[iClaudiusX]

Even a brand new, unlocked, $1000 Samsung Galaxy S10 comes riddled with adware and spyware, some of it unremovable:

"There are apps from Flipboard and Spotify as well as a unremovable version of Facebook. McAfee Anti-virus is baked into the operating system as "security," and the Samsung Gallery app wants to share my location with Foursquare. The storage management settings, which is just a simple file-cleanup app, is "Powered by Qihoo 360," a Chinese security company. A caller-ID feature built into the phone app is provided by a company called "Hiya."

Once you run through setup and connect to Wi-Fi, the phone spawns an undismissable "Secure Wi-Fi" notification, which, it turns out, is an ad for McAfee VPN subscription service. I tried blocking the notification—it's not blockable—but it turns out you can open the advertisement, carefully consider subscribing to McAfee VPN, say "No," and then it will go away. Cool."

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/04/galaxy-s10-review-fo...

[tbrock]

I don't understand why folks subject themselves to this for $1000 when other options are available.

You don’t have to keep supporting Samsung by buying their phones. Get a pixel instead.

[sfifs]

Google branded hardware has a notorious reputation for problems about 1-1.5 year down the road. This has happened with every single Google device anyone in my family has ever owned and so we've basically stopped buying Google. Very few manufacturers apart from Samsung come close to Apple in terms of sheer hardware quality and service support and Apple OS's lack of customisability, pathetic camera and lack of 3.5mm jack completely rules it out for me. That's basically why I have paid a premium for Samsung over the years. I may look at Huawei too now that they appear to have significantly upped the hardware quality game.

Being virtually stock Android, pre-installed software is easily disabled (even FB) - the only major complaint is inability to assign Bixby button to something else without rooting.

[saulrh]

? I used a Nexus 5 up until last year. Ended up upgrading last year, not because it had issues or because lineage stopped releasing for it, but because IT at my new job refused to let six-year-old devices on the network. Meanwhile, my parents complained continuously about their three-year-old iPhones getting slower and slower. Anecdotes, yeah, but...

[aosmith]

My nexus 5 still works, I don't use it anymore but the thing was an absolute tank.

[robocat]

Nexus 5 was not a tank in my experience.

On mine the plastic frame cracked between the power button and the volume control (I think a reasonably common problem with this phone, I've never had a frame crack on any other phone). After that one button gets stuck on, which makes phone cycle reboot - OK - I can workaround that. Then the microphone went bad: that is caused by the crack causing pressure on the micro-connector which causes an electrical issue. That wasted more time and eventually my workaround for that issue failed.

I have had close experience with 5 different Nexus devices, and 4 of the 5 had nasty failure modes.

The Nexus line has been far less reliable than the iOS devices I have had experience with, and all the Apple devices got far more security updates over their useful life. Note: I usually use Android phones and iPad tablets (although I have also personally had iPhones and Android tablets).

[sannee]

The soft plastic casing definitely cracks easily. On the other hand it does not fail catastrophically. I have dropped my Nexus 5 on the floor more times than I can count and while it has miniature cracks around the button/power connector it's nothing that prevents the phone from working.

[neilv]

The Nexus 5 is one of my favorite devices for PostmarketOS (project to get sustainable mainline Linux on smartphones and tablets): https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Google_Nexus_5_(lg-hammer...

[PascLeRasc]

I loved mine, I'd still be using it if I could have found one that didn't have motherboard issues. It was a pinnacle of industrial design and I'm sad that smartphone designs have moved away from it.

[ajdlinux]

My Nexus 5 was also fantastic.

And then I heard the horror stories of everyone in my office who, having had a great experience with the N5, went and bought a Pixel.

[tigershark]

My iphone 4 was pretty much as fast as the nexus 5 and way less buggy. The nexus 5 is the only phone that I almost threw against a wall, I’ll never touch android anymore after that shit show. You must have a very high tolerance to bugs and poor performance. My friend was very happy when I sold him that piece of crap, so it must be subjective.

[petre]

What did you replace it with? I also use a N5.

