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I have a Samsung Galaxy S and am currently waiting indefinitely for the operator to pull its finger out and release its bloated edition of Froyo.

If I root the device using the instructions here, will that enable me to ugrade to Froyo over Kies or will I have to upgrade through some other method?

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  • 1
    Not adding this as an answer, as I don't have the facts in front of me, but you don't need to root for this. Kies remembers what region and operator images you're phone is supposed to have in a registry key in Windows. As long as you have a Galaxy S I9000 that is compatible with that from another country, all you need to do is change the region code that Kies has saved on your PC.
    – GAThrawn
    Commented Nov 21, 2010 at 13:12
  • The OPs question was 'could I upgrade [to Froyo] on a rooted phone'. Not do I need to have a rooted phone to upgrade.
    – SGSBoy
    Commented Jan 7, 2011 at 14:41

3 Answers 3

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Looking at your profile it looks like you're based in the UK? If so you should have no problem running the Samsung's European JPO release of the Galaxy S Froyo software that went out to unbranded UK Galaxy S's a few weeks ago. As this is an Official Samsung release there's no need to root to apply it, you just need to trick Samsung's software into installing it for you.

To start with I'll make the assumption that you have no problems running the Kies software, that it recognizes your phone when you plug it in, and that you get a "You are already running the latest release" message when you click the Firmware Upgrade link. (this is a big set of assumptions given the quality of Kies, if any of these aren't true, then you need to get Kies working properly before going further).

This post on Vodafone UK's Galaxy S forums lays out the steps Samsung Galaxy S - Froyo Update (Android 2.2) (reply 113). I'll summarise them below as Vodafone are about to upgrade their forums to new software, so I have no idea if the post will survive, or the link will still work in a week or two's time, credit to "ado28" for these instructions.

First of all you need to go into regedit and do some minor alterations to the registry.

Do not update Kies! If you do then I think this tweak won’t work! The Kies version I used was 1.5.0.10024_74 but I fooled it into thinking it was the latest version

Step by step guide

  1. Back up everything you wish to keep, including Apps, phone numbers, Text messages etc because we're going to wipe your phone clean before we start!

  2. Go to Settings – Privacy – FACTORY DATA RESET and click. Follow the prompts and then let it wipe your phone.

  3. Now you have a bare naked phone again and can proceed onto the next step.

  4. Open up Kies and leave running

  5. Connect phone

  6. Open Regedit by clicking on Start – Run – then type in regedit and press enter

  7. Scroll down to Kies and look for “Localver” see pic

  8. Change your Localver code to 1.5.3.10103.100

  9. Now go to your Device DB folder and change your settings to these:

"SoftwareRevision"="I9000XXJF3/I9000OXAJF3/I9000XXJF3/I9000XXJF3"
"ProductCode"="GT-I9000HKDXEU"
"HIDSWVER"="I9000XXJF3/I9000OXAJF3/I9000XXJF3/I9000XXJF3"
"DEVCONINFO"="" Delete the writing in this box and leave blank.

  1. Now go back into Kies and click "Update firmware"

This will now allow everyone who has JPA on their handset with the product code XEE to be replaced with JPO and the product code XEU which is for the UK. Once you have successfully updated then allow the phone to boot up. Once booted up you will now need to go back into your settings and change your product code to XEU. To do this open your keypad and type in *#272*YOUR IMEI# and now you will be back to having a lovely wee choice of product codes to enter. Choose XEU and install. The phone will reboot and you will now officially be on JPO with the correct product code XEU!

Please note that by doing any update on your phone could cause it to brick itself. The guide I have written worked perfect for me however I can’t be held responsible if your phone bricks itself. To be safe always try the 3 button recovery method first before you update and also doing a factory reset first usually ensures a smooth installation of new firmware.

Extra note on Kies: as stated above, this doesn't work with the latest version of Kies. If you need an older version of Kies then this version should allow you to do this (according to XDA): Kies version 1.5.3.10093_82.

If you do end up uninstalling and reinstalling Kies and find that it doesn't detect your phone any more, then first thing to try is clicking the menu icon in the top-left corner of Kies and selecting the "install drivers" option.

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  • Very thorough answer!
    – TREE
    Commented Nov 24, 2010 at 16:09
  • Thanks for your answer, GAThrawn. Now that I've rooted and run Titanium Backup I'm going to give this a go. holds breath
    – bcmcfc
    Commented Nov 27, 2010 at 10:42
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Kies didn't play nicely but I did find this tutorial from Goots at Samsung Galaxy S forums.

I'm now running Froyo.

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To answer your original question: yes, almost all popular Android phones have community mods (CyanogenMod, Samdroid, etc) and many of them are writing drivers for Froyo for many popular phones.

Community mods are often able to release drivers and updates much faster than operators can since they are unbriddled by the red tapes and the internal politics of official releases.

Most community mods are rooted, although some may release unrooted version as well.

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