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ICS - is it worth updating??

P

peterc10

Android Enthusiast
My unbranded and unlocked UK Sensation is telling me that I can update to ICS. But I have been readings about lots of problems. So should I update or not? Are the improvements worth the hassle or should I wait until the bugs are fixed.

I need to be able to continue to send and receive emails and play music (using MixZing). I also need to make sure that the following apps and/or widgets work properly:

  • Sygic sat nav,
  • Train Times
  • 3G watchdog
  • London Tube Status
  • ezPDF
  • Dolphin Browser
  • Agenda Widget
  • Swiftkey

If you are using any of these with ICS I would be really grateful if you could confirm whether or not they are working OK. Also will I be able to restore the apps I have backed up onto the SD card using Astro please? I know I can redownload from the Market (or whatever it is called now) but one or two are no longer available and with some others I prefer the older versions.

Thanks for any help you can give me
 
In the UK, unbranded Sensation and have ICS.
There were problems, mostly to do with rebooting for an hour - pulled the battery to stop it.
Go Launcher and HTC battling it out as to what was going to come on top.

As for your apps, I use the following with no probs
Navigon SatNav (know you have Sygic) but should be OK
3G watchdog,
London Tube and a variety of others for the bus as well, all work OK
Dolphin Browser, works as well.
I have swiftkey but use Slideit and that works fine. Can give swiftkey a go if you want, not a problem.
I have a pdf viewer (can't remember the name), not used it yet, so cant say.

Hope that helps.

May be worth noting that older apps may not be compatible (as you are sort of suggesting) so the only way to know would be to actually try it.

No idea how you could go back to older version of Android unless you are on a rooted phone.

Personally speaking, my Sensation was working OK before and I don't see any great improvement to be honest for 'day to day' use. Maybe a little more smoother flicking from screen to screen, I use Go launcher have 9 Home screens and they flick around pretty smooth. Battery is much the same, battery ran down much more quickly at the start but has settled down now.
I use Live wallpapers and they seem more smooth.

That's about it, I think.
 
From my own experience I would say no. Wait for another update from HTC to iron out all the bugs.

Here's the problems Ive noticed since updating to ICS.

Every time I restart the phone it it comes up with Android is updating apps. From reading online this is a common problem. If you tick fastboot it doesnt do this, but thats a work around and not a fix as fastboot only puts the phone in hibernate mode it doesnt actually shut it down properly, so it hasnt actually fixed the problem.

Wifi turns itself on at will, although only during the night time hours (after midnight).

No matter what message alert I set, it always plays the same one (not the set one) when I receive a message.

Stock browser has slight lag on pinch to zoon compared to before, and doesnt line the text up correctly as it did before update.

Battery seems slightly worse.

No powersave options anymore.

Cheers
 
Thanks to both of you for the helpful replies. Anybody else got any thoughts please? What about reinstalling existing apps using Astro?
 
I haven't really had many problems since I re-calibrated my battery. I was having terrible battery life in the beginning, but once I fully discharged and recharged it I actually have much improved battery life. The crashes in HTC sense still happen, but I'm using Apex Launcher now and that's a lot better in every way, plus you get the traditional ICS app drawer.
I'm also refusing to use the stock browser until they implement the quick control semicircle, so I'm using ICS Browser+. I love both that and Apex, and both of those are only available on ICS. I say to go ahead with it.

Note: I'm running Vodafone firmware.
 
Thanks for that. For me the whole point of having an HTC was to have HTC Sense, otherwise I could have got a cheaper Android phone. I just prefer many of the widgets - and I have seen and used other non-sense equivalents but they are just not as good for me. And I am having no problem with Sense at the moment - the phone is working how I want it with no crashes.

I suspect I would rather have my existing Android 2.3.4 with Sense than have ICS without Sense. And once I have upgraded I can't go back (at least not without a lot of hassle).

Do you have any screen shots of the Apex launcher please? I can't try it on my phone because (I guess) it is only available for ICS. Also what do you mean by the traditional ICS app drawer please?

