45
votes
I hate phone updates
I don't think I've installed an update on my phone and felt like it was an improvement over the old version.
Samsung just pushed their new firmware onto my phone and added a whole bunch of annoying AI stuff that I don't want and additionally decided for me that I no longer want the bluetooth signal in the statusbar unless I open up the notification menu, with no way to reenable it. I turn off my headphones when I don't need them and it was really useful to see at a glance that if they were connected and I had forgotten to turn them off.
The software was always the main reason why I was never interested in buying Samsung's phones. It seems there's always some problem with them, especially on the software side. I owned the T-Mobile Sidekick 4G, which was a Samsung phone, and it was quite literally the worst cell phone I have ever owned because it was constantly crashing. Though to be fair, this was also the early days of Android, but still, I wouldn't trust any software written by Samsung without some serious vetting and credible third-party recommendations.
Yeah my partner has Samsung. She always had odd problems with it..
I love the hardware, but prefer stock so I've been using Google phones since the Nexus 5.
Recently upgraded from the 6a to the 9 pro
For Samsung specifically there's an app called Good Lock in the Samsung app store. It's made by Samsung themselves and gives you tons customization options that normally aren't available. Too much to get into right now, but it can solve your problem (more than likely, my phone has not updated yet so I can't confirm).
You'll want to open the Samsung apps store, helpfully called "store" and search for "good lock". Once that's installed, it will give you a menu of 20 or so more apps you can install as plug-ins. The one you want is called "quick star". There's an option in there called "visibility of indicator icons" which lets you turn on or off individual icons like wifi, nfc, Bluetooth, etc.
Sometimes after an OS update the good lock plug-ins take a few days to get updated themselves, and I don't have the update yet but I think this should be what you want.
I tried doing the Good Lock thing but it still didn't reenable my bluetooth icon. Maybe after some updates..
I've never had a Samsung phone, but I helped my uncle set up his new Samsung Galaxy, and the process involved so much fluff and confusion-inducing design that I will never buy a Samsung phone myself. It honestly got me thinking twice about buying any Samsung-branded product again.
I probably have unusually low tolerance for that sort of thing, though. My uncle seemed perfectly happy with the phone even though the setup process was so fraught that he couldn't manage it himself (and he is a far more experienced computer user than I am).
Referencing to your uncle being more experienced: There is a point where you are far too experienced to do basic stuff that other people manage just fine. I'm the "tech nerd" in my circle and sometimes I'm looking for too complex of a solution for an easy problem. That said - sometimes the user experience is actually that bad and the "nerdiness" doesn't have to do anything with it - it is just straight bad.
Yeah, same. I recently helped my grandmother set up a Samsung phone, and it was the worst thing in the world. Here's the Kagi Translated version of the angry rant I posted about the experience:
Also holy hell Kagi Translate is so good
I had this exact reaction, that is basically perfect english. What was the original language?
The original was in Russian, and Google Translate did translate it, but it sounded pretty unnatural and lost all of the angry tone
I think this is a Samsung specific problem, not a general industry problem. At least that has been my experience. Motorola, pretty decent updates, few regressions. Google, good updates, no regressions. Apple, good updates, no regressions. Samsung, bad updates, sometimes entire advertised features removed completely. The one that burned me was smartcast (I think that is what it was called). That was Samsung's built in way to send audio and video to screens using the chromecast protocol. It supported a special protocol for Samsung smart TVs, but I only used it for chromecasts. I also managed to teach my entire family how to use it without having to run to me every time they wanted to share their screen. Samsung released an update that rewrote the smartcast implementation. Not a problem, except that they decided it shouldn't support chromecast anymore, just their stupid proprietary protocol. The worst part is this wasn't documented anywhere. I spent weeks troubleshooting why our chrome cast suddenly stopped accepting smartcast streams. I finally found some Samsung user forum of people complaining about the same problem. I didn't leave Samsung because of that, but it was definitely one of the push factors that got me to try Apple.
