Balachandar

HTC Magic in India is an unadulterated brick!

// August 13th, 2009 // Android, Technology

Update: Jan31, 2010

HTC announced the loong waited firmware update which makes all Android magic Indian bricks into an ‘open, smart, Sense UI enabled Android phone. Thats just awsum. http://www.htc.com/in/SupportDownload.aspx?p_id=267&cat=2&dl_id=859 Thanks to Arun and Harsha for the update

Before I start let me share something. Just like any other open source enthusiast, I was excited when Google announced Android OS. Luck was on my side when my manager told me that there’s some interesting work that I’ve to do and its totally Android. Things are very exciting after that. I’ve been using G1 from early December 2008, and a Google Ion (HTC Magic) after the Google IO developer conference. Undoubtedly thats the best experience so far that i ever had in my life with reference to gadgets and being connected. So you have some expectations set, since you’ve used those android powered beasts for almost 7 months. Meanwhile, I bricked my G1 in the dev process and I’ve to give the back the Google IO HTC Magic to my client. Once that happened, i was like in a lost world. Life without Android just sucks.

I jumped out of joy when Airtel launched the country’s first Android powered smart phone HTC Magic. Im a proud Indian for that moment. Im a Vodafone customer, so i almost made my mind to buy an Airtel connection. But i was a little skeptical that Airtel will definitely screw up something, as I already had some bitter experiences with the Airtel Connect (Store) people when i went to enquire about iPhone. So i waited. The D day came when i saw the advt in Hindu that HTC Magic is available for anyone and there’s no operator dependencies. I called a couple of mobile outlets in Chennai to check the availability and it was available in Wavetel, Kodampak, Chennai for a little less than 26K. When i went there I was shocked to see an Airtel logo on the HTC Magic box. I double checked whether it’s operator tied. The guy said that its the same phone that HTC distributes to all dealers, and it was unlocked officially by HTC. He opened the box and showed me the IMEI number and the unlock code sticker on it. He typed in the unlock code and a confirmation message got displayed that it’s successfully unlocked. I made a call using my SIM to verify. I made the payment since its a crowded store and came back home.

I opened the box, switched it on and was surprised that it never prompted me with the Google sign in. WTFiss! Ohkay, I can install most of the stuff via Market. So where’s Android Market? Holy crap, it’s not there.

• No Android Market.
• No Gmail.
• No Google contact sync.
• No Gtalk
• No Google Voice search
• No Google Maps, yes no *maps* at all.

I google’d for relevant info and i landed here and here . I started realizing the truth. I SOS’d Karteek (we work together), and he wanted me the check the SPL via fastboot and I got to know its 1.33.0010 which is not rootable yet. So there’s no way you can customize the phone, or rather use the phone. You can read his post here.

You might wonder ‘so what’s the big deal? Guys, You have to use a completely open Google powered Android phone to feel the difference. Leaving that aside, look at this. The specs at HTC India website talks about GPS, but there’s no application in the phone which uses that. So what am I supposed to do with that GPS hardware?

I still have a huge reputation for HTC Global. I’ve been watching the company for a while and I know how serious are they about Innovation and end user satisfaction. The way they pioneered OHA, the way they supported developers by launching the first Android powered phone G1, their recent HTC Hero launch, its all just awesome. Peter Chou sounds very committed and serious. I’ve interacted with few senior HTC guys during my work at LATAM. We are supposed to burn some customised OS into HTC phones and sell it as some ‘XYZ Phones’. I got an email from the HTC User experience team stating ‘Our experts will have to validate the user experience of your application before it goes inside any HTC device. Its a HTC brand image related thingy’. So i know how serious are they when it comes to end user experience. But then, I seriously wonder how can they sell dummy Android bricks in India. Are’nt we potential endusers who deserve the same Android experience that the rest of the world enjoys. I’m sure there’s a gap in the way I understand HTC’s global strategy and the way in which HTC India operates. You guys simply cant do this to us.

My question is, why not the CXO’s at Airtel and HTC India put themselves in users shoe before they strategize something like this. Why do you take Indian customers for granted? In a country like India, with 320+ million mobile users, ruled by Nokias and Sony Ericssons… Is this the strategy for HTC to penetrate? What are you guys upto? The smart phone market is mostly driven by word of mouth. We are the early adopters. Unless you do justice to us, its tough to survive. Im sure, if its not a crippled phone here, i would have influenced more than 10 of my friends to buy a HTC Magic by now. I cannot expect Airtel to do something on this, as I bought this phone totally driven by the fact its a HTC phone in an open outlet. Its pure trust on HTC. Comeon HTC. Its better to be late than never. Get us the actual Android experience.

Update: Aug 14

I got a surprise call from HTC India’s customer care and was told that ‘a firmware update is on the making, and will be available to all HTC Magic customers by September which takes away all the Google account restrictions’. That’s very nice to hear. Lets wait and see how fast they do it.

Update: Aug 28

After reaching out to many, HTC replaced my old brick with a real smart HTC Magic imported from Singapore. http://twitpic.com/fk8rt . But, honestly i want the firmware update to be released asap so that every magic buyer will be happy about it

Update: Jan31, 2010

HTC announced the loong waited firmware update which makes all Android magic Indian bricks into an ‘open, smart, Sense UI enabled Android phone. Thats just awsum. http://www.htc.com/in/SupportDownload.aspx?p_id=267&cat=2&dl_id=859 Thanks to Arun and Harsha for the update