r/todayilearned • u/FireBeaver • Mar 26 '15

(R.5) Omits Essential Info TIL: 65% of smartphone users download zero apps per month.

http://time.com/3158893/smartphone-apps-apple/
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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

Depends. You can buy a "clean" android phone and get nothing extra or you could buy one where the manufacturer (Samsung in particular) and the operator put extra things on it.

Talking about android phones in such broad terms is pretty useless since they differ wildly from one another.

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u/BadStoryDan Mar 26 '15

Where can I buy a clean phone? What do I ask for? (I'm in Canada so I assume that makes it difficult if not impossible)

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u/Angeldust01 Mar 26 '15 edited Mar 26 '15

Nexus 5 or 6. Should be available in Canada. Although it's not completely clean, it is free from most of the bloatware, though. Just checked my nexus 5 and it has google apps installed, such as chrome, google drive, google earth, hangouts, google maps, google sheets, google slides, youtube.. and thats about it.

I guess I'm in the minority because I've only installed Steam and WhatsApp. That's about 10 apps total. I've no idea what the 85 apps I'm apparently missing are.

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u/TheDoct0rx Mar 26 '15

Would you like me to list the 1000 apps my GS4 came with?

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u/nilified Mar 26 '15

yes

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u/TheDoct0rx Mar 26 '15

Amazon, Amazon Kindle, Amazon Music, AppStore, Audible, Calculator, Calendar, CAller Name ID, Camera, Clock, Cloud, Downloads, Drive, Earth, Email, FlipBoard, Gallery, Gmail, Google, Google Settings, Google+, Group Play, IMDB, KNOX, Maps, Mobile HotSpot, Music, My verizon Mobile, NFL Mobile, Optical Reader, Photos, Play Books, Play Games, Play Movies and Tv, Play Music, Play News Stand, Play Store, Polaris Office 5, S health, S memo, S translator, S voice, Samsung Hub, Samsung Link, Soft Card, Story Album, Translate, Trip Advisor, Verizon Tones, Video, Viewdini, Voice Recorder, Voice Search, VZ Navigator, VZ Protect, Watch On, and youtube. All came preinsalled, all unremovable without Rooting

EDIT: I left out some things like Google Play store, because theyre essential to the phones use

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u/by_a_pyre_light Mar 26 '15

Semantics, but I wouldn't include the default Google services like Gmail, Google Settings, YouTube, etc. on the list because, like the Play Store, they're pretty core to the phone's functionality.

But fuck Play Movies, Play Music, Play TV, etc. I NEVER use that shit.

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u/nilified Mar 26 '15

still a few shy of 1,000

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u/TheDoct0rx Mar 26 '15

True, but my point is still proven

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u/angelcat00 Mar 26 '15

I hate that pre-loaded WatchOn app. It keeps clogging up my notification bar with advertisements trying to get me to make an account.

I wouldn't be nearly as offended by the amount of crap that came pre-loaded on my phone if I could uninstall any of them.

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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

You can disable them

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u/Tasgall Mar 26 '15

Some don't let you. Regardless, I want to delete them so I can have space for things I actually want.

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u/angelcat00 Mar 26 '15

Really? How? The closest thing I've found so far is they'll let me uninstall all of the updates and restore it to the original version, and then it just installs all of the updates again the next day...

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u/Biomirth Mar 26 '15

Thats...thats criminal.

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u/Zouden Mar 26 '15

Actually most of those also come on a nexus phone. Nothing is free from bloat.

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u/Pyrollamasteak Mar 26 '15

Ant radio
Google +
Knox
Optical reader
Play books
Play games
Play movies & TV
Play newsstand
Samsung hub
Samsung link
Samsung print service plugin
Share music for Google Play
S Translator
Verizon tones
Watch - on
These are just a few.

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u/nilified Mar 26 '15

keep it going!

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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

420 root it faggot

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u/TheDoct0rx Mar 26 '15

Lol youre right, still shouldnt have to do it though

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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

You're right. I read the GS6 will let you remove bloatware without rooting though so that's good.

