HTC TyTN II Annoyances

[Guest Ves]

I've stopped the extreme tourture test. (Concequently I didn't have the box when I needed the serial number) Today I have been on and off the phone and read up on some news on the web. In 14 hours I have run the battery down to 67% with wifi, buetooth and push email enabled. If I just use it for phone calls I can probably make three days with my use. I'm very happy with the battery life.

In order to run it down twice in one day I had to use the wifi, bluetooth and GPS radios a lot along with a couple of hours of video playback and listening to music. GPS and video kept the screen on and it was at it's brightest setting. SP Timesync was updating the time every 10 minutes and I was also checking pop mail every 5 minutes which kept the data connection active most of the time. I made lots of phone calls took lots of pictures and read part of an e-book.

I would not expect this to be normal use for anybody. It certainly isn't for me. If you need to be able to use a device this way then perhaps this is not the one for you. I am very happy with the TyTN II.

Great test, I think this will be very important to alot of people who have qeustions about the battery. And for me more hope the phone is even better then I thoughted

[Guest pestekkorna]

It doesn't ask on mine - just disconnects when I click it.

Although I don't bother disconnecting my GPRS connection manually. Can't see the point.

I'not complaining about stopping gprs connection manually. I just don't like the fact that after checking my mails, the connection just stays on until the next check.

Last time it remained connected for 2hrs...

I found the solution: I'll check the connection manually :wub:

About the activesync permanent activation... I found the "dummy server" solution. Did it work for you? ;)

Thank you and have a nice day!

Peste

[Guest Webreaper]

I just don't like the fact that after checking my mails, the connection just stays on until the next check.

Last time it remained connected for 2hrs...

But why do you care if the connection stays on? It doesn't cost anything, doesn't require any data transfer, and in my experience has pretty much zero effect on battery life. Just leave it - it's fine. ;)

[Guest pestekkorna]

But why do you care if the connection stays on? It doesn't cost anything, doesn't require any data transfer, and in my experience has pretty much zero effect on battery life. Just leave it - it's fine. ;)

Oh, I thought it had some effects on the battery. Besides, my unlimited plan only concerns the "normal" surfing (web sites and emal from the provider). all the https connections are not included so I'm always afraid that applications such as msn or gmail applet could log on and reduce my credit (but I have to admit that it never happened until now and then...).

I'm going to leave it on and who cares!

:wub:

Peste

[Guest dolbe666]

I've stopped the extreme tourture test. (Concequently I didn't have the box when I needed the serial number) Today I have been on and off the phone and read up on some news on the web. In 14 hours I have run the battery down to 67% with wifi, buetooth and push email enabled. If I just use it for phone calls I can probably make three days with my use. I'm very happy with the battery life.

In order to run it down twice in one day I had to use the wifi, bluetooth and GPS radios a lot along with a couple of hours of video playback and listening to music. GPS and video kept the screen on and it was at it's brightest setting. SP Timesync was updating the time every 10 minutes and I was also checking pop mail every 5 minutes which kept the data connection active most of the time. I made lots of phone calls took lots of pictures and read part of an e-book.

I would not expect this to be normal use for anybody. It certainly isn't for me. If you need to be able to use a device this way then perhaps this is not the one for you. I am very happy with the TyTN II.

Actually im not surprised you getting really good battery life now. its the constant total discharging and recharging the battery thats extended the life of it. lithium ion batteries need a minimum of 5 full discharge and recharge cycles before it reaches 100% of its potential power.

People complaining of short battery life probably havent done the proper battery care or havent had the phone long enough for it to reach its full potential battery power. As a rule its good to totally discharge a lithium ion battery once a month for optimum use, but if its new its best to do the discharge and recharge cycles as soon as possible to get the battery upto its full potential power. After this is done you wil get far better battery life and to continue this battery care should be carried out once a month

Edited September 28, 2007 by dolbe666

[Guest Nick Le Lievre]

Thats rather unfair- Nick has acknowledged a problem, and given a number of pointers as to when it happens and how to prevent it. It is his decision whether or not to RMA it, though most contributors think he should.

If nothing else, it has focussed attention on a real, if possibly small risk of a TyTn II showing similar faults, and there have been enough respondants now with the same problem to suggest it isn't a one-off sample fault in Nick's machine.

Thanks. Just to update I was running my Tytn II without soft resets but making sure to disconnect the data connection after every use. It was working fine for 37hours but last night and for the first time ever a message popped up everytime I tried to connect to the data connection saying that it couldn't dial "WAP" and suggested I reset my device.

