Paranoid Android 7.2.0 Improves Color Engine, Adds Accidental Touch Protection, and Supports Even More Devices

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Just a little more than a month ago, Paranoid Android made a grand reentrance to the ROMing world with builds of the ROM built off of 7.1.2 Nougat. Paranoid Android introduced a heap of new features with its last version, and the fine folks over at the PA team are back at it again with their latest release. The ROM is still based off of Android 7.1.2, but the version for PA is now 7.2.0.

The dev team behind Paranoid Android have been hard at work on this new build over the past month, and a lot of time has been spent eliminating pesky bugs, improving existing features, adding new ones, and introducing support for even more devices.

Paranoid Android’s crew has been lurking through Google+ and other platforms to track any and all user complaints from the previous build, and as such, any bugs that were present in PA 7.1.2 should now be a thing of the past with the 7.2.0 version. Furthermore, a lot of the new features that have been added were done as a result of what the community was asking for!

New Features in 7.2.0

Global Changes

Double tap on status bar to sleep device

Screen off action for button settings

Fixed navigation bar swiping gesture

Improved notification light performance

PA Browser is now based on M60

Fix for pulse on pickup bug

Various fixes for contact handling with Google apps

Removed bugs causing Bluetooth connectivity issues

Improved lighting for hardware navigation keys

Higher quality stock wallpapers

Optimized speed for fingerprint unlock

Fixed message when rebooting your phone or putting it into recovery mode

Enhancements for device performance

Power-related enhancements

Numerous other improvements and fixes that you’ll notice the more you use the ROM

Changes specifically for the OnePlus 3/3T

Resolved camera crashes

Fixed manual ISO control issue

Better post-processing for photos using custom HAL camera

Improved performance and accuracy for GPS

Improved power and performance for Wi-Fi

Optimized NFC toggling speed

Resolved errors for specific VoLTE setups

Automatic brightness tuning has been reworked

Added fix for LID support

Numerous performance improvements

Better memory management

Fixed the known idle drain issue

Multiple power-related enhancements

Changes specifically for Google Pixel/Pixel XL

Fixed crashes with the Google camera

Fixed NFC tile

Kernel has been updated to latest EAS upstream

Merged latest security patches

Backported changes from the Android O Developer Preview

Better memory management when device is under pressure

Accidental Touch

Games for Android have gotten extremely good over the years, but while graphics have gotten more life-like and gameplay has become more intuitive, one issue has remained among all of this development – accidentally pressing the navigation buttons during the middle of an intense gaming session. Buzzkill!

This is a very common issue to stumble upon, and it’s especially true when playing games that have your fingers flying all over your screen. Thankfully, Accidental Touch aims to fix this once and for all. Accidental Touch is a feature that allows your phone to recognize when the touchscreen is being used, and when it is both on-screen and hardware navigation buttons will switch to an inactive state.

While most useful when playing games, Accidental Touch could also come in handy while messaging friends, browsing the Web, or scrolling through Twitter. Anytime you’re using the touchscreen, accidentally grazing over your nav buttons won’t send you flying back to your home screen when you didn’t intend to do so. It’s a simple feature, but it’s one that proves to be extremely useful in regular day-to-day use.

Pocket Lock

Another feature that aims to reduce accidental inputs on your device is Pocket Lock. However, unlike Accidental Touch that prevents input when using your phone, Pocket Lock helps to minimize on accidental device use when your phone is in your pocket.

Pocket Lock works by, “switching off major input sources and consuming additional exceptional inputs.” The feature works very similarly to OxygenOS‘s Pocket Mode, as the screen will essentially go inactive if the phone notices that anything is covering ambient light sensors typically found near the top of your phone.

Color Engine Improvements

Color Engine was first introduced with PA 7.1.2, and it allows you to change your phone’s primary and accent colors throughout the user interface. The Color Engine still works in the same fashion as it did with the previous Paranoid Android builds, but you’ll now be able to use a new gray color option as both a primary and accent color.

Furthermore, all known compatibility issues that existed with the Substratum Theme Engine have been addressed as well.

Shuttle+

Lastly, Paranoid Android has partnered with the makers of Shuttle+ to bring the music app to all devices running PA. Shuttle+ is a great-looking app with a lot of features to play around with, including:

Ability to Google Cast songs to your TV

Directly embedded lyrics

Scrobbling to Last.fm

Editing for ID3 tags

Batch playlist creation

Custom themes

And plenty more

Newly Supported Devices

Paranoid Android 7.1.2 launched with a pretty impressive device roster last month, and even more smartphones and tablets have been added with this latest release. The full list of new devices that are now officially supported with PA 7.2.0 include:

bacon – OnePlus One

onyx – OnePlus X

gemini – Xiaomi Mi5

shamu – Nexus 6

Robin – Nextbit Robin

zl1 – LeEco Le Pro3

If you own a Sony Xperia smartphone and are bummed out that there’s still no official support for any of Sony’s devices, the PA team hasn’t forgotten about you! It’s currently impossible for the Paranoid Android team to support every single Sony device out there, so in an attempt to make sure that all time and resources are spent as effectively and efficiently as possible, you can vote for which Xperia devices you’d like to see supported by PA in the near future. There’s currently no word as to when PA support will head to Sony phones, but the Paranoid Android team has confirmed that they’ll release builds for the Xperia phones that receive the most votes.

OTA Updates

Following the release of Paranoid Android 7.1.2, there were numerous device-specific issues reported. While users were likely expecting OTA updates to resolve said issues, the Paranoid Android team was unable to push these out as Paranoid Hub (the OTA update system for PA) was broken at the time. Paranoid Android 7.2.0 features a working version of Paranoid Hub, so the PA team will now be able to push out OTA updates if/when there are device-specific features and fixes that need to be added.

Hands On With Paranoid Android 7.2.0

We were able to play around with a pre-release build for Paranoid Android 7.2.0, and the screenshots below have all been taken from said build.

Paranoid Android 7.2.0 seems to be a great update to what was introduced last month with 7.1.2. The changes that have been made are a touch more conservative than what we saw with the previous release, but when you add together all of the bug fixes and new features that have been added, there really is a lot to love.