5 ms·
Whenever I contemplate putting an ancient device (back) on the air, I always end up finding out, that at least one of the wireless technologies/chips aboard the
by stragies 6y ago
Whenever I contemplate putting an ancient device (back) on the air, I always end up finding out, that at least one of the wireless technologies/chips aboard the device has security problems, and replacement firmware (if the problem is fixable by SW/FW) is usually not available, or from dodgy sources with unknown "goodies" added.
(In those cases, I also don't trust the soft-toggle in the UI)
PostmarketOS is my current "Favorite" FW for hopefully getting some old devices back into service, mostly for interfacing with some IOT installations. They are working to get the Mainline kernel to run on many old(er) devices, since these days only a correct DTB is required to boot on nearly anything. (iiuec)
- swiley 6y agoI’d be surprised if older blackberries had PMOS support. The OS they chipped ~with was based on QNX~, most of which isn’t open source. Edit: TIL the original blackberry OS was a strange embedded java VM. (I’ve never owned a blackberry)
- malexw 6y agoThe QNX-based OS started with BlackBerry 10 around 2013. Everything before that was a Java VM on top of a relatively small OS written by the company.
- jeffbee 6y agoNot everything before that. Before that Java stuff RIM was shipping a bespoke platform with a C API, from 1996 to 2002. The devices had Intel 386 CPUs which sounds weird but the battery life was incredible. The model 850 ran on 1 AA battery. The model 957 was rechargeable but it ran so long you didn't need to take the charger on trips.
- stragies 6y agoYeah, devices that old should be dismantled & scrapped for parts. The screens sometimes are useful. Then you smash the flash chips, and anything else that could have cached/held any credentials/IDs. Some IOT devices cache/store previous WIFI credentials.