By 2011 was a great year for Android. We saw a gobs of new devices with cutting edge dual-core processors, in what seemed like more of an arms race, than an attempt at giving the consumer what they really needed. These devices which were launching, what seemed like, every few weeks on just about every carrier (except Sprint) wasn’t quite accepted with the fanfare intended. Instead, it was met with bitterness and resentment over early adopters jumping on the latest device at the time. But it’s a funny thing, time. It moves. And when dealing with Android and OEM’s not just competing with the latest iPhone but now each other, technology seems to be moving even faster.
Apparently, the problem many are having now is not that there are too few great devices out there, but that now there are too many. And it’s not just the overall quantity, which could be great for app developers and the platform in general but that these devices are launching too frequently. A new device today is considered by some “obsolete” when a better, more powerful, longer lasting model drops a few weeks later. This has been no better evident as when Motorola released the Bionic, only to get 1-up’d by the RAZR then the RAZR MAXX, a few months after.
Now, I get it. You want to know the device you have is going to last you. You don’t want to spend your hard earned money on something when it can be considered “obsolete” the following week. But as a technology enthusiast first, and Android lover second, there’s no way, in my right mind, that I would ever want tech to move along at a slower pace. Especially on my account. Just because I couldn’t handle someone walking around the streets with a device that spec wise, is “better” than mine. The question I ask myself is, “Do these people really love tech — or do they love the status symbol tucked away in their jean pocket?”
I’ve said it time and time again — competition is good. It drives innovation, pushing technology further and getting it more quickly in consumers’ hands.
I can understand that some of you feel cheated. You were locked into another 2 years with your carrier only to find out something better was just around the corner. But really, what did you expect? Not only that but what other option is there? Slow things down? An OEM can’t disclose when every device will launch from here until kingdom come. Nobody would buy what just came out, knowing some better was just around the corner. Funny thing is, we do know something better is around the corner. There always is. That’s the way technology has always worked.
You can go out and buy a new car. One that’s had the same body style and technology for years, only to find out that if you waited a few months longer, you could have had the all new, redesigned model. Sexier. Sleeker. Better technology. It’s how the world has always worked. Back in the summer of ’87, my Aerialbots were outdone by the Dinobots only a few weeks later. Yeah, it hurt. But ultimately, there were more Transformers to play with.
A wise man once said, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in awhile — you could miss it.” So, I say, enjoy the device you have now. Keep your youthful enthusiasm and eyes looking forward, but don’t let it get you down. When your 24 month jail sentence is finally over, you’ll have a smartphone playing COD MW3 like it was Pac-Man.
All that being said, many major Android OEM’s have stated that things will slow down in 2012. If you ask me, the reason things got so mixed up last year probably had something to do with carrier delays messing up the timing of these big device launches, pushing them closer and closer to one another. Nothing Bible by any means, just my personal theory.
So buckle up your seat belts, kids. Even if things do slow down in 2012 I’m sure it’ll move faster than some will still be able to handle. For those, I suggest a certain other phone that may be more suited to your liking. As for me and my house, we will follow the Android.
I like your scripture reference to Joshua 24:15 at the end there. That’s my favorite verse. And i agree with you 100%. I’m currently rocking a Captivate, banging my head against the wall TRYING to wait for the GS3. But with the magic of hacking and ROMing, my Captivate is like a new phone every couple months. and that seems to hold me over.
I think slowing things down can only lead to a better user experience. Fewer releases will hopefully mean better quality, and more importantly faster updates. I would think have to support a few devices as opposed to many would make updates easier and not have anyone wonder about whether their device will be supported.
