Oreo as Daily Driver: What Do You Think?

[PGHammer]

A growing number of Neowinians are apparently running Android Oreo in some form as a daily-driver - at least enough to have opinions.  I'll be posting mine to lick off the thread, but why should I alone let my opinion out?

 

Android Version: 8.0.0 (beta)

AOSP: No

If non-AOSP, what overlay is used: Samsung Experience (9.0 beta)(AT&T Mobility-branded)

Device: Samsung S7 (Snapdragon)(Verizon Wireless-branded)

Carrier: Tracfone/T-Mobile

 

As you can see from above, I'm a rather odd quacker - phone is from one carrier, firmware is from another, yet the phone itself is on carrier's three (Tracfone, the largest MVNO in the US) and four (Tracfone uses both the Verizon Wireless and T-Mobile wireless networks; Tracfone also operates the Universal Lifeline Safelink Wireless brand, which uses mostly T-Mobile's network).  Still, this rather odd combo works, and works rather well - so much for purity.  I'm actually into my secoind week, and I'm not looking to leave it, and have no plans to until T-Mobile forces the issue by rolling out a non-beta version of this firmware itself.

 

In other words, it's a darn solid daily driver (in fact, the most solid daily-driver I've had on this phone); which says a lot that isn't exactly good about TouchWiz 7 + Nougat (the default for both phone and carrier).

[techbeck]

Been using Oreo for months now.  No issues to report.  Works great.

[PGHammer]

I have actually expected that, techbeck - remember, the AOSP crowd have had Oreo the longest - and especially compared to those of us running Samsung hardware on US-based carriers; what has surprised me is that nobnody other than you in the AOSP group has picked up the mic and reported in.

[PGHammer]

Follow up: I have replaced the beta with the released version of Darth Cookie (AT&T Oreo firmware).  Still on the T-Mobile/Tracfone mambo combo (so no change in carrier), yet it STILL works without issues.  It uses marginally more juice than N, but is also more stable than N, so the tradeoff is worth it.  (Even better, not a single app broke due to compatibility issues; however, quite a few apps got upgrades to take proper advantage of Oreo features (and not just from Google).

[shockz]

Works fine here, really hating the UI direction they're going though, my dialer also got updated with material v2 and it's entirely too white. Miss the blue. Even incoming calls are all white and black text now.

 

Outside of that though it's been rock solid, have been on it since the public betas and even then it was fine.

[Steven P. Administrators]

Samsung Galaxy S8 here. It's great spending top dollar on a phone that is incapable of keeping smart unlock active for more than the first half day /s It was the same with Nougat in the S8 and S6edge+ too.

 

Chrome really lags and is super slow to open sometimes, I wanted to look up a recipe from my bookmarks while I was at the supermarket earlier (was also on the Wifi) and was presented by a super slow animation of the browser starting (white blank tile) I ended up killing all apps in the task manager, after which, it opened fine.

 

So, Oreo isn't much better than Nougat was on this phone.

[tsupersonic]

1 minute ago, Steven P. said:

Samsung Galaxy S8 here. It's great spending top dollar on a phone that is incapable of keeping smart unlock active for more than the first half day /s It was the same with Nougat in the S8 and S6edge+ too.

 

Chrome really lags and is super slow to open sometimes, I wanted to look up a recipe from my bookmarks while I was at the supermarket earlier (was also on the Wifi) and was presented by a super slow animation of the browser starting (white blank tile) I ended up killing all apps in the task manager, after which is opened fine.

 

 So, Oreo isn't much better than Nougat was on this phone.

I have an S8+, which has been on Oreo for a while now. Since I got the S8+, I haven't used Chrome because it's just a slow browser. Try Samsung Internet, it's so much faster, has ad-block extensions (wink wink, I shouldn't say this to you as a site admin.), and integrates with Samsung Pass (store website credentials and allows you to authenticate via fingerprint / iris scan). It's the one app I'm glad Samsung made available to other Android phones via Play Store. 

 

To OP - no issues on Oreo on S8+. It's been very stable (just as Nougat was). 

[Rudi10]

I'm using Huawei p10, with Nougat works fine, but after Oreo update, Google Calendar, Gmail, and some apps are deprived of sound notifications options. That is a common problem for Pixel and One+ phones also. I didn't see any other big changes.

I can only wait Pie to hit me.

[PGHammer]

ADDENDUM/FOLLOWUP: I replaced Darth Cookie with the proper (T-Mobile/Tracfone) version of SE9/Oreo - first the original April version, then the current June release.  Chrome is the default; however, for most browser duties, I replaced Chrome with Firefox Focus (security reasons; Focus cleans up after itself - which Chrome does not do).  I have - amusingly - found Focus to actually be faster than Chrome as well - which is rather odd.  I am hoping that SE10 (whihc will likely be Pie-based) does not signal the end for the S7 - as SE9 didn't (but was rumored to).  I have found SE9 a welcome change from TouchWiz.

[PGHammer]

On 8/24/2018 at 2:22 PM, tsupersonic said:

I have an S8+, which has been on Oreo for a while now. Since I got the S8+, I haven't used Chrome because it's just a slow browser. Try Samsung Internet, it's so much faster, has ad-block extensions (wink wink, I shouldn't say this to you as a site admin.), and integrates with Samsung Pass (store website credentials and allows you to authenticate via fingerprint / iris scan). It's the one app I'm glad Samsung made available to other Android phones via Play Store. 

 

To OP - no issues on Oreo on S8+. It's been very stable (just as Nougat was). 

Agreed there on the stability front - if anything, it is MORE stable - not less - than TouchWiz/Nougat - which was the S7's default.  (That is, in fact, the part I found rather odd - especially since SE9 was supposedly NOT designed with the S7 in mind; there was a ton of rumormongering that had Samsung killing off the S7 - and especially the Snapdragon versions - in favor of going all-Exnyos with the S8.  I would not have minded all-Exnyos for the S8 and later - it certainly would have made things more uniform; however, the S7 alone is proving that the old Snapdragon still has teeth and flames a-plenty.)