Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Stock Android phone free of bloatware?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

291–300 of 324 posts

Re: Ask HN: Stock Android phone free of bloatware?

#291

Post by scarface_74 »

smoldesu wrote: post #289
scarface_74 wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re actually not too far off. I use to browse the App Store regularly to see what was new and interesting. The App Store is such a shit show now, I only go there when someone links to an interesting app from a website or podcast notes.

It's probably the biggest problem in the ecosystem, for all the papercuts I piss and moan over. The existence of an F-Droid style store on iOS would go such a long ways in stimulating competition. Even if Apple defends their right to tax platform payments, the mere existence of no-cost ad-free software would force other ecosystem players to do better. It's a win for FOSS fanatics and paid software stalwarts alike. No…

Well, the Google Play store does have alternatives and it’s just as much of a shit show if not more so and monetizes worse.

To a first approximation, no one cares about open source app stores on Android.

Epic tried to bypass the Play Store and it was a disaster for them.

Re: Ask HN: Stock Android phone free of bloatware?

#292

Post by DannyB2 »

hospitalJail wrote: post #122
Daegalus wrote: post #10

The Pixel is the closest. The reason you don't see long term support on Android is because of Qualcomm. Qualcomm wants manufacturers to build on new chips, so they deprecate older chips and stop support. Most manufacturers don't want to hire kernel and hardware devs. Samsung can pull off longer support because of Exynos and they have a lot of inhouse expertise to extend support on old Qualcomm chips. It's all money.…

>walled garden This is a marketing phrase that twists a negative into a positive. Its better to use more objective terms. Gardens give you a perceptions of flowers and fruits.

A walled garden is only seen that way by those inside. To those outside it is a prison camp.

Re: Ask HN: Stock Android phone free of bloatware?

#293

Post by tomcam »

highwaylights wrote: post #211
tomcam wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have been nominated seven straight years for hacker news reader with the least knowledge of security, so I’m embarrassed to ask: what keys would one want to sign and why?

It’s not your keys, it’s the Operating System keys uploaded to your device. Essentially the same way UEFI secure boot works in the PC world. You’re telling the device hardware “it’s only ok to run software that’s been signed with the private key that matches this public key”, so that once you’ve done that, you can have confidence that the operating system hasn’t been modified in future by anyone other than the origin…

That's a perfect explanation. Thank you.

Re: Ask HN: Stock Android phone free of bloatware?

#294

Post by tomcam »

kadoban wrote: post #209
tomcam wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have been nominated seven straight years for hacker news reader with the least knowledge of security, so I’m embarrassed to ask: what keys would one want to sign and why?

The keys that verify that new boot software is allowed, the ones that verify it's coming from _you_ and not some other asshole trying to take over your phone after you rooted it.

Ah, relief. Thank you.

Re: Ask HN: Stock Android phone free of bloatware?

#295

Post by OJFord »

scarface_74 wrote: post #243
OJFord wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuine question: why give yourself the headache of coupling having a great camera to choosong a phone then, if it's important to you? Why not have a compact camera as well as whatever phone, and carry that when quality matters?

You’re right, we should also carry around a separate GPS device, MP3 player, one of those portable TV players, and everything else like it’s 2005.

If you care deeply enough about any of those things that they're a major concern when choosing a phone, yes, I do make the same argument.

A major audiophile won't be happy with a phone. Someone big into 'caching' isn't using Google or Apple maps. A home theatre -phile won't want to watch something good on a phone.

Re: Ask HN: Stock Android phone free of bloatware?

#296

Post by scarface_74 »

OJFord wrote: post #295
scarface_74 wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re right, we should also carry around a separate GPS device, MP3 player, one of those portable TV players, and everything else like it’s 2005.

If you care deeply enough about any of those things that they're a major concern when choosing a phone, yes, I do make the same argument. A major audiophile won't be happy with a phone. Someone big into 'caching' isn't using Google or Apple maps. A home theatre -phile won't want to watch something good on a phone.

The poster specifically said

> …that software does amazing things with old camera hardware .

A “better camera” supported by worse software is not what the poster seems to want.

Are you going to carry around your camera with you everywhere?

And as far as audiophiles, it’s been repeatedly shown in blind studies that they can’t tell the difference as often as their snobbery would suggest.

