so I found a Samsung Galaxy Tab S6 Lite Wifi, one of the few tablets that have official LOS support. the specs aren’t too bad either, 10" 2000x1200 screen, 4/64GB, 7000 mAh battery (remains to be seen in what condition); for $120 with some shitty cover/stand and dubious charger, one hell of a deal. only problem is, it can’t be reset or it’ll lock itself.

thought on passing, but the dude assures me it’s not stolen as he has a bunch of these, so most likely scenario is some corporate client dumped these and upgraded to newest and best without unenrolling them from this knox bullshit. either that or there’s a crew ripping exclusively gta4xlwifis all over Germany.

although I can endure Samsung’s OneUI for basic shit, I happen to know a little bit about Android, bootloaders and stuff and I’m fairly confident I can wipe this crap and install LOS without issues. what is the saying, a little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing? so let’s start.

first off, LOS instructions say you gotta have the latest firmware on the device. this one’s on Android 11, so launch software update. update, reboot, hold breath - will it lock itself, annnd… booted just fine, we’re done!

except, no we’re not. inspecting software properties shows it’s on A12 and the update process is already downloading another package. current LOS ROM is 20/A13, so we need A13 and latest patches, looks like it’s gonna take a while.

well we’re finally done. all in all, FIVE different upgrades, one after another, and then each does some “optimising” shit, took hours. dios mio, you couldn’t just ship a cumulative update, it had to be piecemeal?

anyhoo, tried each of the versions for a couple of minutes - sluggish, stuttering, occasional single-digit fps animations, boatloads of G and S services running in the background, each one is sending you Super Important Notifications All The Time, can’t wait to be rid of this crap.

alright, A13 and latest patches in the house. now comes the step I’m dreading - according to LOS instructions, I have to boot in download (proprietary fastboot) mode where I should unlock bootloader and thus erase user data. this equates to doing a factory reset which, according to the seller, should lock the device. although I’ve tried to educate myself on what this knox business actually is, I’ve come up short (chip busts a fuse when tripped, what?!?) so in lieu of succinct info I guess I’m learning by first-hand experience.

so, power off, disconnect USB cable. press both volume keys and connect the USB cable. one disgusting turquoise screen appears, instructing you to press vol up once for download mode or to longpress vol up for device unlock; not what LOS instructions say.

so press volume up for a couple of seconds and the screen asks for confirmation you really wanna unlock it, calls you a bad person and an even worse user but it acknowledges your intention. reboot and… it stays for eons on the samsung loading screen. I’m fucked, right?

eventually, the system boots up, says it’s knox locked and wants access to the wifi. it connects and the onboarding process begins. I’ve tapped “Skip” everywhere I was allowed and eventually the desktop appears! we’re off to settings, re-enable developer mode, USB debugging and check the unlock bootloader switch is on. then we have to turn off this bixby whatever-the-fuck-this-is popping up when we wanna shut the tablet down.

alright, tablet is off, disconnect cable. press both vol keys and connect the USB cable. ugly screen appears. this time, press vol up once and we’re in download mode. heimdall detect and… not detected. wtf. different USB port? that works, flash successful! edit: turns out, you have to disconnect the USB cable after ugly screen appears and then reconnect it after launching download mode.

now to rebooting. as this tortured soul found out, LOS instructions are kinda off, so what’s needed is keep the tablet connected to your PC the whole time, press vol down and power until the screen turns black, let go for a split second and immediately press and hold power and vol up and don’t let go until you see the LOS recovery. you mess up any of these steps, a) you won’t get into recovery and b) your recovery will get overwritten by the stock recovery and you have to start over with heimdall.

so, finally in the recovery, we select factory reset and then adb sideload. first comes the LOS zip. when it’s done, select adb sideload again and send magisk (you have to rename .apk to .zip before you do). done, reboot. here we go…

and it works! no knox nothing, no google, no samsung crap, I have a beautiful, fast, thin device, bereft of any bloatware. without dicking around with animation scales, the UI is infinitely faster and more responsive.

now getting f-droid and installing essentials.

have to research these questions:

1. the annoying nag screens while booting (you’re a bad person for unlocking it, press power if you agree, etc.) can’t be removed?
2. does LOS support the pen? I haven’t got it, but might consider getting one if it works.

thanks for reading!