Furilabs FLX1
Posted by Aberts10@reddit | linux | View on Reddit | 94 comments
Posted by Aberts10@reddit | linux | View on Reddit | 94 comments
TheRealDarkjake@reddit
Whats the 120hz like?
Whats the android container support like?
Is the touch accuracy good on the thing?
Are you able to reflash if you bugger it up?
How is QT and desktop application support, do they function?
Call and speaker quality? Is it stereo?
What is GPS accuracy like?
Sorry for the mountain of questions, you are the one of few results when researching this phone lol
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
This phone isn't ready YET to hand to grandma and say "Use this!". But I think it's quickly heading in that direction. The amount of progress the dev team has made on it in the past month and a half has been an incredible journey. I bought this not knowing if the phone would work or not, as I had never heard of Furilabs... But I took the chance and ordered one on July 19, 2024.
When I first got it, I found out that the phone didn't work at all in the USA. It would display a 2G or 2.75G symbol, but wouldn't make calls or browse the web, as it didn't have support for US cellular bands, only Europe and the rest of the world. I offered to give SSH access to my device to one of the developers, and have been letting him test modem builds on my device with a Ting MVNO Sim. At first it seemed kind of unbelievable that it would work and I'll be honest, I also wasn't confident in the developers to get it working. I'm glad I did though, because as of today the latest modem build the developer has put on the device has allowed me to place and receive calls, and browse the web on 4G LTE. 5G doesn't work yet, and only band 4 of 4G LTE is enabled currently on the test build I'm running, but I can use the phone now!
I will continue to offer my device to run test builds, and I'm excited to see the progress. The phone's software is extremely liberating compared to android. It's fast, it runs a familiar debian-based Linux environment, and it already has some really unique features I have been wanting in a phone! For example, there is a button on the left side of the phone that you can program from within the settings to run shell scripts, take screenshots, open the camera or take pictures, and toggle the flashlight. This is the first Linux phone I've had with such a feature, and I think it's a fantastic addition.
With my thoughts on the camera, it takes great quality pictures, and even records video! It might sound odd I am counting recording video as a feature, but other Linux phones like the PinePhone and Librem 5 do not support video recording with the camera, unless you use hacky scripts. Aside from that it's fully water resistant, has a removable microSD slot, dual sim capability (at least in hardware, as currently that's not enabled in software), a LED indicator for notifications, a fully working fingerprint sensor (as in you can enroll each finger on your hand and use it to login to the phone - at least after you login once from a cold boot with your pin or password), full disk encryption, Android app support with Waydroid (but amped up as it supports the phone's sensors and GPS and runs android apps as if they're native apps), and volume toggle in the accesibility settings menu that lets you set the speaker volume to 150%.
You might be wondering why you wouldn't just buy a PinePhone, Librem 5, or a phone that can run Ubuntu Touch instead of this device. My answer to that is that the FLX1 while yes, it does use Halium, has far better support than a typical Ubuntu Touch or Droidian capable device. The developers involved with the project have been involved with the Droidian project, and are the one of very people who did a lot of the work to get good Waydroid integration on those systems originally. With the FLX1 they're amping it up even more, with further improvements, fixes, and features that other devices haven't seen and probably won't. A big one for me being VoLTE and VoNR support, something even the mature Ubuntu Touch project still doesn't have publicly available. To my knowledge, this is the first Linux phone that has 5G fully working, and notably 4G VoLTE working globally with hopefully soon to follow global 5G VoNR support. As I've said, the US band support for the rest of the 4G range and 5G is still something that they're working on, and I hope to soon report progress on that front. Very exciting!
There's tons of additional settings to dive into, such as USB settings for MTP, USB state, CD-ROM settings, a NFC support toggle, GPS SUPL server setting you can set to a custom server URL, a printer setting panel for adding and managing printers, and a slew of accesibility and privacy/security settings such as controlling screen lock, location access, file history, camera access, and more. Some of those things have already existed in phosh, but a number of them have been enabled or modified, offering things you don't usually get on mobile Linux. A quick note on the Waydroid settings, it has a full panel for controlling starting/stopping of android apps, clearing app data, as well as controlling NFC access to Waydroid and enabling a shared folder. It also gives you the IP of the Android container and gives you information on the Android version running in the container. The developers have mentioned to me that they have big plans to rework phosh to be a bit cleaner, add more fine grained controls and settings, and add features such as RCS support for messaging and context-aware text suggestions in the phosh keyboard.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
With that said, the new features like RCS likely won't arrive for a bit as they have the cellular stuff to sort, as well as some bug fixes and other features they want to polish first. The device does have some bugs in Firefox and with video acceleration in video players such as MPV, and I've personally noticed that compass bearing in Waydroid is currently bugged although GPS itself does work otherwise. That alongside the fact that 4G LTE band support is currently limited to Band 4 in the USA means that I realize this phone isn't currently for everyone, but I think it's important to note that the developers are incredibly active on telegram and respond immediately to problems you might have. There has only been one device so far, to the best of my knowledge, that was defective from the manufacturer they use, but Furilabs was quick to replace it and apologize to the person for the inconvience. I believe they even overnighted it to him before taking a look at the device to see what hardware had failed.
