11

Possible Duplicate:
How do I upgrade Firmware on my Samsung Galaxy S without windows

Froyo has been finally released for Samsung Galaxy S. The update seems to be only available via a Windows application called Kies. I don't have access to a Windows computer any more (I use Mac and Linux systems only). Does anybody know how to install the update (the official one, not CyanogenMod) without this application? Can I use Custom Recovery for this like in this related answer?

Improve this question
4
  • 3
    possible duplicate android.stackexchange.com/q/181/113
    – trampster
    Commented Oct 18, 2010 at 0:05
  • 4
    I think you'll find there's a lot of Windows users who'd love to ditch Kies and find a platform independent way to update. It is horrifically bad software, with massive problems even detecting that your phone's attached (I have to unmount my SD card before it'll detect the phone, other people have to jump through even more hoops, good luck getting it working if anything's saved files with long file extensions to your internal or external SD). Bring on OTA!
    – GAThrawn
    Commented Oct 18, 2010 at 13:42
  • GAThrawn: Sounds like Samsung has the exact same issue than Nokia.
    – auramo
    Commented Oct 19, 2010 at 4:45
  • 1
    based on my experience Nokia Ovi Suite works like a dream compared to Kies on my Win7 x64... It's that bad.
    – aleksikallio
    Commented Oct 21, 2010 at 5:22

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
5

Going through the Galaxy S Flash/Root/ADB/ROM guide on XDA, I just spotted this:

  1. I'm running Linux/OSX. Can I still flash my firmware? Do I need to install windows?

If you are running Linux you do not need to install Windows. You can either run Odin in a virtual machine or alternatively use Heimdall by Benjamin Dobell. Heimdall runs natively on Linux and has reached a well tested release state.

Which takes us to here Heimdall - Cross-Platform Open-Source Flashing Software:

What is Heimdall? Heimdall is a cross-platform open-source utility to flash ROMs onto Samsung Galaxy S phones.

How does it work? Heimdall uses the same protocol as Odin to interact with a device in download mode. USB communication in Heimdall is handled by the popular open-source USB library, libusb-1.0.

What platforms does Heimdall run on? Linux, OS X and Windows (XP, Vista, 7 etc.)

What Galaxy S variants has Heimdall been tested with? I've tested Heimdall with a Galaxy S GT-I9000 (8 GB) from the United Kingdom and Galaxy S GT-I9000 (16 GB) from Australia. I don't have access to any other devices to test with at present, but community members have confirmed it to also function correctly for the AT&T Captivate.

Hopefully this will help us all out!

Though obviously as this is effectively a replacement for Samsung's Odin software it's more designed towards people who are happy grabbing their ROMs from various places across the internet and flashing them on in a fairly custom way, as opposed to Kies which is (supposed to be) pretty much plug and play.

Improve this answer
1

I don't know how much help this will be, as I've unfortunately not had any experience with the Galaxy S series or the Kies application. However, I'm quite familiar with the Samsung Moment and the myriad of issues surrounding drivers and software running natively in Windows to flash that device.

From the Linux end of things (Ubuntu x64) I was able to get the software for the Samsung Moment (SWUpgrade, it's called) running through VirtualBox on a Windows 7 client from the Ubuntu host. Took me a good couple of hours to get it working, and even still, it's a bit finicky at times, but I've successfully flashed my Moment several times from Ubuntu using that rather thick layer of virtualization.

I don't know if that would be a feasible option for your setup, or if the software would even work the same, being a completely different phone. I would imagine the software would be somewhat similar, as they're both Samsung devices and most Samsung devices do share similarities when it comes to the proprietary file system and partition structure.

Improve this answer

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .