Although smartphones have gotten larger and larger, tablets have mostly been pretty consistent with display sizes ranging from 7-inches to 10-inches measured diagonally. The bezel-less trend hasn’t caught on with tablets (as it doesn’t really make much sense for them), though more devices have shifted to 4:3 displays to match the iPad. In late 2015, the Samsung Galaxy View was released with a massive 18.4″ 1080p display to buck the trend. It was an experiment that the company hasn’t attempted since. Official software releases have long since ceased for the device, but now work has started on bringing Android 8.1 Oreo-based LineageOS 15.1 to the device.
Top: Samsung Galaxy View. Bottom left to right: Samsung Galaxy Tab S 8.4, iPad Pro 12.2, Samsung Galaxy S3, Jelly Pro
The device was launched with Android 5.1 Lollipop and has not even received a single major software upgrade. The last official release is dated March 7th, 2017 with a build date of October 11th, 2016. Fans of the massive media consumption tablet have yearned for a software update for some time. The only custom ROM available for the device for the longest time was Android Marshmallow-based CyanogenMod 13 created by XDA Recognized Contributor deadman96385. deadman96385 has announced that he recently started working on bringing LineageOS 15.1 to the Samsung Galaxy View, and he has published his first unofficial build for the device.
Since this is just a preliminary release for testing, there are a few major bugs. First of all, the light sensor doesn’t work so there’s no adaptive brightness. You can use an app like Underburn if you really want automatic brightness control, though. Next, since the build doesn’t pass SafetyNet you’ll have to sideload Netflix as it won’t show up in the Play Store. Finally, the camera doesn’t work so you can’t use the device to do video calls just yet. There are also a few minor bugs, but we recommend you give the linked thread a thorough read to learn more (also because you should read any development thread regardless before you flash any custom software onto your device.)
Download unofficial LineageOS 15.1 for the Samsung Galaxy View