Verizon Galaxy S5 maintenance upgrade brings lots of changes (and might break root, too)
Verizon Galaxy S5 owners have a pretty big maintenance upgrade (version KOT49H.G900VVRU1ANE9) incoming, though not all of the changes will be satisfactory. Let’s get the official changelog out of the way first. For starters, a few apps have gotten updates, though none of them bring any sweeping changes. You can expect new versions of Caller Name ID, Message+ and Verizon Cloud. Here’s what’s on tap for bug fixing goodness:
- • ‘Search’ icon has been removed within Memo when there is no memo
- • Favorite ‘Contact’ information background is now more readable
- • Visual Voicemail works when S-View flip cover is closed
- • Connectivity has been improved when streaming music
- • Stability has been improved for Samsung Gear Manager
- • Text alert improvements for select factory installed car kits
- • “Primary Contacts” label has been changed to “Emergency Contacts”
- when in Emergency Mode
- • Power On password is no longer triggered when voice call is completed or
- after screen dims
And all of that is followed by some key changes, additions and upgrades that go to further enhance the experience:
- User selectable video application when uploading to YouTube
- • Message+ now supports closed captioning
- • Emergency Mode has been updated
- • Contact Menu stability has been enhanced
- • Easy Mode Settings now includes images
- • ‘Downloaded Apps’ field added to searchable file types in My Files
- • Web Search has been added to S Finder
You can’t say Samsung and Verizon don’t know how to put together a comprehensive update. But one big change that may affect some people is the breakage of root — there are reports that it completely nukes that level of access, and that the current root methods do nothing to restore it.
We’ve only gotten a couple reports of said behavior in our inbox so we’re not sure if these folks were just unlucky casualties of circumstance. Either way, if you’re rooted and you want to keep it that way it’s a good rule of thumb to stay away from official OTA updates.
If none of that concerns you then you can just head to Settings > About Phone > Software Update to start pulling yours down (but be sure to hop onto WiFi and have a healthily charged battery to make sure everything goes smoothly).
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]