Someone explain what the radio's actually do

[mojomahem]

I am using radio 1.32 and wanted to update it to 1.40 or 1.47. What are the benifits of each. What I have gathered so far is better battery life, less lock ups. What am I missing by using 1.32 and where can I download it? I cant seem to find it in the ftp directory. By the way Im using Colonal custom.