I get it it's hard to make a good product and sell it cheaply, but at these price points, with the hardware there are providing, installing a custom ROM is the cheapest and arguably the best way to de-google.

Some of these are selling you the 5 years old hardware with today's flagship killer phone prices. Unless there is a big change in the Android phone market, these prices for these devices will never be justified in my eyes. Not even for the native Linux experience.

[–] ChrisDoeser@feddit.org 2 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

In the case of Fairphone you support the further development of /e/OS also financially. Otherwise the alternative Operating Systems will never be able to fully mature.That alone can justify the purchase of a phone in my eyes (if you've got the money to spare).

[–] BurnedDonutHole@ani.social 1 points 4 hours ago

I have nothing against supporting a project nor I can tell you what to do. However Fairphone has been in the market since 2013 iirc. That makes 13 years, yet here we are still getting aged hardware for a new flagship price. Supporting a project such as theirs doesn't justify the shitty phones they make in my humble opinion.

[–] Teppichbrand@feddit.org 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 16 hours ago) (2 children)

We don't have to settle for just one option. There will always be status-people who buy a brand-new Tesla for 50.000€ because they can afford it. And there are the second hand EV-people, who pay like 10.000€ and still make a difference. Same with de-googled smartphone. Let them buy expensive if they can. I love my de-googled Pixel 4a I bought for like 75€ years ago. Both types are part of the solution.

[–] ChrisDoeser@feddit.org 3 points 19 hours ago

To be fair buying a /e/OS fairphone also directly helps the development of these alternative systems. Therefore I think its justified to pay a bit more if you've got the money to spare.

[–] BurnedDonutHole@ani.social 2 points 1 day ago

I agree.～(つˆ0ˆ)つ｡☆

[–] pantherina@feddit.org 1 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

That is a vast oversimplifications. Custom Android builds either rely on reverse engineered drivers, or vendor kernels, or mostly undocumented drivers and custom kernel patches.

Custom "ROMs" are often very insecure, as they use the outdated stock vendor kernel of the original OS, as it is so customized. Not always, but often.

Then you have firmware, which is responsible for a ton of tasks on Android phones, way more importantly than on a PC. There is an entire separate, proprietary chip in there, connecting to sensible and insecure networks like 2G and 3G (the modem/baseband).

I found this article to explain the situation well

[–] BurnedDonutHole@ani.social 1 points 4 hours ago

And yours is a vast exaggeration. You do realize all of these phones are using either Qualcomm or Mediatek chips and designs which already have those tracking firmwares right?

All of these companies are using these firmwares. As for the Custom ROMs it depends on the device and the custom ROM you're using. So, calling them entirely working on reverse engineered is a bit much. That's why these so called free phones need hardware kill switches. Even that article you linked states this. So, unless these guys come up with 100% pure homemade hardware and Linux based OS they will never be free from tracking. Even then they won't be free from tracking. Hence my point: You can get the same level of de-google and untraceable stuff with using a proper Custom ROM suitable for your device.