Refurbished Samsung Android Phones Sans Google Now Available

How in the long term will this be any different from Google?<p>Reading the features of &#x2F;e&#x2F;, it recommends the use of a an @e.email account (like Google and their recommendation of a gmail account), &#x2F;e&#x2F; runs their own cloud service for your files (like Google), and pre-installs apps of their choosing (like Google). I&#x27;m struggling to see the difference.<p>What I want is an open OS on my phone, with the ability to <i>properly</i> remove any pre-installed apps, and to choose all my own apps from my own sources. And to be able to auto-backup my files to my own private cloud. That&#x27;s the only way I&#x27;ll feel properly in control of my own phone.

I seriously wish they went with Motorola. Almost all phones are officially unlockable. They are also available at reasonable price (€100-200 - Moto G4 to newer ones). Sorry US hn readers, we Europeans do not (may be rarely have) have locked&#x2F;carrier controlled phones.

No, not &quot;now available&quot;. <i>This is NOT a pre sale: you’ll go through a 0€ checkout process (you won’t be asked for any payment details). This is the best way for us to plan for volumes by market, and to keep you informed when products are available.</i><p>I have a Caterpillar-branded phone which has never run much Google software. I bought it new, and when it ran the startup program asking for a Google account, I answered &quot;Later&quot;. Then I deleted the startup app, installed F-Droid, and deleted almost all Google stuff, although not Google Play Services. That breaks too much. Other than Google Play Services, you can turn almost everything Google off without side effects. Then install replacements from F-Droid&#x27;s open source store.<p>That&#x27;s the big headache - Google Play Services. Does &#x2F;e&#x2F; have a good replacement for them?

This is well appreciated. I was recently shocked&#x2F;surprised, after running a netstat, at the number of open network sockets. Even worse, stopping all apps with netguard, still lets &#x27;system&#x27; open a connection to GOOG&#x27;s servers! This is absolutely horrifying; I wonder what kind of data big brother Google has on me and billions like me.

With device-independent ROMs and unlockable bootloaders, this is quite easy to do in a large set of recent phones. See [1] for a detailed list.<p>There are some model-specific glitches, though. Some manufacturers haven&#x27;t implemented Treble HAL properly.<p>So, for the time being, I prefer running pure AOSP on a Pixel. Paradoxically, the best way to use Android but avoid Google is buying a Google phone.<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;phhusson&#x2F;treble_experimentations&#x2F;wiki" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;phhusson&#x2F;treble_experimentations&#x2F;wiki</a>

One can also buy refurbished smartphones with Replicant:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;tehnoetic.com&#x2F;mobile-devices" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;tehnoetic.com&#x2F;mobile-devices</a>

Sorry if I&#x27;m just being stupid, but aren&#x27;t there other alternatives to &#x2F;e&#x2F; already available?

it&#x27;s not clear to me but where is &#x2F;e&#x2F; based? is it American or Chinese (or even Russia) based? how would that be different from Google, honest question, why should I trust it?