I would not use the stock browser anyway, because I am so used to Dolphin now, which I like.
 
UK,Vodafone
I updated a few days ago, at first I liked it but that was probably because it was something "different" but now I hate it.. it has slowed my phone down A LOT lagging all the time, when browsing web it takes a few seconds to stabilize regardless which browser I use.. the only good thing I can say about it is the unlocking phone with your face but even that gets annoying. Because of this I have decieded I'm going to root my phone and get a custom ROM and speed up the processor ;)
 
I must be one of the few, standard phone no farting about with files just added and removed apps and music, upgrade has been trouble free yes I get the "Android is updating apps" but hey I only reboot my phone every week or two, battery life seems no different having said that i have been using it much more since the upgrade so I assume it is actually better but no evidence, I have had absolutely no random wifi turning on since I found out an excersize app was doing it and trying to text an italian number??? (I got rid if that app PDQ) no brobs since i am impressed with ICS.
The face recognition is pants I put my glasses on or off and i become a stranger to my own phone and no good in less than decent light! I never had it before and really who wants to stare into their phone every time they use it unless vanity is your bag
 
I would say no (im on branded UK Vodafone)

Even after a factory reset my Sensation is VERY sluggish and runs VERY low on RAM. Gmail app can take up to 3 seconds to load, stock SMS app often takes over 1 second. Stock 'People' app takes several seconds.

The Sensation was already bogged down with the previous Sense UI in my opinion and having Sense 3.6 and ICS is too much for it.

(It would probably run sweet on a Quad Core One X with lots of RAM)
 
peterc10 said:
Thanks for that. For me the whole point of having an HTC was to have HTC Sense, otherwise I could have got a cheaper Android phone. I just prefer many of the widgets - and I have seen and used other non-sense equivalents but they are just not as good for me. And I am having no problem with Sense at the moment - the phone is working how I want it with no crashes.

I suspect I would rather have my existing Android 2.3.4 with Sense than have ICS without Sense. And once I have upgraded I can't go back (at least not without a lot of hassle).

Do you have any screen shots of the Apex launcher please? I can't try it on my phone because (I guess) it is only available for ICS. Also what do you mean by the traditional ICS app drawer please?

I would not use the stock browser anyway, because I am so used to Dolphin now, which I like.
Click to expand...
Android Police did a hands-on with it (although it's received a few minor improvements since): [Hands-On] Apex Launcher For Android 4.0 Devices Leaves Beta And Hits The Store, Brings Numerous Features To ICS Devices

If you want me to do some screenshots of my own set-up for you after you've looked at that, let me know.
 
My Vodafone sensation was laggy after the update, but have just done a factory reset as recommended by Vodafone and it seems like it is back to normal. They recommend this to clear out any files and to complete the update process.

Ali
 
it will wipe everything but the songs pictures etc on the card, (there is a tick box at the bottom of the page for the reset which can erase the card, just make sure this is not ticked) it will be the same as when you first bought the phone. contacts etc on the sim should be fine. make sure you back anything you want to keep.

it is a bit drastic but it has fixed the problems i had after the upgrade.

Ali
 
hairless said:
I must be one of the few, standard phone no farting about with files just added and removed apps and music, upgrade has been trouble free yes I get the "Android is updating apps" but hey I only reboot my phone every week or two, battery life seems no different having said that i have been using it much more since the upgrade so I assume it is actually better but no evidence, I have had absolutely no random wifi turning on since I found out an excersize app was doing it and trying to text an italian number??? (I got rid if that app PDQ) no brobs since i am impressed with ICS.
The face recognition is pants I put my glasses on or off and i become a stranger to my own phone and no good in less than decent light! I never had it before and really who wants to stare into their phone every time they use it unless vanity is your bag
Click to expand...
You're not alone, I have a stock, unbranded phone, and I've had no problems, seems a bit more fluid, possibly slightly better battery life and apart from Sky Go, all my apps work fine. I've not rebooted since the upgrade, whereas my phone needed a kick up the whatsits every week before. Maybe I don't use it enough :D
 
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