Originally Posted by kashabrown (Post 348450)

This was posted over at XDA - should help all of us Big Red owners:

"Hello all,

Spoke with a few people today from UTStarcom and Verizon and got quite a bit of information about this long awaited update. Figured I'd share with you.

Called UTStarcom and spoke with Orlando, an engineer with them. He forwarded an internal memo to me (I can't post it on here, don't bother asking). I can tell you what was in it though.

The update is complete and was received by Verizon mid June.
Rom version number is 3.36.605.0. I know a lot of you are going to say "but we already have 3.56 blah blah", but those are Sprint updates and just because the version number is different, doesn't mean it's not newer.

The update addresses the following (straight from the memo):

-Update to Windows Mobile 6.1
-Update to EVDO Rev. A
-Update location based services (GPS)
-Update bluetooth profiles

Update is complete on their end, waiting on Verizon to give the go ahead. He said he would speak to his superiors and find more info and for me to call back Thursday (he gave me his extension).

I called Verizon and spoke to Wes, a WDTS Tier 3 Tech.

He confirmed what Orlando told me. The completed update was received by Verizon and has been in final testing. The last update he had was July 3, been in testing for a while with no problems. Projected release set for end of the month/early August.

He also told me it's been so long due to the fact that they decided to add WM 6.1 (previously it was only expected to address EVDO Rev A / GPS)"

Originally Posted by gcincotta (Post 349115)

Yeah, people seem to be missing the point of this.

It's not to actually use their crappy update, it's to extract new drivers, new radio, Verizon aGPS info etc to be added to future custom rom kitchens.

Originally Posted by buckyswider (Post 350348)

Thanks. I am actually looking forward to evaluating the VZ official release.

I love the kitchen and the ROMs, but I'm probably the oddball PPCGEEKS member. I really don't want to spend too much time thinking about/tinkering with my phone. I just want it to work well.

I spent an inordinate amount of time futzing with ROMs, upgrades, and kitchens. Time, due to circumstances beyond my control, I really don't have. I wish I did. So if VZ comes out with an official release that gives me the cool stuff I want from a ROM - RevA, GPS, threaded SMS, reliable bluetooth/voicecommand- I will definitely give it a whirl. Of course, if performance sucks, I will bite the bullet and end up going back to the kitchen anyway. And I'm sure there will be Cool Stuff I'm missing out on.

But I want to give it a whirl anyway...