Happens every time, whenever I start thinking android is not that bad I need to actually do something with it. Tonight it was updates. My son got a Samsung galaxy tab 2 from a friend, I was helping him get it ready for a trip. Went into the software updates in settings and clicked update, it said something about registering the device and told me there was an update available, about 250 megs or so. Hm, well should let the happen and 10 minutes or so later it is done. But wait there is another update, this time 30 megs, it finishes and there is another 60 megs. I figure it done after all that, it reboots I hesitantly go into updates and check, and yes there is another one, this time 381 megs. Last one apparently, now the device is fully updated to the previous version of android (4.1). (Just for comparison my iPHone which is 4 generations old is running iOS 6, the latest version).
One more thing, each time, after getting permission to update it downloads the update and then brings up another screen asking to actually do the update which means you cannot leave it unattended. Have to keep checking it which is quite a distraction.
What a ridiculous way of doing updates, reminiscent of another OS that has been a plaque on us for more than 20 years (cough…Windows…cough). I guess this is what we can expect on our mobile devices, another OS that is widely used, difficult to maintain and rarely running the latest OS version. And a pain to update, ever install a new version of Windows? It can take a long time and multiple reboots before it is finally fully updated.
Just for comparison, I could get an iPhone which had not been updated for a long time and it will only take one update and it will be running the latest version it can support. Also, even if the device is somewhat older, say a 4 year old device (3GS) it will be updated to run the latest version of the firmware, sure there are functions that won’t be available since the device is older and won’t support them but it will be running the latest firmware and will able to run the latest apps.
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