Google says it’ll support Pixel 8 series with seven years of Android updates
www.theverge.com
Two seven-year smartphones.

Now this is nice. Hopefully 3rd party manufacturers can also provide a longer life span for the device.

  • MadisEnglish
    10•1 year ago

    How does it differ from buying a laptop at this point? The price is the same, the capabilities are similar, the form factor can be the same (Fold or tablets in general).

    As long as the hardware can keep up with the software, and the manufacturer keeps building products, why should they ever end support? (a la Windows)

    • 👁️👄👁️English
      2•1 year ago

      I don’t really know all the differences but phone OS upgrades need firmware updates as well, which will delay a lot of OS releases and cause old hardware to no longer have security support. I don’t think the OS layer is completely separate like it is with desktop computers.

      • MadisEnglish
        2•1 year ago

        I can understand that part, but not why providing such update timeline would be “excessive” or “crazy”, if there are ways to achieve it.

    • @[email protected]English
      1•1 year ago

      Laptop manufacturers do end support. The OS manufacturer isn’t the one who typically controls what hardware vendors will support. In this case Google is both so people tend to conflate the two, but there are plenty of laptops that are no longer supported by the manufacturer.

      Computers tend to have user serviceable parts and to be much more tinker able, so it easier to not notice that dell isn’t supporting your laptop, you’re doing it yourself.

      Lenovo didn’t update your laptop from windows 8 to Windows 11, you did. If the drivers went funky, you figured out how to fix them.

      You can likewise side load your own OS onto the phone long after manufacturer support has ended.