Re: WTF @Stuart
"ZTE won't assist me in updating the OS, and going it alone will void the warranty. I just have to put up with the older OS, I have no choice."
So you bought a product which is still under warranty and is now known to have a defect that was in place at the time of manufacture. That sounds like a reasonable complaint to take up with them under Sale of Goods and/or any other applicable consumer protection laws.
I bought a product, the one and only product on the market from what I can see, which has the closest match to the (hardware) feature set that I'm after in a device.
My choice is binary, either I buy it, or I do without, and I need a phone for work.
The difference is that a computer running Windows XP can theoretically be updated to run another OS. Possibly even Windows 10 beta if that's your preference.
A phone cannot be updated by the end user as easily. If an over-the-air update isn't available from the vendor, you're on your own.
Your argument works the other way round. If the PC can be upgraded to a newer version of Windows by the user, then there is no need for older versions to be supported for 13 years... On the other hand, if the Android handset cannot be upgraded then it means that it is reliant on those security patches from the manufacturer being delivered in a timely manner for the lifetime of the product (5 to 10 years).
Yes, I recognise this… and surprisingly I do understand Microsoft eventually dropping support for older OSes. You might be surprised to note that not much software runs easily on Red Hat Linux 8.0, which was latest and greatest when Windows XP came on the scene.
It'd help though if cowboy coders and sloppy design didn't combine to produce a whole raft of software packages that break when said sloppy design got cleaned up.
But I digress… Handset makers should either be prepared to keep up, or they should provide the materials to the end user to let them keep up (either themselves, or pay someone for it).
stuartl@portege ~ $ uname -a
Linux portege 3.11.2-portege-dirty #3 PREEMPT Sun Oct 6 13:47:57 EST 2013 i686 Pentium II (Deschutes) GenuineIntel GNU/Linux
^^ See, even old kit can run a recent OS. That's a PII 300MHz laptop with 160MB RAM and a 160GB HDD running Gentoo, acting as an APRS I-Gate. Does the job fine.