Meanwhile... no Nougat for US

[SoNic67]

As we know India got the Nougat. Brazil did too. EU finally gets it's share.
Nothing in US, except a soak announced by RepublicWireless. On the official Motorola / lenovo forums you can be banned if you talk about sideloading the Nougat on US devices. While Moto allows unlocking the bootloader by providing the unlock codes (in US they benefit from that by canceling the warranty), they frown upon what happens next. Like people will unlock the bootloader just for the pleasure of giving up the warranty, nothing more.

I was a Moto fan, me and my family owned a Moto DEFY XT (557D), MotoX (1st gen), Moto G (3rd gen), Moto E (2015) and now in use we have a Moto G4 Plus and a Moto X Pure.
Sadly, service (updates) for US is now last in line, bad interactions on their forums, no true international LTE bands support (band 20 is ommited from US phones, even if it is becoming one of the most important in EU for CA and rural).

I was planning to get the next Moto G5, but sadly I will have to move to a different company for my next phone.

 

[Tel864]

What's sad is the fact that for each of us that have purchased their last Moto, there are probably 10 people that's never owned a Moto that will buy it. The US is pretty much the backwater for Lenovo and we probably are only a small fraction of their sales.

Sent from my SM-T530NU using Tapatalk

 

[SoNic67]

At the price point that they try to sell the new Moto they needed loyal customers. The people that hunt bargains will not go for their inflated prices, not when they have likes of ZTE or Alcatel in the stores. Bad marketing strategy.

 

[pastorbob62]

At the price point that they try to sell the new Moto they needed loyal customers. The people that hunt bargains will not go for their inflated prices, not when they have likes of ZTE or Alcatel in the stores. Bad marketing strategy.

I usually get a new phone every two years. I have had my G4 for six months, so I won't make any statements about what I will or won't buy at this time since a lot can change in 18 months. But I will say that Lenova is far from being the only manufacturer to drag their feet on updates. And in reality, I really don't care that much about getting stock upgrades since I unlock and customize every device I have. The custom firmwares are usually much better choices IMHO. So when I am ready to get a new phone (or tablet), the custom ROM choices and development activity will influence me more than whether or not the manufacturer is updating in a timely manner. And introductory prices usually fall in time

 

[SoNic67]

Custom firmwares are zero without updated blobs for camera, sensors, modem... That requires manufacturer support.
However my beef is mainly that lenovo had put the US market on backburner.

 

[pastorbob62]

Custom firmwares are zero without updated blobs for camera, sensors, modem... That requires manufacturer support.

:good:
All very true. But it seems that the updated drivers for various features are made available long before stock ROM upgrades, thus custom ROM's are also available. In five years of using Android smart phones and tablets, I have never had to wait long for decent custom ROMs based on the latest version as opposed to the long delays for stock upgrades by some manufacturers. Huawei and Asus come to mind.

Anyhow, I wasn't trying to negate anyone's position about the current situation. I merely was stating my own personal opinion and what works for me. My own 2-cents worth so to speak.

 

[SoNic67]

US soak seems to be older (-13) than what is out now (-14). Probably is somehow related to the RepublicWireless preloaded app.

 

[mikerowes69]

I would like to try the US soak test. Has anyone have a URL for it? I heard their was issues but sounds like the same issues I read about Nougat. Any truth to that?

 

[Jplabti]

I'm using Nougat 14 and it's having battery drain problems, it's general (check Lenovo forums).
Maybe for that reason they didn't update the US version for now.
Anyway it's taking too much time for be an Android version similar to AOSP, other companies like Huawei have very modified versions and are updating more fast.
Maybe Nokia is going to be what Motorola was. I'm going to wait the Nokia 8 presentation for decide if I buy it or a Moto G5 Plus.

 

[Tel864]

I usually get a new phone every two years. I have had my G4 for six months, so I won't make any statements about what I will or won't buy at this time since a lot can change in 18 months. But I will say that Lenova is far from being the only manufacturer to drag their feet on updates. And in reality, I really don't care that much about getting stock upgrades since I unlock and customize every device I have. The custom firmwares are usually much better choices IMHO. So when I am ready to get a new phone (or tablet), the custom ROM choices and development activity will influence me more than whether or not the manufacturer is updating in a timely manner. And introductory prices usually fall in time

The main reason I've stuck with Moto so long is the custom firmware options. It's actually unprecedented for me to be still running a stock rom all this time.

 

[pastorbob62]

I'm using Nougat 14 and it's having battery drain problems, it's general (check Lenovo forums).
Maybe for that reason they didn't update the US version for now.
Anyway it's taking too much time for be an Android version similar to AOSP, other companies like Huawei have very modified versions and are updating more fast.
Maybe Nokia is going to be what Motorola was. I'm going to wait the Nokia 8 presentation for decide if I buy it or a Moto G5 Plus.

I ran Nougat NPJ25.93-14 for a week and didn't see any battery drain whatsoever. In fact, the battery life was slightly better than any of the custom ROMs I have tried. I would have stuck with it except I missed the advanced boot menu and being able to customize the status bar. Not to mention it still has bloat that I really don't need.