Don’t have a 4a, but big fan of my 5a with Graphene! The last one with both usb-c AND a headphone jack! It has been my phone of choice since my iPhone SE broke, and it is still my main driver.
GrapheneOS is the way to go, unfortunately the 5a won’t be supported by Google for much longer, only until August of this year. GrapheneOS will probably provide a few extra months of extended support though.
The most annoying thing is that major android updates are mandatory. I could not choose NOT to update. Notifications are bugged as hell for ages. Some just disappear, some don’t even ring/light up. Samsung had some apps that had more features compared to the Google alternatives. The only annoying this were all teh MS apps that I couldn’t deinstall.
The phone kept nagging me to update to 12 and later to 13 all the time. I didn’t manage to find a way to make the notification go away… Maybe it’s just me being a doofus.
As for the notifications thing, I literally tried everything except factory resetting my phone. Guess I am just unlucky.
I wanted to get some of the Samsung apps back, but most weren’t updated to work on 12 at that time and later I just forgot and gave in. I’ve never used F-Droid before but it looks like a good time to start now. Tnx for reminding me about it.
One more thing I forgot to add. The OS shits itself when I try to charge my phone and use it at the same time. All apps lag, you can’t scroll, can*t type without noticible delay and can’t even close the app by swiping. This was doxumented on some forums. Noone knows why. (I use the charged I got with my phone)
GrapheneOS gets rid of all the Google crap, it’s a much lighter and more minimal experience, I really like it. It also has some significant privacy and security improvements, it’s pretty neat.
I was thinking about it ever since Louis Rossmann showcased it. But as he had problems using his banking app and some other stuff, I decided it wouldn’t be worth the hassel. Also, many people wrote that with Graphene you lose a lot of the fancy camera shenanigans that Google made. And the camera was one of the more important points in getting this phone.
Regarding the camera: Yes, you lost some quality with the default GrapheneOS camera app. But you can easily install the official Google camera app from the Play store (or anonymously through Aurora) to get full quality. You don’t even need Google play services installed for that to work, and you can revoke it’s network access, so it’s completely offline and private. I use the Google camera app all the time, it works flawlessly.
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Don’t have a 4a, but big fan of my 5a with Graphene! The last one with both usb-c AND a headphone jack! It has been my phone of choice since my iPhone SE broke, and it is still my main driver.
GrapheneOS is the way to go, unfortunately the 5a won’t be supported by Google for much longer, only until August of this year. GrapheneOS will probably provide a few extra months of extended support though.
Oof that’s really sad
Oof, the Pixel 2 XL was hot garbage. I returned mine four times due to speaker issues, and the fourth was no better.
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Loved my Pixel 2 XL. Upgraded to a P5 a year ago tho. Really amazing phone
I have a 4a 5G variant and I can’t stand how the “stock” experience manages to be worse than on my old Samsung :-/ The pics are great tho
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Well it’s less features for less bloat.
From there it depends how much of those extra features are useful / how much you miss in stock android.
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The most annoying thing is that major android updates are mandatory. I could not choose NOT to update. Notifications are bugged as hell for ages. Some just disappear, some don’t even ring/light up. Samsung had some apps that had more features compared to the Google alternatives. The only annoying this were all teh MS apps that I couldn’t deinstall.
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The phone kept nagging me to update to 12 and later to 13 all the time. I didn’t manage to find a way to make the notification go away… Maybe it’s just me being a doofus. As for the notifications thing, I literally tried everything except factory resetting my phone. Guess I am just unlucky.
I wanted to get some of the Samsung apps back, but most weren’t updated to work on 12 at that time and later I just forgot and gave in. I’ve never used F-Droid before but it looks like a good time to start now. Tnx for reminding me about it.
One more thing I forgot to add. The OS shits itself when I try to charge my phone and use it at the same time. All apps lag, you can’t scroll, can*t type without noticible delay and can’t even close the app by swiping. This was doxumented on some forums. Noone knows why. (I use the charged I got with my phone)
I 100% agree. Stock android experience is garbage even compared miui.
GrapheneOS gets rid of all the Google crap, it’s a much lighter and more minimal experience, I really like it. It also has some significant privacy and security improvements, it’s pretty neat.
I was thinking about it ever since Louis Rossmann showcased it. But as he had problems using his banking app and some other stuff, I decided it wouldn’t be worth the hassel. Also, many people wrote that with Graphene you lose a lot of the fancy camera shenanigans that Google made. And the camera was one of the more important points in getting this phone.
There’s a very detailed article about GrapheneOS banking app compatibility where you can check if your bank’s app works on Graphene: https://github.com/PrivSec-dev/banking-apps-compat-report/
Regarding the camera: Yes, you lost some quality with the default GrapheneOS camera app. But you can easily install the official Google camera app from the Play store (or anonymously through Aurora) to get full quality. You don’t even need Google play services installed for that to work, and you can revoke it’s network access, so it’s completely offline and private. I use the Google camera app all the time, it works flawlessly.
I still use Pixel 4 and the fabric case is so great to the touch, too bad the new ones don’t have them.
Do you have GrapheneOS installed on it? That way, you could at least get the update to Android 14.