-a simcard, doesn’t have to activated (T-mobile, haven’t tried others)
-a wifi access point
-an gmail account
-android SDK installed

steps for activating GPhone via Wifi

-at android SDK root, type adb shell
-you should see the $ prompt, now starts the setting Screen by typing the following:

$am start -a android.intent.action.MAIN -n com.android.settings/.Settings

-choose Wireless Controls, then turn on Wi-Fi, and choose Wi-Fi Settings
-choose your wifi access point, go through the authentication(in my case, enter a WEP key).
-If successful, you are connected to your wifi.
-go back to the home screen by pressing home, Now you can sign in using your Goolge account
-Your phone is now activated for development

steps for upgrading android firmware to v1.5

-You need to push the new radio image and recovery image onto your GPhone. First download the radio image
and the system recovery image
-Connect the device to your development machine over USB.
-At a command line, ensure that adb recognizes your device by issuing this command: adb devices
-You should see your device in the console output generated by the command

Update the Device Radio Firmware

-Use the adb push command to copy the contents of the radio image package to the update.zip archive on the device’s SD card:

adb push .zip /sdcard/update.zip

-Reboot the device into recovery mode by holding down the HOME key during reboot. One way to do this is to shut down the phone first by holding down the red button, then hold down the home button, then press the red button again.-When the device enters recovery mode, it displays a “!” icon.
-With the recovery console displayed, open the sliding keyboard and hold down the ALT+l key combination to enable log output in the recovery console.
-Next, hold down the ALT+s key combination to install the update. An “installing update” icon and progress bar (or a similar status message) are displayed. when the progress bar completes, the installation is finished.
-Press the HOME-BACK key combination to write the radio image, update the firmware, and automatically reboot. Note that if you do not use HOME-BACK. At this point, the device will not load the updated radio image. After writing the radio image, the device shows a “updating firmware” icon for a few seconds and then automatically reboots in normal mode.

Flash the System Image Package to the Device

-Use the adb sync command to copy the contents of the recovery image package to the update.zip archive on the device’s SD card:
adb push .zip /sdcard/update.zip

-essentially repeating the steps in “Update the Device Radio Firmware to push and flash recovery image

Your dev phone firmware should now be upgraded to v1.5.
for a detailed description on updating device radio firmware and recovery image, see http://www.htc.com/www/support/android/adp.html