Let’s preface this by saying that we know that the Google Play Editions of the Samsung Galaxy S 4 and HTC One are not especially common in Australia, especially as they’re only sold in the United States.
However, a good number of people have converted their normal Galaxy S 4s and Ones into the Google Play Edition versions, simply because they like the hardware offered by Samsung and HTC respectively, but prefer a more AOSP experience on that premium hardware. Perfectly understandable, it’s something that one or two Ausdroid staff have done as well.
These brave folk who have gone through the conversion process (read: it’s not particularly easy) will be pleased to know that the Android 4.4 OTA updates are now available, and with a bit of tweaking, there’s a good chance you’ll get KitKat working on your devices fairly quickly. It’s important to note, though, that while you’ll get 95% of the experience seen on Nexus 5 devices, the Google Experience Launcher is not part of the update, so if it’s that you’re after, best go buy a Nexus 5 instead.
Download Links:
Android 4.4 KitKat OTA link for HTC One Google Play Edition
Android 4.4 KitKat OTA link for Samsung Galaxy S4 Google Play Edition
Hey, are you able to post a link on how to convert the S4 to a Google experience device? I’m just thinking of giving it a go and want to weed it out before going ahead. Any info links would be awesome, I think I’m using bad keyword search on Google. I think :S
Not playing nice with S-On, at least not a couple of days day when I tried it. PA ROMs will include the experience launcher as does some of the CM11 ones
Best bet is to turn S-Off, then it’s much easier (but of course, your warranty could go up in smoke).
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Ausdroid u need to be quicker than that!
It’s not really Australian news, so it’s not a huge priority 😉