Should I upgrade my Galaxy S2 to ICS?

[JHahn7837]

I purchased a galaxy s2 from Sprint 2 weeks ago. It came with Gingerbread on it. It runs great, no issues and long battery life. The ISC update notifications are getting annoying. It continues to tempt me into upgrading. However, after doing some reading, I have seen several folks running into various issues after updating to ICS. theses include reduced battery life and poor reception. I have also read about various app related issues. To that note, users who did a factory reset before the upgrade seemed to report that it helped a lot.

I have experience rooting phones and such, but I was avoiding this since the device is so new (to me), and I have no other reason to root other than getting the ICS notifications to go away.

I run ICS on my Transformer, and it runs well. It seems to be designed for a tablet if you ask me. I would upgrade my phone to ICS if I knew I wouldn't regret it. Right now, I can't talk myself into it. If you were me, what would you suggest?

 

[CRS1]

I purchased a galaxy s2 from Sprint 2 weeks ago. It came with Gingerbread on it. It runs great, no issues and long battery life. The ISC update notifications are getting annoying. It continues to tempt me into upgrading. However, after doing some reading, I have seen several folks running into various issues after updating to ICS. theses include reduced battery life and poor reception. I have also read about various app related issues. To that note, users who did a factory reset before the upgrade seemed to report that it helped a lot.

I have experience rooting phones and such, but I was avoiding this since the device is so new (to me), and I have no other reason to root other than getting the ICS notifications to go away.

I run ICS on my Transformer, and it runs well. It seems to be designed for a tablet if you ask me. I would upgrade my phone to ICS if I knew I wouldn't regret it. Right now, I can't talk myself into it. If you were me, what would you suggest?

Plain and simple NO!!!!!

Don't do it! You will learn to hate your phone and life very fast. :banghead:

Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk 2

 

[Murphy5111]

I purchased a galaxy s2 from Sprint 2 weeks ago. It came with Gingerbread on it. It runs great, no issues and long battery life. The ISC update notifications are getting annoying. It continues to tempt me into upgrading. However, after doing some reading, I have seen several folks running into various issues after updating to ICS. theses include reduced battery life and poor reception. I have also read about various app related issues. To that note, users who did a factory reset before the upgrade seemed to report that it helped a lot.

I have experience rooting phones and such, but I was avoiding this since the device is so new (to me), and I have no other reason to root other than getting the ICS notifications to go away.

I run ICS on my Transformer, and it runs well. It seems to be designed for a tablet if you ask me. I would upgrade my phone to ICS if I knew I wouldn't regret it. Right now, I can't talk myself into it. If you were me, what would you suggest?

I went back to gingerbread. I guess some people are doing okay with it but it don't see how. I would only do it if your comfortable doing a full wipe going back to gingerbread. Also read the forum to see what steps you can take to minimize issues. There were just way too many bugs and things I didn't like. Good luck with your decision.

Sent from my SPH-D710 using Android Central Forums

 

[anon(847090)]

I dont understand why anyone wouldnt want the latest software... ICS has ton of features.. go for it.

 

[HeadBlade911]

ICS is running fine for me.

 

[shaytoon21]

honestly its going to be a hit and miss. it will all depend on your phone and whatever apps u have running. if youre able to wipe back to GB in the event if you switched to ics and didnt like it, then by all means give it a go.

if youre completely comfortable with gb on the phone then keep it and remind urself that the notification is a virus and will ruin ur phone

 

[TechFitGJ]

I would update and then wipe all data and your cache and dalvik cache partition. It's worth a try because you can always go back. Now, if you your willing to root and install ROM's I would have a whole other list of suggestions

 

[harhis23]

It's worth the try. A few people I know who own Galaxy S2 updated their handsets to ICS. So far, I haven't heard any complains from these people, so I assume the update is stable.

 

[samanthanielquel]

There is one more issue like week signal after the ICS update. Mostly the Samsung devices have this issue which includes S2.

 

[anon(847090)]

I made my Girlfriend update to ICS this weekend and she loved it....
There has been no issues so far for her... She absolutely enjoy ICS.

