News - HTC Desire receives Froyo Android 2.2 update

[crossy]

Can't you guys just run software update on it like on iPhones via iTunes? I'm not up to speed why you can't update the phone yourself and first [assumed from responses above] you have to wait for HTC and then your telephone provider... Sorry never had HTC so gotta excuse my lack of knowledge!

It's not just HTC, it's all Android phones. So with iPhone you get:

Apple issues the new firmware -> you get it. Job done

whereas with Android you have:

Google issues the new firmware -> the manufacturers (HTC, Moto, SE, etc) fiddle with it -> the teleco's (Orange, Three, Voda, etc) fiddle with it -> (finally) you get it.

Which means that Apple can get firmware updates out there for iOS far quicker than Google can for Android.

The Android way is old-style phone-stylee and imho just plain stupid (e.g. why the heck do the teleco's have to get involved with updates - aren't they just merging with existing system files?). Apple's way is just superior in about every way (apart from having to use iTunes ) and something I'm envious of.

Of course, you can always root your 'droid phone (which is reputedly easier than iOS) and then apply the new firmware manually, but that's cheating and too scary for me.

Bob

[shaffaaf27]

well at least rooting and jail breaking are legal now (well in the US methinks, not sure here).


tbh that's what i love about WebOS as well, no need to jailbreak/root. just enable devmode and you are done. palm actually welcome homebrew, which is a nice change. and then they send an OTA update, you can either wait for your carrier to push it through, or just grab it form palm servers and enjoy.

[Barkotron]

why the heck do the teleco's have to get involved with updates - aren't they just merging with existing system files?

Spot on. Unfortunately the carriers don't want to be the dumb pipe/consumer electronics hire purchase company everyone I know wants them to be. They want to be service and content providers, so bundle crapware at every opportunity. Don't even mention the utterly worthless default homepages and bookmarks they shove on the browsers. Delaying useful system updates purely so they can add utterly worthless junk is insult to injury.

All anyone I know wants from a phone company is for them to provide free/cheap handset and voice call/text/internet access in return for 12/18/24 monthly payments of x amount of pounds.

Branded firmware is a massive turnoff. Luckily Vodafone actually appear to have done this with the Galaxy S I got off them recently - there's no crapware on it, the handset's unlocked and the firmware appears to be generic. Maybe I got lucky. Otherwise, Carphone Whorehouse appear to only issue unlocked, generic handsets (I assume other non-network shops do too). If they'd had the 16GB version I'd have gone with them. I certainly won't accept network-branded firmware on any phone I buy in the future.