Bell and Virgin Mobile Roll Out Android 2.3 for Samsung Vibrant

After an excruciating wait of nearly one month, Bell and Virgin Mobile have finally announce the availability of the Android 2.3 Gingerbread update for the Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant.

Although the Korean handset manufacturer confirmed last week that it will deploy the Gingerbread update for several branded Galaxy S devices, including Samsung Vibrant, Captivate and Fascinate 3G+ will, no official statements were made regarding the exact release dates of the updates.

While Captivate and Fascinate owner are still waiting for their update, Vibrant users have been informed via Twitter that their Gingerbread update is now available for download:

“update news! the android 2.3 gingerbread update for the samsung galaxy S vibrant is good to go. connect to samsung kies to hook it up.”

As confirmed by the tweet, the update is available via Samsung Kies desktop software, but Android tech-savvy can manually download and install it via Odin.

On the positive side, users who already flashed the update noticed a significant increase in speed and responsiveness of their Vibrant smartphones.

Screen transitions, as well as opening multiple applications are now much smoother and considerably faster than before.

In fact, it looks like this is how the Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant should have been long ago when it was launched on the market.

Furthermore, it appears that the 3 Button Recovery Mode function has been changed to 2 Button Recovery Mode using “volume up & power” buttons.

However, there are also reports of Samsung Kies connectivity issues, which prevent users from updating their Samsung Vibrant devices.

Oh well, this seems to happen every time Samsung deploys an Android update via Kies, so the only thing that one can do is try again and again until the software recognizes the phone and discovers the available update.

It is also recommended to wait a while longer even if Kies shows that it has disconnected the phone, as the device usually connects again after a few minutes.