Now you can update your beloved Samsung Galaxy S3 LTE-variant (GT-I9305) to the latest CyanogenMod 11 M8 Custom ROM (nightly) based on Android 4.4.4 KitKat operating system. CyanogenMod 11 M8 comes with a slew of bug-fixes, performance/stability enhancements and UI tweaks like Heads Up notification mode, redesigned layout, custom grid sizes, etc. Sounds good, right? You’re going to find it to be even better after installing it on your phone. Just download the package and apply it on your GS3 using the step-by-step tutorial given below.
Download CyanogenMod 11 M8 ROM for GT-I9305
Click here (211 MB – MD5 Sum: 46e85b9e71a7049f6adc3ec7428c7e96) to download Android 4.4.4 KitKat CM11 M8 custom ROM for Samsung Galaxy S3 LTE I9305. All the necessary Google apps (Gapps) compatible with Android 4.4.4 KitKat CM11 M8 custom ROM can be downloaded here – they’ll be reflashed later.
Note: This is a nightly build of CM11 M8 which, as you might have guessed, is currently an unstable release of Android 4.4.4 ROM for GS3 LTE. It means that after flashing this ROM, your device will become prone to frequently encountering bugs, lags and random reboots – something that might be a problem for everyday users. If you’re okay with that, then go ahead and install it now! Besides, you can always flash the stable (snapshot) build once it’s made available by CyanogenMod team using the same tutorial.
Install CM11 M8 Custom ROM on Galaxy S3 LTE (GT-I9305)
1. Installation Prerequisites
- GSM LTE variant of Galaxy S3 (Model: GT-I9305). This can be confirmed in Settings > About Phone > Model Number
- A USB cable with latest Samsung drivers installed on PC
- Root access and custom recovery (like ClockworkMod or TWRP) on phone
- At least 70% battery
- A complete backup of apps, contacts, messages and other important data stored in phone’s internal memory. I recommend creating a system image using CWM’s backup utility.
Disclaimer: This ROM has been fully tested on the GS3 LTE and it can rarely cause serious problems during that can lead to malfunctioning. Even so, I’ll not be held responsible if you get your device bricked in any way. That’s why you’re recommended to create a full backup first.
Proceed only after you’ve properly weighed out the risks and benefits of this upgrade!
2. Procedure
- Connect your phone to PC via a USB cable and make sure you’ve enabled USB Debugging mode in Settings > Developer options > USB debugging.
- Copy the “cm-11-20140727-NIGHTLY-i9305.zip” and Gapps to the root directory of SD card.
- Then disconnect the USB cable and turn off your phone.
- Reboot into the custom recovery by pressing & holding Volume Up + Home + Power button simultaneously.
- In recovery mode, choose “Wipe Data/Factory Reset” & “Wipe cache partition” options to clear everything present in phone’s memory.
- Next, navigate to advanced > wipe dalvik cache to erase data stored by existing apps. This will make sure you don’t get stuck in a bootloop after flashing this ROM.
- Finally, select “Install zip from SD card” option and choose “cm-11-20140727-NIGHTLY-i9305.zip” file from the microSD card. The update process should start now, wait for a few minutes until it gets completed.
- In order to reflash the Google apps again, again select “Install zip from SD card” and now choose “gapps-kk-20140606-signed.zip” file.
- After that, reboot your phone in normal mode. The first boot always takes 2-5 minutes.
Note: If you’re already running a previous version of CyanogenMod, then you don’t need to perform step 5 and step 6. It should work totally fine that way too.
That was really easy, wasn’t it? In case you encounter any problems, feel free to discuss them in comments below.
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