 

[bkang22]

NO NO NO don't do it until they fix the bugs. My phone said there was an update and I didn't want to keep getting the message so I did. Battery life is not as good anymore, I now do not receive a good signal at hom anymore, mail sync is not as good as it was. I had to go in and change a bunch of settings trying to recover battery time. Get that annoying error about roaming, i think by turning off data roam it may have stopped that issue. When hooking up to my computer it reads the phone as a media device MP3 instead of the phone even though it shows the model number correctly. I've uninstalled the few apps I had. Took a bunch of try's just to get 3G to stay on....

If you go to sprint forums you'll see a ton of complaints and only a few without issues, I will go to sprint store tomorrow to see if they can make it work better someone said they can. We'll see.

 

[lethalgorman]

I did it and love it. I did do a factory reset but all important information is backed up and reinstalled. You only hear the couple of whiners in the forums, everybody else who did it are happy. ICS increased my performance and battery life. Apps and now running great and all new apps need ICS or Jelly Bean. The good apps anyway.

Sent from my SGH-T989 using Android Central Forums

 

[mdkennedy]

At least for me with a Sprint Galaxy S2 the upgrade to ICS went fine but the battery life is 50% and phone is very sluggish. Worked with techs at Sprint to disable animated wallpaper and a list of other tweaks but only a minor improvement (and things Gingerbread handled with ease). I love the new ICS UI. I cannot get the phone to allow USB backup to my MacBook Pro Lion which seems to be yet another bug even with the Andriod File Transfer utility. Next step was to back-up and then do a hard factory reset and then restore apps and files. Will try that once I figure a way to back-up files (I know should have done that before the ICS upgrade in the first place. Such a cowboy!) :-!

 

[Murphy5111]

I did it and love it. I did do a factory reset but all important information is backed up and reinstalled. You only hear the couple of whiners in the forums, everybody else who did it are happy. ICS increased my performance and battery life. Apps and now running great and all new apps need ICS or Jelly Bean. The good apps anyway.

Sent from my SGH-T989 using Android Central Forums

And what makes you think you're in the majority? I bet there are quite a few people with issues, more than you think.

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Android Central Forums

 

[jwr2]

I have the Galaxy s2 i777 at&t version and I updated to ics when the official version was released via Samsung Kies. I love it and I have had no issues of any kind with anying including battery life. My wife has finally decided to upgrade but every time I try to do the upgrade it says that your device does not support upgrade via Kies. What am I doing wrong????

 

[android4.0helper]

yup

 

[iN8ter]

I upgraded and downgraded and upgraded back simply because I felt I needed the swipable notifications (and lock screen notification pulldown) - but I'm a heavy social networker/texter/emailer and get a TON of stuff all the time. Other than a few convenience features I don't think it's even worth factory resetting your phone to update to this FW. It truly is less robust, slightly slower (despite what Synthetic benchmarks may tell you), and quite a bit buggier than GB.

And anyone who's been using Samsung Android devices for a while knows that after even maintenance updates you're better served just wiping your phone cause their software seems to go bonkers otherwise.

As for upgrading and downgrading, YMMV.

The ROMs at XDA for GB are pretty much garbage because those "Official ROMs" are missing apps that I 100% knew were on my phone when I bought it, and I used those Apps. I basically had to go right back to ICS 5 minutes after I downgraded to GB because of that.

If you're just a normal user you should be good to upgrade. AFAICT, the issues with the upgrade really only affect heavy users and people who actually bought the phone because it worked a certain way (like the Social Hub Contacts integration, etc.).

 

[typos]

Did my ICS 3 days after getting my phone. I have noticed just a few minor bugs in responsiveness to some of my apps but then again isn't this just the norm whenever a new OS comes out. I'm happy running ti so far as I'm still a newbie to this but software development has been my bread and butter so maybe my mind is just a bit conform to bugs until they're worked out.

 

[msquinn]

Samsung Galaxy S II with At&t .. I updated and don't care for it at all! I would prefer going back to the old system. Facebook and contacts are all out of whack......If anyone knows something i don't please inform me. Thanks

 

[Vicky105]

It's worth the try!