The device has a fantastic custom recovery system. You can SSH in to copy files or try to fix a software issue, and it has a factory reset system to easily roll back to the original software, or you could even reflash the phone completely using a computer. Another big thing to note is that the developers also are on a roll at releasing bug fixes and offering workarounds for issues. Infact, they're currently testing a new software release in their beta-tester telegram channel with a couple of volunteers to see if there's any bugs that may have slipped through before release. Currently they aim to release a new update every month, and they release the full changelog on their website for everyone to see. When I asked about automated testing, one of the developers mentioned they would like to get to implementing that when they get a chance.
I highly recommend you take a look at the changelogs, web forum, and telegram as there's tons of awesome information available. Not just to mention the fact that the phone is open source, with source code avaialable on github for everything except the modem and some of the recovery I believe (Which has intulectual property bits that mediatek wouldn't be happy to have public). It's not perfect right now, but nothing is perfect, let's be real! What it is however, is incredibly promising. I've never had more hope in a Linux phone than this one. I've gotten up at 6AM some days to excitedly work with the developer to test out new modem firmware because it's been a steady march of improvements each day, and that's just the modem! I am highly confident within the next month, maybe two, that this device is something I will be able to give to my mother to use.
User_8395@reddit
Is the cellular icon clipping into the camera cutout?
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Nope. The firmware I am running currently only has LTE band 4, and further there is a bug with the cellular indicator not displaying the proper signal indicators all of the time. It should be fixed quickly. Next release I believe they will have a fix for the indicators, and perhaps by then the 4G LTE bands, and even 5G. I have previously tested 5G and it worked well, but there's a few issues to resolve before the developer will be enabling it on my modem firmware for me to use.
User_8395@reddit
I see. I would buy it if cellular worked in the US and I could install Plasma Mobile on it.
PureTryOut@reddit
Plasma Mobile doesn't support Halium, so you can't. You need a proper mainline phone for that.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
There are 3rd party patches that bring back halium support.
PureTryOut@reddit
Yes but the upstream support was dropped for a reason. It's a hack, that's just a fact.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Fair enough. I just think hacks to get stuff working is better than obsolete hardware with incomplete drivers.
PureTryOut@reddit
Plasma Mobile doesn't support Halium, so you can't. You need a proper mainline phone for that.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Well there are patches for kwin that would enable it to work on the device, but the issue is that Plasma Mobile is pretty buggy, and they don't intend to support any other UIs since they have their hands full with just this one. With that said, one of the developers has already told me he intends to shortly do a full UI run-through and polish up the experience that phosh can offer. Including things like improving the notification drawer, and adding lift-to-wake alongside tape-to-wake.
However, there's technically nothing stopping you from uninstalling phosh and installing Plasma Mobile yourself, it'd just be a lot of work and probably not be a great experience.
User_8395@reddit
Well this seems more promising than the PinePhone...
Speaking of, how is the performance? Is FuriOS also based on Ubuntu Phosh or Debian Phosh?
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Very good. It's as fast as my Pixel 6a (running CalyxOS) is, but smoother in a lot of cases. The camera is pretty good as well to my eye. I can take some pictures and post them. For me the only show stopper is some bugs that they aim to fix by next week and already have a fix for a majority in the latest staging build, although I have no tried it since I'm running a modem firmware that isn't published yet for testing it.
User_8395@reddit
Alright. I might buy it and have it connected to my main phone's hotspot. What distro is it based on?
Slight_Manufacturer6@reddit
Android and iOS aren't ready yet to hand to most Grandma's to just use... except the young grandmas.
Most 80+ year olds still prefer the old flip phones.
