Remember when many U.S. customers were thrilled that they would finally be able to enjoy the quad-core Exynos 4412 chipset together with LTE in the Galaxy Note 2? For most of Rootzwiki's readers, though, the first question we ask about a new superphone is "will it have developer support?" Unfortunately, the Galaxy Note 2 and other Exynos-based phones will not have the same developer support that the newest Snapdragon, TI OMAP, and Tegra 3-based devices enjoy. CyanogenMod/Team Hacksung developer codeworkx, among others, have withdrawn support for the international version of the Galaxy S III, citing a lack of developer support from Samsung for its signature chipset. Other Samsung Exynos-based devices facing decreasing support from developers include the international Galaxy S II, the international Galaxy Note and all versions of the Galaxy Note 2.

In a conversation I had with Codeworkx, he pointed out that AOSP ROMs running on new and recent Exynos-based devices face a variety of bugs because of failure on Samsung's part to release source code for its Exynos chipsets. For example, bugs in the international Galaxy S3 (i9300) include certain camera features, broken Bluetooth and WiFi tethering, and unsupported TV Out. In the international Galaxy S2 (i9100), issues include incomplete Jelly Bean support from Hardware Composer (referring to the Mali GPU included in the Exynos chipset), broken camera recording, slow transfer of data over USB in Mass Storage mode, and TV Out (as in the i9300). The international Galaxy S3 hasn't completely lost CyanogenMod support though, as developer Xplodwild is still supporting the device at the moment.


Both codeworkx and other developers I've talked to have said that Qualcomm, nVidia, and Texas Instruments all provide a greater measure of support for their system-on-a-chip (SOC) processors, thus devices with those chipsets will receive more support from the development community. While the Snapdragon series and the Tegra series come with more support than the Exynos series, Texas Instruments provides the most extensive support of all for its OMAP chipsets. Unfortunately, Texas Instruments announced that it is shifting its focus away from smartphones and tablets for its OMAP architecture.

As codeworkx and others have also pointed out, Samsung is under no obligation to release documentation or source code for its Exynos chipsets, just as Qualcomm, nVidia, and Texas Instruments are under no obligation to do so. SOC-specific code is proprietary, and is regarded a trade secret, though Samsung is the most secretive of the four companies. It's also important to note that proprietary code is not covered by the General Public License requirements and is entirely different from device manufacturers (such as HTC, Motorola, and Samsung) releasing kernel source for their Android-based handsets and tablets.