https://www.blueunlimited.com/product/hot-pepper-poblano-vle5/
This is a $9 phone with severely limited hardware. Even if you could root it, it wouldn't run any better

 

1GB RAM, I didn't even know that could run the latest Android version, Pie 9.0. Must be painfully slow. And only 8GB internal storage with Pie, that doesn't leave a lot. As for custom ROMs and rooting, no chance. China phone, from an unknown manufacturer.

 

holy crap man.....talk about a blast from the past. i just started to hang out here more about a few months ago. must have missed this thread. glad to see you alive and and still kicking.......LOL

always check out xda to see of your phone is rooted or not. they are usually the source of all things root. not always. like we have actual developers who now hangout here then over there which is great for AF. but in general xda is where you want to go. for me before i buy any device i always check to see if the phone is generating excitement from the devs or not.

like i always say no dev support=no fun.

 

This phone is actually much better than people are making it sound.

As you have discovered, most of the bloatware can be removed.

You have installed a 64MB SD card.
This phone is made for a maximum of a 32GB card.

As it could work anyway, I must inquire if you purchased the card online for cheap or payed full price for it at a brick and morter store.

I ask, because you say the card is class 10, yet it is slow.

There is the possibility that it is a fake 64GB, class 10, or both.

Anyway, the best things you can do for that phone is to eliminate as much bloatware and Google junk apps and spyware as possible.

Even the clock app has spyware in it!

Then get F-Droid on it, and install some good, small, plain, efficient apps.

I suggest apps from Simple Mobile Tools.
Be sure to include the Thank You app, as this will coordinate the collection of apps from there.

I suggest:

File Manager
Gallery
Clock
Notes
Camera
Calender
Calculator

All of these are better than the stock options, and so you can disable those.

I have diabled all unneeded Google apps, such as Photos, Files, Talk To Text, Assistant, Play Music, Play Movies And TV, G-Board, Google, Duo, Chrome, Maps, YouTube, and others.

Also think about a new launcher.
The stock one is rather bad.

KISS Launcher, also on F-Droid, is awesome, small, simple, and very efficient.

Hacker's Keyboard is a great keyboard, also on F-Droid.

For a browser, try FOSS.

Remember that many things such as Maps and YouTube are accessible through a browser, so you do not need apps for them.

Now, even though this device only has 8GB internal memory, it is a GO OS.
A typical 8GB phone system will use about 4GB just for the system, while the GO on this one uses around 2½GB.

So there is more room than you think for your useage.

Another thing you want to do is keep running apps to a minimum, as this will increase battery life between charges.

For this I use Greenify.
Do not Greenify Clock, Calender, or the like because they may be off when you need an alarm.

Telegram is an amazing addition to this phone, and F-Droid has a nice FOSS version.

For those times when you absolutely have to get an app from Google, you might try a site or app called UpToDown.
They have many Google apps, and also offer the option of installing previous versions.
This can become very useful if an update 'breaks' an app, or if you just don't like a new version.

F-Droid also allows the installation of previous versions of apps.

I have a Hot Pepper, among other devices, and have found that it actually holds it own pretty well.

I actually do more with mine than most folks I know that have $500-$1000 phones.

So don't get discouraged, get creative in finding efficient apps that make it run well.

It actually is a pretty sweet phone for the money.

 

With root and/or a custom recovery img.built for this phone alone! (ON TOP) of even a LOS ROM not to mention a custom OC' Kernel. I mean OFCOURSE it not only could but WOULD be elevated with these perms. Any phone with root is highly modifiable in that way. Allowing high level modifications equaling Custom tweaks and performance and battery enhancements. Issue is popularity of device/s and accomplished devs or those so inclined to be willing to jump on board this unpopular overlooked uninterested or ownef by anybody who could and/or would do the work.

 

!!!!!!!!!!

 

I have not seen my Poblano do this.
That being said, don't give up yet.

Take the battery out again, only this time hold the power button and one or both volume buttons at the same time after you have removed the battery.

This should drain the capacitors inside the phone that can hold a charge for a while after a battery is removed.

Hold the buttons for at least 30 seconds.

After that, let the phone sit.
Go get some coffee or something.

Then come back in and replace the battery, and plug the phone into the charger, then the charger into the wall.

Wait a few moments, and see what happens.

