CyanogenMod: 30, Android manufacturers: 4 (CM7 is released)

Congratulations to CyanogenMod team on achieving a major milestone: CM 7.0 got released last night! CyanogenMod is a firmware based on the open-source Android operating system and CyanogenMod 7 is the first stable Gingerbread-based release.

The number of cell phones that run official version of Gingerbread (Android 2.3) is currently 4. Those are Nexus S, Nexus One, Sony Xperia Arc and Sony Xperia Play.

The number of cell phones and tablets supported by CyanogenMod 7.0 is 30. Here’s the list of the supported devices:

• Google Nexus One (Passion)
• Google Nexus S (Crespo)
• HTC myTouch 4G (Glacier)
• HTC Incredible
• HTC Desire (Bravo) GSM/CDMA
• HTC Desire HD (Ace) / HTC Inspire
• HTC Desire Z / G2 (Vision)
• HTC Evo (Supersonic)
• HTC Evo Shift (Speedy)
• HTC Hero (CDMA/GSM)
• HTC Aria (Liberty)
• HTC Click / HTC Tattoo
• HTC Legend
• HTC Slide (Espresso)
• HTC Wildfire (Buzz)
• Geeksphone Zero
• Geeksphone One
• ZTE Blade (San Francisco, Sapo A5)
• Commtiva Z71 (Boston, G1305, XT502, A60, Blaze)
• Barnes & Noble Nook Color (Encore)
• Viewsonic G-Tablet (Harmony)

Stable CM7 is not ready yet for such popular phones as Motorola Droid and Samsung Galaxy S, but nightly builds exist, so stable version may be coming soon.

So what does the 30:4 score tell us about the state of Android ecosystem? First, manufacturers of the phones are slow to release updates, which is not news. This should become less of a problem as Android OS matures and Google reduces number of major Android releases per year. However, manufacturers should do a better job of managing upgrade expectations, so when customers buy an Android phone they know how long they can expect to receive future upgrades.

Second, having an open source of the operating system is extremely useful. Not only CM7 is available on phones that may never get an official Android 2.3 release, but CM7 includes numerous features that are not part of official Android 2.3.

If you already use CyanogenMod ROM, consider donating to support this great open source project (donate button is at the bottom of this page).

If you want to start using CyanogenMod (or any other custom ROM), you need to root your phone first. Installing CyanogenMod is easiest using ROM Manager. Remember to do a full backup before modding the phone (e.g. using Titanium Backup). If you have questions or run into trouble, CyanogenMod forum or xda-developers is the place to get answers. Enjoy!