I think some of the people who want phones to be released at a slower pace are like me and mostly love tech. Yet we can;t afford the latest and greatest and thus feel left out when something better comes along. It’s like with consoles….you buy a xbox 360/ps3/wii because you LOVE games, you want to see them get better, bigger, faster, but no one in their right mind would want to buy a new console every month just because the new one has 2 extra cores :S
I don’t want tech to slow down, I just want releases to slow down and instead of incremental updates, the next better phone should be a LOT better (xbox->xbox360, ps2 ->ps3, galaxy S-> galaxy SII -> Galaxy SII, not Galaxy ace, galaxy S plus, Galaxy SII advance etc :S)
That is also one of the reasons I currently stick to nexus phones…even though better phones will come along, you have this guarantee that your not immediately out of the game when somehting better comes along.
It would also help a lot if carriers put more effort in upgrading devices to the latest OS
(another even more helpfull thing would be to make em cheaper so I can actually upgrade every 2-3 months :D)
Fewer devices will hopefully mean better and faster updates for the fewer flagship devices. Apple does pretty well being able to focus on their 2-3 devices at a time. Launch 2 flagship phones, a major release and a refresh 6 months later, on all carriers at a time, and make sure they are well tested and well supported. We’ll support a manufacturer who does that.
Great points made Chris. I have a phone that is 2 months old and guess what…it’s not a quad core. It still does everything that I need it to and more and it is a HUGE improvement over my previous phone. What people really get bent out of shape about is Motorolla and the Razr shenanigans. I don’t think you can be mad if you bought a Bionic, but if you bought a Razr for $299 when it first released only to have a much better version (Maxx) announced a few weeks later for the same price you paid, you have reason to be mad. Sure you could pay the $35 restocking fee and swap your phone out, but what is the point Motorolla? So desperate to have something to release at the same time as the Rezound and Nexus? Here is a game changer…release the Razr Maxx with an HD screen 2-3 months after the Rezound/Nexus release and be the must-have phone. The only question on my mind at this point is where can I get one of those sweaters?
I buy the whole argument that you can’t expect to have the latest and greatest device forever and we, as android users, know that we’ll be getting more than one model per year but sometimes it’s just ridiculous. I’ve been a Motorola user since the OG Droid, then the Droid X, then the Bionic, and now the Razr (and throw in a Xoom somewhere in there for good measure). I was livid when I got the Bionic in September and they released the Razr, only slightly better than the Bionic but not plagued by the data issues, 2 months later. So mad in fact that I called up Motorola and got them to swap out my Bionic for a new Razr. That being said, I’m again annoyed at Motorola for releasing the Maxx 2 months after the Razr. The release of the Maxx is a tacit admission by Motorola that they realized the battery for the Razr was too small for a 4G phone and they rethought the device. They should have offered to replace Razrs with Maxxs or mod them at the user’s choice and put in the larger battery and new cover. Being that the Razr and the Maxx have the SAME specs, this isn’t a new and improved phone, it just has a bigger battery, an issue that wouldn’t be present if not for the lack of a removable battery. It’s just a kick in the teeth for those who buy these products thinking that the company will stand behind their products once released. I’m seriously considering jumping on the Samsung train for my next phone, the only thing that keeps me with Motorola is their build quality and radios far outpace the competition, at least in my experience.
Problem is, unlike other technologies, cell phones have there own little eco-system that you cant really diversify like other technologies. Heres my point:
I have an OG Galaxy S. The fiance just bought the Galaxy S II so she can actually have flash on it (the LED camera flash). Now the jump from one to ther other is crazy. Twice the processor and even faster speed. Twice the memory, bigger screen and better colors and resolution. The difference in just a little over a year and a half (for us as owners) is insane! No other teh area advances on ALL fronts this quickly.
Now take for example video cards, TVs or even HDDs. 2 1/2 years ago a 1.5 TB HDD was good with a lot of storage. Now a 3-4TB is the peak, but still not crazy in terms of how fast its growing. TVs havent gotten any larger (to an extent). Technology is better, but its not like resolution has changed. Its not twice as fast or anything else (not turing this into a debate, just opinions).
