HTC

[juux]

First of all, I have a standard Vodafone UK supplied Legend with the latest VF firmware (with the broken SMS threading) and manually checked for the Froyo update last night about 9pm when I heard it might be available. Upgrade was painless and took about 20 minutes end-end. There was one worrying stage where it was stuck on the Vodafone logo for a few minutes without any apparent activity but then it just kicked in again.

The first thing I noticed was that the pattern unlock was ever so slightly different, a bit more spaced out - wonder why they would go to the bother of recoding that as it seemed to work fine before? I know that Froyo also includes a PIN unlock so maybe it was changed to accommodate that? One other change I've noticed is that you no longer need to re-unlock if the screen has only just turned off, there seems to be a grace period built in, no idea if this is configurable though.

The next thing I noticed was the screen transitions, neat touch and they serve to add a little bit more polish to the already slick Sense UI. The side to side scrolling has also been changed, with a little shudder as each screen settles in. Again this just makes it seem more 'solid' for want of a better word. Having said all that, the Sense page scrolling is still not as smooth as an iPhone...

Some of the widget icons for GPS/wifi wtc. toggling have been changed and are a bit uglier as a result. I'm also sure that the HTC clock widget I use has changed in that the time is no longer centre-aligned but right-aligned - uglier.

Some of the apps have new names, Photos >Gallery, People>HTC People.

A couple of my apps were left with shortcuts that no longer worked and I had to recreate them - weird.

Browser - WOW! - What a difference, much faster in almost everything it is doing. Some other apps like Maps are also much improved, offering near seamless scrolling when on wifi even with satellite images. Streetview is now very fluid and responsive.

Live wallpapers work just fine, a diversion for about 2 minutes then I was back to my normal static one though.

SMS threading in the HTC app is finally fixed - yay!

Flashlight app is a welcome addition - about time too!

Talking of Flash, Adobe this time, I wasn't expecting it to work as it apparently requires an ARMv7 core on Froyo with the Legend having ARMv6. From my travels on the intarweb I gather there is no fundamental technical reason why it won't work on more recent ARMv6 devices like the MSM7227, but rather this is a political decision based around having to avoid supporting it on older v6 CPUs. Ho hum.

Not tried wifi tethering yet but expect it works just fine. My old Sony Ericsson K660i used to do this perfectly though so it's not a stretch for something like the Legend. Hope Vodafone don't play silly buggers with data charging though...

Apps2SD has instantly freed me up about 50MB of space! This is seriously worth it, one of the few limiting factors of the Legend was its relatively meagre on-board storage. This is simply no no longer an issue.

Too early to say whether the battery life is improved, or whether there is any improvement in signal pickup/retention. I do seem to nice that it won't hold a 2G/3G data connection if it is logged onto a wifi network - makes sense and if this indeed is a system policy now then I guess it can only help extend the battery life.

[asholiday]

Thank you for your excellent review. I am going to attempt the upgrade.

First of all, I have a standard Vodafone UK supplied Legend with the latest VF firmware (with the broken SMS threading) and manually checked for the Froyo update last night about 9pm when I heard it might be available. Upgrade was painless and took about 20 minutes end-end. There was one worrying stage where it was stuck on the Vodafone logo for a few minutes without any apparent activity but then it just kicked in again.

The first thing I noticed was that the pattern unlock was ever so slightly different, a bit more spaced out - wonder why they would go to the bother of recoding that as it seemed to work fine before? I know that Froyo also includes a PIN unlock so maybe it was changed to accommodate that? One other change I've noticed is that you no longer need to re-unlock if the screen has only just turned off, there seems to be a grace period built in, no idea if this is configurable though.

The next thing I noticed was the screen transitions, neat touch and they serve to add a little bit more polish to the already slick Sense UI. The side to side scrolling has also been changed, with a little shudder as each screen settles in. Again this just makes it seem more 'solid' for want of a better word. Having said all that, the Sense page scrolling is still not as smooth as an iPhone...

Some of the widget icons for GPS/wifi wtc. toggling have been changed and are a bit uglier as a result. I'm also sure that the HTC clock widget I use has changed in that the time is no longer centre-aligned but right-aligned - uglier.

Some of the apps have new names, Photos >Gallery, People>HTC People.

A couple of my apps were left with shortcuts that no longer worked and I had to recreate them - weird.