[saulrh]

Pixel 2 XL, since I also had to stop using a Nexus 7 at the same time and I didn't want to have to deal with not having a large screen to read on. It's been good so far. I haven't had any issues with the lack of a headphone jack, mostly because that jack was also the one part of the Nexus 5 that'd also failed so I was already on bluetooth-only. I upgraded about eight months after the release so they'd hammered out the QC issues on the screen. I see some black smears when I'm scrolling over pictures with black backgrounds on dark themes with the brightness all the way down in a dark room, but that's not something I'd call an issue. The real problem is actually the curved screen, which is sensitive to touch all the way out to the bezel a millimeter or two around the side of the phone, so I get a few misclicks a month when my palm hits the side of the screen while I'm trying to type. I get about two days of battery out of it despite heavy use while I'm on the subway to and from work. It does not feel a sturdy as my Nexus 5, and the screen is not as nice to read on as the Nexus 7 was; the aspect ratio is far too tall. It's definitely better than my old Droid Incredible, though I still miss the physical keyboard. I don't know if it'll be as good as the Nexus 5. It's so far only a sixth as old.

[ssheth]

OnePlus phones (originally replaced N5 with a OnePlus 3 .. now upgraded to 6T) .. they have the same "flagship killer" ethos of the original N5

[tfigment]

Same here. On 5T. My only issue was lack of security updates in the end. I could try to flash with another distro but too much work with too little gain. Love my 5T even more.

[lozaning]

It's now possible to reassign the bixby button to something else without rooting the phone.

[sfifs]

Oh interesting. How do you do that? I don't see anything obvious in the settings area.

[lozaning]

You've gotta make sure that all your native samsung apps are up to date and then you should see the setting: https://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/how-to-remap-the-bixby-...

Rooting will still give you the most functionality, but Samsung has finally at least partially relented.

[sfifs]

Ah thanks! Wasn't seeing this option

[lsiebert]

Tasker can assign the Bixby button as of the newest update that just dropped. Also double clicking power and volume up and down long presses (though I had to use adb to enable the volume on my phone, none of this requires root).

I hadn't messed with tasker in a long time but that got me back.

[wtvanhest]

I have been a samsung buyer for at least 6 years and 4 phone models. The bixby button is an absolute deal breaker for me. I dont know what i will do, but it wont be a samsung with bixby

[ddalex]

I assigned the Bixby button to WhatsApp in settings, no root needed

[guelo]

I got an S10 because of the headphone jack and sd card slot. I uninstalled or disabled any software I didn't need pretty easily. I find it to be a fantastic phone.

[maxerickson]

Those things are available on cheaper phones that don't come with so many ads.

(for example, the Moto G7. Of course, lots of people have Lenovo concerns)

[King-Aaron]

Except cheaper phones tend to be worse consumer products.

[esalman]

> I don't understand why folks subject themselves to this for $1000 when other options are available.

After my "flagship" HTC10 became unusable within 2 years because of battery issues, I was in the market for a new phone. But I was determined to not spend over $250. I ended up with Nokia 6.1. The only issue with it is that it is just a little slow because it uses snapdragon 435 (I think). However for the same reason it's battery lasts up to 2 days. Other stand-out features are unibody metal design, and Android One (meaning no bloatware). I bought it for only $180 from Best Buy after price match, and sold the HTC for $60 at decluttr.com. I think this is one of the best value purchase I ever made- up there with a Toyota Corolla.

[voltagex_]

If I wanted the best camera in a phone on the market, my choices were the Note 9 (before the Pixel 3, I think) or one of the iPhones. I have enough invested in the Google/Android ecosystem that moving would be painful, plus I'm not a fan of Apple.

[sizzle]

Do Google pixel phones offer an unadulterated, bloatware free Android experience?

[gilrain]

As long as you don’t consider bundled Google apps bloatware, yes.

[nextos]

You can always build your own AOSP (which is essentially Android minus Google). In case of Pixels, this is particularly easy. I use a Pixel to avoid Google, which is a bit paradoxical.

[flukus]

And as long as you don't consider google a spyware company, which they are.

