4 ms·

Are Android customers left to rot the moment we walk out of the store?

21 points by xrd 16y ago

metageek 16y ago
>I think the same goes for T-Mobile. Carriers get a cut of the Android Market revenue (10% of the sale), so they do have some interest in seeing you upgrade your phone. However, they also insist on exhaustively testing everything that runs on their networks (or, at least, everything you get from them), which gets expensive. I'd hope the Market revenue would be more than the testing costs, but I don't know.
- enjo 16y ago
  That's definitely the biggest issue. Back in my Symbian days we'd see everything go through essentially 3 testing cycles. 1. Acceptance test at the OEM level 2. Acceptance test for each individual phone 3. Another round of testing at the carrier level. It's that third round of testing that was always the most frustrating, as it was rarely well executed. We'd get a lot of really ticky-tack things ("bugs" in the form of "I don't think feature X should work this way"), while the big problems were rarely caught. We finally built out a rather large internal QA staff which was much more effective. I'm not against testing, but the carriers need to adapt to the new environment. Instead of trying to catch every bug (and failing) be much quicker to push updates to the network. I'd much rather have an update every month or two, rather than wait 4 or 5 months to get a fix in. This is one thing Apple gets right. The cadence of their updates is perfect.
  - metageek 16y ago
    At a minimum, Android needs to organize the base OS with a package system, so they can ship incremental updates which the OEMs can test quickly.
StavrosK 16y ago
Does anyone know if you can install stock Android on, say, the Desire, and get it to act like a Nexus One (OTA updates, etc)? I'm not sure I see that much of a benefit in having HTC Sense, although it does have some good features.
- lftl 16y ago
  Most phones, especially HTC ones, have a ROM that's basically stock Android.
  - StavrosK 16y ago
    Does this mean that I can install the updates and then install Sense on top? I'm a bit confused, I'm also not clear what custom ROMs provide and what the downsides are... I read some wikis but they don't mention downsides much.
    - lftl 16y ago
      I think most of the Sense stuff are system level packages, so you'd either have to find a ROM that included them or monkey around with ADB to get put Sense back on top. But if you want an stock Android experience that would seem to preclude Sense in large part. What the custom ROMs provide really depends on what phone you're on and the goal of the ROM. A lot of them are really nothing more than a new skin, but some make bigger tweaks. I've got the Vibrant, and there are custom ROMs for Froyo even though T-Mobile hasn't released an official ROM for that yet. There are also a number of 2.1 ROMs that have other customizations (overclocking, underclocking, changing battery behavior)
      - StavrosK 16y ago
        I see, thank you.
mrj 16y ago
Yes, it's totally an issue. On the other hand, he's willing to hack his iPhone but not his Android? It's different on Android. After the initial root, you get your future OS updates from the community. There's no reason to ever go back to the base. On the iPhone, you may have to revert your jailbreak at some point, like the author mentions. After the initial root, which can be a pain (another thing to blame on short-sighted carriers and manufacturers), a custom ROM is actually far easier than updating many phones. There are ROM managers available in the Market that will manage them for you. You can even change ROMs without even plugging into a computer. Try that with an iPhone.
- nodata 16y ago
  I've got a Milestone. The reason I haven't rooted it is that I don't want download and run a possibly trojaned ROM off some guy from the internet. I would like to pay a company for access to regular updates to Android on my phone (as long as there was QA to make sure my phone was supported).
- sudont 16y ago
  Your argument is completely valid for this community, people who like to go off the reservation and run their own applications, code and OS. However, the big draw of an iPhone is that it is a managed device, not a full-fledged computer+phone. Anybody who really wants to root their phone should get an Android device, the overarching purpose of an iPhone is to take away this control for the type of stability a casual user needs. It's totally counterintuitive to want to have complete user control of a managed device. Furthermore, the issue of carriers not updating phones is an issue anyone who doesn't root their phone. It's like saying your car can get double the mileage, but you have to pull out the transmission by hand to install a clutch. I made my parents get a Mac so I didn't have to keep fixing their BIOS. I'll be damned if I'm going to drive 370 miles to re-flash their phone after Android gets buggy and slow due to background processes. (They dig their feet into the ground, and will simply not learn about this.)
  - ZeroGravitas 16y ago
    Those ordinary people will still get an Android, because it's on two-for-one offer or the salesman tells them to. And they'll be quite happy because their phone will make calls, and pick up their email, surf the web, play angry birds and give them directions and all the other things that a modern smartphone does. They'll never read Engadget and find out that they're a whole 6 months behind the software curve, and even if someone tells them they will quite rightly not care. Because that is what we're talking about isn't it? Not BIOS problems or constant malware infestations, but geek rage at not being on the cutting edge. The intersection of people who care and can't help themselves is insignificant and consists mainly of whiny tech power-users who have nowhere to go but Android.
