14 DAY TRIAL // Taiwanese mobile phone maker HTC Corporation has finally decided to make available for its HTC Desire users a software update that would bring the Android 2.3 Gingerbread platform on their devices, and also let slip a small detail regarding the update. The handset vendor promised the release of an update to Android 2.3 Gingerbread for this device a few months ago, but it recently seemed to have decided not to release the software.
The company cited issues with the amount of memory that Desire came to the market with, saying that Gingerbread won't fit on this device with the entire Sense UI on board.
[ADMARk=1]However, it seems that they considered it better fit to remove some of the software usually packed with the Gingerbread update, and to release the upgrade to all owners of an original Desire handset.
“To resolve Desire's memory issue and enable the upgrade to Gingerbread, we will cut select apps from the release. Look for status updates starting next week. We apologize for any confusion,” the mobile phone maker announced via Facebook.
A similar situation was met with HTC's first Android-based mobile phones, the HTC Dream (G1) and HTC Magic, which were said at one point two years ago to remain on Android 1.5, but which still tasted OS upgrades afterwards.
Dream and Magic had issues with the memory as well, and it seems that HTC did not learn its lesson at that time, and that newer devices, such as Desire, still experienced similar problems.
HTC Desire was one of the most popular smartphones of the last year, and, while leaving it with an older OS flavor on board might determine users to purchase newer handsets, the move could also hurt sales.
After all, users would rather purchase phones from a company that delivers updates to newer OS flavors than from one that would leave devices running under older software.
With Desire, things have been already settled, and additional details on what will be removed from Gingerbread to make it fit for the device will emerge in the near future.
However, it remains to be seen whether future HTC smartphones will suffer from similar issues or not. Most probably, HTC will not make the same mistake again, especially with Google promising upgrades for at least 18 months for each handset.