[frankhorrigan]

Yes, that was always the draw of the Nexus and Pixel lines. "Vanilla Android." Really hope that's still the case, though I've switched back to iPhone for a number of reasons.

[sizzle]

I used to buy Nexus phones and jailbreak them for SU root privileges so I could deny apps (mostly by google) from using permissions without my consent on app launch.

With that being said, I'll be switching to an iPhone for privacy reasons, starting with my next phone and I've been a loyal Android user since Google started with the G1. How times have changed...

[rhizome]

You can use LineageOS for a zero-GOOG experience from first run without uninstalling anything.

[robocat]

FYI I have a Nokia 7+ and it is fairly good for giving a pure Google experience ("Android One"), without being quite so expensive.

Also HMD Global seem to be reliable at giving the security updates OTA.

I haven't looked at the newer Nokia 7.1.

[kingosticks]

I'm not sure I'd go with a Nokia after https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/03/hmd-admits-the-nokia...

[robocat]

Sure, awful, but HMD Global fixed the problem which I respect.

My other choices are Google (expensive, multiple Nexus letdowns in past), Samsung/LG (awful software), Chinese phones (crapware, I don't trust), Sony (abusive relationship), a bunch of other brands with other reasons I dislike, or iPhone (costly and I don't like the UI).

[kingosticks]

True. And i totally agree with your roundup of the main alternatives. I went for a Chinese phone last time and it's probably the best one I've had in terms of quality and features. But Lord knows what stuff I'm sending back to China. I've been meaning to try lineage out.

[fletchowns]

It was bad enough with the fucking Bixby button that can't be disabled on my Samsung S8 Active. Hearing about the S10 solidifies that my next phone will absolutely not be a Samsung. Which is a shame since the hardware is otherwise great.

[weq]

Bixby remapper has worked of me since i bought my S8

[fletchowns]

I'm not interested in giving some random app a bunch of permissions.

[j16sdiz]

In S10, you can check bixby to double click. No extra app install needed.

[dethac]

These criticisms exist because Samsung does not offer first-party solutions to things such as malware detection, location sharing, storage management, caller ID, VPN, music streaming, and news aggregation. It's unclear how exactly these services are being used (Samsung should be more clear on this front) and what parts of it are integrated (Samsung should be more clear here as well).

But, well, put it this way. If Google or Apple had offered first-party solutions to each of those services, would they be criticized for offering bloatware as well? No, probably not. So, is the issue here that the services aren't first-party (Spotify) or that they aren't from traditionally trustworthy sources (McAfee)? If it's the former, why does it matter? If it's the latter, then Samsung should be more clear about the extent of the influence of the other company, which they are not, but that shouldn't necessarily exclude them from collaborating.

Now, there are some key issues that should be criticized. Hard. A persistent notification? It's unforgivable. Facebook? The amount of tracking they can do makes them a threat to the device. It's basically spyware. It can be disabled, sure, but it shouldn't be enabled in the first place (except to enable Gear VR, I guess).

But really, can you trust any major tech company, considering programs like PRISM exist and are in operation? What differentiates Google from Apple when the device is still able to transmit whatever it wants to whoever it wants however it wants? Apple or Google may or may not be tracking some piece of data, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it isn't being collected and tracked by someone. That the companies themselves don't happen to store the data that happens to be the very thing they make their money protecting and using? It's definitely better in that your data isn't being used for the company's profit, but is it really any better for privacy from, say, the government?

[wtracy]

> If Google or Apple had offered first-party solutions to each of those services, would they be criticized for offering bloatware as well?

The tech community seems to assume that software from Apple and Google will be well-thought-out and useful, and will be easy to dismiss if the user doesn't want it. The community seems to assume the opposite of anything from any other hardware company.

Honestly, those assumptions seem correct about 80% of the time.

[DoofusOfDeath]

Thanks for the warning. My Galaxy Note 4 is getting long in the tooth, and I've been considering moving to a new[ish] Galaxy. Now I'm not.

[LeoPanthera]

That's astounding

ly bad