gte910h 16y ago
Yes, and the mobile networks and device manufactures have no incentive to update; they actually want you to buy a new phone!!!
- ScottBurson 16y ago
  They're forgetting about those of us who haven't bought yet, and are watching how badly they are treating the early adopters. I was excited about the Samsung Epic when it first came out, and planning to get one when my Sprint refresh cycle comes around in January, but having seen how glacially slow Samsung has been to fix the problems people have been having with the phone, I now don't think I'll ever buy a Samsung phone.
  - gte910h 16y ago
    Yeah, they have. Apple and Windows 7 are going to split the market if they don't start paying attention to their existing handset owners. (Both of those are doing centralized updates).
- wmf 16y ago
  Realistically, people 6 months into a 2-year contract are not going to buy a new phone just to get the latest OS. They're more likely to say "never again" and buy an iPhone when their contract is up.
  - cjensenius 16y ago
    Apple and these users deserve each other...
- ZeroGravitas 16y ago
  They should take a lesson from Apple. The update they pushed to 3G users prompted many people to buy a new phone.
cjensenius 16y ago
Caveat emptor, if you did not think of how you were going to hack your phone when purchasing. There is a reason I am rocking the original Motorola Droid, and it is this exact reason. It really has nothing to do with Android, per se, and more to do with you.
semipermeable 16y ago
I get the same sinking feeling every time I check for an OS update on my Samsung Fascinate and it's not there. No update means: - ZERO GPS functionality (Verizon reps acknowledge this) - crippled performance on what's supposed to be top-of-the-line hardware (because the Samsung version of Android 2.1 uses a badly written swap filesystem) My iPhone 3G has a better UI, multitouch, and even now feels like a more solidly built device. On the other hand, I've never had a dropped call on Verizon in San Francisco. I'd rather have a mostly-functioning, always-connected device than a beautiful idiot that connects to a network incapable of delivering even SMS.
gcb 16y ago
Of course not. We can open bugs... and then the bugs are left to rot. Like the Arabic text input, Portuguese dictionary, imap folder support... The last one with hundreds of comments and no word from google for half year.
asnyder 16y ago
T-mobile just updated all myTouch, myTouch 3G to Android 2.2. Fortunately I have a myTouch 4G, but I feel comfortable that T-mobile will provide it with future updates.
mbreese 16y ago
It was my understanding that this is one reason why Apple does some strange accounting and why there are fees to get your iPod Touch upgraded, but not your iPhone. Part of the price of the phone is set aside to pay for future updates. So, you're not just paying for an iPhone, but also for access to future versions of iOS (up to a certain point). So not only is there an App Store incentive to get your to upgrade your iPhone, you already paid them to do it. It doesn't seem like other manufacturers do the same thing. This could explain part of why they take so long in upgrading Android versions.
vessenes 16y ago
I see lots of comments, but nobody mentioning Cyanogenmod, or the excellent communities at xda-developers for exactly this situation. In brief -- if you don't want the reference Google Developer phone (soon to be released Nexus 2 / S perhaps? Right now Nexus One), root your phone, and install cyanogenmod. I'm reminded reading the linked article that oh, say, four years ago, phone OS'es never updated, with the possible exception of Nokia's higher end E-series. Today, with a hacked Android phone, you could install nightly builds off the Android Open Source Project Trunk if you chose. This is a big difference, and is something the poster can in fact do with his Samsung Galaxy S. So, why the complaining? All this is easily discoverable with some research before purchase of the phone.
- xrd 16y ago
  Are you suggesting that everyone who purchases an Android phone root it? I can absolutely root my phone. I just worry about things like the issue I detailed with my iPhone. I do think rooting is much easier than before, and there are still warnings in every forum I look at that indicate "if your phone explodes, don't blame us!" I think it is a reasonable expectation that if I have a two year contract when I buy this phone that there should be a responsibility to upgrade that phone, and six months after the OS has been released seems out of bounds. I don't agree about this being easy to research before purchasing the phone. When I purchase a Samsung Galaxy, is this the S? Is this some other Galaxy? Would this process work for rooting: http://answers.oreilly.com/topic/2271-how-to-root-your-android-phone-with-one-click/ http://answers.oreilly.com/topic/2271-how-to-root-your-andro.... (It does not by the way.) When I was at Google I/O they said there were sixty devices shipping with Android, and I am sure there are more now. It is actually non-trivial to keep all these details in your head unless that is what you want to do all day. I simply want to use my phone, and without Android 2.2 I am unable to use tethering, front facing camera for a bunch of apps, etc.
  - mrj 16y ago
    Instead of buying a phone from the carrier, if you want freedom you will have to look elsewhere. Buy a unlocked+rooted phone off EBay (let somebody else take the risk) or buy a developer phone (like the Nexus One). You bought a locked-down, rights-stealing, consumer phone that is made for people who don't know better. You should totally know better. :-)

