[braindoc]

I've flashed quite a few of the 2.5 ROMs. Here are the positives: Generally I find them as fast as the stock ROM but it takes a couple of days. They seem laggy at first but after a couple of days they tend to speed up to a point where I don't notice any substantial lag. Sense 2.5 as more tabs. For example: footprints, document reader, facebook, twitter. Of course, the more tabs you have on the slower the phone will be. Sense 2.5 also allows for program shortcuts on the home tab. With Sense 2.5 you can also use CoOkies modification program, which allows you to modify the look of the home screen and shortcuts - this is very nice; but again it slows the phone a bit. In addition, almost all mods developed by various people are for 2.5 ROMs and will not work with the stock ROM.

Here are the negatives: First, all of the ROMs I've tried are less stable than the stock ROM. If you soft-reset your phone everyday then that shouldn't be an issue. Second, Sense 2.5 uses more memory. This is the biggest reason why I'm back to using the stock ROM. I got tired of being somewhere, opening up Opera to look something up, and getting an out of memory error. Even with not opening any programs the memory leak during the day is substantial. Third, if you use any of the Verizon programs they probably will not work in the custom ROMs. I really like the visual voice mail program that came with the phone but none of the custom ROMs can use it. This is because it is written specifically to work with elements (SMS, I think) in the stock ROM. Fourth, not all the custom ROMs have been verified to allow your phone to work overseas.