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Motorola Droid Bionic Ice Cream Sandwich Update Available for All Users

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Motorola has informed Droid Bionic soak test participants that the Ice Cream Sandwich soak test is over and that due to the positive results of the soak test, the Droid Bionic Ice Cream Sandwich is now rolling out for more users. However, based on what we’ve heard from owners, it looks like it might be available to everyone right now.

The email, which was delivered to Droid Bionic Ice Cream Sandwich soak test participants last night says that because the testing went well, Motorola made the decision to roll out the Droid Bionic Ice Cream Sandwich update to more owners last night, though it says that the update will be rolling out in phases.

What we’ve heard though is that all Droid Bionic owners should be able to pull down the Ice Cream Sandwich update today.

Read: Motorola Droid Bionic Ice Cream Sandwich Update Should Roll Out to More Users Soon.

Motorola-Droid-Bionic-camera-575x3801

The Droid Bionic ICS update is now available.

Here is the full email that Motorola sent to those who were apart of the Droid Bionic soak test over the last few days.

Hi.

Thanks to everyone who participated in our soak test of new software for the Droid Bionic on Verizon. After reviewing your community comments and survey feedback, we’ve made the decision to release the software in stages for all owners starting later this evening.

Overall, the feedback we received was extremely positive — the survey results was among the best we’ve seen. We will continue to investigate issues reported in our soak community and in the survey. And I may be in contact with some of you to follow up on some of the problems you have reported.

I will shortly remove you from the private soak community though it will remain open for a short period of time. To return to the public communities, simply log out of the forums and log back in. Remember, all communications related to this soak test, and the details of our processes, are confidential and should not be shared.

Again, accept our thanks for sharing your time and insights to test this software, and for joining the Motorola Feedback Network.

So, as we told you, the last few days of the Droid Bionic Ice Cream Sandwich have been a soak test to ensure that the update is up to snuff for both Motorola and Verizon. This, it seems, has become Verizon’s new way of rolling out updates. Announce the update, roll out the soak test, and if all goes well, roll out the update to the public.

Screenshot_2012-10-19-13-27-47-323x575

It seems though that Motorola and Verizon made some improvements as far as the timing of the public roll out is concerned. We heard from several Droid RAZR and Droid RAZR MAXX owners who went through the same process but didn’t see their updates arrive for many days after the soak test ended.

It doesn’t appear that Droid Bionic owners will have to wait for the update, it should be available right now. Droid Bionic owners should head into Settings, then About, then Check for the update. It should be there ready to download and install.

Enjoy the update everyone.

Thanks, A, W!

130 Comments

130 Comments

  1. adamhowell1

    10/23/2012 at 9:25 am

    My phone is no longer working after doing the update!

    • damon

      10/23/2012 at 9:40 am

      Really?? Dont make me cancel the update download.its almost done

      • Dylan

        10/23/2012 at 11:41 am

        Mine is jacked up also. Random screen lock ups and apps force closing…..

    • Katie Chase

      10/24/2012 at 1:51 pm

      Nor is mine. Really freaking pissed. I am a personal chef with no way to contact my clients now.

  2. bite me

    10/23/2012 at 9:30 am

    Updates awesome!!!!!!

  3. gerardi

    10/23/2012 at 9:32 am

    Lost my text after update

  4. shdytxmn

    10/23/2012 at 9:34 am

    Got mine this morning. Lousy LG-4 connection required hours of download time but the installation went well and everything is working GREAT?

  5. squirrel

    10/23/2012 at 9:35 am

    Got my update at 0100 hours and I love the way it looks and works…I have gs2 also, but love the bionic more

  6. Robert2012

    10/23/2012 at 9:36 am

    Just recieved the update in Dallas Tx. I had to manually check for the update by going to settings, about phone, then system update. Still says its downloading although I have a strong 3G signal my download may take longer. I will repost if it completes and if I have any issues with my phone.

  7. chris

    10/23/2012 at 9:38 am

    updating right now, cant wait!!!

  8. p hart

    10/23/2012 at 9:43 am

    Got ICS in South Carolina. Working great! Took about 10 minutes to download.

  9. Rob

    10/23/2012 at 9:47 am

    Issues with charging and gallery not working, anyone else?

    • Damon

      10/23/2012 at 10:17 pm

      Gallery and everythingelse is working smooth.but the motion sensor isn’t fully functioning anymore.the screen doesn’t even rotate now
      Any1 else?

    • Jeff

      10/24/2012 at 7:33 am

      same issue…. finally got my battery to charge when i shut it off and just left it plugged in… I haven’t tried charging it while it’s on yet

    • Rich

      10/24/2012 at 1:01 pm

      Despite being plugged in, my battery ran down over night during the upgrade. I told it to instal put it in its cradle and went to bed. At first I thought the upgrade killed the phone as it wasn’t starting up. Then I realized the battery was dead deade dead. I took it out, put it back in, made sure the connection was good. It did start charging, but at a snails pace, 5 hours, in sleep mode, and only 90% charged.