21 points by xrd 16y ago

>I think the same goes for T-Mobile. Carriers get a cut of the Android Market revenue (10% of the sale), so they do have some interest in seeing you upgrade your phone. However, they also insist on exhaustively testing everything that runs on their networks (or, at least, everything you get from them), which gets expensive. I'd hope the Market revenue would be more than the testing costs, but I don't know.

enjo 16y ago
That's definitely the biggest issue. Back in my Symbian days we'd see everything go through essentially 3 testing cycles. 1. Acceptance test at the OEM level 2. Acceptance test for each individual phone 3. Another round of testing at the carrier level. It's that third round of testing that was always the most frustrating, as it was rarely well executed. We'd get a lot of really ticky-tack things ("bugs" in the form of "I don't think feature X should work this way"), while the big problems were rarely caught. We finally built out a rather large internal QA staff which was much more effective. I'm not against testing, but the carriers need to adapt to the new environment. Instead of trying to catch every bug (and failing) be much quicker to push updates to the network. I'd much rather have an update every month or two, rather than wait 4 or 5 months to get a fix in. This is one thing Apple gets right. The cadence of their updates is perfect.
- metageek 16y ago
  At a minimum, Android needs to organize the base OS with a package system, so they can ship incremental updates which the OEMs can test quickly.

StavrosK 16y ago

Does anyone know if you can install stock Android on, say, the Desire, and get it to act like a Nexus One (OTA updates, etc)? I'm not sure I see that much of a benefit in having HTC Sense, although it does have some good features.

lftl 16y ago
Most phones, especially HTC ones, have a ROM that's basically stock Android.
- StavrosK 16y ago
  Does this mean that I can install the updates and then install Sense on top? I'm a bit confused, I'm also not clear what custom ROMs provide and what the downsides are... I read some wikis but they don't mention downsides much.
  - lftl 16y ago
    I think most of the Sense stuff are system level packages, so you'd either have to find a ROM that included them or monkey around with ADB to get put Sense back on top. But if you want an stock Android experience that would seem to preclude Sense in large part. What the custom ROMs provide really depends on what phone you're on and the goal of the ROM. A lot of them are really nothing more than a new skin, but some make bigger tweaks. I've got the Vibrant, and there are custom ROMs for Froyo even though T-Mobile hasn't released an official ROM for that yet. There are also a number of 2.1 ROMs that have other customizations (overclocking, underclocking, changing battery behavior)
    - StavrosK 16y ago
      I see, thank you.

mrj 16y ago

Yes, it's totally an issue. On the other hand, he's willing to hack his iPhone but not his Android? It's different on Android. After the initial root, you get your future OS updates from the community. There's no reason to ever go back to the base. On the iPhone, you may have to revert your jailbreak at some point, like the author mentions. After the initial root, which can be a pain (another thing to blame on short-sighted carriers and manufacturers), a custom ROM is actually far easier than updating many phones. There are ROM managers available in the Market that will manage them for you. You can even change ROMs without even plugging into a computer. Try that with an iPhone.

nodata 16y ago
I've got a Milestone. The reason I haven't rooted it is that I don't want download and run a possibly trojaned ROM off some guy from the internet. I would like to pay a company for access to regular updates to Android on my phone (as long as there was QA to make sure my phone was supported).
sudont 16y ago
Your argument is completely valid for this community, people who like to go off the reservation and run their own applications, code and OS. However, the big draw of an iPhone is that it is a managed device, not a full-fledged computer+phone. Anybody who really wants to root their phone should get an Android device, the overarching purpose of an iPhone is to take away this control for the type of stability a casual user needs. It's totally counterintuitive to want to have complete user control of a managed device. Furthermore, the issue of carriers not updating phones is an issue anyone who doesn't root their phone. It's like saying your car can get double the mileage, but you have to pull out the transmission by hand to install a clutch. I made my parents get a Mac so I didn't have to keep fixing their BIOS. I'll be damned if I'm going to drive 370 miles to re-flash their phone after Android gets buggy and slow due to background processes. (They dig their feet into the ground, and will simply not learn about this.)
- ZeroGravitas 16y ago
  Those ordinary people will still get an Android, because it's on two-for-one offer or the salesman tells them to. And they'll be quite happy because their phone will make calls, and pick up their email, surf the web, play angry birds and give them directions and all the other things that a modern smartphone does. They'll never read Engadget and find out that they're a whole 6 months behind the software curve, and even if someone tells them they will quite rightly not care. Because that is what we're talking about isn't it? Not BIOS problems or constant malware infestations, but geek rage at not being on the cutting edge. The intersection of people who care and can't help themselves is insignificant and consists mainly of whiny tech power-users who have nowhere to go but Android.

gte910h 16y ago

Yes, and the mobile networks and device manufactures have no incentive to update; they actually want you to buy a new phone!!!

