SeaJASUS is apparently killing the ability to root present and future Zenfones
Stefen AurisWell there goes any compelling reason to buy their phones lol
I was genuinely thinking about going with an ASUS phone next because of the unlockable bootloader, this really sucks to see.
There are plenty of makers doing unlockable bootloaders. Honestly, just avoid Samsung.
kindenoughMy EU S9+ (Exynos chip) is running a custom Android 13 rom without flaws. A lot of Samsung phones can be unlocked. Seems US models (Snapdragon) are the ones that can't be unlocked, few exceptions. Most other countries have the Exynos models and are perfectly unlockable.
DopamineDeficienti think this might be related to samsung knox and its efuse, once set not really being able to be undone and that stuff
Same here. Well they lost a potential costumer.
Tony BarkI remember owning their Transformer tablet back when Honeycomb first launched.
KingYeah no reasons besides only tiny stuff like being only flagship under 6", better speakers than samsung, better cooling and less throttling than samsung, headphone jack, near stock android. More like there are no compelling reasons to root anymore, enjoy your 1k samsung throttling tho
z2k_2 years of updates means you’ll quickly end up with a phone that’s waiting to be hacked
They offer 4 years of security updates, what are you on about? It’s even better than sony
XLRVWell it’s better but it’s still not enough imo.
People shouldn’t be left behind on security just because they don’t have the latest phone, 4 years isn’t long at all.
Now phones are powerful enough to last years, and could last even longer with replaceable batteries. This artificial limitation is anti-customer.
So yeah at least there should be an way to root and install custom ROMs, they may not want to support phones longer officially but they shouldn’t limit the user if they want to do it themselves.
DAE 10 years of support for 800€ ?
They don’t have to support it 10 years, but they shouldn’t prevent people to keep their phones updated themselves with custom ROMs.
Ah the peak of security, third party custom roms. Accept your hobby isnt popular and move on, grown ups like their banking apps working
Yeah, you can use Open source roms.
Why being against freedom? Allowing ROMs and root won’t affect you if you don’t want to use them.
No need to be unpleasant too.
Unpleasant lol top thread comment starts with fuck off, the whole thread is unpleasant. Btw open source means nothing if u cant read the code, hoping others will check it for you is not what we call security. So the venn diagram of those programmers who are also willing to read the code with the number of adults willing to not use banking apps leaves us with >1% people who can responsibly root. If you complain for 0 expect an “unpleasant” reality check
BlackEcoThis is such an anti-consumer move, by refusing to unlock the bootloader Asus hinders the ability of users to extend their devices’ life beyond Asus’s original support window by flashing alternative ROMs…
OldFartPhilI’d like to see right to repair laws expanded to right to unlock. I think you could make a reasonable argument that a working device that’s not receiving security updates is just as broken as a device that’s experienced a hardware failure.
As much as I agree, I don’t think our legislators are knowledgable enough to be able to handle the issue, and majority of the users don’t care enough to push for something like this. This isn’t like USB-C vs Lightning where users are sick of buying cables and chargers, so the issue is much more visible.
That’s sad to hear. I’m an iPhone guy but I bought a Zenfone a few years ago when I wanted a cheap VR headset. It scratched the itch at the time and it was the best bang for my buck with the best features and yet still being unlocked from a carrier.
But with all that is going on at ASUS, I’m surprised they would make an unpopular move like this. Their motherboards are frying CPUs and their supposed Steam Deck killer didn’t do much of anything to kill competition. Wtf is going on at ASUS HQ?!
Lol still the motherboard circlejerk when they fixed it in a week, if you like walled gardens just say so, u dont know any person irl rooting their phone
I feel eventually every company would the same.
I think it more likely we’ll get to the point where getting a key to unlock the bootloader requires some kind of bullshit businesses license. Kind of like how Windows is increasingly walling options off from everyone except Enterprise users.
Or the end result of this eSIM shit comes to pass: unlocking the bootloader breaks the SIM and/or carrier refuse to let it on the network.
But do carriers really have a horse in this race? SIMs are separately secured so all they care about is having as many in use as possible. Whatever game of cat and mouse manufacturers choose to play with the users is their business.
Yeah, carriers want as many user as they can on their network. So no valid reason to block a user if they root their phone.
