Flying with Froyo on Vibrant

Froyo is now available for T-Mobile Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant, however to really get it, you need to have the charged to more than 75% and have the Samsung Kies Mini downloaded & installed. This release is not OTA and the full fledged Samsung Kies software dos not work for USA hence the Mini is required.

Downloading Kies downloader was quite fast, however the actual installer download took some time but the install was a breeze. Hooked up my phone to the laptop and was told that an update is available and I started it. The downloading took about 15 minutes and then the actual install another 7 minutes. Here are the steps:

1. Setup Vibrant as follows:
1. Go to Menu > Settings > Applications and check the box beside "Unknown Sources"
2. Go to Menu > Settings > Applications > USB Settings and select "Ask on connection"
2. Download Samsung Kies Mini from Samsun website.
3. Install Kies Mini
4. Ensure that the battery on your phone is more than 75% charged
5. Take a backup of your data from the phone
6. Start Kies Mini and connect the phone to the PC
7. On phone prompt, choose "Samsung Kies" as the connect method on the phone
8. Kies will show that an update is available, click on the "Phone Upgrade" button on the left
9. A disclaimer Caution screen pops up - Read the Caution statements
10. Click the checkbox for "I have read and understood...", and click the Upgrade button
11. Kies will download the upgrade from the server - this took about 15 minutes for me
12. Once the files are downloaded, Kies will start the upgrade process and the phone screen will change to reflect this with icons and info of what step is being performed
13. After the installation finishes, click on the "Ok" button in the last screen to complete it.
14. Now the phone should reboot by itself and now you can disconnect your phone from the PC

My phone just kept waiting for about 5 minutes in the initial screen that displays the Vibrant logo and then came up.

Here are the differences that I see right off the bat:

1. Menu icons are colorful
2. Phone seems to be a bit faster than before
3. T-Mobile TV is now available - this is a pad service so not that interesting for now
4. Option to add Samsung widgets on the home screen using the long press is not available any more
5. WiFi calling is now available - but this still uses plan minutes so is useful only in places where T-Mobile or any other roaming GSM signal is not available, but a Wi-Fi signal is available.
6. There is a new app for Google Search
7. USB / Wi-Fi tethering is now available from Settings > Wireless and network > Mobile AP and Settings > Wireless and network > Tethering 
8. In the pull down menu from the top notification bar, there is a new icon to control Auto-Rotation

Here are the current version numbers:

• Firmware version: 2.2
• Baseband version: T959UVKA6
• Kernel version: 2.6.32.9
• Build number: FROYO.UVKA6

Yay!!! Finally on Froyo!!!