For lovers of the green robot, the world of modding is something fantastic, it allows us to give new life to old devices, improve performance, completely change the user interface by adding various features, and much more. Today we are talking about the Amazon Fire TV Stick, a dongle for streaming that reigns supreme among devices of this type.
However, due to the Android fork installed by the manufacturer, Fire OS, not everyone could be completely comfortable with the device, perhaps wanting to. modify some aspects; this is where modding comes to your rescue thanks to the XDA developer forum.
A version of LineageOS 18.1 is available for the Amazon Fire TV Stick
If you own a third-generation Fire TV Stick (codenamed “sheldonp”), or its Lite version (“sheldon”), and you are not satisfied with the software experience with which the device is sold, from today you have the possibility to install a ROM based on Android TV 11, LineageOS 18.1. The senior member of the forum, k4yOz, managed to find a way to unlock the bootloader of the device (which Amazon does not allow to do normally) without having to disassemble it, the only requirements are to have a version of Fire OS earlier than 7.2.7.3 and to use Linux as host system; the developer was also able to compile a special version of TWRP (one of the most popular and used custom recovery) compatible with both dongles.
Once these preliminary operations have been performed it will be possible, thanks to the work done by the developer Rortiz2, to install an (unofficial) version of LineageOS 18.1 based on Android TV 11; after flashing the ROM, the developer recommends using an ARM variant of the gapps, this is because despite the fact that the processor of the aforementioned Fire TV models is capable of running at 64-bit, in reality, Android on these works at 32-bit.
According to what was reported by the developer, there are no big bugs that affect its operation, but it is necessary to make a clarification, SELinux is set as permissive: in other words, SELinux is a security architecture useful for developers that deals with defining access controls for applications, processes and files based on security criteria; in practice, it guarantees the security of the system by checking that only administrators have access to certain parts of the memory.
When this is set to “permissive” (one of three modes of action) it allows attackers to sneak into the device, assuming that the average user doesn’t even know where to look; it is a bit like leaving the front door open during the night, it is not dangerous regardless, but it facilitates the work of any malicious people. In any case, be aware of what these changes entail, if you want to try it yourself, just follow this link for unlocking the bootloader and this one for the ROM.