The problem with the cell phone issue is the technology is changing so fast that you cant utilize the fact the older, last year technology is now cheaper. You dont see an OG Galaxy S for $100-$200 (which it should be) with NO CONTRACT. Instead, you get tech that keeps changing so rapidly with no real guidlines…you end up with a market flooded with phones that all have different capabilities and you cant compare one to the other.
Imagine buying TVs that work with your service provider only, imagine how stressed out you would be when shopping for one. The phone industry has the added layer of confusion and frustration as it has to be paired with a service provider
Good article, but i think it misses a couple things with its focus purely on the “latest and greatest” aspect of things. The reason people want less options has nothing really to do with the amount of devices there is on the market and the hardware inside of them. It has to do with the service and support the OEMs/carriers are currently providing. The reason the Gnexus is doing well is because it will get updates quickly, and great support. The reason apple phones do so well is because they have very clear choices and they all get updates at the same time. The OEM that comes out and only supports vanilla Android and gets all of its phones updated within 2 months of each OS release will kill off all the other brands.
So while I think you are right somewhat about latest and greatest… I think it doesnt have to do with the hardware. It has to do with the software and support. While you can get custom roms, etc, etc,.. Alot of people dont want to mess with that.
If for example, motorola was to drop all the custom UI stuff and only create 2 phones (Droid and Razr) and come out with 1 new version a year and guarantee the current and last years phone will get all Android updates within 2 months of release they will get massive sales.
Root. Mod. Hack. Rom.
maybe it’s just me, but the talented Dev Pool seems to be getting watered down. The devs are split up by a number of different phones, and some of them abandon their rom projects for different or newer phones as quickly as they come out. This is the downside…
Agreed. That’s why I’ll only buy phone that i know will be very popular, and have a large dev community. Pretty much anything from samsung…
See… i refuse to buy Samsung. Everyone one I know that has had a Samsung phone all have has nothing but problems. Does not matter what provider. I know over 20 people that are done with Samsung. I had a captivate and had to trade it 3 times to get a working one.
The Stratosphere says “hi”… and wonders why nobody is paying attention to it…
There are so many android devices being released and I don’t believe it will slow down any time soon! I always keep up to date with the latest mobile phones to make sure I don’t miss anything new…
I’m with you Chris. On its own, a newer device coming out right after mine doesn’t bother me. What does bother me though is how this release schedule affects their ability to support my device; if my device has some glaring issue that remains uncorrected when the manufacturer’s next device comes out… THAT bothers me.
Support is a very valid issue but a whole ‘nother horse of a different color. You might have given me another idea for my next vid ;D
I’ll never go contract again, you can find much cheaper and better ways to go.
How? Your monthly fees are still the same price.
All I have to say is: Get used to the increasing pace of change. There’s a little thing called “The Law of Accelerating Returns”, and it’s not going to stop progressing just for you and your ‘butthurt’ feelings about not having the latest and greatest for more than a couple months at most.
If you do get ‘butthurt’ when trumped by new tech, you need to be off-contract and reselling on ebay ASAP in order to put that used value toward a new trade-up (and you need to have money to ‘waste’ doing so).
One more thing…… butthurt marklar marklar, butthurt? butthurt.
Reselling and trading up? Do you think regular people want to be doing that just to get some new features/security fixes? No. They’ll just go to a platform that’s supported like iOS or WP7.
The high-end launches were gated last year by ATT LTE network roll-out (ATT wanted lots of new devices available when LTE went live) causing a glut of new devices. There was also a big push from Verizon to have a variety of LTE phones introduced for the Holiday season…again a glut.
Wow great article chris love the cod on my next gen cell phone part, i love tech im with you on this im a tech enthusiast 1st, then android/high end pc.
It’s not about “status symbol”, I think most Android users care most about updates. And when a company puts out 25 phones in 6 months the odds that they will update your phone to the latest Android version is VERY low. I’m not mad that my phone is .2ghz slower, I’m mad because they’ve already abandoned it and it will never see another update until I upgrade in 2 years.
