Sony Extends Xperia AOSP Project To All 2014 Handsets With Qualcomm Chipset

Sony Extends Xperia AOSP Project To All 2014 Handsets With Qualcomm Chipset

After announcing inclusion of its latest flagship Xperia Z3 to its Xperia AOSP project, Sony Mobile has now announced that its entire 2014 smartphone lineup powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon chipset has now been added to the AOSP project. That includes the Xperia E3, Xperia T3, Xperia T2 Ultra, and the Xperia M2 devices. With the announcement, Sony has also included the source code for these devices and also updated the source code for the Xperia T2 Ultra and the Xperia M2 with stability improvements.

Sony has managed to get Android 4.4.4 AOSP up and running on all these new devices that have been added to the Xperia AOSP project, as shown in the video attached with the post on Sony Mobile’s developer blog. Unlike the Xperia Z series family of devices like the Z Ultra, Z1, Z1 Compact, Z2 Tablet, Z2, Z3 Compact, and the Xperia Z3 that have working Android 5.0 Lollipop AOSP code, the newer devices don’t seem to have Android 5.0 AOSP working yet. We’re not sure if Sony will be releasing Android 5.0 Lollipop source code for these devices in the future, as none of these devices are mentioned in the list of Xperia devices that are scheduled to receive the Android 5.0 Lollipop update officially.

Sony is the first Android OEM that officially promotes AOSP development for its devices. Initially restricted to its flagship smartphones, Sony has included its mid-range and low-end devices now to the AOSP initiative. This should help developers on XDA who are interested in AOSP based development for Sony Xperia smartphones and tablets to get working builds out for the devices. As you can guess, the AOSP project is limited to Xperia devices with an unlocked bootloader. And if you wish to install an AOSP based ROM on your Xperia smartphone that is part of the Xperia AOSP project, you will need to have an unlocked bootloader to do so as AOSP based ROMs cannot be installed on devices with locked bootloaders. Do keep in mind though that the current available software is not very stable and is not meant to be used as a daily driver ROM. On Xperia E3, Xperia T2 Ultra, Xperia T3 and the Xperia M2 devices, camera and modem are not enabled. So you will not be able to make calls or send text messages to anyone and nor will you be able to use the camera to click pictures.

If you are a developer who is keen on contributing to the Xperia AOSP project, you can find the AOSP binaries and resources at this link. The Xperia AOSP Project is maintained by Alin Jerpelea, former leader of the FreeXperiaProject who has hired by Sony Mobile earlier this year as the Sony Developer Relations Community Manager.