Re:Setting up phones is a nightmare
by dismalaf on Sunday March 01, 2026 @11:45AM
(#47208298)
95% of what was written in this article isn't required to set up an Android phone. You can literally log into your Google account on first boot and everything is done for you, automatically.
[ Parent
| on HN ]
The point is that you have to turn off preferences and uninstall apps that come with the phone. (Samsung apps and OneDrive are mentioned.)
So you don’t have to do this, but if you don’t, you are under even more surveillance and experience more advertising.
Re:Setting up phones is a nightmare
by GuestFAUniverse on Sunday March 01, 2026 @04:07PM
(#47210656)
At least Samsung doesn't sync folders.
Meaning: if they were organized before by topic they aren't there after syncing via their "Samsung Smart Switch Mobile" to a new Samsung phone.
A lot gets synced, but it's not like an image with full DSC (desired state configuration) afterwards.
Pretty mediocre -- not totally useless, but far from a seamless experience.
Maybe Samsung has changed how the first boot works compared to stock Android, but this definitely has not been my experience across several Samsung devices. Also many apps store their data in different ways which doesn't always survive a device migration/backup. Only cloud-only apps have a good experience, wheras anything that stores data on device can be hit and miss depending on how easy individual apps manage its backup.