My primary mobile, my Nexus 6P finally bit it for good this time. Endless reboot and I am on my backup phone that is kind of a turd, the Pixel and I need another phone I don’t hate. I really want to get the PinePhone but can I use my banking applications? Is there enough of an Android compatibility layer to get me by there on any flavor of OS for it?
I am interested in any thoughts on this.
Most of my family and friends are in Signal and (regrettably) WhatsApp. I couldn’t realistically consider the PinePhone until at least Signal works on it.
After replacing the battery about a year ago my Nexus 6P is still going well with a custom ROM. I would love to replace it with the PinePhone running (my favorite) Manjaro, however I’m afraid I’d have to wait for a version that ships with a descent, 12 MP or more, camera.
That is unfortunate.
I think that developing for ARM in linux is a job which deserves a lot of money as a wage, as it’s much more challenging than the AMD64 world (and this isn’t to say that developers in the AMD64 linux world don’t deserve handsome salaries).
Yesterday evening I ordered my PinePhone UBports edition and I am really excited because of that. Just after that I deleted two of my google accounts; still keep one open, don’t really know what for, nothing really is there ;p
I hope to get my PinePhone some time in June, until then I will use my venerable S7. I will try to switch off to PP completely. No WhatsApp? Tough, I bet my wife and some family members will be pissed off. I use PayPal and banking apps on my S7 but they are not essential to me; I actually prefer to use a web browser for all banking activities. I suppose not having access to parking apps could be a major pain, but I will try to manage without them.
I just cannot wait for all the fun I am going to have with choosing the OS of my choice and messing with it on PP. I also keep fingers crossed for Pine64 to develop later this year a dedicated keyboard for PP.
Even if I have not got the PP yet I consider $150 I paid for it to be well spent. Pine64 is doing just amazing work and they just deserve my gratitude 
I ordered my PinePhone UBports this week. I will be letting you all know how this goes for me. I’m pretty excited. I am not in “need” of it but I do need it. I don’t have anyone I know on WhatsApp, nearly everyone is either on Telegram or Facebook Messenger (pbpbpbpb). So, as long as I can do that, my messaging requirements are good to go.
I am absolutely looking forward to this new frontier in mobile experience!
I am also looking forward not to rely on any Google or Apple account to run MY OWN phone. I look forward not to have any Facebook-owned messenger (I don’t have Facebook account, BTW). Instead, I can start advocating among my friends for Signal or Telegram
Anyway I consider all messenger apps to be a nuisance. The more contacts I have there, the more rubbish I receive. Seriously, how many times can you get the picture of the cutest dog in the world o the most globular tits in the universe? 
What you need are more cat memes, that makes all the messaging platforms WORTH it.
I totally agree. I want to have my phone that isn’t reliant on any services. I think I am going to have some pains doing so but so long as I have my core applications, I think I will be tip top. I will have to get my Nextcloud service up and running before it gets here as well.
I bet we are going to have lot of fun trying different software and discussing it Lets keep fingers crossed we will get our PinePhones some time in early June.
It certainly looks interesting.