  10. Mike Humphrey

    10/23/2012 at 9:47 am

    Just updated this morning (in Phoenix). Front facing camera not working. Minor issue. Never used it anyway. Everything else looks & works great.

    • Jonathan Wolfson

      10/24/2012 at 10:07 am

      My front-facing camera also does not work with the ICS upgrade. When I push the rotate button on any app which uses the front-facing camera the application crashes or is unresponsive. Face Unlock also just hangs since the camera is unresponsive. Do you know how to make it work? I am using a thicker, extended battery (lost the original one). Thanks.

  11. Jorell

    10/23/2012 at 9:48 am

    This update has made my phone crash and reboot every 30 seconds! The keyboard app fails and instead of closing and reloading the app, the whole OS freezes. :'( Any app that crashes, crashes the whole OS. I’m SO MAD.

  12. Gordy

    10/23/2012 at 9:49 am

    Mine updated and so far so good. I’ve only seen two small issues so far. The first and biggest is I turn WiFi off and it keeps automatically turning back on. The second, and may only be the ICS / facebook interface is when I type a post, in landscape mode, I can’t see what I’m typing because the keyboard takes up most of the screen. Both of these may just be setup issues, so I’ll keep playing. For the most part though, a few hours into it, been pretty happy

  13. Glenn

    10/23/2012 at 9:54 am

    This update is taking forever. It is stuck on the uprgrading media database screen. Has anyone else had an issue with this?

    • John McMullen

      10/23/2012 at 11:21 am

      Yes, it’s happening on mine. Did you find a fix?

      • Glenn

        10/23/2012 at 9:40 pm

        I just did a battery pull, but now my music or photos won’t show up on my phone…

    • Jimmer

      10/23/2012 at 2:43 pm

      “Android is upgrading…” “Upgrading Media Database”…
      this has been going on for 2 hours now. Did you find a fix? advice….?

      • Joe coppola

        10/23/2012 at 4:53 pm

        i just pulled the battery, it boots up fine after that, in ICS of course =D

        • jimmer

          10/23/2012 at 8:23 pm

          That Worked…thanks. Boots well, but battery drains in an hour. Now I can use the phone to heat my ice shanty. “Media” using most of battery. “Android core apps” is second. “Google services” is third. Screen in fourth, using only 11% of battery. Anyone have any ideas?

          • Abw209

            10/24/2012 at 9:51 am

            Same issue. Find a fix for the terrible battery life? I’ve had mine plugged in for 2 hours and only 15%.

          • Rich

            10/24/2012 at 4:37 pm

            Yes, something called media in the battery usage menu is burning more battery than the display, and, even when ot in use my phone is warm, as though it is working hard. Also, when looking to manage storage it is perpetually trying to load media.

    • crusaderwabbit

      10/23/2012 at 11:23 pm

      I pulled the battery out to shut it off and then I started the phone without the media card. Verified that the install worked and then shut it off again and put the media card in and that is now working OK. My problem now is I don’t have any ring tones or volume control.

      • David Miller

        11/13/2012 at 11:09 am

        That happened to me too, but I got the ringtones back after rebooting a second time.

    • Rich

      10/24/2012 at 1:13 pm

      Happened to me, part of the reason I just let it do its thing and then went to bed. Thenwhen I woke the battery was dead, despite being plugged in.

  14. Heidi

    10/23/2012 at 9:58 am

    What can i do so my phone isn’t so hot after the update? I updated lastnight and now my phone its ruining way hot and my battery life sucks.

    • Owen

      10/25/2012 at 12:05 pm

      Did you find a solution?

  15. wb

    10/23/2012 at 10:04 am

    Update was ready for me this morning when i got up. Install went smoothly. Only issue so far is that app notification icons in top left are very small and so faint as to be almost invisible. Louisville, KY.

  16. iDavid

    10/23/2012 at 10:05 am

    I’m very pissed. My Gallery doesn’t work and my 60 Bookmarks are GONE. This is not an update, this is a full installation of a new operating system of which we were not advised. I feel dooped by not receiving a full disclosure prior to sending out this “update”. We all should have been notified of the process and the pros and cons. Verizon, you really blew it.

    • cootybird

      10/24/2012 at 2:08 pm

      I completely agree!! All my texts are gone and wont even let me send or receive texts!

    • Danielle

      10/25/2012 at 4:22 pm

      agreed.

  17. mh34

    10/23/2012 at 10:07 am

    Phone been running slow ever since i updated last night.

  18. ben

    10/23/2012 at 10:09 am

    I have updated mine but now my music will not play. Whats going on?

  19. iDavid

    10/23/2012 at 10:10 am

    PS I also cannot access my aol email, nor does the icon respond. This is nothing more than a cosmetic change, no faster, if anything slower, nothing better, just problems. I want my old system back. It worked just fine.

  20. Matt

    10/23/2012 at 10:47 am

    Installed about an hour ago, the phone was running hot after the installation so I powered it down, pulled the battery, put the battery back in, and fired it back up. Since powering it back up it seems to be running perfectly normal. Not hot. All apps seem to be working well, and have not found any bugs.

