Nexus One to get Gingerbread OS?
Twittermill chews over rumours
It seems that the venerable Nexus One might be the first phone to get Gingerbread, if tweets from the Open Handset Alliance are to be believed.
The tweets come from 'Alliance member Alvaro Fuentes Vasquez, who appears to confirm that Gingerbread will be Android version 2.3 and will be available to developers using Nexus One handsets in the next few days.
The Android Police blog, which spotted the tweet, reckons that chimes with earlier rumours and Samsung's announcement scheduled for later today.
That announcement, it seems, will concern the launch of the Nexus Two, to be built by Samsung and (if financial-freebie City AM is to be believed) sold by Carphone Warehouse. The Nexus Two is widely expected to be the first handset to run Gingerbread, but the tweets from Alvaro Fuentes Vasquez warn Nexus One users to be ready for an update:
"Preparen sys Nexus One (Developer version) para la actualización vía OTA de Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) para los próximos días :-D"
...which Android Police helpfully ran though Google Translate to get:
"Prepare your Nexus One (Developer version) for Android OTA update 2.3 (Gingerbread) for the next few days:-D"
That would fit with the screenshots of a Nexus One running Gingerbread that have been knocking around the internet for the last week or so. Such things are easy to fake, but Google has a soft spot for the Nexus One so it's possible that such an update will come, even if the hardware proves underpowered for Gingerbread.
Google's headlong dash to get new versions of Android out doesn't always mean more powerful hardware is needed, as new features or optimisations can do more for existing handsets. Users of those handsets might prefer Google to spend some time fixing existing bugs in retaining cell signals, or enabling the use of web proxies, but that's no fun and the Open Handset Alliance is more interested in features than fixes.
Not that the Open Handset Alliance has much say in the matter: it is supposed to be the governing body for Android development, and Alvaro Fuentes Vasquez is on the Leadership team, but the 'Alliance is little more than a front organisation intended to deflect accusations that Google was trying to take over the (mobile) world. Such accusations never became a problem, though, so the 'Alliance barely gets mentioned these days.
Despite that, it's safe to assume that the Leadership team still gets some attention from Mountain View, so anyone with a Nexus One handy may get the opportunity to be very smug indeed in the next week or so ®.
COMMENTS
Venerable?
A phone that's been out less than a year is venerable? What's a year-and-a-half old phone considered? Doddering?
Most people, most techies even, don't buy a new phone every three months even if tech media people do. Seems to me the Nexus One is still one of the most powerful phones on the market even if it's no longer THE most powerful.
All that aside, I look forward eagerly to Gingerbread, I can't wait to see what it brings to my phone.
Of course it will be on nexus one first
It's been launched less than a year ago and is still quite current hardware.
Of course it will hit the Nexus One first
That was the main advantage of this handset.
I suspect it will be one of the first to get Android 3.x too, Nexus Two or no Nexus Two. Google haven't yet released a version of Android that the older 500MHz handsets can't run so I don't think they'll release one any time soon that the 1GHz Nexus One can't.
After the debacle of all those pre-release firmwares of 2.2 it seems Google have learnt from the experience and kept this release close to their chests. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for Bluetooth HID support and maybe the enabling of the Nexus' FM Radio ;-)
gingerbread what?
that's lovely and all that, but what exactly will gingerbread do for my nexus if & when it turns up? froyo seems to be working quite nicely so far.
