Phones have a hard life compared to a computer, I suspect the number of phones that last four years would be very small, never mind 8.
Comment on Qualcomm and Google team up to offer 8 years of Android updates
hypertown@lemmy.world 1 month ago
I still can’t understand how I can install modern Windows or Linux on a 20 year old PC but the same can’t be done with 4 year old phone… 8 year is cool but it’s nothing compared to 20 years.
Ilovethebomb@lemm.ee 1 month ago
hypertown@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Do people really treat their phones so badly? I have a Galaxy Note II (Almost 12 year old phone!) that still works. Thanks to community support it has Android 12 installed and it’s currently working as a radio in my garage.
My uncle is using my old S8 as his daily driver and it works no problem.Ilovethebomb@lemm.ee 1 month ago
They get carried around all day, charged every day, dropped, ports wear out etc. Compared to a computer, they have a hard life, even the most kindly treated ones.
Max_P@lemmy.max-p.me 1 month ago
Because phones are a mess of out of tree patches specific to that phone model with zero hope of being upstreamed into the Linux kernel without a cleaner rewrite because it’s not good, it’s made to work and nothing more.
It’s improved but companies like Qualcomm also used to basically drop the code to the manufacturers when the chip launches and then move on with little maintenance for the code and stop maintaining the code once the chip is not produced anymore. Manufacturers don’t have the expertise to maintain that forever nor the will, so you end up with a kernel that keeps aging and isn’t keeping up with Android and the community hasn’t been successful in integrating it all either.
Google’s been pushing hard for this to improve but they’re the only ones to even care. Samsung and others would much rather sell you a new phone.
refurbishedrefurbisher@lemmy.sdf.org 1 month ago
Not just Google, but the community has been hard at work with porting mainline Linux to phones. postmarketOS is the main OS that devices are initially ported to.
hypertown@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Honestly I’m impressed with all the work the community has put into projects like LineageOS but when I recently checked the supported devices list I feel like we’re at the lowest point we’ve ever been and now to buy a phone for 10 years means to buy a Pixel.
Not often I say this but: Good job Google.