Sony updates timeline for 2011 Xperia Phones and Xperia S upgrade to Ice Cream Sandwich

Sony has updated their Xperia Blog overnight to give an update on when 2011 model Xperia phone owners can expect to see their Ice Cream Sandwich Update. The blog post contains not only the timeline but seems to show something of how Sony feels about the update and who should receive it.

To start with the ICS update will NOT be pushed out OTA via carriers, it will only be made available to download via the PC Companion and Bridge for Mac software, you also won’t receive any update requests or notifications that the update is available. This could have something to do with Sony wanting to leave their users with a consistent experience but leave their hardcore Android users with the ability to have the latest update to the OS or perhaps Sony feels that their handsets will not function optimally with the new Ice Cream Sandwich upgrade and wants to limit the update to only those really interested in chasing it.

Now, the timeline for the update : For Xperia Arc S, Xperia Neo V and Xperia Ray owners they will see the update available from around Mid April and it will roll out over 4-6 weeks. Xperia Arc, Xperia PLAY, Xperia Neo, Xperia Mini, Xperia Mini Pro, Xperia Pro, Xperia Active and Sony Ericsson Live with Walkman, will have the update available from the end of May/early June.

If you are one of the early adopters though and want one of their latest handsets the Xperia S, you will have to wait till the later part of the second quarter. Yes that`s right, one of their flagship phone releases so far this year, which ships with Gingerbread will have to wait till at least halfway through the year to get ICS.

Sony has released Beta ICS ROMs for their Xperia Play phone and also for their Xperia Arc S, Xperia Neo V and Xperia Ray handsets which you can find here if you really want to play with them early, bear in mind before you go ahead and install them that Sony is advising that ‘you should only download and install the beta version if you are an advanced developer’.

Sony has also released a blog post on what users can expect to see when they receive their update to Ice Cream Sandwich, you can read all about the differences here. Bear in mind that the blog post gets a little in-depth but is still a fairly interesting read nonetheless.

Now, in my opinion, Sony was doing well, they had promised to keep their phones from last year updated with the latest OS, but now they seem to be starting to slip. This is a little disappointing as I was expecting a more streamlined and responsive company once they parted ways with Ericsson but alas that doesn`t seem to be the case. Well at least their phones will be getting the update, albeit slowly.