ScottBurson 16y ago
They're forgetting about those of us who haven't bought yet, and are watching how badly they are treating the early adopters. I was excited about the Samsung Epic when it first came out, and planning to get one when my Sprint refresh cycle comes around in January, but having seen how glacially slow Samsung has been to fix the problems people have been having with the phone, I now don't think I'll ever buy a Samsung phone.
- gte910h 16y ago
  Yeah, they have. Apple and Windows 7 are going to split the market if they don't start paying attention to their existing handset owners. (Both of those are doing centralized updates).
wmf 16y ago
Realistically, people 6 months into a 2-year contract are not going to buy a new phone just to get the latest OS. They're more likely to say "never again" and buy an iPhone when their contract is up.
- cjensenius 16y ago
  Apple and these users deserve each other...
ZeroGravitas 16y ago
They should take a lesson from Apple. The update they pushed to 3G users prompted many people to buy a new phone.

cjensenius 16y ago

Caveat emptor, if you did not think of how you were going to hack your phone when purchasing. There is a reason I am rocking the original Motorola Droid, and it is this exact reason. It really has nothing to do with Android, per se, and more to do with you.

semipermeable 16y ago

I get the same sinking feeling every time I check for an OS update on my Samsung Fascinate and it's not there. No update means: - ZERO GPS functionality (Verizon reps acknowledge this) - crippled performance on what's supposed to be top-of-the-line hardware (because the Samsung version of Android 2.1 uses a badly written swap filesystem) My iPhone 3G has a better UI, multitouch, and even now feels like a more solidly built device. On the other hand, I've never had a dropped call on Verizon in San Francisco. I'd rather have a mostly-functioning, always-connected device than a beautiful idiot that connects to a network incapable of delivering even SMS.

gcb 16y ago

Of course not. We can open bugs... and then the bugs are left to rot. Like the Arabic text input, Portuguese dictionary, imap folder support... The last one with hundreds of comments and no word from google for half year.

asnyder 16y ago

T-mobile just updated all myTouch, myTouch 3G to Android 2.2. Fortunately I have a myTouch 4G, but I feel comfortable that T-mobile will provide it with future updates.

mbreese 16y ago

It was my understanding that this is one reason why Apple does some strange accounting and why there are fees to get your iPod Touch upgraded, but not your iPhone. Part of the price of the phone is set aside to pay for future updates. So, you're not just paying for an iPhone, but also for access to future versions of iOS (up to a certain point). So not only is there an App Store incentive to get your to upgrade your iPhone, you already paid them to do it. It doesn't seem like other manufacturers do the same thing. This could explain part of why they take so long in upgrading Android versions.

vessenes 16y ago

I see lots of comments, but nobody mentioning Cyanogenmod, or the excellent communities at xda-developers for exactly this situation. In brief -- if you don't want the reference Google Developer phone (soon to be released Nexus 2 / S perhaps? Right now Nexus One), root your phone, and install cyanogenmod. I'm reminded reading the linked article that oh, say, four years ago, phone OS'es never updated, with the possible exception of Nokia's higher end E-series. Today, with a hacked Android phone, you could install nightly builds off the Android Open Source Project Trunk if you chose. This is a big difference, and is something the poster can in fact do with his Samsung Galaxy S. So, why the complaining? All this is easily discoverable with some research before purchase of the phone.

xrd 16y ago
Are you suggesting that everyone who purchases an Android phone root it? I can absolutely root my phone. I just worry about things like the issue I detailed with my iPhone. I do think rooting is much easier than before, and there are still warnings in every forum I look at that indicate "if your phone explodes, don't blame us!" I think it is a reasonable expectation that if I have a two year contract when I buy this phone that there should be a responsibility to upgrade that phone, and six months after the OS has been released seems out of bounds. I don't agree about this being easy to research before purchasing the phone. When I purchase a Samsung Galaxy, is this the S? Is this some other Galaxy? Would this process work for rooting: http://answers.oreilly.com/topic/2271-how-to-root-your-android-phone-with-one-click/ http://answers.oreilly.com/topic/2271-how-to-root-your-andro.... (It does not by the way.) When I was at Google I/O they said there were sixty devices shipping with Android, and I am sure there are more now. It is actually non-trivial to keep all these details in your head unless that is what you want to do all day. I simply want to use my phone, and without Android 2.2 I am unable to use tethering, front facing camera for a bunch of apps, etc.
- mrj 16y ago
  Instead of buying a phone from the carrier, if you want freedom you will have to look elsewhere. Buy a unlocked+rooted phone off EBay (let somebody else take the risk) or buy a developer phone (like the Nexus One). You bought a locked-down, rights-stealing, consumer phone that is made for people who don't know better. You should totally know better. :-)