Kivela Developers blog, star date 47410.2

Inconvenient truth … about smartphones

Pocket PC’s - Smartphones - Gps phones still suck.

After using my Mio a701 for over 6 months the overall feeling is the sentence mentioned above.
Today it really crossed the line.

The specs look great, even the battery isn’t a reason for complaining but what about the following:

1) When someone calls you and you pick up, you will have to deal with the 1-4sec bug. This means the first few seconds of the call they cannot hear you speak. (even the r65 firmware)
This results in 3 possible resolutions:
* Break the f*cking phone
* Repeat your name twice (+/- 2 sec) but looks kinda weird for people standing next to you
* Be patient and count till 3 and start speaking

2) The phone will crash at least once a week, and yes also with the newest firmware and a clean re-install. And I am aware of the fact that it is a Windows Mobile 5 but still this kind of bugs tend to annoy me.
Possible resolutions:
* Break/Throw the f*cking phone
* Reboot and try to remember that all Mobile 5 devices tend to do this

3) Sometimes the phone will freeze when someone calls you, resulting in the following behaviour. You see the phone come alive (screen becomes active), you hear your ringtone, you try to unlock the phone and answer the call.... and nothing, you try again, ... still nothing... OK Reboot now, guess what : you can’t see who called you because apparently this becomes recorded in a sequence after the freeze up?
Possible resolutions:
* Break it
* Throw it
* Reboot it

4) Sometimes the a701’s phone functions have crashed but the phone isn’t frozen. So it looks like nobody called you in +6 hours but in fact the phone part is dead. This can easily be tested by trying to make a call yourself. If this results in an error message you can be damn sure that someone is pissed at you ! Result: messages will look delivered by the person who did send them, and you won’t have a clue. If someone called you however they tend to be stored however.

Although this device gets straight A’s on the googled reviews I do want to mention that from the 4 people I know with this device 3 are experiencing this behaviour and the other one, well, ... just doesn’t have any friends Just kidding ofcourse but he seems to be doing fine, but then again he also thinks that Vista is the biggest innovation since sliced bread.

So I will sell it or use it as a gps-only and buy another -really cheap- phone (Nokia / SE) so that when I feel the need to break it (phone), I will only lose 100 euro instead of +500

At the moment I am still thinking about throwing the damned Mio against the wall while taping it and publish it later on YouTube next to the Wii movies.

Is really nobody else facing these trouble and thinking:
No way I will cope with this bullshit, back to the oldschool phone and f*ck it, I’ll wait for a year or 3 until they get it figured out ? - Or the iPhone becomes affordable

I mean really:
- Sending messages with a stylus whilst driving your car, you need to be a pro if you don’t want to spill your cola ...
- Trying to call someone with only your fingers (And I mean without a stylus with the former sentence), only for the really patient once, or with only 3 friends / relatives
- Leaving Bluetooth on and try to call someone a few hours later - thats a nono - battery will die on you whilst calling.
- Using the excel / word on these things: get real !

The iPhone looks promising but I will pass on this one, will wait for a few years to see what happens on this geeky market.

Flashing a mio a701

Since I bought my Mio in the dutch version, and still with the original rom (r45) I just had to give it a try.

(pictures will follow shortly)

So here is how you do it (with succes mind you)

download an updated rom (i took the r55 WorldWideEnglish one) with some sw improvements

Download:...

http://rapidshare.de/files/26383654/WINCEIMG.ZIP.html

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=S3KUZZ74

http://www.cafejapan.co.uk/MioA701R55.zip

http://www.sendspace.com/file/bsa3zk

After this copy it to your storage card root directory and make sure you have 60 mb of free space on your card.
Now take a last look at your device (you never know

) and check that your batteries are full.

Disconnect the usb wire (if connected) and shut down your device.

Push and hold the volume up, navigation down (the d pad down, the circle with metal border)
then hit the reset button while still holding the other two.
Now you can let go of the other 2 buttons.

You will now see a menu. (your stick won't be working now, so use your d-pad controls)

select
0 - FlashROM Upgrade.
than
6 - Total img By SD/MMC.

then it will start updating. first some reading - checksum - flashing - and then it will go back to its menu.
Do not reset it while in this process !!!
after the update is complete just use the return option and in the initial menu choose watchdog reset...

You're done and now your load screen will give following number
r54.3.101.0428.1

On your first use the Mio Map v2.0 installer will start (if you had this package ofcourse)

There ya go...