Apple is better, but they are still pushy at times. After updating Mom's iPhone, it wants her to set a thumb print and passcode, and bypassing it is a little tricky, so I have to do it for her.
(It probably makes sense for most people, but she is elderly and can barely use it as it is.)
I agree with your post for the most part. I have a OnePlus phone, and generally speaking the amount of crap that gets shoved via OS updates are pretty minimal. I wouldn't say zero, but they are mostly ignorable or you can turn them off.
Back when I did Android development, a Samsung Android OS update would make the phone go from usable to a barely usable billboard ad disguised as a phone. It's a shame, because it's Samsung sticking a pipe in its own bike spoke and then when the phone eventually falls off, Samsung will shake its fists and blame their customers/Apple/competition.
I really like Samsung hardware but I agree the software has got completely out of hand.
If I were you (I'm not, I am sadly stuck with a Pixel for another 2 years) I would install a custom OS and enjoy the best of both worlds.
You can definitely get a selection of AOSP images for Pixel phones. Eg, Derpfest
XDA Devs has many more options depending on the device but they seem to have significantly "upgraded" their site layout since last time I was there (many years ago) so it's rather harder to navigate than it used to be.
I think you misunderstood me. I was being intentionally obnoxious in my post. I don't like the Google hardware (the software isn't great either let's be honest).
I'm gonna install something custom probably next year, but ain't nothing gonna fix the hardware until I get a new phone.
Have you ever dabbled with Lineage OS? I dont know if it is compatible with your Samsung phone, but might be a good alternative to avoid all that AI bloatware
I’d love something like Debian but for phones: stable, well-maintained software that barely changes every two years — but you don’t need to bother for +5 years before security updates are dropped.
There is plasma mobile, basically KDE for phones. But there’s practically zero support for it.
Is sailfish still around? I wonder how support for it is.
Yeah, I'm aware of those attempts to bring Linux to phones. What I meant was a practical phone software that has the apps an average person needs and uses. Something like an Android or iOS, but LTS.
Sailfish is still around, but support for it is terrible. I've literally never had a phone that can run it, despite wanting to try it. Every year or so I try to look into it again, but there's never any development. Unless you have a select Sony Xperia device, or the Jolla device, you can't run it. Sony appears to have abandoned U.S. phone sales, too. I'll probably never try it out.
[edit to add]
I have tried Plasma Mobile, through postmarketOS. I experimented on a partially supported Pixel 3a XL. It was not usable; could not make phone calls for instance. The interface was terribly slow, but it is a pretty old phone.
There's also Ubuntu Touch
Mobian which only supports a few devices.
Some people also seem to be using a UI called Phosh on top of postmarketOS
While I want something better than Android, I don't think we're going to get it. Everything listed here is built on top of Linux, and I doubt anyone is going to get it better than Google has been able to with decades of investment. Maybe something like FreeBSD or FreeRTOS could offer stability, consistency and/or responsiveness over Linux, but frankly that's a pipedream. No one has the resources, experience and expertise to invest in something like that. I might as well wish for an AI developing a new mobile OS.
And Google seems to have all but abandoned Fuchsia
Most of what Google pushes to the Pixel I couldn't give a crap about, but most of it stays out of my hair just fine.
I've seen updates that are improvements. For example, a while back, a feature was added to the camera to show if the camera is level or not. Simple, very handy.
I like most of what they added that I notice, besides the stuff I ignore.
My Samsung phone stopped updating the OS in January 2023. I still don't understand why, but I need to do a factory reset to fix it (installer gets to the same percent every time then has an issue and reverses it).
That said, it runs great despite being a few years old so I feel like you might be on to something.
Yeah, companies keep pushing updates for the sake of updates but they are mostly useful now for the security updates contained within.
I always disable updates for this reason.
As a workaround, you could use something like Automate to display a notification if headphones are connected.