But I made good commissions in college selling overpriced Monster cables to them.

Re: Ask HN: Stock Android phone free of bloatware?

#298

Post by OJFord »

scarface_74 wrote: post #296
OJFord wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you care deeply enough about any of those things that they're a major concern when choosing a phone, yes, I do make the same argument. A major audiophile won't be happy with a phone. Someone big into 'caching' isn't using Google or Apple maps. A home theatre -phile won't want to watch something good on a phone.

The poster specifically said > …that software does amazing things with old camera hardware . A “better camera” supported by worse software is not what the poster seems to want. Are you going to carry around your camera with you everywhere? And as far as audiophiles, it’s been repeatedly shown in blind studies that they can’t tell the difference as often as their snobbery would suggest. But I made good commissions in…

No cameraphile uses on-camera software to.. do anything. That you can do better on a computer than a phone then goes without saying.

I'm not going to carry it everywhere no, nor did I say that. (Actually I didn't even say it applied to me.) I carry my Panasonic TZ100 when on holiday or otherwise desirous of better-than-phone photos. It fits in my pocket. Not the same one as my phone granted, but nonetheless in a pocket while in a case and straddling a spare battery.

There are audiophiles and audiophiles. A good chunk of them will laugh at Monster cables et al. as much as any of us.

You can appreciate a better DAC than found in most/all phones without descending into gold-plated USB-C charging cables that maintain optimal audio nonsense.

And even that assuming playback of some locally stored file. I'm not sure any of the mainstream streaming Services offer a format/bitrate that it's not possible objectively to do better than.

Re: Ask HN: Stock Android phone free of bloatware?

#299

Post by DocJade »

gettodachoppa wrote: post #268
Daegalus wrote: post #10

The Pixel is the closest. The reason you don't see long term support on Android is because of Qualcomm. Qualcomm wants manufacturers to build on new chips, so they deprecate older chips and stop support. Most manufacturers don't want to hire kernel and hardware devs. Samsung can pull off longer support because of Exynos and they have a lot of inhouse expertise to extend support on old Qualcomm chips. It's all money.…

How is the actual phone (not computing device) hardware on the Pixel? The last time I had a Google phone was the 2012 Nexus, and I said never again. It had absolutely trash speakers and microphone. I couldn't be talking to someone when it was windy, I couldn't hear them. And when I tried recording a video at a sports stadium, the audio was completely distorted from the noise because the mic couldn't keep up with the…

I have a pixel 6 pro, works great Never had problems with the microphones, and calls are extra clear because they do some ai nonsense to upscale the audio coming into the phone My 2 main gripes are: The modem, I have issues with reception in the strangest locations, I can have direct line of sight to 3 different cell towers and still get stuck on edge till I hit the "Fix connectivity" button in settings, but when it is working (which it does 95% of the time), works great The camera, amazing photo quality, videos look great, I have nothing against image quality. But the videos this thing takes are MASSIVE, even with HVEC on, a 50 second video can weigh over 300mb. Not sure what's up with that. Oh also the main shooter camera is mechanically separated from the rest of the phone, so if you shake the phone or whip pan it too hard, you can hear it rattle.

Overall 9/10 though! I hear the pixel 7 has a better modem

Re: Ask HN: Stock Android phone free of bloatware?

#300

Post by predictabl3 »

jqpabc123 wrote: post #290
predictabl3 wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that popular chipsets (ie: get community support due to device saturation) do see vulnerabilities published past the point of support. I trust Qualcomm's ability to develop their modem driver (which is an entire Linux install) very little, and I trust it's ability to stand the test of time to be even less. I'm not sure I'm saying it's a total loss, but I feel a bit lost on what to do as well. Do I think Google…

If the mere possibility of a bug is a show stopper, you really shouldn't use anything because this possibility always exists --- with all hardware and software.

I think there's a difference in saying "software tends to be buggy, security can't be perfect" vs "I'm using a baseband modem running out-of-date Linux, that has DMA to my entire phone, that the manufacturer has stopped supporting, and there's active CVEs".

> Without physical possession of the device, access to drivers passes through the OS.

With all due respect, that is not a wise take on modern device security. At all, all, all.

Post reply on HN