Motorola Releases Status on ICS Upgrade Schedule
The majority of qualifying Motorola gadgets won't bite into Google's Ice Cream Sandwich until the second half of 2012.
Motorola finally released an estimated schedule for the Android 4.0 upgrade to be installed on many of its smartphones and tablets. Unfortunately, the news isn't good for those hoping for some tasty ice cream sandwich love this quarter. In fact, only a handful of devices will receive the update in 2Q12 and five devices in the following quarter. Over twenty smartphones and tablets are still stuck in the "evaluation and planning" phase (limbo), and awaiting a projected release date.
As Motorola indicates, upgrades go through four stages: evaluation and planning, development, testing, and the actual release. During the evaluation and planning stage, Motorola evaluates the benefits, technical issues and user experience of an upgrade. "Generally, we are not able to provide release dates in this stage," the company states. "There are also some cases in which we can state that an upgrade will happen but are not able to provide a release date. Please note that some products that enter the Evaluation and Planning phase may not complete the upgrade cycle."
Once the upgrade goes through development and testing, it must be approved by the carrier or local regulators. Typically this is when consumers actually notice that an OTA update is ready to install, but at times there's also a small testing group that will make sure everything is in order before the carrier unleashes the upgrade to the masses (Verizon, for example, does this). Otherwise, users can simply go into the Settings menu to see if a manual update is possible.
With that out of the way, here's Motorola's schedule thus far here in the States:
Q1 2012
Motorola Xoom Wi-Fi only
Q2 2012
Motorola Xoom Family Edition
Q3 2012
Atrix 2
Atrix 4G MB860
Photon 4G
Motorola Xyboard 8.2
Motorola Xyboard 10.1
Undetermined (meaning it's too early to project a timeframe)
Admiral
Droid 3
Droid 4
Droid Bionic
Droid Razr
Droid Razr Maxx
Droid X2
Droid Xyboard 8.2
Droid Xyboard 10.1
Electrify
Milestone 3
Milestone X2
Motorola Pro+
Motorola Xoom Wi-Fi + 3G MZ600
Motorola also provides a schedule for Canada, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia-Pacific, Latin America and Mexico which can be viewed here.
"We know how excited you’ve been about getting the next stage of Ice Cream Sandwich updates for your Motorola devices," the company said in a blog. "Our engineers and designers are combing through the code and preparing it for you. We are pleased to provide more details to the ICS upgrades."
So far it seems that a majority of Motorola devices won't bite into Google's ice cream sandwich until later this year. Bummer, we know (sigh).
- VIDEO: Portal Gets Ported to Android (Sort of)
- Sony Says Price of Whitney Albums Raised By Mistake
- WSJ: Apple Testing Smaller iPad; AT&T, VZN to Get iPad 3
- Rumor: HTC Working on Music Streaming Service
- Chrome to Surpass IE Market Share by End of March
- Repair Site Makes iPad 3 Prototype With Rumored Components
- Skyrim Dog Costumes to Sell on Ebay
- Time Warner Now Streams TV to PC, Mac
- HTC Devices Receiving PlayStation Certification in 2012
- Archos Offering 9.7" Gingerbread Tablet for $229.99 USD
- Is This Motorola's First Intel-powered ICS Phone?
- Skype Co-founder Wants To Offer Free 4G LTE via FreedomPop
- Congress Wants Answers Regarding iOS Apps and Privacy
- FCC Finally Nuking Annoying "Robocalls" With New Rules
- Hulu Plus Finally Arrives On Nintendo Wii
- Anonymous Threatens To Shut Down Internet Next Month
- Report Compares Top Issues With Kindle Fire and iPad 2
- Battery Device Turns Sea Water Into Freshwater
- The Coolest Hotel in the World, Literally
lol...Undetermined=laziness
lmao glad I bought a Nexus S.
Glad I have my Galaxy Nexus. lol. Although I'm pretty stupid when it comes to getting a phone, I always buy it when it's like $800.. -.-
I really need to learn to wait two months, now its $550.
I must say I'm dissapointed. I have a Razr Maxx. Fortunately, Go Launcher is a nice step above the default Motorola interface, though even it is not perfect. I'm somewhat like Joytech...I tend to go for what I want in the now as opposed to worrying about the costs (when I can). I fear by the time they ready ICS for my phone there will be something newer that I'll really want...and probably get. ...of course they do that on purpose.
...at least I have a Transformer Prime to help cheer me up.
