HTC confirmed today that the HTC One S will not receive any more software updates, sticking the 15-month old handset with 4.1.1 Jelly Bean OS and the company’s own outdated Sense 4 skin. The 4.3-inch smartphone comes equipped with a 1.5GHz dual-core processor and 1GB of RAM, making it powerful enough to handle the latest OS updates, but apparently HTC doesn’t see reason to continue pouring time into future updates.
The Taiwanese smartphone maker released an official statement to the press, promising that the HTC One S’s hardware is still worthwhile even without the latest software:
We can confirm that the HTC One S will not receive further Android OS updates and will remain on the current version of Android and HTC Sense. We realize this news will be met with disappointment by some, but our customers should feel confident that we have designed the HTC One S to be optimized with our amazing camera and audio experiences.
The news is certainly a disappointment to some, but also a reminder that Android’s open source software is a double-edged sword, encouraging innovation and competition among hardware companies, but also leading to fragmentation across the platform and frequently delayed updates.
Despite the bad news for HTC One S owners, the company also had some good news today, reporting that the latest Android 4.2.2 OS has just become available for the international version of its flagship HTC One aluminum handset. The company said it will also provide updates to the One X.