Browser - WOW! - What a difference, much faster in almost everything it is doing. Some other apps like Maps are also much improved, offering near seamless scrolling when on wifi even with satellite images. Streetview is now very fluid and responsive.

Live wallpapers work just fine, a diversion for about 2 minutes then I was back to my normal static one though.

SMS threading in the HTC app is finally fixed - yay!

Flashlight app is a welcome addition - about time too!

Talking of Flash, Adobe this time, I wasn't expecting it to work as it apparently requires an ARMv7 core on Froyo with the Legend having ARMv6. From my travels on the intarweb I gather there is no fundamental technical reason why it won't work on more recent ARMv6 devices like the MSM7227, but rather this is a political decision based around having to avoid supporting it on older v6 CPUs. Ho hum.

Not tried wifi tethering yet but expect it works just fine. My old Sony Ericsson K660i used to do this perfectly though so it's not a stretch for something like the Legend. Hope Vodafone don't play silly buggers with data charging though...

Apps2SD has instantly freed me up about 50MB of space! This is seriously worth it, one of the few limiting factors of the Legend was its relatively meagre on-board storage. This is simply no no longer an issue.

Too early to say whether the battery life is improved, or whether there is any improvement in signal pickup/retention. I do seem to nice that it won't hold a 2G/3G data connection if it is logged onto a wifi network - makes sense and if this indeed is a system policy now then I guess it can only help extend the battery life.

[starlinguk]

I've just found out a bit of an annoyance about the upgrade: the phone keyboard has shrunk. You don't have shortcuts to particular symbols anymore (such as the !), you have to look it up in the list of symbols instead. Boo!

[johnnytruant]

I've just found out a bit of an annoyance about the upgrade: the phone keyboard has shrunk. You don't have shortcuts to particular symbols anymore (such as the !), you have to look it up in the list of symbols instead. Boo!

With a bit of googling, you can find an APK for Swype (you want the HVGA version) which is the bestest text entry system since T9.

So much better than the default keyboard app.

[martyelmore]

My wifi works for the first time! I've done a fair bit of complaining about Vodafone over the past few months but they finally seem to have extricated digits from orifices. My phone is running quicker and is generally better thanks to this update. Most impressed. Finally.

[nickrpearce]

At last! Android 2.2 update arrived this morning - very excited. Seems improved in many areas - namely speed in launching apps, web, etc. Overall I am pleased! My findings? As follows:

Upgrade was painless - 20/25 minutes, no issues

Not sure either why the lock pattern is slightly more spread out - noticable immediately and a bit disconcerting at first

My home screens were just fine, haven't discovered any widgets/shortcuts not working yet.

Didn't notice the flashlight app until i read this forum, but sure will be useful!

One of the best features I've found is the App to SD Card. Have saved 14MB on the internal storage already and most of the apps won't move (I understand developers have to enable this feature and update the app). Legend doesn't have the best amount of internal storage so this is a bit of breathing space!

Live wallpapers are pretty cool to show off the phone, but a bit of a distraction in the background...! Quite like the map background though, I guess it will update when you travel around? (But it still shows my location at work, without GPS enabled, as about 400 metres out!)

Apps do seem to load quicker, and web browsing has been given a boost too!

Also noticed that the wifi signal indicator actually shows more signal now than on 2.1 - so either something is working better or they've changed the way it displays!


Overall I'm reasonably impressed. Things are quicker, slicker, and more internal storage available. I've had the update on for 6 hours now and am probably no where near exploring everything that's changed. By the time I've done that I'm sure there's be many more posts with everyone's thoughts!

[qbert456]

I use an improved version of the htc ime keyboard.

If you follow this link you can design your own for free (i'm not involved with this site at all - just that i used to use this keyboard before 2.2 and it stopped working - found this whilst looking for a fix)

http://www.gimpsta.com/themerlo/

you have to "sign up" but it lets you in straight away

for our Legends you need: v27 froyo low res 1.6+


The t9 phone keyboard this gives you is far far better than the standard one, and in my opinion better than swype.


Once it's on your phone, use something like ASTRO to open it, then in phone settings enable it then finally long press on the text input box and select it there.

[juux]

Also noticed that the wifi signal indicator actually shows more signal now than on 2.1 - so either something is working better or they've changed the way it displays!

Yes, I think Google/HTC has 'done an Apple' and just shown more bars for the same signal. It still drops out in the same spots in my house that it used to, but displays more bars when it is in range.