I thought maybe the GPRS was down so left it untill this morning and tried again but no it still wouldn't connect. Figuring that I`ve still got 5 days to hold onto the device I decided to do a soft reset and lo and behold it could dial the data connection again. So despite not having an SOD in 37 hours something forced me into doing a soft reset.

I`m going to try and run it again for the next 5 days without soft reset and see if it happens again, has anyone else had this happen to them with a data connection?

[Guest Neil5459]

Thanks. Just to update I was running my Tytn II without soft resets but making sure to disconnect the data connection after every use. It was working fine for 37hours but last night and for the first time ever a message popped up everytime I tried to connect to the data connection saying that it couldn't dial "WAP" and suggested I reset my device.

I thought maybe the GPRS was down so left it untill this morning and tried again but no it still wouldn't connect. Figuring that I`ve still got 5 days to hold onto the device I decided to do a soft reset and lo and behold it could dial the data connection again. So despite not having an SOD in 37 hours something forced me into doing a soft reset.

I`m going to try and run it again for the next 5 days without soft reset and see if it happens again, has anyone else had this happen to them with a data connection?

Did you try a 'Flight Mode' cycle on/off? Sometimes the GPRS system gets cobbled at the server end, giving rise to 'unable to connect' messages; A Flight Mode on/off usually clears it. Although I use a Trinity rather than TyTnII, I sometimes get this when working on a train, and if the signal has been lost in a tunnel- not often, but once in a while.

If it happens again, in the interests of your testing routine it may be worth trying the flight mode trick.

[Guest Webreaper]

Did you try a 'Flight Mode' cycle on/off? Sometimes the GPRS system gets cobbled at the server end, giving rise to 'unable to connect' messages; A Flight Mode on/off usually clears it. Although I use a Trinity rather than TyTnII, I sometimes get this when working on a train, and if the signal has been lost in a tunnel- not often, but once in a while.

If it happens again, in the interests of your testing routine it may be worth trying the flight mode trick.

Yeah, I've seen the GPRS connection get its knickers in a twist a couple of times. Quickest fix is just to go to Comm Mgr, press 'Data Connection' to drop the connection, and the next time it dials it usually sorts itself out.

[Guest Nick Le Lievre]

Yeah, I've seen the GPRS connection get its knickers in a twist a couple of times. Quickest fix is just to go to Comm Mgr, press 'Data Connection' to drop the connection, and the next time it dials it usually sorts itself out.

The thing is I didn't have an active connection already running. I`d not used the device for a few hours and came to it to try and load Internet Explorer which tries to make a data connection when one is needed. It was then that it kept trying for a split second then trying again to connect eventually giving me a message that it couldn't connect and to reset the device.

I left it overnight and tried again this morning and it did exactly the same thing... not knowing what to do I decided to reset as it instructed.. immediately after reset it connected to data connection fine. I don't think it was a problem at the server end but something on the Tytn II had stopped working properly and a reset fixed it.

In view of that I think I was better off when I was resetting it everyday. Anyway I`ll try not soft resetting it again for the next 5 days and report back, if it does it again I`ll try enabling/disabling flight mode as suggested.

[Guest Everton1878]

Mine's just fallen over again, it's been sitting on my desk connected to my PC for the last 6 hours or so

Then I notice the big clock display disappear, left it for a couple of minutes then undocked it but it was unresponsive and so did a soft reset

Just uninstalled Batti to see if that makes a difference, after that I may have to look at loosing the Spb Diary plugin

Must be a memory leak somewhere! ;)

[Guest Solar Hydro]

Hello all,

Several points (SOD, SOL, battery life, camera bug, browser, warranty, next project).

SOD/SOL

After a good few days (Friday evening to Wednesday afternoon) of essentially flawless operation (except battery - see below), I experienced the 'Standby of Death' (SOD) for a second time. Phone/SMS and camera would just not work at all; even after soft-resetting. All through this episode, power and camera button problems resurfaced as I have reported before, whilst e-mail checking worked after doing soft resets (outgoing e-mail failed for unknown/presumably unrelated reasons). I did at least 8 soft resets while sitting in an auditorium for 3 hours (boring presentations) and could not get the device to operate properly. Upon returning home this evening, I did a synch, and all seems fine again now, i.e. the Synch of Life (SOL) seems to be validated again. Note: I do not synch regularly, since I don't use Outlook I see little reason to synch. In fact, I did not synch since the previous SOD/SOL.

