Jelly Bean! Jelly Bean! Jelly Bean!

[Mandopicker101]

I guess this means a trip to Cyanogenmod 10 is coming up for my G9 80. Anyone had any experience with CM10? From reading around, I'm not clear if the Archos 3G stick works under CM10. Can anyone say what the situation is right now?

Regards

Gareth

[Marco]

Archos just confirmed in their Facebook page that the G9 series will not receive JB and that firmware 4.0.26 is the last update.

Funny: They just released 4.0.28.
Maybe Archos internal communication wis not exactly the best!? - But I could not find that Facebook statement either: Could you please post a link?

P.S.: I have also opened a new thread to discuss bugs for the new firmware 4.0.28.

Don't know what to say... and good Archos continues to release updates You can see Archos post informing there is no more updates to the G9 series under the comments about the Archos 97 Platinum in their official Facebook page. Here (if this works):

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set= ... omments=58

Have a look and comment please.

[Nightsurfer]

Have a look and comment please.

Thanks for the link: I found the statement from Archos you had quoted before. - It is really amusing that their PR department states "4.0.26 will be the final firmware" just a few hours before they release 4.0.28.

Anyway, what they basically state is: "we have messed up by releasing too many different hardware combinations, so you, our valued(?) customers, have to live with the consequences".
As I have stated before, nobody forces them to release one firmware version that covers all G9 tablets, but they are free to release separate firmwares for the 8" and the 10", for the OMAP4430 and the OMAP4460 CPUs, or for 512MB and 1GB RAM, etc. - Whatever is needed. But I guess that's too much effort for them. (And they have our money already, so why bother?)

Even if they would argue "the very first tablets with 1GHz CPUs and 512MB RAM do not meet the requirements for a JB upgrade", why not at least provide one for the "turbo" models? - It is less than 1 year that these new 1.5GHz models became available, and they cancel their firmware support already???

For the record:

• iPad 2 was released in March 2011 with iOS 4.3, but still gets supplied with firmware updates: the latest one (iOS 6.1.2) has been published just a few days ago, almost 2 years after the release of the product.
• Blackberry Playbook has been available since April 2011. The last firmware update was rolled out on 2/13/2013 (two weeks ago), and the company's CEO has recently re-confirmed that it will even receive the OS10 upgrade later this year.

But Archos seriously states that less than 1.5 years after the 1GHz model was released and even less than 1 year after the 1.5GHz model became available, there won't be any further firmware updates??? - They argue that they have released 15 updates already; but 14 of them were bug fixes, so this is not exactly something they should be proud of!!!

Quite disappointing!

[Nightsurfer]

Today Archos posted on Facebook:

"The G9 Range, originally released in the autumn of 2011, running Honeycomb, saw 16 firmware updates taking it across many versions of Honeycomb and Ice Cream Sandwich, making 4.0.28 the final firmware that will be provided to this device range"

So exactly the same as yesterday, except that they increased the number of updates from 15 to 16 and the firmware revision from 4.0.26 to 4.0.28. No further comment. Nothing! - Who knows, next week they might announce that 4.0.30 is the final version now that the device received 17 updates...

But I do not really care any longer: I know for sure that I won't buy another Archos tablet ever again, no matter how good the technical specifications may look on paper.

[mls]

But I do not really care any longer: I know for sure that I won't buy another Archos tablet ever again, no matter how good the technical specifications may look on paper.

I've never understood why so many people expected (or even wanted) Jelly Bean on their Archos G9 tablets to start with. They were originally made to run Honeycomb, then later upgraded to faster CPU's and 1GB RAM... which is what ICS really needs to run well.

There simply is no logic at all in expecting a device to be infinitely up-gradable. If that were possible I'd still be using my old 286 computer with only 512MB of memory to run Windows 7 on... just not possible!

If you want Jelly Bean you buy a device that comes with it already installed not a device model that's a year and a half old already and expect to upgrade to it. Heck, the average smartphone user replaces their phones every 18 months (or less).

If you want Jelly Bean that badly then why don't you just buy a device that was actually made to run it (hint: Google Nexus 7 or Nexus 10) and move on with your life.

[swaaye]

Lets not defend Archos. If hardware can run 3.0 and 4.0, it can run 4.1 without a doubt.

I have a Samsung Fascinate running 4.1 very well thanks to the community. That's just a single core with 384mb.

Hopefully our XDA guys can figure everything out too. It looks like progress is being made.

[Nightsurfer]

But I do not really care any longer: I know for sure that I won't buy another Archos tablet ever again, no matter how good the technical specifications may look on paper.

I've never understood why so many people expected (or even wanted) Jelly Bean on their Archos G9 tablets to start with.

This is not about Jelly Bean, it's about Archos' credibility: they had officially announced to the press that after they completed the upgrade of their "Gen 10" tablets in December, they would upgrade their "Gen 9" tablets in January. And I can imagine that this was an argument for quite some people to buy a G9 tablet for Christmas... (I just bought a Samsung phone myself when Samsung announced it would get an upgrade from Android 2.3.6 to 4.1.2 very soon; otherwise I would have bought a different one.)
Furthermore, I am not exactly happy with their support (if they replied to my questions at all, their answers were not exactly helpful, like "I will pass this to our development team", but nothing further happened). And while I have to admit that you got some good value for your money a year ago when I bought my G9 tablet, there are many other alternatives available in the meantime, so I don't see any good reason to buy another Archos tablet.

[the_leander]

But I do not really care any longer: I know for sure that I won't buy another Archos tablet ever again, no matter how good the technical specifications may look on paper.

I've never understood why so many people expected (or even wanted) Jelly Bean on their Archos G9 tablets to start with.

This is not about Jelly Bean, it's about Archos' credibility: they had officially announced to the press that after they completed the upgrade of their "Gen 10" tablets in December, they would upgrade their "Gen 9" tablets in January. And I can imagine that this was an argument for quite some people to buy a G9 tablet for Christmas... (I just bought a Samsung phone myself when Samsung announced it would get an upgrade from Android 2.3.6 to 4.1.2 very soon; otherwise I would have bought a different one.)
Furthermore, I am not exactly happy with their support (if they replied to my questions at all, their answers were not exactly helpful, like "I will pass this to our development team", but nothing further happened). And while I have to admit that you got some good value for your money a year ago when I bought my G9 tablet, there are many other alternatives available in the meantime, so I don't see any good reason to buy another Archos tablet.

This. I'm on my second G9 after the first was replaced by the shop I bought it from. That was in august. 4.0.7 was the last fully functional firmware released for the 80 classic and whilst .28 goes a long way to returning the device to the pinnacle it once enjoyed, it isn't there yet. For a 6 month old device to have its support cut is frankly outrageous. Worse, without bug fixes, it leaves effectively factory fresh devices in danger of being becoming vulnerable to malware as time goes on.

As others have said, there is no reason why they couldn't have made model specific patches for the same amount of effort they did trying to build a universal package. That was a choice that has consistently bitten them.

Archos are on very thin ice on this one, not just morally, but legally as well because if flaws aren't fixed that are then exploited rendering it unsafe to use online, potentially they will fall foul of the sales of goods act here in the UK (unfit for purpose). Google release bug and security fixes for almost all their versions of Android, there simply isn't any excuse.

All in all I'd say at this point I'm actively looking for a mid term replacement and without 3G, the xs and variants aren't in the running. Hell, given this, I would have to think long and hard about another Archos device again, regardless of their bang for buck - as Android becomes more mainstream it'll become a more of a target for virus writers, only those companies who continue to offer security fixes (at the very least) should be considered.

Peace out.