After nearly 24 hours I also think this has been done to the mobile signal bars aswell, seeing full strength a lot more often.

[starlinguk]

I don't know about the signal showing extra bars. In fact, I now have no signal whatsoever in the auto option (WCDMA was really good before the update), I have to set it to GSM only to get any reception.

[guntha]

Overall I like the new update. However I have noticed an issue with the media player. I listen to pod casts when I'm driving and pause them when I finish my journey. When I get back in I used to just press play and hey presto it starts from where it was paused, as you would expect. Now though it always resets and starts back at the beginning. A bit annoying when you are a couple of hours into a pod cast especially as the time line is hard to accurately use with fat fingers.

[GingerPiston]

Easy upgrade, don't think it's made any difference to signal though - will try from another location later today.

I may have discovered my first bug;

Immediately following the upgrade, I moved what apps I can onto the SD card.
For the first time since I just plugged my phone into my computer to move some more music onto it, and obviously selected the mount phone as Disk Drive (from the connect to PC screen). This seems to unmount/disconnect the SD card from the OS.
When I'd finished moving the files onto the phone, I unplugged the usb cable and was flicking through the screens. ALL the icons for all the apps mounted on SD card were showing the broken app icon, rather than their specific icons, and were also not appearing in the application list. I had to reboot the phone and wait about a minute before everything returned to normal, and all the SD card apps were back.

I've not tried to recreate this yet, but I'm hoping it was a one-off!

[munrojock]

I've just found out a bit of an annoyance about the upgrade: the phone keyboard has shrunk. You don't have shortcuts to particular symbols anymore (such as the !), you have to look it up in the list of symbols instead. Boo!

Hmm, I did the upgrade last night and with both Handcent and the HTC message app, I can still use the shortcuts!! Does this mean my upgrade failed or is something else up???

Harris

[asholiday]

Having updated to Froyo, I have a couple of additions to your excellent appraisal.

I can now add a second gmail account.
I can scroll forward and back through gmail, previously could only scroll back.

Mobile Internet connection is significantly quicker.
I did have a problem connecting to my Linksys 4400N wifi router but then upgraded the firware on the router and it's fine now. (this could also be of interest to Ipod touch users with poor battery issues following recent OS4 upgrade)

First of all, I have a standard Vodafone UK supplied Legend with the latest VF firmware (with the broken SMS threading) and manually checked for the Froyo update last night about 9pm when I heard it might be available. Upgrade was painless and took about 20 minutes end-end. There was one worrying stage where it was stuck on the Vodafone logo for a few minutes without any apparent activity but then it just kicked in again.

The first thing I noticed was that the pattern unlock was ever so slightly different, a bit more spaced out - wonder why they would go to the bother of recoding that as it seemed to work fine before? I know that Froyo also includes a PIN unlock so maybe it was changed to accommodate that? One other change I've noticed is that you no longer need to re-unlock if the screen has only just turned off, there seems to be a grace period built in, no idea if this is configurable though.

The next thing I noticed was the screen transitions, neat touch and they serve to add a little bit more polish to the already slick Sense UI. The side to side scrolling has also been changed, with a little shudder as each screen settles in. Again this just makes it seem more 'solid' for want of a better word. Having said all that, the Sense page scrolling is still not as smooth as an iPhone...

Some of the widget icons for GPS/wifi wtc. toggling have been changed and are a bit uglier as a result. I'm also sure that the HTC clock widget I use has changed in that the time is no longer centre-aligned but right-aligned - uglier.

Some of the apps have new names, Photos >Gallery, People>HTC People.

A couple of my apps were left with shortcuts that no longer worked and I had to recreate them - weird.

Browser - WOW! - What a difference, much faster in almost everything it is doing. Some other apps like Maps are also much improved, offering near seamless scrolling when on wifi even with satellite images. Streetview is now very fluid and responsive.

Live wallpapers work just fine, a diversion for about 2 minutes then I was back to my normal static one though.

SMS threading in the HTC app is finally fixed - yay!

Flashlight app is a welcome addition - about time too!

Talking of Flash, Adobe this time, I wasn't expecting it to work as it apparently requires an ARMv7 core on Froyo with the Legend having ARMv6. From my travels on the intarweb I gather there is no fundamental technical reason why it won't work on more recent ARMv6 devices like the MSM7227, but rather this is a political decision based around having to avoid supporting it on older v6 CPUs. Ho hum.