  21. g2-53c0f4ab1b989e6f94b65706bc4b5c8a

    10/23/2012 at 10:48 am

    I got the update right after midnight last night. I cannot load my contacts nor can I open text messaging.

    • tbeckett98

      10/23/2012 at 10:50 am

      Also I noticed that it seems to be draining my battery faster, and I have an extended battery.

  22. Max

    10/23/2012 at 10:58 am

    Got it at 1AM/2AM this morning — been working AWESOME! Much much much better than 2.3.4. Maybe I’m a rare case, but since the update the phone has been running faster, more smooth, 4G has yet to drop, and GPS works fast again (GPS, when I got the phone, was wonderful, but as time went on it took longer and longer to lock onto where I was). No problem with any apps yet, although I haven’t gotten a chance to test them all. No camera issues — already tested face unlock and have taken a normal picture as well. Gmail app working fine (don’t have any other email). Music is playing just fine, battery life has seen no negative impact (maybe even better… not enough time passed yet to fully judge), not running hot. Just turned off WiFi, hasn’t tried to turn itself back on.

    DL of update took a little while on WiFi (was doing other things as well), but installation was the approximate 10 minutes as warned.

    SWEET. Also, phone was never rooted… any correlation there? (Funny story… I do have CircleLauncher and decided to use Cyanogen Image for one of my CircleLauncher widgets… Verizon tech tried to say that I had Cyanogen on my phone and wouldn’t consider replacing… lol)

    Also, thanks to Adam for keeping updates coming during this upsetting update process – articles were concise and informative every time.

  23. mattsim1

    10/23/2012 at 11:03 am

    Uh, it sucks so bad. Wiped out all my contacts and phone is running EXTREMELY slow. Very disappointed.

  24. Norm

    10/23/2012 at 11:12 am

    Update is perfect…hotspot is working the way it is supposed to and phone startup is much faster than it was before….got to give motorola credit for doing this update correctly

  25. adamhowell1

    10/23/2012 at 11:46 am

    Just wanted to post an update from my first comment above. When doing a soft reset on your phone, make sure to take out and reseat the SIM Card. This got my phone to work again. If you are registered to a corporate server, it will take a long time for the phone to completely update your email, calendar, and contacts. My phone is just starting to work normally after several hours, so be prepared. You may want to back up everything before you do anything just in case. 4G connection has not been lost yet, so I’m very pleased!!!

  26. mike

    10/23/2012 at 11:54 am

    Im having all the same issues. Gallery not working. Sound is not working and charging is not working.

  27. JD

    10/23/2012 at 12:21 pm

    I’ve been checking for days and have yet to receive the update. I’ve tried manual update checks almost every 30 mins. I’ve tried powering down, powering on then checking. Using WIFI to maybe boost chances of server connection and still nothing. What else is there to do.

    from Lincoln, NE

  28. Damon

    10/23/2012 at 12:26 pm

    Update works great.so flawless that you almost don’t notice the minor bugs in it.yes.there are bugs.some of my top nvidia tegra games are not functioning well now.there are display problems in high graphics powered games like the bard’s tale.and also some high detailed live wallpapers lacks their full effects with glitches.as in fresh leaves wallpaper,the rain drops are displayed as white boxes.also picture quality has gone down.mainly there are display issues.hopefully jellybean will come with a fix.but that is gonna take ages of waiting again.

  29. Damon

    10/23/2012 at 12:48 pm

    And i don’t know if this problem is occurring only with me but, eversince the update when i startup the phone it doesn’t say DUAL CORE Tecnology under the motorola logo.Has something gone really wrong or is this happening with anyone else??

    • Damon

      10/23/2012 at 12:51 pm

      Also like the others said, the phone is getting really hot.please fix all this motorola!! Whole phone is ruined with the good part that came with ICS.

  30. Robert2012

    10/23/2012 at 2:53 pm

    Just installed the 4.0 update an hour ago after waiting a couple of hours to download. Everything seems to be working great. Now I have a full 4G signal. No more data connectivity problems anymore. No issues with the camera or apps. Everything is running smoothly. Although the battery seems to be getting hot so I took the battery out and put it back in and that problem was solved. Awesome upgrade! –Dallas TX

    • Jimmer

      10/23/2012 at 2:58 pm

      How long was your screen stuck in the “Android is upgrading…Upgrading Media database”? Mine seems stuck for the last 2 hours.

      • Damon

        10/23/2012 at 3:12 pm

        Thats a problem.it should be finished within an hour.I have just noticed another problem too.the motion sensor doesn’t seem to be fully functioning.please check yours.

        • Jimmer

          10/23/2012 at 3:25 pm

          Should I interrupt it by taking the battery out?….the circle is still spinning.

        • Jimmer

          10/23/2012 at 3:27 pm

          Uhhhh….just thought of something….I have about 15gig of music on my card….Could that be the “media”?

