There aren’t a lot of things out there that iPhone users wait for more anxiously than Apple’s free firmware updates. Unlike every single other company in the industry, Apple has taken it upon themselves to provide iPhone users with regular software updates that actually add valuable new features to these devices without costing them a dime (although iPod touch users do generally have to pay a price for them)!

All the iPhone and iPod touch users among our readership will be glad to know that, after a lot of leaks and rumourmongering, Apple has just made available the v2.2 firmware update for both these devices. The focus this time round has primarily been on enhancing Google Maps and adding podcasts to the “iTunes application” (that’s what Apple is calling it now because, with the addition of podcasts and the ability to download them over the cellular network, the original name ‘iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store’ would perhaps have been a misnomer).

After this update, the Maps application on the iPhone will become capable of displaying public transit and walking (turn-by-turn) directions, addresses of dropped pins, and even sharing your current location via email—at least in countries that are well mapped by Google (which, unfortunately, does not include India).

But that isn’t the real news, folks—the flashiest addition is the swanky Google Street View technology, which allows you to look at and virtually navigate the streets of most major cities in the USA as if you were actually there. Since the update is still downloading (you can blame the super fast broadband speeds out here for that), I haven’t had a chance to play with it yet, but it promises to be snazzy!

The second big addition to firmware v2.2 is a new section for podcasts on the iTunes application that lets you download new episodes of both audio and video podcasts for free over both Wi-Fi and the cellular network (GPRS/EDGE/3G), though they have to be less than 10MB in size if it’s the latter.

Apart from these big changes there are several minor additions too, which I’m listing out here directly from Apple’s release notes, along with my own remarks:

• Enhancements to Mail (still no unified inbox or horizontal mode though)
• Improved stability and performance of Safari (and the slightly altered UI we mentioned earlier)
• Decrease in call set-up failures and call drops (I hear some people use these devices to call other people—weird, huh?)
• Improved sound quality of visual voicemail messages (inapplicable for customers in a lot of countries, including India, where the iPhone doesn’t support said feature)
• Pressing the Home button from any Home screen takes you to the first Home screen (ah, what a blessing!)
• Preference to turn on/off auto-correction in Keyboard Settings (a boon for people who generally transliterate from other languages while typing and find the keyboard’s auto-correction feature to be more a hindrance than an aid)

The update weighs in at a hefty 245.6MB, is free for all iPhone users and iPod touch users who are on v2.0 or later (and costs them $9.95 if they aren’t) and can be downloaded directly from within iTunes using the prominently displayed Check for Updates button. If you’d rather download the ‘IPSW’ file manually, right click on the appropriate link below and hit Download Linked File (courtesy: ‘Beau’ at MacTalk Forums):

• First generation iPod touch (1G)
• Current iPod touch (2G)
• iPhone (1G/2G)
• iPhone 3G

Note: If you either own a ‘jailbroken’ iPhone or an iPhone 3G that you intend to unlock if and when a software unlocking solution becomes available, it’s advisable that you wait it out and see what the iPhone DevTeam has to say before proceeding with the update.

Edit AsstEd: The 2.2 update does not bring street view to the iPod, unlike iPhone owners.

[Via iPhone Central | Macworld]

In iPhone on 21 Nov, 2008| |