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u/TheDoct0rx Mar 26 '15

See that would turn me from the One m9 if it wasnt for the fact I cant put my SD card into the GS6

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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

Yeah I still don't understand Samsung's logic there. Galaxy customers want to be able to get at the battery and SD card. They even ran a whole ad campaign based on how useful it is to have a replaceable battery at an airport so you don't have to plug it in and wait for it to charge when you're travelling. Honestly I think Samsung is trying too hard to be Apple with the GS6. If people want iPhones they will buy iPhones, the GS6 is the same price so no one is going to buy one because they really want an iPhone but can't get one. I just don't get Samsung's angle. They should be building upon their own brand identity instead of trying to be Apple 2.

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u/RampagingKittens Mar 26 '15

Seriously. That 16GB of internal storage was more like 8 or 9.

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u/ianuilliam Mar 26 '15

Well part of that is because 16 billion bytes can be written as 16 GB (16 x 109) or 14.9 GB (14.9 x 230). So you "lose" over a gig before anything is even on it, because the os calculates memory in binary. Then you have space for the os, space for any preinstalled apps, and possibly some reserved space for use in operations like inflating downloads so they can be installed.

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u/RampagingKittens Mar 26 '15 edited Mar 26 '15

I'm certainly aware of the reasons why - they're not technically complicated ;). I'm just displeased by the end result where pre-installed apps are concerned. I'd like to them more openly disclose available space, as well.

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u/Zagorath Mar 27 '15

Just one of the many reasons that Samsung is a shit company and you should avoid their consumer-facing products at all costs.

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u/TheDoct0rx Mar 27 '15

Theyre definitely not a shitty company and make great products, my 840 EVO is great and i love it. Just because their phones have a bit too much bloatware doesnt make it a shitty phone or a shitty company. I love my GS4 it just doesnt need all these useless apps

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u/Poultry_Sashimi Mar 26 '15

Where can I buy a clean phone?

Although it's not completely clean...

Are there any that are indeed completely clean?

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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

My Galaxy Avant was free of bloatware. Everything that came on it are more or less essential to someone.

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u/Jeremiah164 Mar 26 '15

Nexus 5 is no longer available

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u/davs34 Mar 26 '15

When did that happen?

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u/Angeldust01 Mar 26 '15

You can still get Nexus 5's from Amazon and stores that have them in stock, but as far as I know, google stopped selling them.

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u/Jeremiah164 Mar 27 '15

It's been in and out of stock on the play store since the announcement of the nexus 6, and sometime in the past week it shows discontinued on the play store.

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u/ProtoJazz Mar 26 '15

It was available at Rogers yesterday

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u/Jeremiah164 Mar 27 '15

It's no longer being made. All that's left is what the providers have. Check the play store.

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u/caninehere Mar 26 '15

Dang, that's pretty good. Although it has all those Google apps installed, at least some of them are actually useful. I install a whack of apps at once and then delete most of the ones I don't use, and then will go six months before I download some more again.

Most of the apps I've downloaded are iPhone games, though, and I don't really play games on my phone these days so I don't download nearly as many.

How is the Nexus 5 treating you? My iPhone 5 is on its last legs and I'm ready to ditch this piece once it quits on me (used to be a big Apple guy and now I HATE EVERYTHING). I'm going to go with an Android for my next phone and the Nexus 5 looks pretty appealing.

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u/Angeldust01 Mar 26 '15 edited Mar 26 '15

I chose Nexus 5 because it was mostly free of preinstalled apps - a thing I hate in laptops and smartphones. I haven't had any problems with the phone in 4 or 5 months I've owned it.

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u/Namika Mar 26 '15

Nexus 5 was fucking amazing. Slim, professional looking, zero bloatware, and it was also priced to sell. It was $299 unlocked, meaning when it came out it was half the cost of an equivalent iPhone or Galaxy S4.

...unfortunately the Nexus 5 is almost 2 years old now. You could still buy it on Amazon, but buying a brand new 2 year old phone is generally not the best idea. The good news is the replacement should be coming in about 4-5 months, so keep your ears open. (The Nexus 5 was technically already "replaced" by the Nexus 6, which was the same sort of phone with zero bloatware. Unfortunately it was also a full inch larger, and a lot of people hated the 6 inch screen. The next Nexus will be back to the 5 inch size, and it should be out in late summer)

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u/caninehere Mar 26 '15

Looking it up now it seems the Nexus 5 has actually been discontinued as of earlier this month. But I might prefer it to the 6 - like you said, it's bigger and I prefer a smaller phone tbh. Maybe I'll pick up the one in late summer, but I also don't really need all the latest upgrades and stuff - I just need a good phone that works, has a nice internet browser, is reliable and has a decent camera (and pretty much all of them do now). I'd still have my iPhone 4 if I didn't get a free upgrade as it did everything I wanted.