          • Damon

            10/23/2012 at 10:01 pm

            I think it’s better if you wait.can’t even imagine what problems you’re gonna face after the update if you do that.i mean, some phones aren’t even functioning anymore.i hate motorola, they should pay us.

          • Damon

            10/23/2012 at 10:04 pm

            And yeah.music files are stored in the media area.

  31. Jason

    10/23/2012 at 4:01 pm

    Mine sat on the Upgrading Media for more than 3 hours, I finally pulled the battery and then it booted up. Like so many others it ran HOT and sucked battery horribly. I swapped to a new battery just now so maybe that’ll do something. My gallery is broken as well. Everything seems so very slow. Considering factory restoring it, but only as a last resort.

    • Damon

      10/23/2012 at 10:21 pm

      @ jimmer. These are some side affects for inturrupting the update.

  32. Adam

    10/23/2012 at 4:04 pm

    Just updated Bionic to ICS and I so regret doing so. Phone/Apps are running incredibly slow and 4G is no longer working. Thanks Verizon. I would shy away from this update, wish I could undo it.

  33. Jon Stanley

    10/23/2012 at 4:16 pm

    I am also experiencing a hot Bionic and a failure of the phone to charge.

    • Damon

      10/23/2012 at 10:11 pm

      Turn off your phone.take off the battery and put it back in
      Restart the phone.Many users are saying that works with the phone getting hot issue.worked with me too.and battery isn’t draining as fast as it was before.try it and see if it helps.

  34. Chris

    10/23/2012 at 4:37 pm

    It has no adobe flash support!

  35. Mike

    10/23/2012 at 4:45 pm

    any way to install the update?

  36. Mike

    10/23/2012 at 4:46 pm

    uninstall

    • Damon

      10/23/2012 at 9:56 pm

      Nah bro.you cannot. Uninstall it and return back to 2.3.4 .thats the problem.we can only hope and wait for bionic’s next update.many guys are facing different problems.my phone is all fucked up.the motion sensor has gone bam.the screen isn’t even rotating now.

  37. Alan

    10/23/2012 at 4:57 pm

    guys – chill a little. NEVER execute a major upgrade on the day of release – give it a few days, and learn from the “bold ones.”

    Also, if you really feel macho, make sure you DON’T backup your contacts, bookmarks, or any files before you start.

  38. dbio

    10/23/2012 at 6:05 pm

    phone is a bit laggy during txt and sending messages. my fb finally works… but getting a lot of “app not responding” screens hiss. I’m thinking about shipping it clean to see if that helps

  39. jimbob

    10/23/2012 at 7:22 pm

    I manually tried to update. Download took longer than expected but still reasonable. Had issues on install after reset. It started and failed about a third of the way in. No opinions as of yet toward the software as i dont have it yet. I did a factory reset and still the same issue. Il just wait until i get the prompted for the dl later on.

    • Michael Maxwell

      10/24/2012 at 11:14 pm

      My phone is doing the same thing man,. sucks

  40. Kathleen

    10/23/2012 at 9:35 pm

    I updated 6 hours ago and still can not make or receive calls…. the whole OS is slow, everything forces close… just…. pissed.

  41. Melanie Liebers

    10/23/2012 at 10:37 pm

    Text messaging does not open and some apps force closing. Bionic.

    • Melanie

      10/23/2012 at 10:39 pm

      Also my data signal still goes in and out constantly.

      • Damon

        10/24/2012 at 1:01 am

        I haven’t come across any such problems yet.but i guess that is possible since a lot of users are facing different problem.we need motorola and verizon to hear us and let them release a new update soon, hoping all bugs get fixed with the update.screw the soak testers who said it was a positive result.

  42. Artichoke

    10/24/2012 at 6:29 am

    My Bionic received new OS and updated this morning. Took about an hour. But now Gmail app does not work when it opens, other apps are slow to open and respond, if they open at all, no 4G. Phone is pretty much unusable right now. Help!

  43. Amber Jones

    10/24/2012 at 9:08 am

    So what do you do after you have updated and it wipes out EVERYTHING on your phone. pictures, contacts, text etc??? This is ridiculous.. and who can help??

  44. Adam K

    10/24/2012 at 9:11 am

    Got the update this morning as i woke up. Literally took 8 minutes to update. Booted right up. No problems, no freezes. Everything works. Totally different phone. Data did drop for a few minutes at work on facebook, but not as bad as it has been. So smooth and refined.

  45. Robert

    10/24/2012 at 9:17 am

    Wow. I really wish I’d not updated. I have an enormous amount of music on my phone. I have a 64GB card with probably at least 40 GB of music purchased from Amazon. Most of it is backed up somewhere else, but I’m still waiting for the “Upgrading Media database” to finish. I’ve heard some people waited 10 and 12 hours before it finished, so I’m still waiting. Right now it’s been doing this for about 26 hours! I’ll give it another day, but then I’ll have do do a battery pull. I just wish there was a way to know of this is working or if the thing just crashed? And – I wished I’d been warned. I’ve not had issues like this with other updates.