I think the updates are more of the issue for me as well. I’m happy as long as the phone does what it is supposed to do but not getting updates is upsetting, particularly when they are security updates and the like. Those kind of updates should never be delayed. Major OS updates are cool to get and we know that the more phones a manufacturer makes, the less likely it will be that an “older” phone will get such an update.
Agreed. Wouldnt matter if they come out with a new phone every 5 days as long as they continue to support software upgrades on the device. Abandoning a device less than 2.5 years is unacceptable. Especially for a device that costs more than 500 dollars off contract.
i say 1.5 – 2 years is optimal, sometimes these phones are actually physically outdated hardware wise after that time period. 2.5 years pushes it quite a bit. iPhones don’t even REALLY get that much support, hell, after one year the iPhone 4 still only received PART of ios5
It’s like when Acer releases the new A200, which has IDENTICAL specs as the A500 (they’re both Tegra 2). Except the “benefit” of the a200 is that it will get ICS. Here’s an idea, just put ICS on the a500 and quit screwing your customers.
dude, that’s what ROMs are for.
I get so sick of that response. That and “just root it”. I’m a nerd who builds my own computers and loves all things tech, and I find rooting and installing roms a hassle. My phone has way more random force closes and restarts than it had on the stock rom and overall I just don’t enjoy it. It’s a solution I guess, but I’d still just much rather have my phone updated by the manufacturer. Like it SHOULD be.
“Just root it” if it hurts you that bad.
Sweet cardigan dude
Chris, thanx for sharing in the video. I could bich and moan about the Vibrant but I’m not. I’m just gonna say that my Galaxy S II is so bad ass that I really wouldn’t care if they dropped a T-Mobile Galaxy S II HD tomorrow complete with ICS.
My 4.5″ SuperAMOLED Plus screen is top notch and I know that ICS is coming. Of course I will change phones when I get the opportunity but I won’t (and don’t) feel left behind just because something better is available.
Everything else is just icing on an already delicious cake.
Yes!
I did a video about this that was (kinda) triggered by your video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ktoalz6PbXc
Feel free to embed if you want. Good conversation!
I don’t get butthurt when a new phone comes out that’s better than mine, but I do expect the OEMs to support their phones for 18 months minimum with software updates and bug fixes. Bionic owners probably aren’t too happy that the RAZR is going to get ICS before them.
This is the main reason why I bought the Galaxy Nexus, because most of a phones longevity is directly due to the support it receives throughout its life cycle.
Did people complain in the 90s and early 00s that every 3-6 months a new CPU was released that was phenomenally better than the one you just purchased, or that the vendors/oems had so many models? Of course not. Can a vendor risk their entire future lineup on a single product or chip? Of course. There will always be overlapping products and there will always be project/schedule delays pushing out releases.
In theory one day you could get a build-to-order smartphone like Gateway & Dell made famous for PCs. We already see nice competition for core comopents {cpu, cpu count, graphics, memory speed, memory size, rom size) and features (io port selection, remove storage, unlockable sim card, global ready attena, 4g) to make this idea feasible.
In the PC industry there are many computers that are similar/same feature-set on paper, yet we decide between them. How? Brand allegiance, Customer Support rankings, User Reviews, Build Quality, Bloatware, Price, etc.
One thing that can be confusing though is how flat the prices are. Phones that are incredibly different in age & features are often not priced far apart by the carriers. This is misleading, because this is possible by the long contracts. I think that if contracts were significantly shorter (e.g. 6 months), phone price disparity would be increasingly evident. Also, a smartphone priced the same as a feature/flip phone requires the additional data plan …
In the end, if you’re the kind of person that isn’t happy unless your toys are better than everyone else’s, than you’ve got bigger problems that need to be addressed :)
The issue it comes down to is support. You’re it getting security fixes and/or new features fast enough. A commenter above said that just because they release fewer phones doesn’t mean technology won’t keep progressing at its current rate, their will just be bigger jumps in technology with each new release.
Yes.
