I got my Nexus 5 from Dubai, $520 for the 16GB, 32GB was out of stock due to Christmas n all. It's an amazing Phone, pretty fast, responsive, no micro-stutter, or lag anywhere, even when scrolling in G+while it's still loading !
I flashed all the custom ROMs currently available, as well as Kernels. Finally I have settled for Mahdi ROM 2.4 with its own modified Stock Kernel. And now I get 4 to 5 hours of on screen battery life compared to the 2 hours 20 I used to get on Stock. Sure, I did under-clock it a bit to 1.9ghz of the original 2.26ghz, and undervolted it just a tad.
As a side note, I hate the new "Law" put by MOT Sehnaoui, coz, as I mentioned my Nexus 5 came from Dubai, and my bro forgot to register it at airport, and it was Christmas, so time was not on our side. So if you are planning on getting it from abroad, make sure you have a passport with an entry visa that doesn't exceed 30 days, else you will be out of luck. Simply because shipping service won't do it for you, it will be up to you. That's if you want to use it as a phone not an expensive toy.
Thing is, if you don't do it at airport, you will have to do it at Alfa or MTC, and they do not accept photocopies. You need the actual passport, that you will have to photocopy there, in person. Hence why I hate that new law so much. I was lucky my sister was here, so my Nexus 5 is registered on her passport, since I do not travel much xD
In conclusion, this will be last time I get a phone from abroad. Only local. Sehnaoui won this round I guess. Also no more Nexus for me. I wanna try other brands. Will see next Christmas.
Link to ROM :
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2540455
Here's my review of it on my site.
http://www.techxero.com/2013/12/mahdi-rom-review-for-nexus-5.html
Cheers.