  46. braleigh

    10/24/2012 at 9:39 am

    started to install this morning after i awoke to the upgrade message – i saw the same issue as some previous posters where it stayed on the “upgrading media” for a couple / three hours.

    seems like it finished but now i can’t get the thing to even turn on… anyone else?

    • braleigh

      10/24/2012 at 9:41 am

      well apparently the upgrade killed the battery… no idea if it made it all the way through or not. awesome.

      • braleigh

        10/24/2012 at 9:50 am

        finally got it restarted and received notice that upgrade was successful… but phone is very very slow to respond. hopefully that works itself out.

  47. Jimmer

    10/24/2012 at 10:21 am

    OK…Apparently wifi is the only good way to upgrade. data upgrade takes forever, kills battery, causes lock up on upgrading media. Lockup causes SD card not to work right. the pics and music are there, but no connection to apps.

    Motorola just walked me through a factory reset. All my stuff is backed up…music on itunes, files on dropbox, pics on macbook, etc. Make sure gmail account is configured so your apps will download automatically in my apps in Play store. The reset didn’t take long. Music works. Gallery works. Apps are reloading now. Later I’ll sync with itunes (isyncr). 1500 songs…easy in one playlist…but takes a while.

    I recommend calling Motorola for help to do the reset…I’d like to tell Moto to take a leap, but the guy that helped me was great.

    800-734-5870

  48. slowpoke

    10/24/2012 at 11:32 am

    Upgraded last night, I love everything that I have tried so far except email (my most important application I use the stupid phone for). All my accounts stopped working. After trying to remove and reinstall the accounts, sometimes it seems to work , but I don’t get the message body!!!! If this was working, I’d be an extremely happy camper, but at this moment, I’m feeling the “NEVER buying from Motorola/Verizon again” vibe that has been so prevalent here.

  49. Andrew

    10/24/2012 at 1:03 pm

    Updated this morning. Word to the wise: DO NOT UPDATE YET!!!!!

    – Text Messaging keeps loading without showing any of my text history (blank area below the header). Clicking the plus sign for new text message crashes the app half the time, the other half it crashes on send.

    – Handcent (alternate sms app) doesnt even start, crashes.

    – After making a call, the call service doesn’t stop (it keeps counting up time like Im still in a call.)

    – Most things are slow and not smooth.

    Honestly this is pathetic. It’s almost as if they didn’t even test their new update on the phones. $100 motorola credit?? no thanks, I’d rather get a Nexus device. At least they’re doing it right. Motorola – bloated, old, horrible.

    • Andrew

      10/24/2012 at 1:42 pm

      Okay some of the issues have stopped.

      Texting: I had a HUGE number of texts in my history, which caused all the texting crashes and problems (it was trying to load them all). Just be patient, plug the phone in, and wait for the texting app to load your messages.

      Handcent: same as above, working now.

      Calls: Working.

      Sorry for the hatred, but you can imagine my frustration :)

  50. Angela

    10/24/2012 at 1:17 pm

    Do a factory reset and it should fix all the problems.

  51. Kathleen

    10/24/2012 at 4:08 pm

    Had to factory reset to get everything working properly. I literally could not make or receive phone calls for a day. Which is not that bad, but it is for a college student that’s six hours away from home… -_- I was upset that I lost all of my apps and text messages, but I backed up my contacts and photos so all is well, now.

  52. eric35

    10/24/2012 at 6:17 pm

    This still seems like an internet hoax and a bunch of crap to me. it is now Wednesday night Oct 24 and I’ve yet to get notification that ICS is availble nor can I pull it from the server manually. Again it seems like lies from Motorola. If in fact ICS does come along soon, how long is Motorola going to jack us aound about getting Jellybean? I think it is time to switch to Samsung.

    • Jade

      10/25/2012 at 2:14 pm

      It is honestly out there… But you do not want it any way it messes your freaking phone up

  53. Michael Maxwell

    10/24/2012 at 11:12 pm

    Hello, i recently heard the ics update was available to bionic users last night. I had to manually pull it up but it said it was due for an update so i started the process. It took about 45 minutes to finish downloading and then it got to the installation process where it said it would take about 10 minutes. It shuts down the phone and starts doing it’s thing and the yellow bar only reaches a quarter of the way there and the picture goes from an open box to an exclamation sign. Then the phone rebooted and came back on with a status update that said “system update failed!” Any suggestions?? or has this happened to anyone else?? Please help!! I’ve tried like ten times and Verizon was no help either.. did a factory reset and still doing same thing…

  54. Isaac

    10/24/2012 at 11:12 pm

    Since the update, I noticed my battery life is draining extremely fast. Unplugged for 2 min and down to 90%. Another 10 min unplugged and down to 80%. I hate it. Before update I was getting 15 hours out of one charge. Now, getting 3.5 to 4 hours top! Any way to fix this?

