What’s Up With Certain Devices and the Android Market?

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I have an issue that’s a bit perplexing: I have the T-Mobile MyTouch 3G and the Verizon HTC Droid Incredible. Both are Android devices, and both have the Android Market, albeit branded differently based on carrier as you can see in the above photo.

I was looking up a free software title on the Incredible — one that is definitely available on the MyTouch 3G, but on the Incredible it was nowhere to be seen.

This happened to me again when I did a search for another title, only this time I could see that there were other results that weren’t being returned.

So my question is, would applications not show because devices have different resolutions (making certain programs incompatible, perhaps)? Or is it due to another reason? Is there a simple fix that I am missing?

Because Carly is able to see the same programs on her Droid that I can find on the MyTouch, and it’s a Verizon phone just like the Incredible. So … anyone know the answer?

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About the Author

Judie Lipsett Stanford
Judie is the co-owner and Editor-in-Chief of Gear Diary, which she founded in September 2006. She got her start in 1999 writing software reviews at the now-defunct smaller.com; from mid-2000 through 2006, she wrote hardware reviews for and co-edited at The Gadgeteer. A recipient of the Sigma Kappa Colby Award for Technology, Judie has written for or been profiled by nationally known sites and magazines, and she has served on multiple industry hardware and software award panels. She is best known for her device-agnostic approach, enjoyment of exploring tech, gadgets, and gear, and her deep-diving, jargon-free reviews.

13 Comments on "What’s Up With Certain Devices and the Android Market?"

  1. abitnerdy :)* | April 20, 2010 at 2:32 pm |

    RT @GearDiarySite

    What’s Up With Certain Devices and the Android Market? http://goo.gl/fb/VFz1n

  2. RT @geardiary: What's Up With Certain Devices and the Android Market? http://bit.ly/9jitKf

  3. It seems the market will only show apps that are compatible for your device. If the dev has said it will only run on 2.1, it won’t show if your device is running 1.6 or 2.0. That is the only “filtering” I’ve seen. I don’t think it is carrier based.

  4. What’s Up With Certain Devices and the Android Market? http://bit.ly/d48GqM via http://topicfire.com/Gadget

  5. @drowe – that makes sense, but since the Incredible is running 2.1 and the MyTouch runs 1.6, I don’t think that’s what’s happening here. Unless these programs can’t run on the newer version, which seems wrong … but who knows? Any other ideas? 🙂

    • It may seem wrong but it’s definitely the case with some apps.

      The filtering is definitely due to software versions and restrictions/changes in API over each version.

      You can’t grab the RoadSync exchange app on any 2.x device either but it shows up fine on any device running 1.6 and lower.

      Nothing fishy here. Just filtering based on device specs.

  6. RT @BreakingGadgets: Whats Up With Certain Devices and the Android Market? via http://topicfire.com/Gadget http://bit.ly/9jitKf

  7. I think it must be something else. I have the Sprint Samsung Moment, and before I flashed it with a leaked version of 2.1, I was looking through the market and clicked on the details of quite a few programs that said they would only work on the droid or required 2.1. I haven’t experienced any filtering based on the version of Android that I’m running.

    After I flashed to 2.1 I was looking for a flashlight program that I loved using with 1.6 and it showed up in the market. I downloaded it and installed, but it would no longer work until I checked a few days later and saw that the developer had updated it to work with 2.1.

    I have no idea what would be causing this other than possibly server issues or maybe different ports used to access the server.

  8. @Nguyen urgh – this one would be better 😉 http://bit.ly/coiWNh

  9. There is some kind of filtering going on, but I have no clue what it is. For example, on my Nexus1, PDANet does not show up in the market if the phone radio is turned on, but if I turn it off or remove the SIM card, it and another tethering application appear. It would be great if we could ask Google to explain, but I’m guessing they won’t.

  10. The same thing happened with the Droid Eris when it first came out last year. The Eris, like the Incredible, is an HTC Android phone with a Sense interface.

    There was all sorts of idle speculation (as there will be here).

    The problem turned out to be that copy-protected apps (both free and paid) didn’t show up on the Eris.

    I suspect that this is happening again.

    They fixed it (at their end) after a couple of weeks.

    • If it’s only a couple of weeks to wait, then that’s not too bad. I just wonder why they don’t sort things like this out before release day, and it’s pretty frustrating to the end-user — especially when they are coming from another Android phone, expecting to use their favorite apps. :-/

  11. Jason Reese | May 7, 2010 at 3:34 pm |

    Experiencing the same annoyance on the HTC Desire…no Amazon MP3 store app shows up in Android Market.

Comments are closed.