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Google-free /e/ OS is now selling preloaded phones in the US, starting at $380
- bobkrusty 6y agoI live in asia how can i buy this one? Is there any way
- npteljes 6y agoYou can just buy a used phone that's supported by them and install the OS yourself. I have done it with LineageOS and it's not hard.
- 177tcca 6y agoIf you're going to do this, buy a Pixel so you can have the bare minimum in secure hardware. And consider GrapheneOS.
- npteljes 6y agoI'm sorry I don't get why you're downvoted. In what way is a Pixel phone more secure, hardware-wise?
- 177tcca 6y agoYour guess is as good as mine. Misdirected hatred at Google services privacy bleeding into this debate? Anyway, please read GrapheneOS.org in its entirety.
- FieryBinary 6y agoPixels are pretty much the only Android phone that supports full verified boot with custom keys, meaning verified boot of the entire base system works no matter what OS you're booting (as long as your OS supports verified boot in the first place). They're about on par with iPhones security-wise, but Pixels support alternate OSes which is really nice. Other Android phones often either have broken verified boot implementations (such as only verifying the kernel) or completely lack it. The Titan M makes Pixels even better; it is a security chip which stores keys such as those for verified boot. The security of Pixels is why security-focused mobile operating systems like GrapheneOS often target Pixels instead of say, Samsung Galaxies.
- FieryBinary 6y agoJust to correct myself, about Titan M: It does more than just store keys, it also does other things that contribute to security.
- jeroenhd 6y agoYou can follow this guide if you have one of the easy installer compatible devices: https://doc.e.foundation/easy-installer https://doc.e.foundation/easy-installer Or on any other supported phone (see this list: https://doc.e.foundation/devices/ https://doc.e.foundation/devices/) you can follow the install guide there. Might even work with your current phone!
- jqpabc123 6y agoThe "easy installer" has very limited hardware support at this time. The first time I followed the install guide, I ended up with a "hard brick" --- wouldn't even power up. Contrary to popular opinion, it is possible to recover from this but it does take time, effort and determination. As a result of my experience, I made suggested changes which were incorporated into the guide for my device.
- fuzxi 6y agoSo they're charging a premium (you can buy these phones in mint condition on swappa for nearly $150 less) for a refurbished 3 year old phone because it's preloaded with a ROM for enthusiasts. Who would buy this? I can't imagine any of the people who know or care enough to use /e/ are the kind of people who'd pay someone else $150 to flash a ROM for them.
- geogra4 6y agoI think /e/ needs the Exynos version, which is much harder to come by in the US. Either way, when I'm ready for my next phone i'm going to strongly consider /e/
- fuzxi 6y agoYes, there's no root exploit or rootless bootloader unlock that I know of on the Snapdragon versions. I'm seeing similar prices on the Exynos versions, though.
- npteljes 6y agoI don't know either but I wish them luck. I'd really like it if it would take off, along with Fairphone, Pinephone and Librem.
- websites2323 6y agoI've flashed ROMs before. I don't get a kick out of it, and my hourly rate is more than $150. I'll probably buy one.
- BoorishBears 6y agoW... what? Could you find someone to pay you more than $150 an hour to flash a rom? Do you have to sit there the entire time you're setting up a phone with a new rom? The comment you replied to is making a great point, generally people running custom roms without Google's services do so because they are enthusiasts. An Android device without Google is going to require avoiding very common apps and using workarounds that are already going to be time consuming whether you flash the device or not. Meanwhile people who aren't enthusiasts probably don't care about Google's hooks into Android via GPS. - People who apparently think... their hourly rate... is too high to flash a rom (something mostly automated anyways...) but also want to flash a rom and deal with a phone that is missing the core services that normally define an Android device on an outdated device and want to pay a 2x premium for a privilege may just be a sample size of you lol
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- johnchristopher 6y ago> an email fork called K-9 Mail, Say that again :) ? Tease apart I think and believe /e/ is a really great initiative, which aligns better with ecology than Fairphone does (so far). If my phone was supported I'd have switched long ago (it's a 2015 sony z5c I bought second hand 3.5 years ago).
- sleavey 6y ago> which aligns better with ecology than Fairphone does (so far) What do you mean by that?
- johnchristopher 6y agoA refurbished phone needs less raw materials and processing than a new fairphone.
- bj-rn 6y ago/e/ & fairphone have a partnership. You can get a fairphone preloaded with /e/OS (in Europe & the UK): https://www.fairphone.com/en/2020/04/30/keeping-your-data-safe-with-e-os/ https://www.fairphone.com/en/2020/04/30/keeping-your-data-sa... https://esolutions.shop/shop/e-os-fairphone-3/ https://esolutions.shop/shop/e-os-fairphone-3/
- age008 6y agoIn Europe if we want a Google-free phone we just buy a Huawei.
- kube-system 6y agoI've only owned one Huawei phone, but it definitely had Google's software installed. (and after running some network analysis, I noticed it also phoned home to China)
- pdimitar 6y agoI'm very interested in how do you run the said network analysis? I'm considering buying an Android again but I'd like to properly tame it by cutting off as much spy traffic as possible.
- kube-system 6y agoI don't remember what I was using at the time, but there's a variety of ways to do it, depending on what you're looking for. Generally, you want to capture network traffic at the packet level and run it through a tool to help you analyze it. The tool you pick would depend on what you're looking for and the type of analysis you're doing. Here's a few tools that come to mind: https://www.wireshark.org/ https://www.wireshark.org/ https://www.snort.org/ https://www.snort.org/ https://www.ntop.org/products/traffic-analysis/ntop/ https://www.ntop.org/products/traffic-analysis/ntop/
- pdimitar 6y agoThanks. I'm particularly interested in how did you find out that your phone was calling Chinese servers.
