Today Prestigio
publicly announced the release of ICS for the MultiPad 5080 range of
Android tablets, although it was actually posted on their site two
days ago. The MultiPad 5080 is a re-badged budget end tablet and the
fact that Prestigio have seen fit to support it to ICS level is
really worth applauding. So many Android consumers who purchased top
end tablets & handsets not too long ago are still waiting for
their own slice of official ICS goodness, many from market leaders
and multi-national manufacturers, making Pretigio's commitment to the
end user all the more welcome.
The ROM itself is a
stock affair, with the launcher being the only difference I can find.
That said it's not as though they have replaced the launcher with a
fancy TouchWiz type experience, but rather they have played with the
source code for their own needs, so think more Nova than custom UI.
The version is 4.0.3 so there is still room for future updates, and
having had the tablet for a few months I can tell you that Prestigio
are no slouches at putting new versions out. The upgrade procedure is
a simple and quick affair although I would recommend that you backup
any data you have on the internal SD. Full instructions and Windows
drivers are included in the download and once you have them installed
it is a simple app that carries out the update for you.
In the few hours I have
used the ROM I have found two small issues. Firstly, and most
annoyingly, there are a few market apps that show as not being
compatible, most noticeably the official Twitter app, so installing
from an external source is your only option. The second issue while
less annoying is a little more alarming, if you wake the tablet from
being in a deep idle state, you have to turn off Wifi and re-enable
to get a connection. It’s not a major hassle, but you would really
expect it to have been picked up during testing. Now the pluses, well
it’s ICS so instantly your tablet looks so much better, it also
seems to run faster. I’ve not benchmarked, but the way the tablet
performs tasks and feels in the hand really is noticeably different.
Previously I used the tablet for reading, Kindle, Google Currents and
other similar apps, but I can actually see me using it more now; gone
is the sluggish behaviour when I have too many tasks running at one
time. With full GAPPS and only a couple of OEM added apps the ROM is
pretty sleek or sparse depending on your point of view, but remember
you do have full market access unlike some budget tablets. From what
I can tell at this stage, battery life is also showing as being
pretty decent and depending on use you should get most of a day out
of it.
Now is the really good
news, the ROM has already been rooted and as an added bonus those
apps which showed as non-compatible before will now install. The
rooted version also has some app adjustments with the removal of the
Prestigio-added apps being most noticeable.
The official Prestigio
download can be found here :-
The rooted ROM is
downloadable from here :-
(This ROM will probably
update at a fast rate to begin with, so I have linked to the original
thread)
