After months of waiting, we have finally upgraded our Fascinate to Android 2.2. The actual act of upgrading was relatively painless, however the upgrade install and the results were typical Verizon foolishness. All you need to do is head to Menu > Settings > About Phone > System Updates > and check for updates.
Then the update will start downloading to your phone. After it has been downloaded and the install begins, your phone will be rebooted and it will start with a flashing Verizon logo. That logo will stay there for what seemed like 5-6 minutes as the OS is installed. The screen will then come up, but it will only show your top bar and nothing else for a little while. I wish there was a better notification at both times about the OS being installed because while this was going on, it was my wife’s reaction to try to turn off the phone. We almost even pulled the battery out as it looked like it was hung.
After the phone is rebooted and the OS is installed and working, you will notice that your icons, application shortcuts, and your widgets are now gone. Why Verizon has to mess with that I will never know. I get the concept of upgrading your users to a more stable release of a product, which Android 2.2 clearly is. I can even understand that it took Verizon 8 months to get confident enough in the upgrade process that this wouldn’t break, or severely hinder their user bases’ ability to use their phones. But to be honest most people won’t notice the changes to the phone. But they will notice that their icons and widgets are gone and the the standard icons and widgets are back on. This leaves a bad taste in people’s mouth.
Their QA process should have taken this into account.
Here is the list of new features.