Short answer: Yes!! long answer HELL YES!!!
I think that the carriers, manufacturers and google are all out of sync. Google is releasing new versions too often, rather than completely fixing what is wrong with the current iterations. The result is that the manufacturers are releasing phones with the old os on it, like now where there are phones being launched with gingerbread even though ICS has been out for 2 months. With the breakneck speed of phone development and google’s OS releases, most of these phones are abandoned and will never see updates.
Chris, you’ve officially regained baby-making status with me. Thank you for this little Op/Ed. I’m with you 100%. Tech evolves quickly. Instead of complaining about that, how about we do something about our 24-month jail sentences instead?
Cut your hair Chris. You look like Japanimation.
Yea that hairstyle is wild.
“Are Android Devices Launching Too Quickly? ”
No … shit…
Yes. That is all.
I’m always interested in new phones that come out, and it rarely bothers me at all, I see a lot of positives to quick turn arounds for new phones the evolution of devices speeds up, however the only valid point I see is updates and that’s about making sure since I have a two year contract that my phone is kept up to date as much as possible, and the flood of new phones make that very difficult for any manufacturer to keep up with and lots of phones get left behind and that’s true of high end phones, entry and med level phones have very little chance of getting decent updates, I always try to suggest to friends to purchase the high end android phone because over the course of a 2 year contract the difference in price is small and they will get much better support from the manufacturer
I have one friend who bought a samsung continuum, she’s stuck on eclair her I feel really bad for.
That said I’m rocking my t-bolt and probably 70% of phandroid users have a better phone than me but it’s ok, after lots of updates and some custom roms it’s the best smartphone I’ve owned , aside from the battery life of course, though it’s at least a lot better after all of the software upgrades
At first,I think it was exciting to have so many good phones out so often,but now its almost irritating. I think that “arms race” was a good way to describe it.
And I do feel bad,in a way,for the people who buy a phone for $300the and see the phone get marked down to $200 a month later because better phones have already came out. And you find out you could gave gotten the same phone fir %$100 less if you waited a month (see DROID razor
Hey Chris, thanks for the video. Regarding the part where you’re trying to rationalize why people get upset, and you’re asking whether it’s because they see their device as a status symbol, or they think it’s suddenly obsolete: I think it has nothing to do with that.
As a consumer who just bought a gadget from CompanyX, I did them a favor by giving them my business, and I expect to get their best work out of it. When CompanyX releases an updated version a month later with better features, for the same price I just payed, I think it’s very disingenuous and disrespectful to the customer. Why should their best customer–the one who bought their latest product first–get the shortest end of the stick? Why should that customer be stuck without all those useful features? And why should the customer have any grain of respect left for CompanyX after this experience?
Apple customers always know that when they buy the latest iPhone, they’re getting the culmination of Apple’s hard work and dedication. They know this for a fact, and Apple backs it up by not releasing another one for another whole year.
I don’t think anyone’s arguing over .2Ghz or quad core vs. dual core processors. We all know that processors have nothing to do with our phone experience, until they become a bottleneck (which isn’t the case with decent phones). My Galaxy Nexus could have a 1Mhz processor in it for all I care, as long as the experience of using the phone is the same (scrolling and games run normally).
That said, I enjoyed your video and you’re a cool guy.
That’s life my friend. Thing’s get updated, the 2010 Camaro is more powerful and cheaper and gets better mileage than the 2009 version. But you cannot compare Apple to Android as a whole. iPhone is apple’s flagship phone. So you can only compare iPhones to Android flagship phones like the Nexus or Galaxy S. If you decide to buy a random run in the mill android phone then you should know you arent buying the company’s full attention.
Do you think Ford gives the Fiesta as much love as it gives the Mustang?
See: Galaxy S 2, Galaxy S 2 Skyrocket, Galaxy S 2 Skyrocket HD.