PureTryOut@reddit
This is a new Linux phone but focuses purely on Halium. In my opinion that's a mistake (it means several software options are not available like Plasma Mobile and GNOME Mobile and is full of hacks) that's not highlighted enough by people praising this thing.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Well, its either this or you don't have a Linux phone right now. The only real options, where you can buy modern and up to date hardware, are with Halium-based Linux mobile projects like UBT and Droidian.
The Oneplus 6T on mainline is old, you can only buy used off eBay, and it still doesn't have everything working like the cameras or calls.
Adventurous-Test-246@reddit
I use a pinephone and have since early 2022, you absolutly can have a proper mainline linux phone without halium; what you cannot have YET is one with modern hardware.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
The PinePhone for me is far to slow and underpowered to do what I need. It barely loads web pages.
Adventurous-Test-246@reddit
it can load a web page just fine if you use a decent non firefox browser like GNOME web or brave. For some reason firefox SUCKS on this device and maybe just linux on ARM in general.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Well, with more powerful hardware on the FLX1 and Oneplus 6T Firefox on PMOS and FuriOS works extremely smoothly and doesn't touch much system resources other than RAM. That in conjunction with the PinePhone being slow to run Waydroid and barely able to run games and such means that it's not for me. It also won't get RCS support, 5G (and VoNR), nor have working video recording in the camera app... Not to mention this device is water resistant up to full submersion in a few feet of water, has a much better quality camera, has working NFC, has working wireless charging, and a side button that can be bound to actions such as taking pictures and toggling the flashlight.
Mind you, I have a PinePhone, and I think it's a great device for what it's goal was: Make a development platform for mobile Linux... It's 100% achieved that goal and led to a smooth platform that other devices can take advantage of. But I do not see it as something that is realistically daily drivable, not just due to bugs you have to workaround, but also because the hardware is vastly inferior to modern hardware, or even hardware of a few years ago like the Oneplus with PMOS.
Adventurous-Test-246@reddit
I largely agree, I just hope the FLX1 gets proper mainline support within 2ish years. I know a phone will take about that long to get decent mainline support no matter how it is launched so the halium approach at least gives users a working device in the meantime while the devs work their magic.
What is the reason the pinephone cannot have RCS? It already has VoLTE assuming that is similar to VoNR.
There is a separate video recording app for the pinephone but i agree it being in megapixels would be nice.
Farshief@reddit
I know it will likely be years before Linux phones are stable enough to be polished daily drivers but I will celebrate on that day
Adventurous-Test-246@reddit
I have been daily driving a pinephone since early 2022 and I have some sort of crash only once or twice a year that is bad enough to need chroot style surgery.
Farshief@reddit
Is it actually that good? In the US? From the videos and information I've found about even the pro it was not ready for daily driver.
Are you running plasma mobile on Manjaro? Any details about performance you can share I will gladly take.
Adventurous-Test-246@reddit
It is pretty stable but not perfect, for example last week I started having a an issue that currently that has me running on a backup from april but with my message history copied over.
I live in Texas and use a T-mobile based plan with no issues.
I run danctnix's Arch build with phosh. Performance sucks but all i really need is sms/mms plus calls and a browser all of which it can do fine.
The most common issue is microphone/audio not working but if I ran a more stable distro I think I would have almost no issues at all.
Everything works just none of the hardware is very good.
However i came from a flip phone and have never daily driven an android phone, windows, macOS, or IOS device so please keep that in mind as my prospective is from a different background than most. I am a second gen linux user and when my 3g flip phone was shut off the only other phone I had on hand that worked on a hardware level was a ubports edition pinephone my dad had ordered a couple years back. I basically didnt have a phone for a bit until I got it working and let me tell you it has made so much progress since then. I call it the sink or swim method for keeping spyware out of ones life. For me PHOSH is the normal smart phone experience and everyone else has something UN-intuitive and hard to use. At this point the work would be in switching to android.
Farshief@reddit
I live in Arkansas and travel to Texas regularly on TMO so that bit wouldn't be a problem. I agree it sounds like the biggest shock/difficulty for me would be how used to Android I am.
I do use Manjaro on my laptop and that's what brought Pinephone to my attention initially was hearing that they shipped with Manjaro mobile on them.
I think getting away from the Android (Google) ecosystem would be hard at first but I think I could get used to it.
The hardware difference is what I'm not sure about. I currently daily drive a OnePlus 9 (8 gb ddr5 ram with an 8 core 2.84 GHz Snapdragon) and the Pinephone Pro looks like it has 4gb ddr4 ram with a 6 core 1.5 GHz Rockchip.
