With whatever Google’s been doing lately to android, and the general decline in custom ROMs, I’m wondering if custom ROMs are even worth the hassle anymore or if just tweaking settings and using ADB on any phone is enough these days. Thoughts and suggestions?
That Google is attacking custom ROMs should tell you anything you need to know. Definitely continue using ROMs as long as possible and pray to holy GNU that linux on mobile will attain day to day usability until that fails. It’s actually looking pretty promising on that front!
It’s difficult to understand the move against custom ROMs. Especially considering the size of market for “weridos” that will spend hundreds of dollars on a device and first thing they do with it is unlocking bootloader.
Take that away and you go head to head against Samsung and Apple. And you will not win.
I am sure they are tracking public sentiment and the normies are taking notice. So they are fro at running that IMHO
I was recently wondering if I should try GrapheneOS on a second-hand Pixel, or PostmarketOS on a Pinephone… Any experience withe these ?
Linux on mobile, like pmOS, is great for tinkering, but I wouldn’t use it as a daily driver. The OG Pinephone also has quite weak hardware for the modern age. Pinephone Pro is a bit better, but still slow compared to even something like a OnePlus 6, which also supports Linux on mobile quite well, albeit, still with issues.
GrapheneOS is great, but this move by Google may make it difficult for Graphene to continue to offer major updates. Only time will tell. But for the short term it’s a great option.
You 100% should.
I bought a second-hand Pixel, installed GrapheneOS the moment it arrived and never looked back.
I recently installed Curve for contactless NFC payments. Their support is terrible but, after some teething issues, it works without any problems.
GrapheneOS
GrapheneOS 100%, it’s a really good Android experience, unless you really want to root your device without much bother. You won’t find as much customisation as in other ROMs but it’s a very solid ROM and sandboxed play services is really nice.
Happy with my 2nd hand pixel / graphene OS. Avoid Verizon models- they hate everyone they can’t control & make the boot loader impossible to unlock.
PostmarketOS is not quite there yet to be daily driveable imo, I’m tinkering with it on a Oneplus 6T. But some enthusiasts do daily drive it - and it’s getting better and better!
Depends what you are looking for.
If you need a specific Android app that does not work on Waydroid, sure, go for GrapheneOS (or another deGoogled AOSP solution) but if you do no need that (and don’t mind carrying a rather larger phone with limited battery) then PmOS on PP is very interesting to explore.