back in the days, I remember how we used to brag as having a durable well-designed handset whenever you had a HTC ‘s hardware in your pockets. The company shaped most smartphone designs albeit more than Apple did. Fast forward to 2016, HTC unveiled what I’d come to appreciate as the most well-designed phone, probably the last all metal body phone we’d ever see. The HTC 10’s design was unmatched even though that wasn’t enough to prevent the company from vanishing on the market.
The HTC 10 was lauded by most pundits out there, but the smartphone faced some dire shortcomings as well. Even though its probably not easy to replace a smartphone’s battery without a set of tools, replacing the HTC 10’s battery was particularly a nightmare, almost impossible without damaging the display. The device has a metal chassis separating the display panel and motherboard, while the battery is hidden underneath them all – meaning to replace its battery, you’d need to remove both the display and motherboard.
Lucky enough, I managed to replace the battery without damaging the screen. Batteries are still readily available online for about Ksh1000 or USD10. My next to do list was loading it with a custom ROM, just so to get every juice I can get on the HTC 10. To be honest, I never anticipated doing this. I was comfortable running stock Oreo firmware – this was the last version HTC released for this model.
Pixel Experience ROM for HTC 10 based on android 10
Unlock the bootloader and install recovery software
To be able to install a custom ROM, first I needed to unlock the bootloader, a process HTC was so generous to allow using the HTCdev tools. I then installed a recovery software from TEAM WIN – very popular and easy to use of course.
Install Custom ROM
Then from my search of a perfect ROM, I came across the pixel experience ROM on xda, of course this became my favored choice since its based on pure stock experience without unnecessary bloatware from carriers and manufacturers. I’ve never been so happy with a dated device, it’s smooth, almost flawless with several tweaks at your disposal. The HTC 10 just glides in the awesomeness of android 10. There are a ton of devices with better specs nowadays costing less, but if you’re up for a little adventure, get yourself the HTC 10 online very cheap and bring the beast out of it by replacing the battery, unlocking the bootloader and installing a custom android 10 ROM.
