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Comment by jtreminio | Hacker News Reader

Semi-related, I've got an iPad 1st gen, and wanted to gift it to my nieces in El Salvador for school work.

So, I wiped it, hoping to give them a blank slate to install whatever they need.

I wish I hadn't - I could find absolutely nothing to install on the device from the Apple Store. Everything requires new iOS version (which is fine, of course), but I also can't install old versions of software on the iPad.

Basically, I screwed myself by wiping the device because now the default, pre-installed apps are the only apps that will ever run on this thing again.

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Since 2012 and iOS 6, the App Store will offer to install the most-recent compatible version of an app.

You can buy the most-recent version of app on your computer using iTunes (or a newer iOS device), and then download the last compatible version to your iOS 6 device.

Original iPad only had iOS 5 - so no such luck. Same applies for pre-3GS iPhones and first 3 generations of iPod Touch.

This kind of user-hostile and environmentally destructive and unsustainable planned obsolescence is exactly why you should use GPLv3 and the AGPL as your Free Software licenses. Apple and Google's current software offerings have been built on Free Software and what this is what we get in exchange.

There are plenty of reasons to criticize Google's lack of long-term support, only 2 years of OS updates for the Nexus and Pixel lines is lousy. But this is perfectly reasonable. Android 2.2 was released 7 years ago. The Nexus One and original Motorola Droid can run it; any device that can't has been obsolete for years.

I am typing this comment on a Thinkpad T43, a model that was released in 2005. It does not matter that you think 7 years ago is a long time. There is nothing "perfectly reasonable" about planned obsolescence. If a thing is still usable and someone wants to use it, preventing them from doing so is violating their freedom.

I am typing this comment on a Thinkpad T43, a model that was released in 2005.

Phones have advanced much more rapidly than computers in the last 10 years.

If a thing is still usable and someone wants to use it, preventing them from doing so is violating their freedom.

You are free to continue using your Android 2.1 devices, just not with Google's store. It is your position that no service provider should ever be allowed to drop support for any hardware that might still be functioning? Are you equally outraged at F-Droid's "planned obsolescence" in requiring 2.3? (https://f-droid.org/repository/browse/?fdfilter=f-droid&fdid...)

> Phones have advanced much more rapidly than computers in the last 10 years.

That argument is irrelevant. If you have something, it does not matter how old it is, you should be able to continue to use it.

> You are free to continue using your Android 2.1 devices

Why do you act like you do not understand anything about Android phones or have never heard of rooting, when you obviously have? You cannot install any other operating system or even many applications on most Android phones without exploiting security holes, which is illegal in many jurisdictions.

Your argument about vendor support is nonsensical in this discussion - if you did not have to depend on the vendor for basic system software upgrades, there would be no problem. You are arguing against your own position with the F-Droid example - why are people restricted from upgrading their version of Android?

Marking a "Install from unknown sources" checkbox provided by the OS is not illegal, nor is downloading properly licensed APKs. If the applications don't (legally) permit themselves to be used without being downloaded from Android Market or provide their source code, they totally have the right to do that.

> if you did not have to depend on the vendor for basic system software upgrades, there would be no problem.

Totally agreed. But your initial comment didn't point that out. It just said naively how GPLv3, AGPL, and FSF are good and all other things are evil. Please make yourself more clear next time.

> Why do you act like you do not understand anything about Android phones or have never heard of rooting, when you obviously have?

Please do not take things on a personal level like this, that section of your comment was totally unnecessary and targeted, which doesn't add any value to this thread, according to the HN's approach to comments guide[1].

[1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html

> Marking a "Install from unknown sources" checkbox provided by the OS is not illegal, nor is downloading properly licensed APKs. If the applications don't (legally) permit themselves to be used without being downloaded from Android Market or provide their source code, they totally have the right to do that.

Certain system changes, and applications that need to do these changes, are not possible without rooting. This includes things like, for example, using ext3/ext4 on external storage.

They probably aren't. Many of the older phones can be rooted and custom roms installed, but the problem is nobody is writing drivers for that hardware anymore.