  55. Slippery Soapbox (@SlipperySoapbox)

    10/24/2012 at 11:49 pm

    Mine updated yesterday around noon. I have 8GB of music, and updating media did take about a half hour.
    I love the new look and functionality, and some of my apps updated as well look better.
    I cannot speak for the camera, chat or possible home launcher issues since I use camera360, Go SMS Pro (texts) and Go Launcher. So maybe the issues that users are having are less icecream sandwich and more Motorola’s apps that perform these same functions.
    The Swype app seems to work better after updating to ICS as well.

    Some users have stated they haven’t yet got the update even when trying manually, though Adam’s article did state ‘update will be rolling out in phases’… which I interpret to indicate something geographical since everything else in the cell phone world is this way (though they like to call it ‘market’…still seems to just be a geographical area….so likely if you don’t have it yet, it will be available soon.
    I am in the Seattle-Tacoma area, I just assumed other Bionic users in the area also have the update but no one I know has a Bionic so really just a theory.
    Likely you could use the Motorola Device Manager app from their website to see if it can be downloaded via PC and installed that way. This might allow you to get it prior to your roll out phase. Not positive,…though i recall that was how i once updated my old original Motorola Droid.
    They do have a new manual for the Bionic strictly for ICS…so the update is real.

    So far the only issue I have noticed is that the battery seems to have drained quicker, and i did have to reload some of the icons from my home screen that for some reason had been removed from my current folder structure i was using through the GO Launcher App screen. May only apply to other Go Launcher users that also were using folders. I do not recall if the default Motorola launcher app screen allowed for folder structures…been so long since I have used the default launcher.

  56. Slippery Soapbox (@SlipperySoapbox)

    10/25/2012 at 12:11 am

    A little further reading on Motorola’s website does state you can update your phone via the USB cable connected to your PC.

    Also found a page on some things to expect with the upgrade and some hints for a smoother upgrade.
    Notice the recommendation for at least 50% battery life and connection to Wi-Fi… maybe that is why users are having drained batteries during/after the upgrade? My battery didn’t drain or get hot though usually I can unplug it in the morning and with normal usage it will be about half drained when i get home. Today it was almost drained and was throwing warnings about plugging it in about a half hour after i got home. 6AM-6PM (though it still lasted till 7PM before i got to a charger)

    I think they really should have sent out a text with a link to his page or put that in the warning screen before the upgrade. Maybe that would have resolved some of the issues users are having.

    • Isaac

      10/25/2012 at 12:15 am

      My battery was at 100% when I updated. Its been an hour and I on 30%. It was fully charged. I did the battery calibration and it didn’t help.

  57. Shauna

    10/25/2012 at 2:38 pm

    Messed up my phone. Everything is force closing!

  58. lanettef

    10/25/2012 at 3:44 pm

    My phone is HOSED! Reboots constantly, Is Verizon ready to give me a new phone because this one is bricked!

  59. kevin

    10/25/2012 at 6:11 pm

    My phone updated itself while I was at work today without me authorizing the update. I absolutely despise the update. Called Verizon and was told I’m stuck with ics. The phone is functioning OK with exception of this crappy update.

  60. Rich

    10/25/2012 at 7:05 pm

    So I did a factory reset after backing up my contacts and such. Music works gallery works battery charges properly and battery life seems back fo normal. ICS looks slick, I like the lock screen options and the way you organize widgets and such. I think the killer on the update problems is having way too many media files and music cauding the update to hang.

    • Jimmer

      10/26/2012 at 10:52 am

      I agree with Rich. My phone was ruined…no music, no pictures…dead battery…it was a very expensive hand warmer. However, Even though the factory reset took some time, it was worth it. My phone, apps, battery work better now than before update. Unlock screen is better. I like how you can stack apps on top of each other on screen (like a folder) to save space. Phone is faster cause I no longer need a launcher. Battery seems to last longer. Heat problem gone. I do get more freeze-ups though, but I think that will be solved with app updates.

      The only problem I found is that the “direct dial” widget wont work. I like to put my close contacts pictures on screen for speed dial with direct dial. Found “Better Direct Dial” in play store. Works great. With one touch it dials my friends’ mobile. Works for my voice mail too.

  61. gust

    10/28/2012 at 1:37 am

    So far, my phone has been stuck in “Upgrading Media database” for 2 and a half days. I have a 10-speed 32 GB MicroSD card filled with music. Considering taking the battery out but really don’t want to mess up the phone. Before the upgrade, I had changed the music on the phone and was experiencing many of the problems listed online by people who took out their battery during this step of the upgrade, to include battery rapidly draining, phone heating up, and 70+% of the battery usage being taken up by Media. I do not think this is an ICS problem but rather a Motorola Droid Bionic issue. Should’ve just bought an iPhone…

    • gust

      10/28/2012 at 2:53 am

      Found a solution that worked (although took some tinkering and time afterwards..):

      If your Bionic is stuck on “Upgrading Media database”…
      Pull the SD card — your upgrade should complete and then you can put the card back in.
      If you continue to have problems…
      Main screen > Menu > Manage apps >All > Media storage >clear data.
      Launch “My music” – it may take a few minutes to load music

      https://forums.motorola.com/posts/a5f0e4f055?page=1

      I’m still upset about all these bugs on the phone and am terrified of updating the music or video on my SD card ever again, but at least now my phone is functional again and the My Music app is actually finding the music on the phone.

