Sony Xperia P receiving update to Ice Cream Sandwich

Sony has posted on its blog that one of its phones, the Sony Xperia P, will be getting an update to Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. The rollout for the update will happen over the next few weeks globally. Users will get a notification when the update is ready, but the availability might vary depending on the region. To get the update manually, users can go to their phone’s “About” menu and select “Check for updates”.

Now getting Ice Cream Sandwich

Sony has listed some of the features users can look forward to after they receive the update:

• New ways to experience your media with new media applications – “WALKMAN”, “Album” and “Movies”
• Extended standby mode, increasing standby time by up to four times (depending on user-profile and data consumption)
• Lock screen with improved functionality
• Resizable widgets for improved personalisation
• Improved control of your mobile data consumption
• Recent Apps button for a clear overview of your applications

Sony has also released a video that shows off the new features in the update to Ice Cream Sandwich.

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The Sony Xperia P is powered by a 1GHz dual-core processor with 1GB RAM and internal storage of 16GB. The camera is an 8MP shooter, instead of the 12MP on Xperia S. Still, this shouldn’t keep it from capturing good quality photographs.

Here are some of the highlights of the phone:

• Android 2.3 Gingerbread
• 1GHz dual-core processor
• 4-inch Reality Display powered by Mobile BRAVIA Engine
• WhiteMagic display technology
• 8MP camera with fast capture, HD recording, 2D and 3D panoramic image capture capability
• HDMI, DLNA
• NFC

There is no news as of yet about the Jelly Bean update for the phone, but Sony has mentioned that the Xperia Sola and the Xperia Go will be the next phones to get the update to Ice Cream Sandwich. According to a previous report, a Sony spokesperson has posted an official statement on the company’s official blog saying, “We are actively investigating Android OS upgrades for all devices, but in the meantime, our Ice Cream Sandwich rollout for Xperia S and 2011 Xperia smartphones continues as planned.”

Last month, Sony had announced that the Xperia lineup from 2011 will not be eligible for the update to Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. UK Product Manager for Sony Mobile, John Cooper was taking questions from customers on Facebook and revealed that the Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc S and Xperia Mini Pro will not be getting updates to Android 4.1 aka Jelly Bean OS.

Sony was yet to make an official statement regarding its 2011 phone lineup and the Android 4.1 Jelly Bean update before this. The Arc S was the Xperia phone with the highest specs released in 2011. So if it isn’t getting the update, you can be sure that none of the other 2011 phones would be getting it. Sony is also yet to announce if the 2012 lineup of Xperia phones will be getting the update to Jelly Bean.

Sony had earlier announced that the 2011 lineup of Xperia phones would be receiving the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS) update. The rollout for the ICS update was set to take place in a phased manner over the course of several weeks and Sony had stated that all kits for a specific model would not receive the update at the same time.