Update Sony Xperia Neo, Neo V, Neo L to Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow via CyanogenMod 13

By
Usama M
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Update Sony Xperia Neo, Neo V, Neo L to Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow via CyanogenMod 13:

Xperia Neo, Neo V, and Neo L can now enjoy the Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow via CyanogenMod 13 custom ROM. This has been made possible by XDA recognized developer mikeioannina.

The Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow for Xperia Neo trio comes in the form of unofficial CyanogenMod ROM build. Xperia Neo’s official Android firmware support was extended till Android 4.0 Sandwich only.

After this firmware, the device wasn’t able to enjoy any further version of Android officially, but thanks to custom ROM developers who have always been able to give a new life to this series of Sony Xperia.

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Contents

Overview:

  • Sony Xperia Neo trio’s 2 smartphones, Xperia Neo and Xperia Neo V were introduced to the world back in March 2011 and October 2011 while the Xperia L made an appearance in June 2012.
  • All these smartphones carry almost same specifications except a few minor changes. Xperia Neo, Neo V are equipped with a 3.7-inch 480p display with 265 ppi and the Xperia Neo L sports a 4.0-inch 480p display with 245 ppi.
  • All these phones are powered up with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon S2 CPU clocked at 1.0 GHz accompanied by Adreno 205 GPU and a RAM of 512 MB.
  • Their internal storage is ranged at 1 GB supported by an external SD Card slot. Xperia Neo and Neo ran on Android 2.3.4 Gingerbread, and the Xperia Neo L ran on Android 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich out of the box.
  • In case you own this device and you’ve put it aside, it’s the time for you to take it out for the sake of giving it a whole new life by means of Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow.

A Bit of Important:

If you’re concerned about what’s working and what’s not working in the mentioned custom ROM, you may be happy to know that there aren’t so many bugs for now. Mainstream features like Camera, WiFi, RIL, Bluetooht, Video are working pretty great. You may not find FM Radio, ANT+, 720P Video Recording and HDMI working for now.

When most of the other features are working, these features may not seem a big deal. If you’re okay with that, you should go ahead and checkout the unofficial CyanogenMod 13 Android 6.0.1 custom ROM.

As you scroll down, you will find a comprehensive step-by-step tutorial to update your Xperia Neo, Neo V, Neo L to Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow via CyanogenMod 13 custom ROM.

Precautions / Early preparations:

  • This guide is intended for Sony Ericsson Xperia Neo, Neo V and Neo L 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 Neo / Neo V / Neo L. Here’s How to Unlock Bootloader of Xperia Smartphones
  • Install USB Drivers for Xperia Neo / Neo V / Neo L using the driver’s installer from the Flashtool installation folder. Download Flashtool from here. After installing USB Drivers, connect the 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:

Update Sony Xperia Neo, Neo V, Neo L to Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow via CyanogenMod 13

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 phone’s internal memory.
  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.

Let’s go On:

  1. While the phone is booting up, press Volume down button repeatedly to enter recovery mode.
  2. 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.
  3. Now in the custom recovery, select Apply Update > Apply from ADB.
  4. Connect your phone to your PC once again.
  5. Now in the opened ADB Command line, issue this command: adb sideload update.zip and hit Enter key.
  6. Once the process has been completed, issue this command: adb sideload gapps.zip.
  7. Now that the ROM and GApps have been installed, wipe cache and dalvik cache from recovery once again.
  8. Reboot your phone now. The first reboot may take up to 10-15 minutes.
  9. 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.

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Usama M
Usama is a software engineer by profession and at TechBeasts.com he uses his expertise to solve everyday consumer tech problems with his main areas of interest being Android, iOS and Windows.

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