Trying to update a Lenovo Yoga Tablet

Android, oh my god really?

I tried, really, I tried very hard, but a combination of Android craziness and Lenovo ineptitude just made it so hard I couldn’t be bothered. In fact, the combination of the two made Microsoft look positively stunning in their slickness of updating and a paragon of patching.

In the windows world Microsoft delivers updates to all manner of hardware mixes without a pause for breath. You may not want them, but you get them anyway and since Windows 10 you get OS updates on the fly for free as long as your chipsets are supported, but it is quite a long term support, 7 or 8 years at the shortest, normal 10 or more. With Android, you are lucky if you get 2 years for OS updates if you are lucky and security patches, I really don’t as I have yet to work out how to find out.

So what produced this anti-android rant? Trying to update my Wife’s Yoga Tablet (less than 1 year old) from 5.1 to 6. Yes, I know the latest Android version is 8.0 but due to the unique way Android manages update (ie they abdicate all responsibility to the people who are only interested in selling you new kit that has old versions on it, then it may have to be validated by a fourth party as well) the latest supported version is 6.

So, on Windows I would download the update and run it. Simples. Might break something probably won’t, but it’s there, available and seemless(ish).

On a Lenovo Tablet (your experience may vary depending on type of device, manufacture and supplier/carrier), first you need to go to the Lenovo web site, don’t bother doing this on the device you want to update (I know, a kind of crazy assumption) but on a Windows computer (Mac OS may work don’t have one) find the web page for the device you want to update, don’t bother with the scan my device option (not available on the same web page when viewed from your Android device) just get you reading glasses out and try and find the product number on the device, stick it in the search box and cross your fingers.

Eventually your work out there is a download available, so you download it. Unfortunately, it is just a Tar file or compressed data file. Yeah, no idea what you do with it either. Then you notice there is an application, so download and install that on your PC.

Run it, plug you tablet in to USB when prompted and whoa something worked!

Tablet and some details turn up on screen, now you need to disable all the security on your tablet, set it to developer mode and enable installing from anywhere. Ok found all the bits, done and done.

Now you can install the Firmware update, already downloaded that, oh that was 146GB, it says there is a 1GB download, oh well click on that. Do some web surfing while it does its stuff. Great downloaded, now I can hit the update button. “Backup your device as this process will wipe everything”. Really, oh that so 1990s. Ok, how do I do that, is there a backup button here somewhere, white text on a white background? No? Ok back to web site, here you go, back up a Yoga tab, do this and do that…er that is not my OS, is that the one I am trying to update to? That option isn’t there. Oh, what the hell lets just go for it.

Click the update button, Yeah, a progress bar, off it goes and then a button that says finish, click and, er..  nothing, it says update now. Tablet hasn’t rebooted. Should I just do a manual reboot? What the hell go for it. Ok we are still on 5.1.

So what have we learnt today?

When it come to updating Android is about as rubbish as Windows 3.1. It may be a combination of lack of interest by Lenovo but ultimately it is down to Google abdicating responsibility to third parties to manage the updating process. Alphabet is the richest company on the planet and spends a considerable amount of time dissing Microsoft about patching fails in its OS and yet the experience of patching Googles OS is about as good as it was in the 1990s (Windows 95 was marginally simpler if not wholly effective).

I would love to see a break down of Android versions on active devices out there, and just see how many have the latest security patches for things like the latest WPA2 bugs if there has even been any for the version like my wife’s Yoga Tab, which you can still buy from Lenovo with Android 5.1. Imagine what people would say if Dell sold PCs with Windows Vista installed?

Oh, and that first download? Still no idea what to do with it.