Developers port Android 4.1 Jelly Bean to HTC HD2

Developers have ported Android 4.1 Jelly Bean to the three-year-old smartphone HTC HD2. Although the HD2 once came out with Windows Mobile 6.5, most smartphone users have long since switched to Android firmware.

The firmware of Android 4.1 Jelly Bean for the HTC HD2 is not bug free. For example, Google Now and the camera don’t work and some apps crash when installing. Together with the One X and Sensation, the HD2 is one of the first HTC devices for which working Android 4.1 firmware appears. This also happened with previous Android versions, which were quickly run on HTC’s flagship from 2009.

The HD2 was released with Windows Mobile 6.5, but after a developer got a Linux kernel running on the device, Android firmware was also released. For example, in 2010 it was possible to get the software of the Desire HD on the HD2 to work. Later, even booting Windows Mobile was no longer necessary, as Android can boot directly from nand. The HD2 did not receive an update to Windows Phone 7, but the phone turned out to be the only phone not released with Windows Phone 7 on which the OS can still be run.

The HD2 has a 4.3″ capacitive touchscreen with a resolution of 800×480 pixels; it was one of the first phones with a screen of that size. The HD2 runs on a Qualcomm QSD8250 processor with Adreno 200 GPU. Also the Samsung Galaxy S from 2010 can get an update via a custom rom.