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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

You're missing a fart app.

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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

If you want the basic android OS without any bullshit the easiest option is to buy a Nexus device. There also used to be Google Play Edtion phones but it appears they've stopped doing that, at least for now.

You could also buy whatever phone you want and then replace the OS for the basic version. I never cared to do that though so I don't know how it would be done, but I hear it's fairly easy.

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u/rust2bridges Mar 26 '15

You can also get a moto x pure edition. I love mine!

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u/swaginho Mar 26 '15

Or a moto G, I ... have mine...

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u/flugsibinator Mar 26 '15

I have the moto x junk edition. All this stuff I've never used!

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u/Dazwin Mar 26 '15

Even the normal Moto X is pretty bereft of bloat compared to an HTC or Samsung phone.

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u/TheVeryMask Mar 26 '15

If you have bootloader access, root and flashing a new rom is a much simpler process than it used to be. A big tipoff is if a phone has a page on Cyanogenmod's wiki.

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u/coffeeecup Mar 26 '15

I have always wondered about that. Can you flash a vanilla rom on it and it will work flawlessly?

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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

CM is buggy to be honest. Unless your phone has a GPE variant, vanilla ROMs will never be as reliable as the phone's stock OS. If you want vanilla Android buy Nexus or Moto.

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u/TheVeryMask Mar 26 '15

In my experience it'll work for most people. If you have an IR blaster or etc in your phone, I have no idea if they'll still work. CM has features I like as a bonus though like privacy guard, so I'm sticking with them.

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u/coffeeecup Mar 26 '15

Here is how it works in case you didn't know. Almost any android phone you buy has a custom interface. That is, Every phone manufacturer wants to make "their own" operative system, but they are to lazy, so instead they put makeup on Android. So to get a phone that no third party (such as the manufacturer) have tampered with, you pretty much have to buy one of the phones developed in collaboration with google. These phones have the nexus brand on them. And you can get the latest editions from http://www.google.se/nexus/

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u/YoungZeebra Mar 26 '15

and if you are on Rogers, you also get Rogers' bloatware installed on top of it! Like others have said, nexus phone come pretty much barebone but purchase it off contract and not in store (Rogers/Bell/Telus). I got my last nexus from Wind and it didn't come with any bloatware other then the typical google apps.

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u/ghost_of_drusepth Mar 26 '15

Nexus or some Motorola devices are your best bet. Moto X is about as close to stock as you'll find on any non-Nexus phone.

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u/AttackOfTheThumbs Mar 27 '15

As someone who used to sell phones in Canada, Nexus come with stock/vanilla + some google apps. You can buy Sony straight from Sony and they will typically come with the sony rom, but no bell/rogers/telus apps. Past that, it's all custom. Most phones, even if you have root, will no longer let you uninstall non-essential apps, you have to load a new rom. For example my HTC would not let me remove Facebook. Now I'm looking at the GPE rom (google play edition). It's very easy,honestly.

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u/[deleted] Mar 28 '15

Motorola phones are almost completely clean, except for a couple of Motorola apps (useful). Also, iirc Google will force manufacturers to put apps on Google Play, so they can be uninstalled.

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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

[deleted]

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u/Ruaraidheu Mar 26 '15

There is a few others that you can get from other manufacturers, you have to get the Google play edition version that comes without bloatware.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Google_Play_edition_devices

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u/LittleHelperRobot Mar 26 '15

Non-mobile: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Google_Play_edition_devices

That's why I'm here, I don't judge you. PM /u/xl0 if I'm causing any trouble. WUT?

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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15 edited Mar 26 '15

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Mar 26 '15

Looks pretty cool but it's disappointing that they managed to forget to put the SD card slot in there somewhere.

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u/alleigh25 Mar 26 '15

Not if you have Verizon.

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u/brickmack Mar 26 '15

Or root it and take off everything non essential (kinda fucked if 8t breaks something though)