  62. Joseph Fratoni

    10/28/2012 at 5:11 am

    After updating to ICS, Bionic constantly crashed,rebooted,apps automatically closed and froze. Did multiple battery pulls as well as Factory Reset. Same problems, Verizon is sending me a new Bionic with the suggestions of not upgrading to ICS yet

  63. Rich

    10/28/2012 at 9:15 am

    I know it has been really frustrating for those of us who have had problems upgrading but files wife who does not have a whole lot of media on her phone was able to upgrade without any problems at all. I really think a big part of the problem is big card, packed with thousands of media files. Still, now that I have resolved the issues and have been using ice cream sandwich for a few days now, I really love the new features. It feels like a whole new phone. Also, google Chrome is a great browser, be sure to try it out once you upgrade.

  64. Rich

    10/28/2012 at 4:45 pm

    After using my phone pretty heavily this weekend and paying close attention to battery life to see if the whole thing with the battery dying while on the charger during update damaged the battery, I can say that I have noticed a slightly improved battery life. BEWARE, though, of a serious battery hog called media server that is related to google listen and other cloud music services, if you have those set to sync, it seems to run in the background.I simply told them not to sync automatically.

    The more I use it, the more I like it. Voice integration seems to have improved and I really like being able to disable most of the bloatware without rooting, though there are still a couple you can’t. I really love interface, and the ability to stack apps in the app tray. As I said above, it feels like a whole new phone, and I mean that in a good way. Too bad the upgrade process was such a pain for many of us.

  65. Nathan

    10/28/2012 at 5:02 pm

    Downloaded the update several days ago when it first rolled out. Took a few hours, but it finally finished. After all was said and done I booted my phone back up and was welcomed by a slew of fancy new updates and a pretty slick-looking “new” interface.

    My being impressed with the update stopped right about there…

    The old music player on the device was completely removed and replaced with a new one which is a bigger pain in the behind to use (there wasn’t even a warning of this, it took me a while to figure that out, and the non-stock one I was using quit working too well). The airplane mode and wi-fi widgets were completely removed as well; it took me a few days to figure out how to access them. The majority of my apps are now forceclosing half of the time. The battery has been draining faster than normal as well. Had it off the charger for about 10 hours yesterday (with minimal use all day) and by the time I got home the battery was practically dead. The album art for every single (music) album on my phone was deleted as well and I had to manually re-download all 100+ of them (ok, this one was just a minor inconvenience, but still annoying nonetheless). The volume controls are being kinda fidgety. Swype seems to be not as accurate as it was before the update. I’ve received three separate messages (in text and email form) from Verizon saying that I have reached 50%, 75%, and 90% respectively of my monthly data allowance, all in one day, within one hour. I’m on the 2 GB plan and I’ve used less than a tenth of that as of writing this (wi-fi is always turned on when I’m home). On top of all of this, everything in general seems to be running and loading more slowly.

    There are some good things about it though: not having to use the slider AND enter my password to unlock are nice, now I just enter my “connect the dots” password instead. Being able to access various features like texts or the phone from the unlock screen are pretty spiffy too. A few of the changes have actually cleared up a bit of clutter on my desktop. One of my friends and I have a habit of sending each other stupid pictures of stuff pretty regularly and they’ve made inserting a pic into a text a bit more streamlined which I appreciated. The new stock text format in general is pretty nice; the new color scheme is a bit easier on the eyes. Like I said earlier, everything in general is more aesthetically pleasing to look at.

    All things considered though, the cons are outweighing the pros here (in my opinion, anyway). I’m not super thrilled with this update so far.

    Has anyone else experienced any of the problems similar to what I’m seeing?

  66. Nicole R.

    10/28/2012 at 7:04 pm

    Grrrrrrr. I can’t access the home screen, apps including my navi or my email. Some upgrade!!!

  67. Carol

    10/28/2012 at 9:29 pm

    Not liking this upgrade. Battery life is worse than ever. I have poor 4g service here and usually leave phone set on 3g only. Settings won’t let me do this anymore. How do I get to just 3g?

  68. areagu

    10/29/2012 at 6:51 pm

    love the upgrade — but battery life became horrible all of the sudden — lasts a just a few hours — use to last a whole day. Not sure i can continue using this phone.

  69. Alex

    10/29/2012 at 11:42 pm

    My droid keeps crashing and resetting every 3 minutes. I’m not getting any text messages and cannot even open my text messaging apps. This is retarded. Please fix this…

  70. Nichole

    11/03/2012 at 6:18 am

    I use my phone as my Internet at home. We watch Netflix on our ps3 and when I got this update on my phone I can no longer use my Netflix. I’m super upset this is all we have for tv and I have a 4 and 2 year old. someone please help it looks as if my password changed in the hotspot but I’m not sure why it will not connect to my ps3. Help

  71. Shannan

    11/03/2012 at 7:30 am

    Battery is horrible. I like the new look of everything, but I miss the old task manager. When I go onto Facebook or Google, it won’t start from the main page and always goes back to where I left off. I liked ending tasks on the old task manager and it basically cleared everything for you.