Mine will act like it is starting up, showing the color explosion and the hot pepper, etc., and then go dark.
After a few more moments, a large battery emblem appears in the middle of the screen showing the state of charge.

The LED indicator is red if any charge level is below 100%, and green if it is 100%.

Wait for this battery thing to disappear and for the screen to go dark.

Was there a good charge?
If not, wait a while.

If there was 60% or more, then press and hold the power button until the phone vibrates a bit and the screen activates.

Hopefully your phone will boot up normally.

If not, then you are probably stuck in recovery mode or something like that.

As familiar as I may be with these things, that is something that I only found by accident, and I considered myself lucky to find my way back out of it, hahaha.

But hopefully the steps above solve this for you, if not then we can try something else.

 

On F-Droid, there are a few apps by the same dev that may be useful to you, and one outstanding browser you are sure to like.

There are 2 similar apps that allow you to store bookmarks and open them in a convenient way:

WebApps
Web Media Share

WebApps allows you to stay logged into sites that you frequent, while sandboxing each one from the others.
Each individual 'WebApp' will open a separate tab in your recent apps.
Each individual site you store also can be limited by the user (you) as to what 3rd party links can be allowed.
This is great to hamper tracking and ads.

Web Media Share is similar to WebApps, except the individual sites do not open up separate tabs in recent apps and there is no sandboxing as far as I know.
Although a bit less secure, this is a nice app for those sites that do not function well with WebApps.

G-Apps is the third one by this dev, and works for Google related sites.
I didn't have much luck with this one, just as I don't with any official Google related crap.

The browser that I prefer is Lightning.
Once you go through all the settings (Default homepage and search engine is Google, so change that first!), you will have a secure, ultrafast browser with unlimited tabs and bookmarks.
It is a great default browser, and even has a built in ad blocker that is customizable.

 

i had a hot pepper that i bought for $500 (300rmb) and could not root it. another thing is, there seem to be limited numbers of roms for lesser known phones like hot pepper. i would like to also say that rooting chinese phones are possible. i rooted one with king root, and another one through twrp. i have not tried it on any of the more recent android phones. now if you dont want to pay alot for phones, you can look into these brands, nuu, coolpad, and zte. you didnt mention which carrier you use, but the cheapest one is $5 via hello mobile. because of how cheap they are, theyre phones sold out in a month. if you are using one of the at&t based carriers, then you can choose from alot of cheap phones from xiaomi, oppo, or vivo

 

I don't think that we are talking about the same 'Hot Pepper' phone.

The one being discussed here is one that is often provided for free with the government free cellular program that is available in the USA.

The phone, according to the supplier, is manufactured by ZTE.
ZTE does not list this device as one of their own, so I am assuming that it is a special purchase.

 

My Hotpepper Poblano's camera doesn't work at all.. it's slow and possibly has some kind of hacker watching what I do. How do I find that out?

 

Factory reset the phone

 

I have

 

how do you know you have been hacked?

 

First things first.
Without knowing you or your situation, I can say with relative confidence that your phone is not hacked.

I am lazy, and on my Poblano right now, so I didn't go over all (or any) of the apps that I may (or may not) have suggested.

Did I mention an app called Pandroid?
It is a Device Administrator app that controls the camera.

This app gives you a quicksettings tile that allows you to activate and deaçivate the app, which allows the camera to work or not.

This is intended to keep apps from using your camera without your knowledge/permission.
The caviat is that as far as I know, this is only effective against user installed apps- meaning that a factory or carrier installed app might still be able to aquire unknown access to the camera.

All this extra info aside, did you happen to install Pandroid or a similar app?

If so, this will prevent the camera from working (at least for you, lol).

I have it and use it all the time.

Let me see if I can make a short video for you to compare with your experience.

I keep getting a 'security error' when I try to upload it here, so here is a link.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bcpFhqiHz926MCMUIRFGK6Z4tjTdJCke/view?usp=drivesdk

 

I'm getting a Poblano also.
Thankful to hear bloatware is removable! I'll be making as many changes as possible so thanks for the tips. Much appreciated!!

 

It is a a sweet little device, for the price (lol).

I recently discovered a new keyboard for it that works very, very well on it.

https://f-droid.org/en/packages/dev.patrickgold.florisboard/