The Sony product blog has today released information regarding their Jellybean upgrade schdule for the Xperia range of handsets.
Upgrades are often a bone of contention for Android handset owners with many handsets receiving little or no post sales support from the manufacturers however Sony have been rather good at explaining what handsets are being upgraded and why.
Today’s release explains that the Xperia T and TX as well as the Xperia V will get their upgrade to Android 4.1 Jellybean in Q1 2013.
It goes on to say that the following handsets WILL get Jellybean although there are no fixed dates set for release as yet. The handsets are:
- Xperia S
- Xperia acro S
- Xperia Ion
- Xperia P
- Xperia Go
- Xperia J
Sony go on to explain that the rest of the range will not be upgraded beyond Android 4.0.4 Ice Cream Sandwich as “we are unable to guarantee owners of these smartphones the user experience you expect and we demand. We will however, continue to support all these products with firmware maintenance releases.”
This essentially means that anything beyond the last generation of Xperia handsets will be stuck on Ice Cream Sandwich and will definitely not see an upgrade.
Are you happy with Sony’s decision, is it fair or totally unjust? Let us know in the comments below.
Having had a number of Sony handsets, I think its safe to say you MIGHT get an upgrade. My wife’s Xperia Ray is still stuck on Gingerbread, about 6 months after my one was upgraded to ICS. The problem seems to be they do ‘batches’ based on the SI numbers, and it all seems a bit random if you view the Sony blogs (Some SI numbers never show up). They haven’t mastered OTA updates, and you have to use the PC companion software in order to do it. So while a phone might OFFICIALLY get an upgrade, your phone may not. I currently have an Xperia Go which the ICS upgrade was ‘released’ 28/9, yet I’m here on 22/10 with still no update.
I have an Xperia Arc nestled away, it is locked on o2, Sony released ICS for it earlier this year, with side note that the upgrade may cause slow down in performance, that is fine, they told us. But o2 refuse to release it, even to provide customers with a choice like the phone manufacturer, they could just have a pop up before you confirm to upgrade that tells you the issue accepting without the liability to o2. Nope, it was rejected. Sony say it is up to o2, ah dear.
On the whole with Sony, I thought they were turning a corner, after their original Android OS upgrade fiasco of 2010, then 2011 came and it looked rosy, 2012 looked even better, but now they are back to square one, With the Samsung GSIII being upgraded to JB now for unlocked and some networks, if Sony really wanted the T to be the flagship, people have to wait till next year? By that time KLP will be out or on the near horizon…. Sony sort it out or release a Nexus device to keep my faith and purchases. Thanks.