  72. danny

    11/04/2012 at 9:11 pm

    Really hate new updait really need a way to role back to old version.

  73. Roger

    11/06/2012 at 8:20 am

    My first week with ICS on my Bionic was a real pain. Various apps would hang, FCs galore, the device rebooted spontaneously, my preferred launcher (Apex) crashed,GPS activities failed, etc. I was really frustrated!

    Two days ago I did a factory reset and reinstalled and reconfigured everything. Now the device is running flawlessly, with super smooth action and excellent performance. Haven’t considered battery performance but it doesn’t appear to be any worse than before the upgrade.

    I’m typically hard-headed but have learned my lesson for the future.

    • Jimmer

      11/06/2012 at 9:25 am

      Update….My Bionic is working well. Battery life has improved. I own three batteries for my Bionic. Two are spares that I generally rotate into use. I haven’t needed the spare batteries since the factory reset.

  74. Lauren

    11/06/2012 at 10:51 am

    I still have not received my update and I have tried to go in and manually update the phone. Has anyone else still not received the update? Does anyone know when everyone will be updated by? Thanks!

  75. Ivory

    11/07/2012 at 9:34 am

    I like the upgrade although there are some things that I dislike. The major thing is the My Music feature which now looks like my picture gallery upon intentionally opening it. There are some cool features about it like the song recommendation and media share features but I dislike the setup. You can not move as smoothly from finding music under Artist to Albums or Playlist by simply swiping you must use a drop down list. I like to sync my music to my car and if I want to find something on the road I only have that quick moment at a red light or stop sign to find out, this will slow the process. Another thing is I greatly dislike the widget for Youtube which is just a clump of videos that you CAN swipe out of the way to view videos behind. I feel that it was an unnecessary change. So far I like the other changes but I’ve only had the update since last night.

  76. Dizzy

    11/07/2012 at 6:59 pm

    This update blows. I hate it so much. My phone worked perfectly until ICS. My media is jacked up, everything freezes and closes, gallery fkd up, task manager gone, settings doesn’t respond… just loathsome garbage now. So mad.

    • danny

      11/07/2012 at 7:39 pm

      Dubley hate the new update. You should have a choice.used to be able to quickly navigate pages now thumb thumb thumb. This update is crap!!!!!!!

  77. sanpiece

    11/10/2012 at 6:04 am

    I got the update a week ago and absolutely hate it, not fond of the whole layout anddeleted my media player. Most of my apps force close, phone super slow, Swype dictionary even seems to have gotten worse so I downloaded a new keyboard but it just ran entirely to slow and just got me more aggravated. If I got to type in Facebook my phone brings up a list of my last 20 posts as a suggestion which makes my phone bug out and my cursor jump to random parts of my text and change words I didn’t ask it to. It no longer automatically capitalizes I and I give up on correcting and typing errors like the one above because moving to a different part of this post to do so can cause my phone to mess up and just ruin the whole post.

    • danny

      11/10/2012 at 5:54 pm

      Still finding more and more things that you can no longer do. I am about to divorce DROID and get an I phone since can’t do anything the DROID was famous for haven’t had anything this shitty since the comadore

  78. Ron Case

    11/13/2012 at 11:17 am

    This Version is a pain the ass wasting time and resources! Changed everything, many apps work much slower, harder to configure, etc

    How do you go back?

  79. uf student

    11/14/2012 at 11:21 pm

    overall like the new update mostly because of the faster speed of it and more reliable internet connection. enough changes to complicate things for a bit but well worth it and haven’t had the crashes or slower working apps others are complaining about

  80. Katie

    11/15/2012 at 12:46 am

    Would have been nice if they told us we were getting a whole new systems upgrade! I liked my old one better except for the occasional force closes. Now they won’t let you go back to the old one! And I can’t customize any of the stuff I hate like this black menu and the small writing on the top bar of the home screen. And my phone is hot and running slow!!! Really really mad! I can’t afford a new phone! Verizon you really f-ed up!

    • David Miller

      11/16/2012 at 3:53 am

      I had the same problem at first (overheating, running thru battery quickly), but it went away after i shut off the phone and pulled the battery out, then restarted, TWICE.

  81. john

    01/08/2013 at 3:06 am

    I cant believe you would even install it after all the negative feedback ics sucks anyway no flash support at all id stick with gingerbread any day its stable and once i install launcher pro it looks the same on every device ics is a fail dont update

    • David Miller

      01/08/2013 at 3:20 am

      Whoops, to late: so can it be reverted to gingerbread?

  82. john

    01/08/2013 at 3:32 am

    No you cannot unless you root an flash the gingerbread rom

    • David Miller

      01/08/2013 at 3:43 am

      In that case thanks for your constructive “ICS sucks” comment; Lotta good it does now.

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