I bought a Nexus 7 Tablet 2 years ago. It runs Android. Google kept pushing updates to it to make it better and more secure, going through versions like Kitkat and Lollipop and maybe Marshmallow as well, I don't know, and I don't really care. What I care about was how it suddenly slowed down. Like totally slowed down; it would take a full minute for an email to open after I tapped the notification. It would take so long for apps to switch out that Android would ask me if Android should shut them down. It became unusable.
I found the tools to flash (which means replace) new Operating Systems on it, like older versions of Android, and other ones based on Google's work. It requires things called unlocking, reflashing bootloaders, flashing onto SD cards, booting into recovery mode.
I tried clean and fresh Android, pure stock version. Stayed unusable. I finally got Cyanogen on it, version 12 to be exact, as the latest version, 13, was unusable in the same way as stock. Version 12 seems to work, and I have my tablet back to do some Twitter and Facebook and watch a video.
I am not a hacker or maker of any kind, really, I just know my way around google and a Terminal and flashing tools. I used my experience I had built up getting a degree in Software Engineering and being a coder for a living for a decade. And all I could think was, here's a product that I paid good money for, and within three years it was unusable. Because of the manufacturer. Who what, didn't care? Didn't notice?
Yes I fixed it, but how are average consumers supposed to?