While I'm not familiar with the hardware in person it just sounds like quite a drop from what I'm used too.
In fairness I suppose if the overhead on the Pinephone vs Android is similarly reduced compared to Windows vs Linux then it might not be so bad but I haven't been convinced enough to take the jump yet since I do need a somewhat stable daily driver for life and work
Adventurous-Test-246@reddit
I dont have the pro so i cant tell you how good or bad the performance is on that one but i do think the furi labs FLX1 will get mainline support eventually.
The way I see it is it took years for the pinephone to get somewhat usable and a year for the pinetab2 to get even non-mainline FOSS wifi support and it still doesnt have BT so if furi labs want to launch a phone with halium and libhybris that is fine since it doesnt prevent the normal mainlining process from taking place. What it does do is give non dev users a good mobile linux experience on a device that actually works in the meantime that all linux first phones produced to date have experienced.
LovePoison23443@reddit
Its halium... dont even need to buy it specifically for that use, there's plenty of good halium phones out there that work great lol. For me I just prefer mainline
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
But they don't have VoLTE or 5G support. Which VoLTE is important for north america now. The only exception being sailfishOS which has 4G VoLTE, but not 5G, and even if you did manage to buy a compatible sailfish device for the USA, the modem only supports two or three LTE bands, so coverage won't be great. Now with that said, at this very moment, the modem firmware build I'm testing on the FLX1 only has the main LTE band 4 activated, but other bands have been tested to work on my device, including 5G, and the hardware is capable of it, it just needs more bug fixes first before I'll be running it. They say in four days they will release the next patch and a new modem firmware will be included, so fingers crossed.
Aside from that, I'm not aware of any of those devices also being fully water resistant in full water submersion. That's a big pro for personally.
Adventurous-Test-246@reddit
the pinephone has volte
harbourwall@reddit
Sailfish has 5G support now
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
I don't believe there is a device with US cellular support though. You can get one that has like three working US bands, but if you aren't in a ideal area your reception with be demolished.
LovePoison23443@reddit
Oh I see. Im not in the US so its not that important to me
Posiris610@reddit
Hopefully they can get something solid going. I just got a Pixel 8a and I'm running Graphene on it. I hope that Linux will be ready to go by the time I'm ready to get a new phone.
cakee_ru@reddit
No it won't, sadly. Or at least not easily available. Maybe next decade! I'll celebrate that day for sure.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
I wouldn't say that. Everything is there, it's just down to polishing things up. It's not starting from scratch like mainline has to.
rileyrgham@reddit
Not a chance. Your optimism is laudable, but this will remain a hacker's delight.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
What evidence makes you say that? It's not like the PinePhone in that the drivers have to be written from the ground up. It uses Halium, like Ubuntu Touch and Sailfish do.
beanbradley@reddit
It's definitely a lot better than a Pinephone but I still don't see mobile Linux taking off anytime soon.
Slight_Manufacturer6@reddit
depends how do you define "taking off"? Most would say Desktop Linux hasn't "taken off" yet. I'm not looking for mobile Linux to take off, just be usable.
That said, I don't think we should define it as simply mobile Linux. Tablets and Laptops are mobile and Linux works great on those devices.
Morphized@reddit
Linux modem support?
rileyrgham@reddit
I'm a long in the tooth programmer and electronics has been. And I know distro hell and ill invested optimism when I see it. But I've made mistakes too. But... . Even the glowing op sounds like a horror story of desires over reality : this will never be a mainstream appeal... Way too many issues to be up and running in s month. But for sure a fun drag around for scripting and ssh fun. So long as you don't expect more than about 4 hours battery life?
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
I've had it last longer than that. I've used it with the screen on for around five hours before without issue. And it lasts a couple days in standby. It doesn't get as good 'sleep' battery life as my Pixel, but it's leaps better than a pinephone, and slightly better than my OP6T with PMOS. You do you, but I personally think this device is close to being my daily driver.
ultra_sabreman@reddit
Most people need their phones to last a full day on one charge, and with the amount of stuff done on a phone today, 4-5 hours is abysmal.
This thing sounds cool as shit, from a tinkerer perspective (and I kinda want one lol), but there's no way in hell a normal person that just uses Iphones will ever even think about this device.
You gotta realize that a normal persons workflow is -> tik tok, instagram, maybe a bit of facebook, then snapchat/signal/telegram/imessege to talk to friends, some facetime, etc.
