CyanogenMod Installer Now Available on Google Play Store

[Spider]

Summary: Want to update your Android smartphone or tablet, but your vendor or carrier won't give you a fresh release? Cyanogen can help.

By Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols for Linux and Open Source |November 13, 2013 -- 00:00 GMT (16:00 PST)

Few things are more annoying to an Android smartphone or tablet owner than wanting to upgrade their device to a newer version of Android but being blocked from doing it by their vendor and/or carrier. Sure you could unlock your device and load an alternative bootloader — if you knew exactly what you were doing. Cyanogen, the company behind the leading alternative Android firmware CyanogenMod has released the first easy-to-use Android bootloader to the Google Play Store: CyanogenMod Installer.

Say howdy to the easy-to-use Cyanogen alternative Android ROM bootloader. (Credit: Cyanogen) While it's not as simple as click, download, and boot your new Android, the CyanogenMod Installer and its accompanying Windows program, makes upgrading Android devices easier than ever before.

At this time there are only a few dozen devices supported by the Installer. These are all members of the Google Nexus, Samsung Galaxy, and HTC One lines.

You will also need a Windows PC for the CyanogenMod Installer. This assistant program works with Windows Vista, 7, and 8. It does not work with Windows XP. There are plans for a Mac OS X Installer, but none for Linux at this time.

With the pair of programs, you can upgrade the supported devices from their existing version of Android to the CyanogenMod 10.2 M1 Release. This is a version of Android 4.3.

For now, there is no version of CyanogenMod for Android 4.4 "KitKat". The newly minted Android company is working on this.

"We will continue to work on the 10.2 code branch, in parallel to all of our Android 4.4 efforts," the company said. "For those that will inevitably ask, we have not made any decisions with respect to what devices will make the leap to the KitKat code base and likely won't have that information for a few weeks."

Before jumping into upgrading your device, do keep in mind that this is potentially dangerous for your device. With more than nine million downloads, CyanogenMod may be the most popular alternative firmware. However, most of the people who've used it until now have been Android developers or power users.

So, to lessen the chances that you'll brick your device, or at least be in a better position to recovery it if you do brick it, be sure to take the following steps.

First, back up your data. Next (no, really) make sure you backed up your data and that you can read the backup.

Then, make sure your device's battery is fully charged. After that connect your device directly to the Windows PC with a high-quality USB cable. Do not use a USB hub. You must also turn off your anti-virus program during the process. You should also avoid moving the phone around until the install is complete. The last thing you want is to end up accidentally disconnecting the two during the process. Now, follow the instructions and good luck to you.

Still want to give it a go? Good luck! I'm going to wait until tomorrow morning myself before throwing it at my 2012 Nexus 7.

 

[SEMIJim]

Not a complaint, mind you, but more an observation: Looks like all, or nearly all, of the supported devices are newer ones. Arguably: It's the older devices that need CM most, as both the manufacturers and wireless companies tend to abandon them.

Jim

 

[edap]

Not a complaint, mind you, but more an observation: Looks like all, or nearly all, of the supported devices are newer ones. Arguably: It's the older devices that need CM most, as both the manufacturers and wireless companies tend to abandon them.

Jim

I agree, wholeheartedly. These companies have their sights set on the future, exclusively. Guess it's up to independent developers to pick up the slack. Oh, isn' that how CyanogenMod started.

Ed

 

[SEMIJim]

Oh, isn' that how CyanogenMod started.

Yup.

I don't know the CM universe well... or at all, actually. My Samsung GT2 is running it, but that's about it. So, with that caveat out of the way: I've been following the Samsung GT2 and HTC Sensation forums over at CM. Well, was, anyway. I stopped. Nothing to follow. Was watching the Lounge, over there, too. Kind of not, anymore, for the same reason.

I asked, in the CM forums Lounge, if it would be a faux pas to ask in the device-specific forums if development was still alive for those devices. Didn't even get an answer to that.

So, again remembering I don't know the lay of the land, there: I'm beginning to wonder if the going commercial of CM hasn't orphaned a number of devices?

If CM has significantly altered its charter, I imagine other group will eventually be along to fill the void. If the demand and interest is there.

Jim

 

[Spider]

This app has been removed form the Play Store. More here:http://www.androidtablets.net/forum...e-play-store-google-s-request.html#post301004

 

[SEMIJim]

Executive Summary: Google won't "encourage" suppliers of devices using its Android OS to update relatively recent devices and neither they, nor Google, want anybody else to do so, either. Just makes you want to go right out and pay several hundred dollars for an Android device that will be obsoleted in a year or two, and have known, unpatched security vulnerabilities, does it not? Not that, as I noted earlier, I thought the CM app particularly useful.

I hadn't originally noted it requires MS-Win. Makes it completely worthless, to me. (Tho I doubt I'm their target demographic.)

Jim