Side update, there are good students and bad. To be first in the class, Xiaomi announced on Weibo that forty models in its catalog would receive an update to MIUI 9.0. But this one is based on Nougat …
The average of updates for an Android smartphone is two years. There may be better. But there can also be a lot less good. If the high-end terminals are rather well regarded low-cost models, they are very quickly abandoned (when they are not outright marketed with an outdated version of the Google OS and left well). Few feel the effect of an update. HMD is among those who want to look good (with technical support that even covers the entry level, such as Nokia 2 and Nokia 3). And in between, it depends on a lot of the selling price and the commercial popularity of the phone …
It’s not a wave anymore; it’s a tsunami!
Xiaomi, who made a smashing comeback in the top of the world rankings (with a second place in India delighted by the nose and beard of Oppo and Vivo), must now meet international standards in terms of update of its products (a reflection that Huawei had last year and which led to more updates).
And to show that it can do as well, or better than the others, the start-up of Lei Jun has communicated on its Weibo account the complete list of all mobiles in its catalog that will receive an update to MIUI 9.0, the latest version of its custom ROM. And this list has about forty terminals. Nothing else. Even Samsung does not do as much!
Mobiles that date from 2012 and 2013 included
We find pell-mell the range of Mi and Redmi of 2017, but also those of 2015, 2014 and some of the iconic models of 2013 and 2012, not to mention tablets. Because, yes, some mobiles of this list date from more than five years ago. Even Apple, which has the reputation of maintaining support for iPhone longer than the average, does not arrive so far. Forty terminals at once, it obviously requires respect.
There are all the iconic mobiles in this list, such as Mi A1, Mi Note 3, Mi Mix and Mix 2, Mi 6, Mi Pad 9.7, Mi Pad 2 and Mi Pad 3, Redmi Pro, Mi 5 and Mi 5s, and even the Redmi 1S. The oldest is the Mi 2, officialized in August 2012 with an antique Snapdragon S4 Pro, 2GB of RAM and 16GB of storage. Note that some of the models listed (which you can find by following the link above) have already been updated.
Updated to … Nougat?
Behind this enthusiasm born of the goodwill of Xiaomi regarding technical support, we must, however, temper slightly. Because the 40 terminals will not know Oreo. Because the latest version of the Xiaomi ROM is based on Android 7.x Nougat. Yes, where the rub is that Xiaomi is behind a major version.
And at a time when security breaches threaten the protection of personal data in smartphones (we are talking about Spectrum and Meltdown obviously), see landing an old version of Android, as customized as it is, is not necessarily good news. Let’s hope we do not have to wait a year before seeing Oreo arrive at the Chinese brand.
