No, it was not. The keyboard looks exactly the same, and the settings for the keyboard are exactly the same.
I must admit that this version is pretty much a complete letdown from a user experience standpoint. No trace-type keyboard, the changes in Sense are almost too subtle to notice, no front-facing camera in Google Talk (which is the primary reason I chose this phone over the AT&T version). I'm sure there are some good things going on underneath, but from the surface view adding Go Launcher was FAR more profound an upgrade.