A small project to help out anyone trying to keep their old devices functional.
I wrote a script to scrape pages of some popular alternative OS projects (such as postmarketOS and LineageOS), and put them into a single list. I’ll try to automate and keep this up-to-date. Any additional OS suggestions and comments are welcome!
I recommend you look on xda too
That would be great and I might add a scraper for xdaforums, but even XDA has a lot of dead links for old devices now.
All my old devices became unusable due to the flash memory chip degrading. Unless they can run off SD card?
Alas, no. You could hypothetically replace the board though, which would allow you to continue using the rest of the hardware. But you have to source the part, and switch it out, which isn’t always possible
what its like when that happens? does it just not power on anymore? fails to boot? boots but works erratically?
Starts getting slower and slower over months, then yeah starts failing to boot, sometimes works if you pull the battery and retry, and eventually doesn’t work at all anymore.
What device?
The flash should be rated for something like 100,000 - 1,000,000 writes
DivestOS is no longer maintained, RIP. Long live Calyx.
Thank you @yaky@slrpnk.net
Thanks for reposting, I subscribed to this community too.
Nice! It is a bit more active than the Lemmy.world one.
Dang I thought this would resurrect my old Galaxy Tab S2 but, according to PostMarketOS, wifi is broken :-(
Couldn’t you use a USB hub with a USB wifi adapter attached? I already have both things, and if the device will be in one place, it works. Of course, if you don’t have any of the components, it gets tricky.
I can see you’re missing options for the Sony Xperia XZ1 and XZ1 Compact. I own both of those phones and they are currently being maintained for both iodéOS and LineageOS for microG. Here are some links:
- iodéOS builds for XZ1 through automatic installer
- LineageOS for microG builds for XZ1
- iodéOS builds for XZ1 Compact (unofficial)
- LineageOS for microG builds for XZ1 Compact
Check which regional variant you have first, as I believe some models (such as the Japanese ones) are not supported.
Thanks for pointing this out. The list is made by a scraper (and I haven’t updated it in a few months), so it probably missed some models depending on the model code.
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All my old devices become un-chargeable due to USB-C plug wearout. Even with wireless charging I cannot avoid sometimes needing a wired full charge.
I have not heard of USB-C wearing out yet. What devices are those? Have to be new enough to have USB-C.
My Pixel 3a had to be retired when it could no longer “hold” with plugged in cable (and had to be chargeda day).
Did you abuse it heavily? I have an old 3a and the USB-C works fine
Don’t think so. Just normal usage. I wasn’t trying to assert that the 3a had some design issue or systemic manufacturing flaw. The port just eventually got kinda loose and any perturbance of the phone or cable would wiggle enough to lose connection.
Samsung and Pixel, but various earlier models with micro-USB also. The plugs on my nightstand chargers have also tended to loosen up over time, but since I don’t unplug those as often they don’t seem to be the weak link.
This list is pretty cool but unfortunately for me, most of my devices aren’t listed. Two of them are listed but the specified OSs aren’t being actively updated anymore and most of the features are labeled as not working or untested.
What about newer phones I just want to decouple from google? Is there anytjing for newer samsungs?
The problem with newer Samsung (post 2021 is update) is they don’t allow you to unlock the bootloader (at least for US phones). This pretty much squashes your ability to put a new OS on it.
I’m guessing Pixel is a nonstarter then 😁
Actually, GrapheneOS works on new pixels!
Ironically Pixels are actually the best/easiest because you can easily unlock the bootloader and they have good custom ROM support
Like everyone else said, pixels are the best phones for non stock OS. You can unlock them easy and they are quick to release security updates so the open source security nerds who made graphene OS (the best open source OS) love pixel phones.
That’s good to know!
Good to know for sure that my old phones are dead.
Haha, I knew my device would show up there (Poco F2 Pro) but I still can’t believe this is an old phone, even with its 5 years old battery it still gives me more than 6 hrs of SOT.
Also my phone is very much resurrected with the Pixel OS ROM and the latest security update and passing strong integrity even while it is rooted… (with a bunch of KSU modules) Long live custom ROMs!
Nothing for the Nokia 7.2, and yet the 4.2 sits there with more than a half-dozen options. WTF??
Is it just user preference to choose between postmarket, cachyos, and lineage? Or is one preferable
postmarketOS is fully Linux (based on Alpine Linux) Choose this for more technical projects or if you want your phone to be like Raspberry Pi++.
LineageOS is a clean Android. Choose this for Android experience.
Awesome thank you, now I’m really interested
Nothing for Xperia 1 VI :(