Battery

I drove 200+km to a meeting, with TomTom6 running; followed by minor e-mail checking and receiving/sending a few SMS, and a quick Palringo check. On the way back, about 100km from home, I got a 10% battery warning, so decided to switch off TomTom (no problem, I knew the way from there; and was extremely grateful for TomTom doing work for me at the remote destination). I have also spent a (different) day running Skype over HSDPA and 3G (including no less than 226 Skype chat messages...), and got a battery warning little after 6pm. All of this indicates to me that under heavy usage, the battery may NOT last 24h. I suppose that I could/should get a car charger, and some kind of 'stand' to put the phone in a sensible place in my car (upon heavy braking and fast corners I had to hold it, and lost it down below the pedals a couple of times which could be deadly...)

Camera bug

Thanks for the registry edit help. I haven't yet tried to implement that, but I will.

Browsers

Minimo (a Mozilla project for a cut-down Firefox has tabbed browsing, and some bookmarks installed). This seems to work quite well on a fast data connection, but IE is still triggered from e-mails. I'll have to look into a way of changing the default. I will install Opera Mini at some later stage.

Warranty

After I got my first SOD, I informed the company I bought the TyTN II from. They answered that I can return a faulty device to a specialised service, until 24 months after failure. Am I unduly relaxed, or does Nick have totally different Terms and Conditions? I am in continental Europe.

Shutting down data connection

The day I got the TyTN II, I upgraded my old GPRS subscription (10 Mb/month, €15/month) to 2 Gb/month (€40/month). Hence, I do not reset/shut down mobile data, and don't intend to. I did notice that Google Maps/Earth is very bandwith intensive, but I don't care until I see the first month's data throughput calculation/bill. I had installed the HTC 'gprs monitor' but it messes with the connectivity icons, so I uninstalled that again.

Next Project

Friday or at the weekend, I will properly install a SIP client and do outgoing and incoming calls on a geographic number over WiFi, HSDPA, UMTS, EDGE, to test quality.

Greetings!

Solar Hydro

[Guest drokkon]

Several points (SOD, SOL, battery life, camera bug, browser, warranty, next project).

Great report, Hydro - thanks! I look forward to your next one!

[Guest ipgenie]

Hello all,

Shutting down data connection

The day I got the TyTN II, I upgraded my old GPRS subscription (10 Mb/month, €15/month) to 2 Gb/month (€40/month). Hence, I do not reset/shut down mobile data, and don't intend to. I did notice that Google Maps/Earth is very bandwith intensive, but I don't care until I see the first month's data throughput calculation/bill. I had installed the HTC 'gprs monitor' but it messes with the connectivity icons, so I uninstalled that again.

I didn't like the task bar icon either so I just disabled that icon and the today plugin. Now to check my data usage I can open the software and do a report. Otherwise I don't even know the program is installed. I've found it very interesting to see how my data use fluxuates based on the availability of wifi.

[Guest Neil5459]

Warranty

After I got my first SOD, I informed the company I bought the TyTN II from. They answered that I can return a faulty device to a specialised service, until 24 months after failure. Am I unduly relaxed, or does Nick have totally different Terms and Conditions? I am in continental Europe.

We are talking about different things- all items have a warranty for a fixed period- 12 months or 24 months, and you can return an item for repair to a manufacturing fault within that time. It will be repaired or replaced with a new or refurnished unit at the discretion of the repairer.

In UK, we also usually have a 'Dead on Arrival' facility, whereby we have up to a certain period (usually 7,14 or 28 days) to return a faulty item for a full refund, or replacement with a new one.

[Guest Phil_UK]

Hi

In UK, we also usually have a 'Dead on Arrival' facility, whereby we have up to a certain period (usually 7,14 or 28 days) to return a faulty item for a full refund, or replacement with a new one.

It is worth knowing this is no Dead on Arrival facility except perhaps what the retailer offers. Under the sale of goods act you need to return the goods in a reasonable amount of time, there is no hard fixed 7, 14 or 28 day period. Shops like Dixon's may say 28 days for refund/replacement and then on the 29th day force you to send it for repair however this is illegal under UK law and there will be a statement somewhere in such shops that "This does not affect your statutory rights" to cover themselves although sales staff will not have a clue and such companies force this fixed number of days. Shops like Dixons/Curry's get penalised by their group for refunding goods after 28 days so it is in their personal interested (bonus's etc) to force this time period.

