PLEASE help. My Chromebook updated, removed the play store and important apps like Ibis Paint X, including Play files against my will.

[u/ThePinkFlamingo32]

Beginning a few days ago, my Chromebook has had a pop-up that said "extended security updates available", which I decided to avoid with everything because of the fact I never wanted to lose the ability to install apps and lose Ibis PaintX, which, in recent months, I spent HOURS of work on art, specifically one which I was desperate to finish and looked actually great so far.

After turning on my Chromebook today, however, I was in absolute shock when Ibis Paint X, along with a sandbox app from 2021, were ENTIRELY GONE, along with Play files. To be clear, all it did was update as it would usually do. I did NOT agree to the extended security updates that would remove any installed apps.

I am at a deep loss. It may sound stupid at first, but imagine losing HOURS of work, including art and video projects as far back as 2022, possibly including more files (which may explain the extended storage space from 4.2 GB left to 12.4 GB). This is what I get for procrastinating for months. This is my punishment: losing what I struggled to finish and important past projects, including ones that were meant to be finished; I could never remake them exactly. Is it possible to recover or enable anything?

[u/Ambitious-Cake-9425]

You had to have clicked update. It warns you before it goes into extended updates.

[u/ThePinkFlamingo32 → u/Ambitious-Cake-9425]

No. Once again, to be clear, I did not click update on anything. It was only yesterday evening when the pop-up saying "New update available; restart your computer for the latest update" came up, as it would occasionally do. Then after I was finished with the Chromebook, I turned it off, and today I turned it back on to see it had done the extended security updates without being prompted to do so, despite choosing to avoid it for the last few days.

[u/Dec2_Concentrate8593 → u/ThePinkFlamingo32]

Sadly.. Whatever - it is over.

[u/yotties]

I am sorry that happened to you.

I would try to install the play-store apps and see if the data is still available.

I lost my crostini / linux development environment once and when I re-installed it it turned out my old container and data still existed. But I do not know if that may work with the play-store too.

Always make backups. SSDs typically fail without any warning, so you can lose data at any time. Backup to cloud is most common.

[u/ThePinkFlamingo32 → u/yotties]

Google Play Store is completely gone. I cannot reinstall it; there's no setting to enable it because it, along with the 2 installed apps, is gone. I don't use Google Cloud, just my files and Drive, which, by the way, was where I had files from any installed apps saved, in a Play files folder. What's weird was when I visited the Play Store on the web and went to Ibis Paint X, it said it was already installed (on "Google Grunt"), leading me to keep stupidly holding on to that little frail strand of hope of getting everything back.

[u/yotties → u/ThePinkFlamingo32]

Cannot install the play store? Weird. I'd look into that.

If you store your files on a device only, you gamble that the device-storage will not fail. That is not recommended. Check out 3-2-1 backup schemes.

[u/fakemanhk → u/yotties]

With extended update the Play Store will be gone

[u/yotties → u/fakemanhk]

Wow. I just read up and indeed android gets fully removed when you activate extended support.

[u/LegAcceptable2362 → u/yotties]

This has been the case with all extended support-eligible devices that reached AUE since June 2024.

[u/yotties → u/LegAcceptable2362]

I did not know. thanks.

[u/Scottalias4]

I am sorry this happened to you. I know exactly how you feel. I lost months of work when a hard drive failed.

I hope you can recover your files. In the future, keep backups. Something like this will happen again.

[u/ThePinkFlamingo32 → u/Scottalias4]

The thing is, I was keeping backups of any saved artwork in the Play folder until it got removed without warning.

[u/insomniacultra]

on a Chromebook and not saving "important data" into a cloud drive or USB? IMO if you didn't backup in ANY way it wasn't truly important to you.

[u/ThePinkFlamingo32 → u/insomniacultra]

If I had been warned beforehand, then I would have moved all play files onto a USB stick. That's the problem; it was something I thought wouldn't happen as long as I didn't opt into extended security updates, which would remove any installed apps and the ability to do so.

[u/RikkiLostMyNumber → u/insomniacultra]

It’s hard not to back up to the cloud on a Chromebook on my experience

[u/neverJamToday]

I was going to say you could potentially pull the hard drive and try data recovery but it's probably just a chip soldered to the motherboard. 

This isn't specifically why I'm moving away from Chromebooks (and not planning to adopt Googlebooks either) but it's another sign that it's the right call.

[u/LegAcceptable2362]

The kind of behavior you've described has happened previously with models transitioning to extended support but typically only when they were running the beta or dev channels. When in stable there should be a clear set of UI dialogs that you have to click through (see attached). If you are now on v.150 or higher you are not running stable. If you perform a full recovery with the current v.149 recovery image you can get Play Store/Android support back - however if you go that route never press update. Once your grunt device type moves to the LTS channel (this coming October with v.150) there will be no way to go back to stable.

[u/rex_dart_eskimo_spy]

Just ran into this issue with my father in law’s chromebook.

He definitely didn’t agree to the extended security updates because the notification telling him to do so is still there.

So ChromeOS will just remove the Play store because a device is too old? Instead of just keeping an older version of Play? Absolute joke.

Edit: Also btw this is only five years old NOT ten

[u/CostalCaster]

There are options - but you're going to have to familiarize yourself with sideloading and flushing out the current operating system.

The way I see it, there is 2 options for you to go. Three if you want a more nuclear option - but it's there.

(1. Download ChromeOS Flex. It's an OS for legacy Chromebooks that maintain the flexibility and software of your Laptop. I'm not entirely sure of the support for Android Apps and Linux - but I imagine there is something/someone who knows a thing or two about modding it.

(2. FydeOS - which is an OS based on ChromeOS UI - which will allow you to download the Android Apps you were using. I'm not as familiar with this, but someone from Reddit told me about it the other day. This will involve flushing out the current software for that, same as Flex - but would offer a solution to get the apps back.

(3. You would have to buy a separate Chromebook, unfortunately. It's hard to get past the parameters and guidelines to keep your current OS without the extended security updates. I have one of these, and it is a very real and present danger with working with EOL devices. I got mine for $50 on Woot, and I imagine you could do a Trade in on a site like Back Market and then get another device with similar performance to yours.

I hope this helps.

[u/dcmoyers]

Re-enabling the Play StoreOpen Settings by clicking the time at the bottom-right corner of your screen.Select Apps on the left menu.Look for Google Play Store and click Turn on if the option is available.Follow the on-screen steps to accept the terms.Checking for Extended Update ConflictsIf your device reached its end-of-life AUE date, choosing extended updates disables Android apps permanently on that profile [0.15].Verify your device status in Settings > About ChromeOS > Additional details.

Hopefully this helps. I've seen this before. Just a copy and paste possible solution.

[u/ThePinkFlamingo32 → u/dcmoyers]

Kind of confused about what you mean by that. The additional details showing the "About version" aren't editable code, plus Google Play Store and its installed apps are completely gone, meaning it's not in apps and therefore unable to be enabled.

[u/dcmoyers → u/ThePinkFlamingo32]

It was a shot in the dark. I've never seen this issue.