6 January 2010 15:24 GMT / By Dan Sung
Google's Andy Rubin caused a bit of a stir at last night's Nexus One conference when he said that everyone will be getting Android 2.1 when it's open source - i.e. in the next couple of days. This will be music to the ears of Android early adopters everywhere but, according to other sources, not all of the previous handsets will be reaping the benefits.
What's clear so far is that both the HTC Magic and HTC Hero will be going straight 2.1 without bothering with any version in between at all. The Magic will also get the benefit of the HTC Sense custom UI according to some. The HTC Dream or G1, however, will not be able to cope with the 3D graphics and will stay put at Donut (version 1.6).
We also know that the Motorola Milestone (Droid) will be the next to get Android 2.1, but there's no confirmation as yet as to whether the DEXT will benefit too. Again, there's no reason why the Samsung Galaxy shouldn't receive the update but in the mean time we've contacted HTC, Motorola and Samsung for confirmation. We'll update you when we know for sure.
UPDATE: There's no comment for the time being from Motorola on the DEXT or the timeline for the upgrade on the Milestone, but Samsung has got back on its position with the following statement:
"Future Samsung devices using the Android platform will carry or enable an upgrade path to the latest Android software".
Unfortunately, this doesn't tell us much about the Galaxy and its careful omission in these words doesn't bode well considering the suggestion from O2 that the Galaxy hardware is not equipped to run the new software. This detail has not been confirmed by Samsung.
Either way, the continuance of better and better software does rather leave phone manufacturers in a tricky situation as it's effectively asking them to produce future-proof handsets if they're expected by the public to keep up.
Phones, Software, Android, HTC, HTC Magic, HTC Hero, G1, Motorola Milestone, Nexus One, Google
Five tips for photographing snow Exposure, contrast, light, kit and point of view
Nikon D800 pictures and hands-on Full frame camera in the flesh
Nikon D700 vs Nikon D800 New and improved?