In the first 6 months if a fault occurs it is up to the shop to prove there is no fault rather than for you to prove there is, so in other words they have to take your word for it or prove otherwise.

Regards

Phil

[Guest catchwater]

HI- I have just bought a Tytn 2- after waiting 2 weeks to get it through NZ customs! It is all working great except when someone calls me. As soon as a call starts to come in the phone shuts down and restarts. I am able to make calls from the phone without a problem. I can also connect to the internet over 3g.

I am using vodafone New zealand. Does anyone have any ideas about possible solutions.

I have this problem with my usual SIM card, but have tested the TyTN II with another SIM and it works fine. My SIM is old (12 years!) and there is a statement in the manual that some legacy SIMs may not work, I am assuming that this is the problem and when I get an up-to-date SIM card from my network provider will solve my problem.

How old is your SIM? Have you tried other (recent) SIMs?

[Guest Everton1878]

daily alarm never went off this morning, or more accurately it did but it mustn't have made a sound or vibrated as it didn't wake either myself or the wife up (did the same yesterday too). When I looked at it, the reminder was minimised

Then when I got into work I noticed that the time had jumped one hour forward (the timezone has been out for a while but still showing the correct time)

Set it on repeating alarm in the hope that it'll work ok tomorrow

Found the problem for the alarm sounds

I'd installed phoneAlarm to test it out and it had changed the default alarm sounds

Set them back now

Edited September 27, 2007 by Everton1878

[Guest dbaleanu]

Another SOD victim here.

Got my TyTN II from eXpansys Saturday 22nd. Finaly sent a RMA request today.

I've had days with 3+ SODs. I wanted to make sure that there was nothing to do with whatever free/share-ware I've put on it, but in the end I've concluded it must be a faulty unit.

I've also experienced problems with the battery being worryingly hot. I've got a Mio A701 and an E-Ten M700 and never felt they were overheating, not even when running video over WiFi whilst in a Skype call . My Kaiser though got to 43C+ whilst charging with nothing more than WiFi and mail synching (on its back, on a hard, flat, wooden surface). Is it the way thinner back cover, or just way hotter? Or just mine?

The other issue is battery life. Never got more than 6 hrs out of it, even when only used as phone, no WiFi, no GPRS, nothing.

Looking forward to a replacement.

[Guest pestekkorna]

I've also experienced problems with the battery being worryingly hot. I've got a Mio A701 and an E-Ten M700 and never felt they were overheating, not even when running video over WiFi whilst in a Skype call . My Kaiser though got to 43C+ whilst charging with nothing more than WiFi and mail synching (on its back, on a hard, flat, wooden surface). Is it the way thinner back cover, or just way hotter? Or just mine?

The other issue is battery life. Never got more than 6 hrs out of it, even when only used as phone, no WiFi, no GPRS, nothing.

Looking forward to a replacement.

About battery life, I got mine on monday and after one day of use (maybe intensive) the battery was done. I noticed the heating while charging (the device was on stand by, nothing on) and thought it was normal. Last charge, yesterday at 23h30. I will controlly how long it is going to last.

Peste

PS. Even with the dummy server solution, activesync still randomly present in the background activity (and of course I didn't try no sync).

[Guest evad]

About battery life, I got mine on monday and after one day of use (maybe intensive) the battery was done. I noticed the heating while charging (the device was on stand by, nothing on) and thought it was normal. Last charge, yesterday at 23h30. I will controlly how long it is going to last.

Regarding battery life - I have managed to get Kaiser working without charger for whole 4 days (I mean 4*24 = 96 hours). :) Conditions: 2G-only, rather low usage - just few calls a day, max 10-15 texts, a little bit of GPRS to update weather and/or check mail...

[Guest Paul (MVP)]

I never have a Single 'SOD' and I have a LOT of stuff installed.

Something must be breaking in your config? What do you have installed?

P

[Guest Goldberg83]

There seems to be some serious issues with this phone, does anybody still recomend me to get one?

[Guest Goldberg83]

There seems to be some serious issues with this phone, does anybody still recomend me to get one?

[Guest evad]

I never have a Single 'SOD' and I have a LOT of stuff installed.

Same here.. Looks like there were some dodgy units released, just like it was with famous 'screen alignment issue' on Hermes - but my Hermes never had it. I think I'm lucky. ;)

[Guest dolbe666]

Mine is still running perfectly, im getting about 2 days from mine without charging, and thats with a bit of browsing with HSDPA and a couple of calls, a few texts and syncing my email about 4 times a day