So Q3 '12 or later for all Motorola phones... and consider ICS came out in October '11.
My upgrade is up in April... and for me this means I just won't buy a Motorola phone, period.
Undetermined=You already paid for the phone. Sucks to be you!
I'm waiting for a phone the size of the Droid Galaxy Note, the battery of the Droid Razr Maxx and really good camera quality, with ICS out of the box, AND on Verizon. 4G is a given.
Until then, I'll wait.
Companies can do all these corporate talk BS! There are independent developers with very limited time and resources churning out ICS ROMs from AOSP base for these devices at fast pace. Sure they have a few kinks to be worked out, but that is because the developers dont have proper drivers and such. Should I really believe Motorola dont have the resources to update phones to ICS until after the next big android release??
No wonder Moto said they will unlock the bootloaders when it releases ICS. By that time the RAZR, in all 23 variations by then, will be nothing but a foot note in Moto's history book.
After getting burned by HTC and their "update" schedule I have vowed to never buy another Android phone unless it a pure Google phone.
Heck I am becoming so sick and tired of the android crap that goes on between the device manufacturers and carriers that I may just hold out for the next version of Windows phone and jump ship.
Cool. Once we get ice cream sandwich, everyone else will have moose tracks or something.
Funny how the more Android enables features, like tethering and such, the more time it takes for the carriers to find ways to cripple them. Rest assured, this and their custom bloatware launcher and apps are the only reasons it takes that long to release them to masses.
Carriers like these, and stupid phone manufacturers, are the ones giving Android a bad fragmentation rep. in it's vanilla form Android is a perfect OS. I still prefer it to some closed alternatives, because it offers so much customization.
Even funnier is how only a few days after they have worked so hard to cripple their phones, some dev dude working alone can crack it and release it into the wild in just a few days. Instead of investing all that money into building roadblocks, they should invest it in revamping their hardware line and start listening to the customers' feedback. Is it that hard to slap a BIG battery together with a top-of -the-line screen, 2 GB RAM and release it in our hands?
Why is the Photon getting a 3rd Quarter update, when the Electrify is on the 'Undetermined' list?
They are the same hardware, just different carriers.
Why is the Photon getting a 3rd Quarter update, when the Electrify is on the 'Undetermined' list?They are the same hardware, just different carriers.
Different carrier = different bloatware.
Wow, almost a year after the announcement/debut of ICS software updates come. I'm not a fanboy or anything, but this is making me have second thoughts about getting an Android phone. I guess I will stick out my 2.5 year old 3GS a little longer. I bought it when Droid phones were still relatively new. It has been a decent phone, but far from perfect. I'll wait for some new Droids designed around ICS or WP8. I'm definitely ready to move on from iOS.
Sweet, only have to wait until Q3 2012 to get ICS for my Atrix.... =\
Maybe by then they'll have figured out why YouTube constantly locks up on the d*mn thing.
Sweet, only have to wait until Q3 2012 to get ICS for my Atrix.... =\Maybe by then they'll have figured out why YouTube constantly locks up on the d*mn thing.
I am surprised to see the Atrix on this list. And I've never had an issue with YouTube on my Atrix.
Any news about Defy+. If not in list... not ice cream?... Pity...
So with Jelly Bean coming out this year, I'll still be running Gingerbread while phones are coming out three versions later (Honeycomb, Ice Cream Sandwich, Jelly Bean) even though my phone was only a couple months old when ICS came out? It takes longer to port ICS to a phone than it took Google to write ICS in the first place?! Does that seem ridiculous to anyone?
Honeycomb was tablet exclusive. I guess ICS will be Nexus exclusive at this rate.
There's nothing really wrong with Gingerbread but when they made it sound like you'd be able to get the latest and greatest when you bought the phone this news really stinx. I won't say the devs are lazy but I am disappointed that these ICS ports obviously get such a low priority. Motorola, you can do better.
I am surprised to see the Atrix on this list. And I've never had an issue with YouTube on my Atrix.
Lucky for you. The thing locks up 50% of the time for me on youtube. You can't do anything but remove the battery to restart the phone. It really sucks having an big Otterbox case on my phone too. On the bright side, i can pull the whole thing apart and reassemble in the dark now lol.
I'm just glad the Droid 3 made the list, even if it's "undetermined".
PLEASE DROID 2 GLOBAL!!!!
The phones friggin awesome, ics on it would be so sugar sweet