A demonstration of Ice Cream Sandwich on the first-generation Android phone, the 2008-era T-Mobile G1.

Running a newly released version of Windows or Mac OS X on a 3-year-old personal computer is an unremarkable feat.

But it's a lot more difficult in the smartphone world, where hardware and software have been changing at a breakneck pace. That's why I recommend watching this brief demonstration of Ice Cream Sandwich, aka Android 4.0, on the first-generation Android phone, the T-Mobile G1 from October 2008.

XDA Developers forum member jcarrz1 posted the video and an alpha version of his OS build yesterday, nine days after Google released the Ice Cream Sandwich source code.

As you may expect, the new OS drags on the comparatively ancient hardware, with slow app launches and long lags between a touch action and the phone's response. But all the ICS apps work.

What doesn't work at this stage, jcarrz1 said: Wi-Fi networking, Bluetooth, and screen rotation.

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