Galaxy S4 users have been waiting for quite some time now, but their wait is now finally over. Samsung has finally decided that it will indeed be giving the S4 users a taste of the latest Android OS. The S4 users have started getting the 5.0.1 Lollipop update on their phones.
The update first appeared in Russia. This signaled an intent that Samsung was eventually going to release updates of Galaxy S4 for all regions. A few days into February, users from Russia started to receive the Android L update and just after a week, Galaxy S4 users from India started to get Android L updates.
Inside reports are claiming that just like Samsung gave Android L updates for all versions of Galaxy Note 3, so they will be releasing the firmware for all models of Galaxy S4 in the near future.
The latest firmware for the Galaxy S4 is available on the internet, but you have to see whether the firmware is compatible with your model. If you can’t take the risk, then you will have to wait to get over the air updates for your Galaxy S4.
Indian Galaxy S4 users are getting the Android 5.0.1 Lollipop update. They can download the 1GB over the air update or can also download the Lollipop update through the Samsung Kies desktop software. It looks like the rest of the European users will have to wait as Samsung is still taking its time in releasing the update for their region.
The US carriers will also take their time and users in North America will have to wait a while before they start getting the update on their Galaxy S4. Only Verizon has released the official Android L update for their Galaxy S4. There were many leaked beta versions of the firmware for the Galaxy S4.
The Finnish Samsung website claimed that the Galaxy S4 will start to get the Android L update soon after the Galaxy Note 3 is updated. If you live in Europe and you have a LTE Galaxy S4, then you are probably the next users that will receive the Android L update.
The Google Play edition Galaxy S4 users already got the Android 5.0.1 Lollipop update. The Google Play edition Galaxy S4 users need to manually check the update software option from their phones if they still haven’t gotten a notification which is telling them that an update is available.
If you can’t wait and you really want the Android 5.0 update, then you would be happy to know that people from the XDA forum have provided us with an unofficial Lollipop update. You will need to root your phone and after that you will get the CyanogenMod 12 in your phone. You will be really happy to hear that it is a pretty stable version and that it has all the features one ask for in the Android L update.
But there are some problems with the custom ROM. Some people have claimed that there is a problem when they use the NFC chip and many have claimed that the micro SD card sometimes does not work properly and it starts to give errors like it is not able to recognize the memory card. If you are going to wait, then the GT-I9500 Galaxy S4 model will first receive the update. This is the same version which has the Exynos 5410 SoC.
Inside reports are claiming that Samsung are working on their TouchWiz and that they have toned down their TouchWiz. They have done this because people were complaining that they wanted a more pure experience of the latest Android OS. The latest Android OS looks beautiful on the Google Nexus 6 and Nexus 5.
This is why the Galaxy S4 users will see that with the new update, their phones will look almost just like the Nexus devices. Now as Samsung have toned down their TouchWiz, it is said to improve the phone’s battery life and this will also make the phone a bit faster. And people are also claiming that with the new Android L update, the Galaxy S4 doesn’t get hot.
The size of the update is 1GB so if you don’t have that much space on your phone, you will need to delete some stuff and uninstall some big games. It is advised that the users should have at least 3GB of free memory so that the installation of the OS goes smoothly. The size of this new OS is bigger than the KitKat OS so the users will lose approximately 950MB of space to the OS.
You can also download the Samsung Kies desktop software and you can use it download the firmware directly to your phone. Some reports are suggesting that now Samsung might stop pushing out Android L updates for Galaxy S4 users. The reason for that is that they are going to be releasing the Samsung Galaxy S6 and Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge at MWC 2015 in March.
They would want their users to buy their new devices rather they would give them the update. The main target here is selling the devices. People are saying that Samsung will try to stop the update so that people think about buying their latest devices. But whether that is the case, we will see it in the upcoming weeks.
But currently two models of the Galaxy S4 are receiving the Android L update which are the GT-I9500 and the GT-I9506 which is the LTE model. Currently Russia, India, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Germany are receiving the Galaxy S4 Android L update. The Galaxy S4 GT-I9505 is still not receiving the update. But this model is said to be the next to receive the Android L update.
The GT-I9505 is still on KitKat and people are hoping that it will soon get the update. This is the international version and many people across the world have this version so many S4 users are waiting for the update to hit their regions. It is to be noted that the international version of the Galaxy S4 will receive the Android 5.0.1 update.
After the Galaxy S4 release, Samsung will roll out updates for their other devices like the Samsung Galaxy Alpha, Galaxy Note 3 and Galaxy S5 mini. The Galaxy Note 2 users would be happy to hear that their devices will also get the Android L update in the future.
