[T-Mobile Galaxy Note 4 General] quicksite:
Help orient me please. I haven't rooted a phone in over a decade, not sure whether to or not. Please help me assess these pros and cons regarding the feature set I want most. (Apologies this is a narrative vs bullet-pointed; please bear with me)

1. IN GENERAL/ NOTE4 RELIABILITY OF MOTHERBOARD, ETC

I've always loved the Note 4, have had 4 of them, as one went bad (endless bootload error, constant restarting, failing motherboard) I'd buy a used one in excellent condition on Swappa, until late 2018 when I seemed to reach point of diminishing returns. Multiple Note 4's were diagnosed over time, once by Samsung official repairs, another by me by observing similar patterns of bootloader or other problems. The last one started to develop an auto-focus motor problem where the focus would get stuck and the motor would churn for minutes, creating an audible whine that got picked up by video recordings drowning out and polluting all sound recordings. A trusted reseller on Swappa advised me in Dec that maybe I really need to get somewhat newer hardware for similar cost because in truth the Note 4 is at a lifecycle point where problems can be expected. He rec'd the Google Pixel XL.

2. MY RESEARCH, THEN ANNOYING EXPERIENCE WITH PIXEL PHONE & ANDROID 9.0

What I loved most about the Note 4, aside from S-Pen note drawing, was its video quality, especially at night, as I used it for on-the-street documentary interviews. So I did a ton of due diligence using both direct comparison Youtube videos as well as GSMarena's video compare tool:

[IMG="screenshot from GSMarena"]https://i.imgur.com/mM9G3nw.png[/IMG]

I compared several other phones in same used pricerange that reviewers raved about camera quality, but I ultimately chose Pixel XL — despite fighting back all my concerns about no microSD card, no battery access and more, because the camera was so highly touted. I "sold myself" by the supposed upsides of "finally I would experience the highly touted pure Android experience" and the supposed superiority in operational features and UX. In short, I discovered quickly over 5 months with Pixel XL that

(a) the camera, though great, had no manual exposure controls, and was terrible for night shots because it is programmed soley for auto-compensation making everything as bright as possible, actually destroying any accurate cinematography. I ended up using the paid excellent app Cinema FV-5 then runnning into typical Google problems of inability to use the default camera app's excellent image stabilization,

(b) the Notifications UI in Pie, even as advanced as they supposedly are, were so inferior to the Note 4 running Android 6.1 with Samsung's quite amazing GoodLock app. I tried every enhancement I could find particularly Powershade, which though far better than native Android 9, had too tiny type for my eyes, had NO ability at all to set prioritization order of various app notifications, way less-efficient quick-settings access of favorites, making usability hugely inferior to the Note 4.

(c) No call-recording thanks to Google's Pie decision to deny apps ability to access inline audio. My favorite & for my needs essential Call-recording app ACR and pretty much all others rendered unusable. This is huge for me, and I kept waiting to see if previews for Android Q indicated that Google had restored this feature, and to date I have seen no information.

(d) smaller screen than Note 4, and no easy way to disable the on-screen navigation, hogging even more screen real-estate.

(e) Scrolling screenshots— with Samsung's Goodlock came the built-in easy capability to do scrolling shots on the Note 4. No equivalent on Pixel running Pie, requiring additional 3rd party apps, and less fluid, less-elegant, slower usability.

3. I SWITCHED BACK TO NOTE 4 — NOW HERE'S WHAT I MISS FROM ANDROID PIE

(a) Recent Apps horizontal scrolling. I have to say that is the biggest thing I now miss, having become so accustomed to easy gestural navigation using Android 9's Recent Apps layout and functionality, one of the very few substantial usability improvements from my years on 6.1

(b) Google's Call Screening — definitely worth its weight in gold

(c) Fingerprint sensor unlock, authentications, payment validations. Everyone knows the Note 4's homebutton sensor is not very secure, and does not suffice for Google Pay and other payment systems. Though I understand there is not much if anything I can do to compensate for a hardware missing feature, I would like to know if I root my Note 4, can I gain access to a way to use Google Pay?

(d) being "up-to-date" in whatever advances have come with Android 7, 8 and 9. I can't actually break these out because Note 4 maxed out on 6.1 without rooting. But I never felt on Note 4 that I ever needed to root because I'd also always been running Nova Launcher Prime for years, and had become accustomed to so many Android OS features being added to my phone's native 6.1 OS. But I now feel that I limit myself with whatever OS advances come down the pike.

4. QUESTIONS:

a. If I root my recently acquired "new" Note 4, which is in excellent condition, can I get the Pie's newer Recent Apps layout/functionality?

b. If I flash some recommended ROM, how can I maintain use of Samsung's GOOD LOCK notifications app. Honestly, I can't give that up.

c. If I flash to a recommended Pie ROM, can I actually use ACR for call-recording?

d. What are the highest recommended ROMs for my needs?

e. Rooting Guide. A decade ago XDA was the only place to go. Now I see guides everywhere. What method is recommended?

Thanks much for any help here!