alt Hacker Newsthat isn't all that different from getting a Pixel.
Paradox is, that with Pixel device you can get most freedom and security togather. Installation of GrapheneOS is easiest custom ROM installation that could possibly be.
Replies
Unless you live in a place where your phone needs to be a regional variant and there are no custom roms that support it.
> Installation of GrapheneOS
and you get absolutely nothing in return. Yeah you will have root access sometimes. But other than that, android is not opensource anymore.
I mean, it never was because you had hundreds (no exaggeration [1]) closed-binary blobs running (not to mention a whole OS on things like radio and camera, running on their own SoC), but now you cannot get even close to a proper of the userspace since google already anounced they will not be mainlining anything back to AOSP
[1] zero source for kernel pieces, even for pixel https://github.com/GrapheneOS/device_google_laguna-kernels_6...
I tried it, Graphene isn't really a good alternative because the built in apps are so bad that you end up needing to install the Pixel/Google versions anyway.
If I have to install Google Messages for RCS, Google Calendar, Google Contacts, Pixel Camera (which forces you to use Google Photos for basic functionality), … where is the benefit?
If I have to turn Graphene into a Pixel to make it usable, and I did, there’s not much point. And the apps are 90% of the time very noticeably better on iOS, so overall turns into a very bad trade.