Install Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow on Xperia Active, Xperia Live With Walkman via CM 13

Learn how to Install Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow on Xperia Active, Xperia Live With Walkman via CM 13:

Own a Sony Ericsson Xperia Active or Sony Ericsson Xperia Live With Walkman? If so, it might be the time for you to cheer up. Xperia Active and Xperia Live are now blessed with an unofficial build of CyanogenMod 13 custom ROM which is based on Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow. That means you can now install the latest available version of Android, the Android Marshmallow on your legacy Sony Ericsson Xperia smartphone.

Overview:

The following guide illustrates how you can install the CyanogenMod 13 custom ROM on your Sony Ericsson Xperia Active or Xperia Live With Walkman. We will go through what’s working in this custom ROM and what’s not, and also have a flashback on the specifications of both the mentioned smartphones prior to flashing this ROM.

As far as the stability of the CyanogenMod 13 custom ROM for these devices is concerned, you may be happy to know that there aren’t any mainstream bugs in it. The list of not working features includes Radio, ANT+, 720P video recording and HDMI. Rest of the features are working pretty well. If you don’t really consider these features a big deal, you may be able to install this custom ROM right away. Let’s go through the early preparations and then go through the method to get CM 13 Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow running on our beloved Sony Ericsson Xperia Active and Xperia LWW.

Precautions / Early Preparations:

• This guide is intended for Xperia Active and Xperia LWW only. Do not try this on any other device or else you will result in bricking it.
• Your phone must be running the latest available Android 4.0 ICS firmware on it.
• Your phone must be charged over at-least 50% to avoid any mishap during the flashing procedure.
• Use the original data cable to establish a connection between your phone and your PC.
• Unlock Bootloader of Xperia Active and Xperia LWW. Here’s How to Unlock Bootloader of Xperia Smartphones
• Install USB Drivers for Xperia Active and Xperia LWW using the driver’s installer from the Flashtool installation folder. Download Flashtool from here. After installing USB Drivers, connect a phone to PC using the USB cable so that USB drivers are installed properly and the connection is established properly.
• Install ADB and Fastboot Drivers. | Mac ADB And Fastboot Drivers. To avoid the lengthy installation, use the Minimal ADB and Fastboot tools for your PC to make the installation quick.
• Make a backup of all everything including Contacts, SMS Messages, Call Logs.
• Make a Nandroid Backup if any custom Recovery is installed already. If not, you will find a custom recovery later in this guide. – Guide
• Copy all the media files and anything else stored in the internal memory to a PC before flashing to save this data.

Disclaimer:

THE METHODS INVOLVED IN FLASHING CUSTOM RECOVERIES, ROMS AND ROOTING YOUR PHONE ARE HIGHLY CUSTOM AND MAY RESULT IN BRICKING YOUR DEVICE, AND HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH GOOGLE OR THE DEVICE MANUFACTURER THAT IS SONY IN OUR CASE. ALSO ROOTING YOUR DEVICE WILL VOID ITS WARRANTY AND YOU WILL BE NO LONGER ELIGIBLE FOR ANY KIND OF FREE DEVICE SERVICES BY THE MANUFACTURERS/WARRANTY PROVIDERS. IN CASE OF ANY MISHAP WE MAY NOT BE HELD RESPONSIBLE. FOLLOW THESE INSTRUCTIONS TO THE LETTER TO AVOID ANY MISHAP OR BRICKING. MAKE SURE THAT WHATEVER YOU DO, YOU ARE DOING IT AT YOUR OWN RESPONSIBILITY.

Required Downloads:

• Download the cm-13.0.zip ROM file carefully according to your device.
  • Xperia Active: cm-13.0-xxxxxxxxx-UNOFFICIAL-LegacyXperia-satsuma.zip
  • Xperia LWW: cm-13.0-xxxxxxxxx-UNOFFICIAL-LegacyXperia-coconut.zip
• HDPI_miniGAPPS-6.0-20160311-tb-signed.zip

Install Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow on Xperia Active:

First of all, we will need to format the SDcard to ext4 or F2FS format. Here are the steps on how to do so.

1. Download and install MiniTool Partition on your computer.
2. Connect your SD card using a card reader to your PC, if you’re using internal storage, then connect your device to your PC and mount it as mass storage (USB).
3. Now launch the MiniTool Partition Wizard on your PC.
4. In the MiniTool Partition Wizard, select your SDcard or your connected device and then click on Delete.
5. Now click on Create and from the displayed options, configure it as follows.
   • Create As: Primary.
   • File System: Unformatted.
6. Do not touch any other option and leave everything as it is and click on Ok.
7. Now hit Apply and click on Yes as soon as a popup comes up.
8. Hold on tighter while the process finishes.
9. That’s all with the partitioning process.

Next step:

1. Make sure that you’ve followed all the instructions listed above.
2. Extract the downloaded cm-13 ROM.zip file and copy boot.img from it to your desktop.
3. Rename the dowloaded CM-13 ROM.zip file to only “update.zip” and the Gapps.zip file to only “gapps.zip”.
4. Copy downloaded CM-13.zip file and Gapps zip to Fastboot (platform-tools) folder or Minimal ADB and Fastboot folder.
5. Now turn off phone wait for 5 seconds.
6. Hold volume up button and connect the phone to PC.
7. The LED should remain blue, which means that the phone is in fastboot mode.
8. Now copy boot.img to Fastboot (platform-tools) folder or Minimal ADB and Fastboot installation folder.
9. Open that folder, hold shift button on the keyboard and right-click on the mouse.
10. Click on Open Command Window Here.
11. Type fastboot devices and press Enter.
12. It should only one fastboot connected device in return. If it showing more that one, then disconnect any other connected device or close any Android Emulator. Also, make sure that PC Companion is completely disabled if installed.
13. Now type fastboot flash boot boot.img and press Enter.
14. Type fastboot reboot and press Enter.
15. Disconnect your phone from your PC now.
16. While the phone is booting up, press Volume down button repeatedly to enter recovery mode.
17. Now in recovery, format system/format data and then format cache. You can find the format options in Advanced / Advanced Wipe options in CWM or TWRP recovery.
18. Now in the custom recovery, select Apply Update > Apply from ADB.
19. Connect your phone to your PC once again.
20. Now in the opened ADB Command line, issue this command: adb sideload update.zip and hit Enter key.
21. Once the process has been completed, issue this command: adb sideload gapps.zip.
22. Now that the ROM and GApps have been installed, wipe cache and dalvik cache from recovery once again.
23. Reboot your phone now. The first reboot may take up to 10-15 minutes.
24. That’s all! Best of luck 🙂

That’s all. Just in case you’re stuck with something, reach us out through the comment box below. We will try to help you out at our best.