I was going through Pine64’s page again after I found the latest KDE announcement. With that said, I seem to see a lot of issues with firmware on the Pine, whilst the Librem is just plain out of budget for me. Was interested in how many people here run a Linux mobile as a daily driver, and how has your experience been?

I’m considering purchasing the Pine but I’d like a better screen, more RAM and a better CPU. Don’t know if I should wait for a new model to be released (are they even planning to do that? Is the company active?). I will only really use it to browse the Web, and might even look to desolder a couple of parts that I know I won’t use.

Thanks.

Edit: I am willing to watch content and use banking apps from the browser. Do you think it’ll be fit for me?

Edit 2: overall, I am much saddened about the state of affairs regarding private computing on the go. I desperately hope that Linux on mobile takes off, even though its incubation looks disheartening at the moment. Thank you everyone for your comments.

  • Sarcasmo220
    5·
    1 year ago

    There’s been a lot of good discussion here, all with valid points.

    I daily drive a Librem 5 and first thing is to temper expectations. If you use your phone for high quality camera, intensive graphics games, constant phone calls and SMS messages then it will not be a good fit. The reason I am okay with daily driving it is because my needs are very little. All I do is web browsing, use Signal, occasional VoLTE calls and SMS messages. And that was even when I was using an Android phone.

    There are modem issues, which have improved somewhat, but I also don’t receive a lot of calls or SMS messages anyways. I haven’t had anyone complain that I missed their call or SMS. I use the desktop Signal flatpak to communicate with close friends/family there and that has been really reliable.

    For things that absolutely cannot be done without Android, I spin up Waydroid to use whatever app, and then close out Waydroid when I’m done. During that experience I notice Waydroid performs better which means any slowness is absolutely due to lack of OS optimization. That also gives me hope that it can also be improved over time.

    Overall, there are a bunch of quirky things about dailying a Linux phone. Unless, and until, you use it everyday you will not figure out the little workarounds to make it usable in your life.

      • Sarcasmo220
        1·
        1 year ago

        I guess it depends. My banking app is simple, so yes. But from what I hear, major banks require like facial recognition or something. That will probably not work because Waydroid cannot access the camera. Currently it can only access the network.

        I have heard of Anbox that run apps in a container like environment, but I have not personally tried it out.