Slight_Manufacturer6@reddit
My iPhone 12 doesn't even last all day. I charge when I sleep, at my desk and when I am in my car.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
So someone else posted that during their testing they got ten hours of battery life while running Waydroid.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
You're joking, right? I get about 5 hours of SOT on my google pixel 6a as well. Battery life with the screen on doesn't get a whole lot longer than that unless you are using a phone with a massive battery.
cakee_ru@reddit
Look at windows phone.
xmBQWugdxjaA@reddit
And Firefox OS.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
It doesn't come overnight but the software stack its using has already been developed on other mobile Linux devices. Its not doing anything new there. Chatty handles texts, and gnome-calls handles calling. Ofono and Modemmanager have been around for years and are used by UBT and Sailfish. Phosh has been tested and developed for other hardwarw such as the Oneplus 6T with PMOS. Halium, which is the compatibility layer that allows the Android kernel to run with a Linux userspace, is not new either and is also used bu UBT, Drodian, and SailfishOS. This is nothing like SailfishOS.That said, there is bugs and issues to resolve before its daily driver ready, but they are quickly improving things.
rileyrgham@reddit
Your optimism is admirable, but, I suspect, in cloud Cuckoo land. I'll happily be proved wrong.
GranPC@reddit
Working on proving you wrong. :)
genitalgore@reddit
you say "everything is there" and it just needs polishing, but in your first comment you said it couldn't even connect to cellular networks and you had to give a stranger ssh access to your phone
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
In about four days the new firmware will get released. It does work on my device, albeit with some bugs. Its a developer from the company, not a stranger. 5G is expected in four days as well, as they're fixing the issues it had.
Slight_Manufacturer6@reddit
You don't know how infrequent I get new phones... since it is 2024 now, it will probably be next decade when I get a new phone...
cakee_ru@reddit
Alrighty then :) I usually get it every 4 to 5 years.
Slight_Manufacturer6@reddit
Ext decade is only 5.5 years away so you would be pretty close.
cakee_ru@reddit
In the beginning of the next decade is very optimistic tho! I like it.
rileyrgham@reddit
Really? The stock pixel 8 SW is excellent. What does Graphene bring you for this super hardware other than hacker chops? I've been through the mill with all that, and as years went on it was a case of diminishing returns.,
Posiris610@reddit
Privacy. That's why I'm using it. A little more control over what Google services does on my phone.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Yup! GrapheneOS and Calyx are a great piece of mind.
branja6@reddit
Ngl, it looks pretty cool. Is there a chance you could make a short video of the device being used and upload it somewhere so we can watch?
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Yup! As soon as the next update comes out, and if all the core functionality of cellular is working as they're saying it should, I plan to make a detailed blog post and videos about it after using it for a day or two. I'm truly hoping this is going to be my last Linux phone... In terms of not having to keep looking for one that is. Just hoping the company follows through on their promises. Even as it stands there's some things that make it really neat to me, so at least there's that.
branja6@reddit
Cool. I'm looking forward to seeing the video and learning about the device.
thelastcubscout@reddit
I love htop, but for a phone I'd rather have btop :D
(Oh god, you don't actually need to monitor processes on the phone that way, do you???)
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Nope! Gnome minitor fits the mobile layout.
Pure-Willingness-697@reddit
I want a mobile version of the de hyprland
nicman24@reddit
i understand these companies are basically extensions of the open source community but having to pay anywhere close to 500 dollars to be a beta tester is unacceptable to most
I have already been burnt by some of them and even as an enthusiast I do not want to bother with drivers and modems anymore
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Well, I think in a matter of a month or two it will be in good shape. It really just needs some bug fixing at this point, and they've been very quick on that front. That is a fair point though.
nicman24@reddit
the worst of all that is that nothing is sure. i got like 10 ox64 sbc and running anything on them is shit. bluetooth wont work and zigbee (the reason i bought them) will never work
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
I thought the same, but they've proven themselves to me personally.
rszdev@reddit
I have Vivo Y19 Phone
How to install this on my phone and run a number of apps
And also what about when i need any android app i.e banking apps
ThjodolfHvinir@reddit
Nice 8BitDo keyboard in the background. 😄
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
I love it. OS agnostic because you can bind keys to the programmable button on the keyboard itself. Wired, wireless dongle, and Bluetooth support. And then all the cool accessories!
CarryOnRTW@reddit
Does it do video out and can it be used as a Linux computer when hooked up to a monitor/keyboard/mouse?