I disagree with this article 100%. The technology is moving faster than Google or even manufacturers. You’re JUST getting GPU acceleration now, apps are beginning to be coded for dual-core processors and we’re already on the fringe of quad-core. What the hell do we need quad-core for right now? Android games aren’t exactly taxing like Infinity Blade 2.
Does anyone think the iPhone will have quad-core, or that it will need it? How about WP7? Android is moving at break neck speed and when you’re already not getting updates for 3-5 months after its been released then the platform has a problem.
For one, Hardware only limits software. No one is going to produce an app that will take advantage of multicore processors if multicore processors arent available. That would just be a waste of resources.
Also, i dont think you get all the good things about quad core. Having multiple cores isnt just for power. It can significantly improve battery life. quad core can flexible meaning you can increase the performance immensely or you can maintain the current performance and increase the battery life immensely. Imagine what the Droid razr Maxx could do if it was quad core? I’m thinking maybe 2 full days of battery? I don’t know why one would be against such a thing. My phone is on 30% when i get home from work and i keep my internet off.
With capable hardware capable software will follow. Yes releasing the same exact product with 10 variations is annoying. But if each release offers a significant improvement im all for it. I dont see why if my contract ends in september i should have to wait until January to get a phone im looking forward to if its ready now.
The way i see it, is no matter when your contract is up, there will be a new phone waiting for you.
You only get those advantages if Android is coded to support quad-core, and if apps themselves are too. Just throwing a quad- or octo-core onto a phone doesn’t bring instant results.
The same thing was said about dual core last year and I saw very little improvement going from my old G2 to my Sensation.
Again, why would android be coded with it, if the hardware didnt exist yet?
Once the hardware is available, then the coding will be made. ICS supports multiple cores doesnt it? The vast majority of dual core phones will be getting upgraded to ICS (the time it takes to upgrade is a whole other discussion).
I work in the computer animation. And what the software can do is always limited to the hardware you have available. It takes advantage of the resources available. So with more resources available, more innovation can be made software wise.
Quad core will be upon us in a few short months. I don’t know if ICS is coded
Because android hardware is progressing faster than its software. Google has had to reduce the amount of updates they release because OEMs are having a hard time updating phones, and devs are not using the resources available to them.
Dual core was out for at least 8 months before Google got around to supporting dual-core, so the benefit of using it wasn’t there for early adopters. Same thing for quad. Until the benefit is immediately available, there’s no point to quad core, especially if we don’t know that it won’t be detrimental to overall UX because it’s not optimized just yet.
ICS supports multiple core processing. This includes dual core as well as quad core. You can say it took google 8 months to be optimized for multicore processing, but dual core phones have been performing better than single core phones since launch. It just had to wait for the next update in order to be more supported by the OS for further performance enhancement and features to maximize multicore potential. And by no means will a quad core processor make a phone worse. Worse case scenario would be slim to no benefits across most situations.
Your reasoning for updates taking longer due to too much advancement doesnt sound quite right. Its the multiple types of hardware AND software skins ontop of stock android that cause delays. Not the advancement in technology. Google apparently releases the source code for their next OS version after they are already in the late stages of development for their own handset. That headstart, plus the skins like motoblur, and sense, and touchwhiz slow things down. Because if Asus can come out with a vanilla ICS device in a month and change with quad core, than why cant everyone else?
Not exactly because of advancement is the updates process slowed down but because of 1) your point about the multiple hardware types and skins as well as 2) the sheer number of SKUs that need to be updated, tested and then rolled out.
That’s still more heavily weighted on the skins if anything hardware. If they can roll out 8 gingerbread devices in any given year with different hardware, then they can roll out 8 updates in any given year. Asus has two separate hardwares running ICS in under a month and a half and other companies still don’t have one device updated. What’s the difference? Asus doesn’t skin its tablets.
I’m not saying separate hardwares doesn’t slow things down a little, but it isn’t the main reason updates take so long. Carriers just seem to focus more on pumping out new devices and updating takes a backseat. That’s why devices are planned on coming out with ICS (separate hardware as well) before models that have been out are updated.