Also, consider that Android universally has sideloading. Nothing stopping you from running whatever you want.

> Many of the older phones can be rooted and custom roms installed

"Rooting" is exploiting security holes, which is illegal under the DMCA in the United States and under other laws in other jurisdictions. The only reason that is even possible is accidental. The phones are deliberately locked down.

> the problem is nobody is writing drivers for that hardware anymore.

If the Linux kernel had been re-licensed under GPLv3, the source code for the drivers would be available and the drivers would still work. There are a ton of Free Software drivers in Linux and NetBSD/OpenBSD written in the 1990s that have had minimal modifications in the meantime and still run.

Are you sure? IIRC when I played with my old iPhone 3Gs (older than iPad) earlier this year, I could still install the old versions of apps, even if the new ones required higher iOS versions.

I kinda have to question the value of giving someone a 7 year old device with a $50 market value that can't run any modern apps. Why not just send her $50 to buy a new Android tablet that probably runs whatever she needs?

I tried most of Google's offerings, iPad refused to install them.

> I kinda have to question the value of giving someone a 7 year old device

The device is perfectly usable. The battery life is still great on it, the screen is unscratched, it runs school-related apps just fine (or, did). What am I supposed to do with the thing now? Just junk it?

edit: I ended up giving them an Android tablet. I still have this iPad, and would love to at least give it to an organization that can hand it off to someone in need. Something inside me absolutely balks at the idea of throwing away a perfectly usable, modern device just because the parent company turns a blind eye to it.

Well, you could just jailbreak it, find the compatible version of all apps that you need and sideload them. If you bought them previously, I don't see any moral issues with this.

It's 5 years old which is when a lot of corporate computers end up in the junk heap even if they are still running.

Why are you comparing a personal tablet to a corporate computer? Consumer needs and expectations are vastly different from those of businesses.

Not really, there's big refurbished computers market, where this stuff ends up.

Once downloaded in your account you can still access them.

If you install an app on a newer device while using the same account sometimes the older download becomes available for the older device as well.

This worked really well for an iPhone 4 stuck on iOS 8 or 7 somebody gave my stepdaughter.

Can you restore from an old backup? (iTunes by default preserves at least the most recent backup when you sync; in fact, I don't know how to stop it from keeping at least one.)

There's a trick to downloading older versions of apps still in the App Store: https://medium.com/@iosight/how-to-legally-download-any-prev...

I was able to get this working recently* to get an older version of Pandora installed on an original iPhone.

Problem with this method is you're guessing at version numbers to find a version that will work, but it's neat when it does!

*The article says certificate pinning breaks this, but there's a comment about how to add Charles Proxy's certificate to your trust store which seems to circumvent this.

To anyone who has this problem, there's the option to download older versions but you have to be logged in to the appstore using an apple id that was used to download that version previously.

This same sickness affects old iPhones too.

Can you jailbreak it?

Probably, but what does that gain you? It's still an old OS, and most software that a user would want is still going to be unavailable.

a 1st gen iPad .. I'd just buy and gift them a $329 iPad (2017) which is an INSANE deal for what you get, arguably the best value per dollar of any Apple device, ever.

I bought them a modern Android tablet ... and I'm still stuck holding an iPad that can't do much of anything.

I have the opposite problem: I have a 1st gen iPad that still has all the old apps we used on it, but it sat on a shelf for a year and now the battery won't charge. I've tried all the little tricks scattered across the 'net and nothing. I can get the screen to power up to the "Connect to iTunes" logo, but it won't charge in that mode and won't boot the OS off the charger alone.

I'd love to get it running, as you said it's still a very capable device and if nothing else would be a good digital newspaper for the bedside. Unfortunately, I think it's toast and I'm going to have to send it to the recycler.

They still sell Android tablets? Who buys them?

Also it's more than a little weird to expect a V1 product in its genre, from 2010, to still be useful 7 years later. I think your expectations are all messed up here.

Hint: An iPad is an unaffordable luxury to most people.

Not when it is being given as a gift

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