Not tried wifi tethering yet but expect it works just fine. My old Sony Ericsson K660i used to do this perfectly though so it's not a stretch for something like the Legend. Hope Vodafone don't play silly buggers with data charging though...

Apps2SD has instantly freed me up about 50MB of space! This is seriously worth it, one of the few limiting factors of the Legend was its relatively meagre on-board storage. This is simply no no longer an issue.

Too early to say whether the battery life is improved, or whether there is any improvement in signal pickup/retention. I do seem to nice that it won't hold a 2G/3G data connection if it is logged onto a wifi network - makes sense and if this indeed is a system policy now then I guess it can only help extend the battery life.

[nickrpearce]

Couple of issues I've discovered today:

1. Although it said it would save all my settings, the upgrade removed all of my alarms!

2. For some reason the phone set itself to GSM only in Preferred Network Mode (Settings --> Wireless & Networks --> Mobile Networks --> Network Mode). Changed it GSM/WCDMA and all OK again!

But am still pleased overall!

[NX3]

VPN now works over L2TP/IPSEC, it was a known fault in 2.1

[djd3tox]

Couple of issues I've discovered today:

1. Although it said it would save all my settings, the upgrade removed all of my alarms!

2. For some reason the phone set itself to GSM only in Preferred Network Mode (Settings --> Wireless & Networks --> Mobile Networks --> Network Mode). Changed it GSM/WCDMA and all OK again!

But am still pleased overall!

Good spot on the Network Mode, mine had done that too although strangely I was still getting 3G and H connections with my mobile connection.

One thing I had noticed was that my 'Time Without a Signal' (Settings -> About Phone -> Battery -> Battery Use -> Cell Standby) was up to 76% at one point today. This was an issue which I had when I first got the phone (there's another thread on this forum about it) and I solved the issue by putting *#*#4636#*#* into the dialler and changing the preferred network type option there to 'GSM/CDMA auto (PRL)'. This stopped the Time Without a Signal problem. I thought that this problem was persisting in 2.2 but changing the regular option as noted by NickyP seems to have fixed it.

Other changes I have noticed:

1. Different noise when changing ringer volume with the volume rocker.

2. Certain weather animations seem to be at the wrong resolution e.g. when it's a sunny day the sun will appear and shine across the phone which it still does, but in 2.2 the sun is only 2/3rds the size of the sun on the HTC clock widget and so it looks a bit strange. Same goes for clear moon animations.

3. Guardian.co.uk RSS feed stopped working in the News widget, but deleting and re-adding fixed this.

4. My calendar/news/weather widgets quite often show 'loading' as if the phone's just been turned on even though it's been on for a while. Not a major issue, just wondering if something was resetting them behind the scenes?


5. But the big question: Is the infamous Antenna Issue resolved?! I have seen my connection go from G to H without signal drop out which to me indicates it has been fixed, but then signal has still been funny since the update - it's often been showing no bars yet the H remains and I can still download data. I wonder if this relates to the Preferred Network as mentioned earlier and is actually now fixed however. What's everyone else's verdict on the antenna issue? Can you change from 2G to 3G without the connection cutting out altogether for a few seconds?

All in all though I'm really pleased with the update, good work Vodafone.

[Tomtrek]

I looked at my Contact list only to see that my phone has finally started automatically updating people's Facebook pictures, so I guess they solved the sync problems with Facebook for HTC Sense in 2.2!

[guntha]

Not sure if it's just me but I think the battery life seems shorter. I used to get a couple of days (48 hours) per charge but now it's just over 24 hours.

[nickrpearce]

One more thing missing/changed. In Calendars there used to be "My Calendar" which I guess was purely local to the phone. This is no longer available! Was quite useful if I wanted a reminder for something just on my phone. But heigh ho! I suppose the better speed on the phone on 2.2 makes up for this...

[DGTierney]

Not seen any benifits to the upgrade yet.

Minor niggles
- my keyboard became German (I think) with the Y and Z swapped positions!
- Alarms were lost
- Gallery does not seem to update when folders/pictures are moved.
- why rename things I'd got used to?

I've not reverted to the standard messaging - i've grown used to Handcent

I do absolutly hate the lack of Lock Screen Wallpaper.

And is the thing with the scrolling words (facebook updates I think) of the person calling new or had i never noticed before.

And the logic for when the 'main' home screen appears and when a side screen appears is all different (adn therefore feels wrong)