Disagree completely with that. Updating 8 phones involves testing and bug fixing 8 phones. Regardless of what they’re updating it still has to be tested thoroughly by OEM and carrier. If, however four flagship phones are released then it reduces the amount of work that needs to be done. Longer development times instead of incremental updates benefit OEMs and customers (less confusion, faster updates). Why do you think Moto and HTC are going in that direction now?
OEMs probably will not be releasing stock ICS on a massive scale, as Motorola I believe, came out and said that carriers want differentiation and won’t stock phones that all look alike.
So you are saying that newly created ICS devices do not need to be tested and bug fixed? Or that the Transformer and Transformer Prime didnt needed to be tested and bug fixed? Yet one was the first non Google to receive ICS and the other was updated to ICS a few weeks after. Now if Asus can produce a brand new device and test it, and update an old device 2 weeks later and test it. 2 separate devices tested and released before the end of January and another was announced to be in development. So why hasn’t samsung released one ICS sandwich one now in february?
Different hardwares can only be an excuse when everyone has trouble when it takes everyone 8 months to update. When non skinned devices can pop up in under 2 months but only skinned devices take between 4-10 months depending on the company than we have our common denominator.
Yes different hardwares are an issue, but if skins didnt exist, updates would hardly be that much of a problem.
It’s still MORE devices to update. How many android products does Asus have? Two? Three? Samsung has a metric shit ton of devices to update and test. Asus can devote resources to their product lines more effectively to update quicker. Samsung on the other hand has to spread their engineers more thinly to update more products. This is where a strategy of no incremental phone releases every couple months helps.
I understand what you are saying. And I agree with you to a certain extent. But i disagree with you on two aspects. One being that the number of handsets and hardware advancement don’t go hand in hand. Samsung has a metric ton of devices yes, but most of those arent high end smart phones. They are low end budget devices that won’t be receiving any updates and i do not mind that. Samsung only upgrades a handful of highend devices to ICS. That would be what, the GS2 and maybe 2 other random devices? So lets even say they have what 6 devices they are upgrading? And half of those are variants of the same device. That still wouldn’t take 8 months for their first handset to be updated if hardware was the only concern. If they just updated one phone at a time. They would be able to knock out a device every 6 weeks. That would have the GS2 already updated, and they’d be working on the others right now.
The amount of handsets should only dictate how long it takes for all of your line up to be upgraded, not how long it takes for your most recent handset to be upgraded.
Quality over quantity
NO! MOAR!!!!!
I’m so confused with all the releases, I won’t get any.
Chris! I have that same cookie jar!!! I got it for christmas from my girlfriend!
Best phone out is still the s2 doesn’t matter if it doesn’t have 720p screen. Came out like how many months ago and no other phone besides the galaxy note can touch the power of the exynos.
Who cares dude. What are you doing with your phone that you’re maxing out the Exynos? What can the Exynos do that other processors can’t right now?
I’m all for technology moving as quickly as possible. As you mention, it leads to better competition which drives innovation and brings costs down. However, releasing fewer devices doesn’t necessarily mean technology moves slower. Technology could still be released in the same timeframe it would just mean there were larger technology differences between each handset. More frequently released handsets would have smaller technology jumps between handsets.
Great point.
shoutouts to cardigans
YES! FOR GODS SAKES YES THEY ARE!
ICS is out.. why is ANYONE developing phones for Gingerbread still. WHY?! Why do phones still have capacitive buttons?
Mobile developers are basically just screwing EVERYONE over.
I was up for my “new every two” back at the beginning of january, but this race to be the best is ridiculous and actually motivating me to wait because no one has done anything interesting yet.
There’ve been plenty of devices I want out there, but none that are worth jumping ship, cause something new is gonna come out in 3 weeks.
And I have the Xperia x10, so that says something, that I’m dealing with this POS instead of jumping on a new phone, because there’s always something missing.