Back in December Sony Mobile had revealed its Android 4.1 Jelly Bean update roll out schedule for a range of Xperia handsets. The firmware update for devices like the Xperia T, Xperia TX and Xperia V was to start during February and March. Now when it is still January, Sony has released an Alpha build of Android 4.1 Jelly Bean firmware for the Xperia T.
If you got this device, there is no need to be excited as the ROM is meant for advanced users and ROM developers and is in no way meant for daily usage. One good thing that this alpha build clearly indicates is that the final Jelly Bean update for Xperia T is not very far.
Sony’s official Developer Blog says:
We’re now making an early alpha ROM of Jelly Bean (Android 4.1) available for Xperia™ T, along with the open source archive, as a way for us to get valuable feedback from the custom ROM community (although we are not far away from the official release of JB for Xperia™ T). Thanks to the great dialogue we have with open community developers, we see this as a great way for us to get input, and for the open developer community to get to try this alpha out hands-on.
Sony has taken sufficient measures to ensure that the alpha ROM is used only by the developers who might give some corrective feed back before the final version gets into public domain. The following features are turned off or not working:
- Google Mobile Services (GMS) apps are not included (for example, Gmail and Google Maps).
- Modem is turned off and therefore the SIM card will not be recognised (this also means you can’t make any phone calls).
- Bluetooth™ is turned off.
- Wi-Fi® is turned off.
- FM-radio is turned off.
- NFC is turned off.
- UI look and feel is not updated to final Sony Jelly Bean software.
To install this ROM on to your Xperia T, you will have to unlock the bootloader of your phone and flash it using Sony Flash Tool, but comapany also warns if you unlock the boot loader, “you will not be able to get the final Jelly Bean upgrade from Sony”.
Downloads and Resources:
Unlock Bootloader of your Phone
Download Flash tool for Xperia™ devices (61.6 MB)
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