I took the plunge and decided to update to my older iPhone 3GS to iOS 4.2 this morning. I also jailbroke it using the latest redsn0w release, since I have an older bootrom. The whole jailbreak process took a a bit longer than normal, but I was done within five minutes.
Cydia
Cydia has seen some improvements on iOS 4.2, at least in the latest version that was installed after my jailbreak. The Source refresh times are still beard-growingly long, but I *love* the new queuing feature, which allowed me to install several extensions at once.
SBSettings and the latest LockInfo beta (add this source to see it) are working, so long as I don’t try to customize any of the SBSettings toggles, and as long as I make sure to turn off “libstatusbar” (thanks @Stimpy5050). I’m going to take it easy on the JB downloading for a while and give our friendly hackers some time to catch up.
4.2 in general
Overall, my device does feel a little bit snappier. Apps aren’t loading any faster, mind you, but multitasking feels more responsive, and Safari has definitely seen a speed increase. The search bar pops up faster, tabs are snappier, and I really dig the new “find in page” feature, although it is a little hard to find (you’ve got to tap on the search bar, start typing, and then scroll down). I also noticed a “Carrier Data” option in settings, which presumably turns off cellular data — was that there before?
For those curious, I’ve also done some very minor testing on an older iPod Touch 2G (non-jailbroken). The device is also just a little bit faster, but it’s hard to tell, since multitasking isn’t supported. Safari is a bit speedier, but the lack of a “Find in Page” is definitely a bummer.
Air…what?
I’d gladly test AirPlay and AirPrint, but I lack the other devices to stream and print to, so we’ll have to wait for word from other iSource writers or readers.
App-based e-mails sent from Exchange
There isn’t much more for me to report, aside from this bit of niche news with regards to people who use Exchange accounts as their primary e-mail addresses on the iPhone. There used to be a bug where sending an e-mail through a third party app (or, heck, even trying to e-mail a picture from within Photos) would leave the e-mail stranded in the Outbox until you manually selected the Outbox in Mail, tapped on the e-mail again, and pressed Send. It only seemed to happen with my Google Exchange account in iOS 4.0 and 4.1, but it seems like this has been fixed in 4.2. Thank Bob.
If anybody has anything else to share about the upgrade experience, the comments are just below 🙂
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TAGS: iOS 4.2