- SOLAR_FIELDS 6y agoNot the original parent commenter but a sniffer like Wireshark would reveal the url(s) or IP addresses being requested by the phone to call home - it’s fairly easy to check if those belong to a Chinese IP range.
- plq 6y agoWhy not go sailfish? It also has an android shell that seems to run android apps just fine.
- cecja 6y agoThe UX is atrocious.
- chaosharmonic 6y agoIn a word: drivers. Sailfish has a runtime for Android apps, but under the hood it's closer to other mobile Linux projects, and to that end the hardware compatibility is less like Lineage or /e/ and more like UBPorts. Android's handling of the Linux kernel, until this current version cycle, has involved several forks per device -- patches from Google (the Android Common Kernel), then patches from chipset vendors, then patches from device vendors -- with closed binary drivers inserted at various points in this process. [0] Treble has been exposing generic hardware interfaces to system images since version 8, but the drivers themselves haven't had that kind of uniformity re: how they interface with the kernel itself. There are projects that will adapt them to run GNU-based systems -- to use UBPorts as an example again, it actually does exist as a GSI -- but since the modifications needed to get them to run depend on a custom kernel, they're still device-specific. Meanwhile, Android devices are required to run Google's entire test suite using a generic build of AOSP, so while GSI compatibility isn't perfect, the minimum baseline is effectively just the ability to unlock your bootloader. [0] Generally. In some cases -- most Huawei devices, non-US Samsung models -- the device vendor is the chipset vendor. But that doesn't mean their chipset IP is any more open than, say, Qualcomm's, nor does necessarily alter that of other components like camera sensors.
- etaioinshrdlu 6y agoHonestly, I think this kind of thing is more likely to lead to a good usable daily-driver phone than the Pinephone. Unfortunately there is not quite as much hardware freedom on this device...
- choward 6y agoI thought they were changing their terrible name.
- labster 6y agoI’m sure people use their phones to look at ecchi pictures all the time.
- throwawaygulf 6y agoGet a Pixel 3/4 and throw GrapheneOS on it: https://grapheneos.org/ https://grapheneos.org/ It's the best non-Google, privacy enhanced experience you can get at the moment.
- mickotron 6y agoThis is the way. From another happy grapheneos user, and project sponsor.
- UncleOxidant 6y agoWow, I don't see that often, but when I tried (several times) to go to that link I get: Gah. Your tab just crashed. In Firefox (85.0.1 on Ubuntu 18.04). Works fine in Opera, though, and it looks like just a wall of text so I'm not sure why FF would be unhappy.
- bryanrasmussen 6y agoFirefox Developer, worked fine for me.
- cmeacham98 6y agoWorks for me on firefox nightly on linux.
- MildlySerious 6y agoWow indeed, same here. I don't recall seeing that for a very long time, if at all. FF85 on Ubuntu 16.04 x64
- Consultant32452 6y agoI haven't had any crashes, but I've had more and more sites not work with Firefox. The payroll site I use for my small business is the most annoying one, I have to switch to Safari to run payroll.
- dhimes 6y agoFirefox 86 Win 10 — works fine.
- bestouff 6y agoIs there a way to easily install the server part "at home" ?
- npteljes 6y agoThey have a guide, but I'm not sure how easy or stable it is. https://gitlab.e.foundation/e/infra/ecloud-selfhosting https://gitlab.e.foundation/e/infra/ecloud-selfhosting
- johnklos 6y agoIt's a fork of Android, so it's not Google-free.
- swiley 6y agoyes. Anything Android based is absolutely dominated by Google. At this point it probably takes less manpower to maintain a Gnome/KDE/Lomiri based distro for your platform than Google-free Android.
- unethical_ban 6y agoYour definition of google-free: Completely zero code input, developer overlap, or potential design influence by Google My definition of google-free as it relates to phones, and I think the more common one: No callbacks to any Google service such as Play store, google cloud messaging, or any of Google's usual default android applications.
- FieryBinary 6y agoBy that definition, Linux, Chromium, and lots of other software isn't Google-free. But that's ridiculous. Android does not contain any tracking code, and at most uses Google servers as the default for network connectivity tests, etc. which you can change. Versions of Android running on actual phones often have tracking, but this is not related to Android itself and is largely about Google Play Services.
- willio58 6y agoHow do you say "/e/ OS"? I know this is always asked but I still don't know because I've seen conflicting answers. Is it just e OS? Why complicate your brand by throwing in "/"s?
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- Bombthecat 6y agoCould i use my banking apps?
- jqpabc123 6y agoI have two banking apps that run just fine under it. Your mileage may vary.
- jqpabc123 6y agoHow about a new Moto G7 Plus for say $185 with screen protector and case with $5 going to /e/ foundation to continue development. Here is the proposed /new/ hardware: https://m.gsmarena.com/t_mobile_revvlry+-9764.php https://m.gsmarena.com/t_mobile_revvlry+-9764.php I use one of these myself as a daily driver and have done several for friends and family so I have the flashing part down. I have toyed with the idea of turning this over to my grandson as a business for college spending money. I replace some of the default apps with better non-tracking, privacy focused alternatives such as Brave browser and TwinMe for video calls and instant messaging. Note: Your iOS friends will like TwinMe too. Any interest in going turn key "Google free" at this price point? The goal is for my grandson to net $50 per phone. Any less is not worth the time and effort required.