5 ms·
I always felt manufacturers should be forced to open the boot-loader of their obsolete devices if not for consumer rights at-least "for the environment". Motoro
by Abishek_Muthian 6y ago
I always felt manufacturers should be forced to open the boot-loader of their obsolete devices if not for consumer rights at-least "for the environment". Motorola offering unlock codes on their website albeit voiding warranty felt like a breath of fresh air[1].
PinePhone, other open smartphones are not available in my country due to embargo; So Moto G4 Play was the obvious second choice[2] for PostmarketOS due to availability of robust mainline kernel(MSM8916).
But guess what, Motorola removed unlocking support for older devices from their portal[3]! So even though G4 Play is available widely in the used market it's useless for any aftermarket OS efforts. There's absolutely no explanation for this decision from Motorola, other than making people buy their latest devices. So, it seems that the devices unlocked(hacked) by the community is still a better choice in the long run just because the manufacturers cannot be trusted for the devices 'we own?'.
[1]https://motorola-global-portal.custhelp.com/app/standalone/bootloader/unlock-your-device-a https://motorola-global-portal.custhelp.com/app/standalone/b...
[2]https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11rieZf6ODM-HQkEpFYWXIyqWsC1DDIqDMAh4YHJPt9E/edit#gid=1399530391 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11rieZf6ODM-HQkEpFYWX...
[3]https://support.motorola.com/us/en/solution/MS87215 https://support.motorola.com/us/en/solution/MS87215
- AntiImperialist 6y agoSamsung has had bootloader unlocking as a feature in all their mobile devices for a very long time. It is available for all devices, new or old.
- Abishek_Muthian 6y agoDidn't 'Knox' mess that up for newer phones? Anyways, couple of Samsung A/J series phones does seem to work well with PostmarketOS but unfortunately display brightness cannot be adjusted making it a hard choice.
- AntiImperialist 6y agoYou'll void your warranty and never be able to use Knox again if you switch back to Samsung firmware once you unlock bootloader. But no, Knox doesn't prevent you from unlocking bootloader in any way.
- Reelin 6y ago> Samsung has had bootloader unlocking as a feature in all their mobile devices This is simply not true. Some of their devices provide that but many don't. Research carefully before purchasing.
- AntiImperialist 6y agoI just realized that the US carrier locked devices don't have it. So, if you have one of those, unfortunately, you'll have to use a third-party method.
- saagarjha 6y agoSome of the unlocked ones, too.
- d3nj4l 6y agoAll Snapdragon variants of Samsung's Galaxy lineup are locked, regardless of carrier. This has been going on at least since the S7, and there are exploits to unlock bootloaders for such phones, at least as far as the Note 9 [1]. I would argue that if you need an exploit to unlock the bootloader, you are no better off than purchasing Apple. 1: https://www.xda-developers.com/samsung-galaxy-s9-galaxy-note-9-snapdragon-root/ https://www.xda-developers.com/samsung-galaxy-s9-galaxy-note...
- vinay427 6y agoIt's still a far fry from "no better," in my view. There's an ecosystem of Android software for these environments. For instance, LineageOS, as the typical first target, was unofficially ported to the Note 9 Snapdragon soon after the bootloader exploit. There are also existing tools for Google Apps, microG, Xposed, etc.
- d3nj4l 6y agoYou've got fairly good jailbreaks for most iPhones, too, so in my opinion they're close.
- m463 6y agoI wonder if the right to repair laws that are gaining momentum might help fix this.
- zepto 6y agoThe forced open bootloader proposal is the only right to repair law that makes any sense.