A user at >XDA-Developers (haykuro) has been playing around with a rom from an HTC Sapphice/Magic and has made it run fairly well on the G1. I flashed it last night and have been messing with it (not much, its pretty incomplete because he is still working on adding back some stuff he had to remove to make it work). Overall impression is that it looks better, runs better and has a lot more features. Lots of stuff we were expecting our G1 to have when we bought it will be added. They have added video recording, soft keyboard and a few features you know about, plus a lot that you do not. If you are not a stranger to flashing roms I would suggest you head on over there, download the latest version (he updates it as soon as he can get things fixed) and try it out. Make a nandroid backup first so you can restore if you need to go back to a JF build because it is not 100% functional.

After getting the chance to join in on the TorrentDroid alpha test and being able to see first hand how it works I decided to try out its competition. BarTor, which was formerly known as ScanTorrent takes a slightly different approach while accomplishing the same goal. Where TorrentDroid aims to give users the most choice in where they search for their torrents by letting you do the search in a browser and sending the resulting downloaded torrent to your home computer, BarTor aims more at ease of use by parsing the results of a torrent search for you and displaying them in a scrollable list. BarTor also supports Vuse as a torrent client but unfortunately uTorrent runs better for me in wine than Vuse does by itself. Each app starts by finding what you are looking for, whether it be by scanning the barcode of a DVD/CD/game or by typing in your query by hand and ends with your Android device causing your home computer to download the resulting media. Below are screenshots of my brief use of BarTor. I would have posted screenshots of TorrentDroid but since it is still in alpha I did not know if the author would want that.

Earlier today I was invited to be an alpha tester for TorrentDroid which you probably have heard of from the AndroidAndMe bounty contest. This was a contest that accepted donations towards the “bounty” which was paid to the contest winner. The winning app had to be the first to meet all criteria of the contest, which basically consisted of scanning an upc code, finding the title of the movie/cd/game and searching for it on a torrent site. Once found, a torrent file needed to be downloaded to the phone and sent to the webui of uTorrent to start downloading. The idea is that you are walking around WalMart, find a movie you want to see, scan it and by the time you get home the movie is waiting for you.

Having been searching for a torrent client for Android (which I probably will never find) for months now, I was instantly interested and applied for the alpha tests. My first impressions are that this is really going to work out and will be a popular application if the price is kept reasonable. I first setup uTorrent (in wine since I am on linux (hint hint, ktorrent support please?)) and got the webui working. I tested the app by scanning an DVD that I own (hey, I’m too lazy to go to the store) and told it to use isohunt.com to search. I picked a decent match and downloaded the torrent and told it to open with TorrentDroid. Within 3 seconds uTorrent on my desktop was downloading the movie for me. There are user customizable torrent search engine options so you can tell it to search wherever you want and you can load new engines via a text file for greater customization. This application is very usable, but also rough around the edges (hence the alpha still). With a little bit of work on the UI and making things a little easier on the non techy users I can see this app easily being one of the most used on the market in a few weeks/months.

[RiS] has released the first non beta version of JFupdater, the application that makes the update process for JF rom users a lot easier. This app checks for new updates, downloads and will flash them with your permission. It only works for the official (technically unofficial) JF roms. Anyone using a JF rom should download this from the market (and make sure to give it 5 stars to offset all the idiots who download it and say “it dunt werk what iz dah root?”) and try it out. You can search for it by typing “jfupdater” in the search section of the market.

JesusFreke just released RC9. Download JF RC9 UK here. Details can be found on JesusFrekes new Andblogs.net blog.

Or you can download and install JFupdater and use that to upgrade to the latest version. JFupdater will check (at set intervals) for new updates and if found will allow you to download them and will assist with installing them. Updating to new JF roms using JFupdater is almost as easy as OTA updates were.