Android operating system brought to Samsung Gear S thanks to XDA developer and CyanogenMod

Samsung might not have been the very first smartwatch manufacturer, but they definitely have been one of the most adamant companies in pushing the appeal of a wrist-borne computer. Additionally, one could easily argue that they also produce the most beautiful of all the smartwatches: the curved Gear S. Also, arguably, the Gear S has one of the biggest flaws of all the smartwatches out on the market: Tizen.

Until XDA developer biktor_gj stepped up and brought Android to the Gear S via CyanogenMod 12.1. And what was Biktor’s opening comment upon success? “Hey GearS! Welcome to the Android family!”

Biktor went on to say:

Almost nothing works, just boots, touchscreen, battery level as far as I’ve seen. But doesn’t it look spectacular? Oh, and it goes damn fast! I don’t know if it’s because it’s empty, half baked or what but it needed about 4 seconds to do all that “Upgrading apps X of 70″, so this CPU can do A LOT more of what it does with Tizen.

Using CyanogenMod 12.1 and popular custom recovery tool TWRP, Biktor rooted and replaced the Tizen operating system with that of Android 5.1.1 Lollipop. At the moment, Biktor is only able to bring this advancement to GSM smartwatches that have an unlocked bootloader, so if you have yours with AT&T, you’re out of luck for now.

Stay tuned to his developer thread and see what he brings to the table over the coming weeks!

Now remember, if you don’t know what you’re doing when playing around in the guts of your smart devices, don’t do it. Doing stuff like this voids your warranty and you could end up turning your expensive gadget into a glorified paperweight (a.k.a. “bricking”). XDA developers and Talk Android accept no responsibility in such matters.

Source: XDA-Developer forums via Sammobile

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