N71 - Unbelievable

TerrorFirmer

I bought an N71 off adverts.ie, its in fine condition and works the same, except - whenever you sent a text message, the whole phone just locks up completely until its sent, anything from 1-3 minutes. This is obviously unacceptable, and when I googled it I immediately got countless hits of people whinging about the very same issue, and how the phone was pulled fairly rapidly from production.

Was anything done to fix this problem?? I'm pretty pissed at the moment because there's no way I can use this and I'll have to send it back to the guy who sold it to me (I think that's pretty cheap, selling it on when you know that it has such a serious issue)

Jonathan

Did you upgrade/reinstall the firmware?

strecker

Have you updated to the latest firmware? That does sound like a software bug, and there have been a few fw updates for the n71 afaik.

TerrorFirmer

I don't have a cable, but googling around there doesn't seem to be a fix for it in any Firmware release. I only briefly looked up the spec's of the phone on gsmarena before buying, just assumed it'd be OK and I've owned at least a dozen Nokia Symbian phones at different stages and never had any problems. This just one seems to be a dud - not specifically this particular phone but the model in general - because there seem to be 2 or 3 specific problems cropping up continously when you google n71 problems (camera failure, constant hangs, sim/memory card reading failure) and it was discontinued pretty quickly. I text quite alot and there's no way I can put up with having to wait several minutes for a message to send.

Jonathan

No point complaining until you have updated the firmware tbh... Previous owner may have installed buggy software on it..

TerrorFirmer

Yeah I suppose - sorry I was just ranting, I'm just pissed that the seller would sell it like that and specifically state that it was working great when it clearly isn't. Have to pay for a cable and such now out of my own pocket which annoys me.

Cyrus

surely the cable is in the box? or it should be

TerrorFirmer

I didn't see it there, anyway a new one would cost about 3 euro off ebay but in general its just the principle of the thing. So annoyed.

Cyrus

you should ask the seller for the cable if it isnt in the box

im sure a firmware flash will sort it if you are near a nokia centre they will do it for free

strecker

Yeah, I can understand the annoyance! That isn't a minor bug a seller may have missed him-/herself!.

TerrorFirmer

Updated to latest firmware. SMS issue fixed but now the main screen freezes, and when you select standby, the active apps/ and navigation key options flash up for a second then disappear again - so basically for the most part I have to use the symbian menu key to access stuff, not the active apps or navigation keys. Absolute piece of ****.

drunkmonkey

what network are you using it on, mine only freezes when jumping between networks in bad signal areas, rarley happens....

excellent phone, could be a problem with yours, may be worth getting it repaired it would be still under warranty...

TerrorFirmer

Meteor, it's not the network as I've got full Network coverage. Excellent phone, really? Everything I've read online is plagued by faults, and it was even pulled from production....we're talking about this phone, right? It's not just a problem with mine because all these faults are commonly documented online...

Sully

Bring the phone to your nearest Nokia repair center and ask them to do debrand and repair the problems you describe. They will have the latest firmware that you would not be able to get.

TerrorFirmer

The phone's a few years old, it was discontinued a year or two ago...I have the latest firmware. It's a shame because it's a nice phone otherwise but Nokia seem to have dropped the ball with it. Should have investigated before I bought...

Sully

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

The phone's a few years old, it was discontinued a year or two ago...I have the latest firmware. It's a shame because it's a nice phone otherwise but Nokia seem to have dropped the ball with it. Should have investigated before I bought...

So I guess its out of warranty. Are you sure its the latest firmware? PC Suite only gives you the latest firmware for your operator and not the latest in general. Plus, Nokia have internal firmware releases before they go public.

Phone does have bad reviews alright. Looks like the seller sold it on for that reason!

drunkmonkey

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

we're talking about this phone, right?

oops...e71

jesus_thats_gre

There is a Nokia application called SMS Accelarator.. Download and install that and it will solve your problem. Used to happen with my N80.

strecker

jesus_thats_gre wrote: »

There is a Nokia application called SMS Accelarator.. Download and install that and it will solve your problem. Used to happen with my N80.

Yes!!!! YES!!!!

Finally someone's saying it! Was on the tip of my tongue!
If it's not installed on your n71 that is the reason for your problem!!!
Was the same on my first e61, and I checked: you're supposed to install it on your n71 too!!!

Sully

N71 SMS Accelerator

This application accelerates the sending of SMS messages. It is recommended that you install this application to prevent slowness in SMS sending, which may occur over time if you send lots of SMS messages.

You can download this application, then transfer and install it on your phone. This can be done in the following ways:

1. Download to your PC and transfer it to your memory card or phone, then run the application.

2. Use PC Suite "Install Applications".

3. Download directly from the nokia.com link in your phone's Services browser (where available) to your phone and install.


Please note that some users may find that the handset runs slower for a few minutes after the installation, before returning to normal. The application is invisible to the user.

TerrorFirmer

Thanks guys but the latest firmware already fixed the sms freezing, though there's still some minor problems its usable now. It's definitely the latest firmware released for that model. Thanks for the help though.

TerrorFirmer

Just to update, this turned out to be a freakin disaster.

I've had problems as outlined here with this N71 from day one out of the box. However I didn't mention anything to the seller because I needed the phone badly, and I was confident I could resolve the issues. At first, it seemed like purely firmware issues - the SMS in particular, sending a single message resulted in a hard lock up of up to 100 seconds without fail, every message sent. The thing about this problem is that the seller could not possibly have missed this unless he did not send a single sms from the phone, as it was consistent and well documented on the web (sadly, I only learned that the N71 was pulled prematurely after buying the phone through goggling of my issues). Anyway, I updated the firmware - which helped, but did not solve other issues - but again, annoying as they were (please insert sim card message randomly, etc) I found them somewhat bearable and didn't want to have to go through the hassle of trying to return it as above, when I have no other phone (To cap it all, I bought an N95 which transpires is stolen and hence blacklisted).

Now it's reached disaster point - the phone turns off randomly, restarts randomly, the power button hasn't been working for a week and it's not firmware, the phone cannot be turned on or off - once the battery is inserted, the phone automatically turns on - the phone on occasion gives me a message 'please insert sim card' message, and last night, worst of all, I woke up last night at 4am to find the phone on a blank screen, and scorching hot - a few more minutes and it could easily have combusted.

Googling it, it seems most of these problems are not only very common, but that the phone itself was short lived relative to other N series models. And I find it very hard to believe the phone was 100% for the seller and then mysteriously falling to bits once I got it only 4 weeks ago. In fact as I've previously mentioned when I first got it, it was suffering the well documented hard freezing SMS issue - which he surely must have known about but didn't mention anything. I sent him a message anyway but I doubt he'll want to know about it.

Kenno90

sorry to hear , you have had such bad luck with this phone , did you spend much on it in the first place ,

TerrorFirmer

Not a whole lot, but enough to make it a pain. 85 euro I think - would have been enough to easily buy an N70 or N73, both of which are great phones. In fact I've owned rakes of symbian phones....7650 (have one here working 100%), 3650, 3660, 6600, 6630, 6670, 6680, 7610, N70, N71, N73, N80, 9300i Communicator, N95-1, N95-4, N-Gage, and more - and I've never had any real problems with any of them until now.

Kenno90

God you've had a ton of phones you were bound to get a bad one , soon enough lol, nah kidding , so did you bring it back