Samsung Galaxy A40 (samsung-a40)

Features
Flashing Whether it is possible to flash the device with pmbootstrap flasher.	Partial
USB Networking After connecting the device with USB to your PC, you can connect to it via telnet (initramfs) or SSH (booted system).	Works
Battery Whether charging and battery level reporting work.	Works
Screen Whether the display works; ideally with sleep mode and brightness control.	Works
Touchscreen	Works
Multimedia
3D Acceleration	Untested
Audio Audio playback, microphone, headset and buttons.	Untested
Camera	Untested
IR TX	Untested
Connectivity
WiFi	Works
Bluetooth	Untested
GPS	Untested
NFC Near Field Communication	Untested
Modem
Calls	Untested
SMS	Untested
Mobile data	Untested
Miscellaneous
FDE Full disk encryption and unlocking with unl0kr.	Untested
USB OTG USB On-The-Go or USB-C Role switching.	Untested
Sensors
Accelerometer Handles automatic screen rotation in many interfaces.	Untested

Samsung Galaxy A40
Manufacturer	Samsung
Name	Galaxy A40
Codename	samsung-a40
Released	2019
Type	handset
Hardware
Chipset	Samsung Exynos 7904
CPU	Octa-core (2x1.8 GHz Cortex-A73 ; 6x1.6 GHz Cortex-A53)
GPU	Mali-G71 MP2
Display	1080 x 2340 Super AMOLED
Storage	64GB
Memory	4GB
Architecture	aarch64
Software
Original software The software and version the device was shipped with.	Android 9
Extended version The most recent supported version from the manufacturer.	Android
postmarketOS
Category	archived
Mainline Instead of a Linux kernel fork, it is possible to run (Close to) Mainline.	no
pmOS kernel The kernel version that runs on the device's port.	4.4.177
Unixbench score Unixbench Whetstone/Dhrystone score. See Unixbench.	3683.6
Device package	device-samsung-a40
Kernel package	linux-samsung-a40

This device has been archived. This means that it no longer appears in pmbootstrap and is likely broken.
It can still be selected in pmbootstrap init by typing in the vendor and codename, but you will have to build the kernel package manually.

Contributors

Johnnyhandsome69 did the work for samsung-a30, Resulknad forked for samsung-a40

Maintainer(s)

Resulknad

Users owning this device

Affenull2345 (Notes: Sailfish OS, backup)
Dreamos82 (Notes: PMOs playground)
Kotik (Notes: Running CrDroid 8.2, Android 12, 4/64.)
Resulknad (Notes: Running modified ffmpeg on galaxy a40 for 4k HEVC decode -> 4k h264 encode at 20fps live stream.)
Rmux (Notes: Almost dead, using as Minecraft server)
Tigersusyt (Notes: SM-A405FN/DS - Needs motherboard repair, currently dead)

How to enter flash mode

Bootloader/Download mode: With the device powered off, hold Volume Down + Volume Up and connect USB cable to PC.
Recovery: With the device powered off, hold Volume Up + Power until logo appears.

Installation

1. Use: pmbootstrap install --android-recovery-zip --recovery-install-partition=data
2. Copy pmos-samsung-a40.zip to external sdcard
3. Boot into TWRP
4. Go to wipe and select Format Data and type yes
5. Then select Advanced Wipe and check: Dalvik/ ART Cache, Cache, Data
6. Go to Mount and select only: Micro SD Card (uncheck all other options), then press Select Storage and select the Micro SD Card and press ok.
7. Go to Install, and search for the zip file (If you see failed to mount /data, ignore it)
8. Reboot to system

Mainlining

An attempt at mainstreaming has been started here: https://gitlab.com/dreamos82/linux-for-samsung-galaxy-a-40 (it cannot proceed further because phone broke)

For now the kernel builds and it start to boot, there are some errors. Touchscreen and volume buttons dts entriers have been added, but they still need to be finalized. Touchscreen driver starts but it doesn't respond to input.

Volume buttons are untested.

There is also a closed PR for uniloader: Samsung A40 support for uni loader

The only thing it needs fixed is the scaling of the uniLoader logo, but apart from that, it works.

Tested UIs

console
sxmo-de-dwm
xfce4 (need to be launched from cli with startx)

Photos

Galaxy A40 Running XFCE4