Monday brought the release of Android "Froyo" 2.2--aka FRG01B--to Verizon's dedicated army of Motorola DROID owners. Although it was reported that the rollout would reach most devices by the end of the week, additional news indicated that Verizon would distribute the update in limited quantities at first in order to "test the waters."
Now there are reports that the Froyo distribution has halted altogether due to "unnamed bugs." There are also sightings of a new Froyo FRG22 build making its rounds, appearing as an OTA 1.6MB "security patch" after users upgrade Android to FRG01B (thus changing the build to FRG22). For those who haven't upgraded to Froyo, it's believed that FRG22 will be the resulting OTA update.
Currently we haven't seen a downloadable FRG22 file for those who want to force-install the supposed patch. On a personal note, Verizon hasn't loaded DROID with an alert for the supposed patch. That may actually take place next week.
For those interested in manually installing FRG01B, complete instructions and file mirrors can be found here. There's also a notice that backs up the reports surrounding FRG22, saying that Motorola and Verizon have found an issue with FRG01B and may distribute the new build "next week."
But with all the hype surrounding Froyo, is it worth the upgrade? Definitely. The new build brings a huge performance increase to the Motorola DROID. And despite Verizon's claims, tethering does work for Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Linux--users are taken to a subscription page for details on how to sign up for Mobile Broadband Connect.
Presently the "Move to SD" feature doesn't really fix the internal memory consumption issue, as developers (Gameloft, Google, etc.) need to incorporate the feature into their apps. Adobe and/or Google has also removed Flash Player from the Android Market--those who seek out the APK file will discover that it's a meaty 12.28MB that can't be dumped onto the SD card.
UPDATE: According to this leak, Adobe Flash Player 10.1 is expected to return to the Android Market on August 18, 2010, and will "require an additional download on original DROID by Motorola devices with Android 2.2 software." Let's hope Adobe has moved the chunky file over to the SD card.