I dropped OnePlus for this reason last year, after having 5 models from the 1, with the 8T being the last
Got any recommendations? I’ve been with them for 3 phones starting on 2 and I’m thinking on replacing my 6. I was already looking at other companies but not sure who would be good.
oneplus 11 is going to get lineages soon
its actually in beta rn
WhiskeyomegaMy biggest problem with unlocking the bootloader is that many apps look for an unlocked bootloader as "Its rooted" like my bank
WanderIf you root via magisk, go to settings and configure the deny list. Selected apps won’t be able to tell that you’re rooted.
mzesumziraI always root my phones and I found that installing those app on a cloning environment, like island, usually has them working fine
You usually need to go one step further and install Magisk so you can control what apps “see” about the phone.
Are they going to increase their abysmal security update support time?
Do consumer friendly phones exist at this point?
Chemical WonkaPixel phones are the few ones that you can unlock the bootloader and lock again.
ahornsirupSony allows unlocking the bootloader on a lot of their devices. Except two new US-specific models, according to their site.
joel_feilafairphone is fully repairable and rootable
If I ever come across anyone in the wild who actually has one I’ll be sure to warn them not to root their phone.
redcalciumThe end of an era. Companies also locked the bootloader back then and you’ll need to find a vulnerability to exploit in order to unlock it. When custom roms starting to become popular, companies relaxed their stance and allowing their customers to unlock the bootloader using an official channel instead of utilizing a security exploits, perhaps as a competitive advantage so power users would recommend them to their friends and family. Now with declining popularity of rooting and custom roms, companies are starting to stop allowing their customers to unlock the bootloader again. From their perspective, allowing bootloader unlocking is nothing but trouble (support-wise) and might even cannibalize sales (why upgrade your phone every two years when you can a custom ROM with the latest version of Android), so declining popularity of custom ROMs is a perfect excuse for them to stop allowing bootloader unlocking.
It should be illegal to restrict what people can do with their own goddamn motherfucking private property.
Uriel238 [all pronouns]I suspect we’ll eventually need to create a standard much like th PC Clone, in which hardware, OS and software are independently produced and support compatibility standards.
Not in the current clime of unregulate capitalism, though.
I’m afraid the PC ecosystem is one-of-a-kind, and perhaps once it’s gone, we’ll never have anything like it again. Companies are obsessed with vertical integration now, owning everything from software to peripherals and accessories. The closest thing we have to PC ecosystem where multiple independent companies works to support a single platform is perhaps the raspberry pi ecosystem, but even then it’s pale in comparison to the PC ecosystem in term of variety and number of manufacturers.
1984You will own nothing and be happy.
Yeah, that’s the dystopia we’re headed towards already arriving at, except I’m not fucking happy.
Once digital media got away with “actually we are just letting you borrow it and can take it away whenever we want”, hardware manufacturers have been drooling to do the same. Apple and game console manufacturers are most of the way there already.
Well it sure is a good thing they are making everything smart nowadays….
But seriously I can’t believe how fast the car industry locked previously free features behind a subscription
I agree with the sentiment, but even the claim that they were free is part of their narrative. Their cost was included in the price of the car, everyone paid for it already. They are double-dipping.
ASUS is apparently killing the posibility of me being a potential customer of their smartphones.
Rooting users are only a small percentage of all users so they probably won’t even notice unfortunately.
sent from rooted phone
People who just want a vanilla experience likely all buy Samsung.
Doesn’t matter if I ever want to root my phone or not.
It’s mine.
ASUS annihilated the possibility I’d ever buy any ASUS product after the way they handled the 7800X3D/AM5 VoC issue. I had never really noticed, but a pretty big swathe of my tech came from them (laptop, monitor, and motherboard among others) but no more.
It’s a big company. Lots of people in lots of departments doing lots of different things. Do you swear off Samsung memory or flash because of their practices around their TV’s or refrigerators?
If the refrigerant on my fridge leaked and they refused to fix it, I’d sure swear off their ACs too, yeah.
Asus is really going down the drain…
Locked bootloader and only 2 years of upgrades? Is not like Zenfones are cheap either. Hard pass!
Herr WolandAnd there I was seriously considering getting one. Greed is ruining good things again.
Again? I didn’t realize the ride had stopped for a bit.
.
I don’t understand how this move is even supposed to make them more money.
My guess is they’re going to slow down the device on new android and block rooting so you can’t install your own OS, also, probably doing a lot of spying on the users.