Woe betide my broken Motorola V220 (and all mobiles)
Monday, December 04, 2006
At one and a half years I figured my phone could last at least double that and I wouldn't have to fork out for a snazzy new gizmo for quite a while. I'm not particularly enthusiastic towards mobile phones, yes I am fascinated by their all-in-one capabilities and ongoing improvements (as, after all, I am an electronic engineer) and I would love to have a 7 mega pixel camera, built in digital radio, 4gb hdd, javascript enabled internet, bluetooth and all those other perks but one simple fact remains; I do not use my phone as a telephone enough to warrant a monthly paid contract agreement. Thus I am left with the low end pay as you go options and all the shitty fallouts, or the one off cost of £300 for something high spec.
Because everything is geared towards contracts and the technology is moving along so fast it seems nothing is built to last, this rules out my second option - a £300 price tag is not a worthy investment if it wont last me 2 years, that and I am liable to lose it and phone insurance is a scam. My previous two phones both died a miserable screen-fading Nokia death before their time and all the other in-betweens have had atrocious battery problems; I have yet to lose a phone and I don't drop them - they just are not built to last. And so onto my Motorola story; having abandoned the faulty screened Nokia product lines I ventured towards a new manufacturer, Motorola paying a lowly £40 for the V220 model. I viewed this purchase as an intermediary until high specification models became affordable and I planned for it to last 3 years. Come Saturday afternoon, a windy but relatively warm winter's day in Leicester, my fully charged un-dropped never bashed phone with already defunct camera is sitting quietly in my pocket. Oh, my phone is on vibrate-then-ring, set to loud - I have a missed call that I somehow missed while waiting expectantly for the phone to go off (this happens often). Unlocking the clam I am presented with this:
Because everything is geared towards contracts and the technology is moving along so fast it seems nothing is built to last, this rules out my second option - a £300 price tag is not a worthy investment if it wont last me 2 years, that and I am liable to lose it and phone insurance is a scam. My previous two phones both died a miserable screen-fading Nokia death before their time and all the other in-betweens have had atrocious battery problems; I have yet to lose a phone and I don't drop them - they just are not built to last. And so onto my Motorola story; having abandoned the faulty screened Nokia product lines I ventured towards a new manufacturer, Motorola paying a lowly £40 for the V220 model. I viewed this purchase as an intermediary until high specification models became affordable and I planned for it to last 3 years. Come Saturday afternoon, a windy but relatively warm winter's day in Leicester, my fully charged un-dropped never bashed phone with already defunct camera is sitting quietly in my pocket. Oh, my phone is on vibrate-then-ring, set to loud - I have a missed call that I somehow missed while waiting expectantly for the phone to go off (this happens often). Unlocking the clam I am presented with this:
Pretty colours. My first instinct is to reset, remove battery and SIM, replace and restart. The error continues and this confirms my fears: c'est cassé! All the functions of the phone still seem to work, I can ring people (if I know their number) and change the ring volume, etc, I just cannot see what I am doing. My first guess as to the cause was faulty software - a nasty bug that I could fix if only I could get to that "reset to factory settings" option somehow (why isn't there a button inside to do that?). However I am now thinking it may be due to wear and tear on the clam's hinge which would explain why the camera went first. Ultimately I plan to open this all up and take a look inside, my sister has the same phone that she doesn't use so I can raid it for spare parts, etc.
Considering I have just finished a safety critical systems course where required failure rates are 1 in 100,000 years, this persistent failure of phones within 24 months when no mistreatment has occurred irritates and annoys me to no end. The irony is that I was for a short time over the summer an "honourable Motorolan", i.e. an employee of theirs (somewhat). I guess now I shall move on to Sony Ericsson and then another manufacturer when that model unavoidably fails.
Considering I have just finished a safety critical systems course where required failure rates are 1 in 100,000 years, this persistent failure of phones within 24 months when no mistreatment has occurred irritates and annoys me to no end. The irony is that I was for a short time over the summer an "honourable Motorolan", i.e. an employee of theirs (somewhat). I guess now I shall move on to Sony Ericsson and then another manufacturer when that model unavoidably fails.
Posted by FofR
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