I travel with a Pi5 as my main PC and it's frustrating knowing that my S24U has much more powerful hardware but is way behind the Pi as a desktop experience. Dex is a start but I'd kill for a fully unleashed Linux smartphone.
faze_fazebook@reddit
I mean you can get pretty much that with DEX + Termux + Termux:X11. Its a chore to setup and get running correctly but it can be done.
Also fun fact, Samsung for a brief time had an offical "Ubuntu on Dex" beta which allowed you to run full on Ubuntu in a Container. Sadly this AFAIK only ever worked with Android 9 and my guess is that Google shut it down.
CarryOnRTW@reddit
Yep, I've gone all the way down the Dex rabbit hole without rooting and it's still not as usable as my Pi5 desktop despite being on a more powerful hardware platform.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Unfortunately, that's a no. At least *maybe* for now. They said they plan to investigate the timings of the USB-C controller chip the device uses to see if it's possible with some changes, but that it is not likely to happen.
omniuni@reddit
USB-C display out is a bit wonky. You have to license it per-port, so it adds cost to the hardware. It sounds like they have overall good hardware though.
CarryOnRTW@reddit
Oh no, that's unfortunate. I think most smartphones have video out now so I'm surprised they didn't think it was important.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
I don't think it was a case of it not being important to them, just that they didn't design the hardware themselves. They buy it from the same OEM that happens to make Gigaset and Volla's phone hardware.
CarryOnRTW@reddit
Gotcha. Makes sense.
faze_fazebook@reddit
I don't wanna hate on the people developing this but in my opinion as just a dumb user, more effort should be poured into bringing quality FOSS Desktop Apps to the already well proven and extremely polished mobile OS which is Android which has all the "basic shit" figured out instead of trying to reinvent the phone.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Because it's way easier to write GTK mobile applications and they are cross platform, running a Linux environment gives you more control and options to tweak things as well as make scripts, and also they plan to ad features that even android doesn't have currently.
20dogs@reddit
Agreed, I just don't see the point in putting so much effort into getting GNU/Linux onto phones when we already have the Android Open Source Project.
Neoptolemus-Giltbert@reddit
I have to say my main issue with this product would be that I wouldn't want to tell people I have a furry phone.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Its Fury, like a swift anger. Not furry. But yeah, I can see how that idea comes to mind.
Anngsturs@reddit
Slick
LvS@reddit
That thing apparently has a Mali G68 MC4, so the GPU drivers are either closed source or shit because the open ones are reversed-engineered - so basically same problem as nvidia?
omniuni@reddit
It sounds like the phone company is actually working with the chipset company in this case. MediaTek is actually quite good to work with as long as you're actually the manufacturer, so I'm not actually too surprised that they're able to get things working pretty well with a little patience and communication.
Aberts10@reddit (OP)
Not sure. You could check their github and see if perhaps the source code is there? I've not run into many issues with applications not running, but now that you mention that I'll try out a couple games and see what happens and post another comment saying what happens. There is issues with Firefox crashing that are being fixed in the next update, and then I did try running Alpaca 's flatpak at one point but it was killed by the OOM manager because it wanted too much RAM.
Either way I'm happy... I know because it uses Halium it's not the "perfect", nor is it a Mainline Linux phone, but I'll be happy at this point if I can get a Linux phone that runs generally most of the Linux software I throw at it, and has solid phone functionality such as alarms (which work great), calls (they sound good with the modem firmware the developer flashed to my device), fast data (It loads web pages and videos straight away, and currently my modem is only using LTE Band 4), and SMS/MMS... SMS works well, but since I'm not running their "staging" branch for testing (since I'm already testing the modem firmware) I do not have the MMS fix on my device, but it's supposedly fully working too.
Of all of the mainline Linux devices I've tried, they always fail to do the one thing you need a phone to do: Make reliable calls and texts, and have reliable alarms. I've been using my FLX for alarms for the past month to wake up, and I've not had it miss a single alarm. I can't say much about calling and texting reliability as that's still something I'm helping to test and resolve issues around, but I have high hopes since this device can rely on a stable Android kernel and firmware underneath to handle all of the phone stuff, including the cameras.
Morphized@reddit
I just checked the documentation, and apparently ACK-4.19-stable will be phased out January 1st 2025. So they'll need to migrate over to a newer version soon, which likely means adding drivers for newer kernels to the repo. Halium is already on top of it, with support for up to Android 13 if need be.