I'm so grateful...

[Heretic1989]

that i'm not an early adopter.

[AZSALUKI]

hahaha......people beg for these updates, while i decline them for as long as i can.

[Heretic1989]

Especially when it comes to the phones.   Now when it comes to the software update(s), aka OTA. I raised an eyebrow when i saw that JB 4.1 came out 7/12. Then JB 4.2 came out 11/12. I bought my phone the inc 4g 12/12.

But when i saw that google has recently come out with 4.4 (kitkat). Forget those previous updates. Now i want kitkat. And here's what i call the kicker. 4.4 may fit any phone, or least a smartphone that has 512 or more of MB of RAM.

http://au.ibtimes.com/articles/507513/20130920/android-4-kitkat-chocolate-hope-top-8.htm#.UoFv5Pmsj0...

[AZSALUKI]

it "can," but i don't know that a 512 device "will" run it well. the tbolt eventually got ICS, and it ran pretty poorly on it. it was capable of handling it, per the required specs, but it ran badly. plus, if it's not the vanilla android, then the requirements could be much more. when you load Sense or Touchwiz, you're adding a lot of stuff on top of android, so i'm not expecting to see too many 512mb RAM devices getting kitkat.

[Heretic1989]

Too bad we won't see a vanilla android phone on Verizon anytime soon. As a matter of fact, i'll be surprised if such a phone is sold by Verizon. You mentioned the thunderbolt and how an update(s) made it run badly. That's a big part that most people don't realize. Half of the issues with updates is that the phone is trying to run old data through new software. The phone needs to be wiped. Of course backing up everything is a must. Once the phone is wiped, it'll start functioning the way it was meant to.

[AZSALUKI]

oh trust me, i wiped it....before i took the update and after (more than once, in vain attempts to get it to run smoother). it was simply an update that should have never happened. it was pushed nearly a year and a half after ICS rolled out. they should have just given up on it, as i'm guessing it took so long because they had too many issues with it.

[Heretic1989]

Hi AZSALUKI. When you first mentioned the Tbolt i didn't check out the specs for it. I checked them out and now i know why that ICS update didn't do it any justice. I noticed it has a single core processor. No wonder it's slow, or lags. Ouch.

Now it does have 768 mb of ram, which in this day and age isn't really a lot. Now according to google, kitkat will fit any phone that has at least 512 mb of ram. Even if that's true, i don't believe 4.4 will do justice to a phone with a single core processor.

By the way, my phone (inc 4g) has a dual core processor (1200 mhz, krait) and 1024 mb of ram and 8192 mb rom.

[AZSALUKI]

i have the note II now so it will be fine. i just think that "if" some of the older, low end devices try to load 4.4, there's going to be problems. i like the concept of streamlining an OS so that some of these $99 tablets can handle it. i just don't know if it will work well vs. just sticking to an older OS. i think google's best bet is to continue doing what they are doing, by breaking out apps from the OS itself, and putting them in the play store as stand alone apps. that way, if there's particular apps that you want to update, you can just do it that way (like get the new hangouts, but keep the old version of others that you don't use, for example).