Here are my notes after successfully setting up a Telus HTC Hero on Fido.
Purchase:
I'm on a multiyear Fido plan and didn't want to bail, so there was no way to get a Hero through my default carrier. Unlocked was the only way to go. Comparing prices of the HTC Hero (with North American 3G frequencies) online and in stores, I found that the best deal at the time was to buy a Telus HTC Hero on no contract in store and bargain in a few freebies. (Bluetooth headset, case, car charger, etc).
Unlocking:
After getting my Hero home and happily unboxing everything, I put the battery in, plugged in the charger and set about unlocking the phone. The cheapest and quickest way I know of is to get an unlock code from the internet. I've had good experiences going through unlock code sellers from eBay so I did a quick search and used my newly purchased unlock code. Note that the IMEI number needed is both on the barcode sticker on the box as well as under the battery inside the phone. This was the easiest unlock I've ever done, no need to find hidden menus or anything. Steps below.
Having unlocked the network, my Hero was now fully charged and on the Fido network. Voice calls worked immediately, but 3G data did not because all of the internal data network settings were preset to Telus servers. Stepping through the first time setup wizard got the basics going and the phone functioning ok. Location detection worked fine, time settings were correct when left on "detect automatically".
Issues Out of the Box:
I found the following needed to be addressed before I was happy with the phone.
The weather portion of this HTC widget showed the wrong weather for the "current location" despite correctly identifying my city. Manually adding the city to the list provided the correct weather but that's not what shows up on the home screen. Here's what I did about it:
As mentioned above, the timestamps for text messages on my Hero on Fido were all messed up for incoming messages. The reasons for this are outlined in detail on this and other forums and are irrelevant to how to get it working. First, I installed ChompSMS from the Market which has other benefits such as showing messages as speech bubbles and makes following a conversation quick and convenient. This displayed the messages in the right order but still didn't fix the timestamps meaning that the timestamps would not display in the app. Here's what I did about it:
The 3G data settings (APNs) were preset for Telus which was no help to me at all. There are many posts on other forums on correct APN settings and I tried all of them with varying success. Here's what worked:
I was getting notifications that I received multi media messages but I couldn't actually get the pictures to download at first. Here's what worked:
Always Roaming Issue:
I don't have a fix for this yet. Based on posts I've found on this and other forums, there may not be a simple fix for this if using a Fido sim card since the the MCC and MNC numbers for Fido and Rogers don't match but they share a network. Its a bit annoying getting the warning all the time but a small price to pay to have the Hero working on a cheap Fido plan.
Getting Value from my Hero:
Signed up for this forum and did a bunch of reading. In particular, followed lekky's excellent tips and apps post found here:
http://androidforums.com/htc-hero/20511-htc-hero-tips-tricks-useful-apps.html
Hope that helps people get started, feel free to PM me to update this post if I've said something incorrect.
Cheers,
Perihelion
Purchase:
I'm on a multiyear Fido plan and didn't want to bail, so there was no way to get a Hero through my default carrier. Unlocked was the only way to go. Comparing prices of the HTC Hero (with North American 3G frequencies) online and in stores, I found that the best deal at the time was to buy a Telus HTC Hero on no contract in store and bargain in a few freebies. (Bluetooth headset, case, car charger, etc).
Unlocking:
After getting my Hero home and happily unboxing everything, I put the battery in, plugged in the charger and set about unlocking the phone. The cheapest and quickest way I know of is to get an unlock code from the internet. I've had good experiences going through unlock code sellers from eBay so I did a quick search and used my newly purchased unlock code. Note that the IMEI number needed is both on the barcode sticker on the box as well as under the battery inside the phone. This was the easiest unlock I've ever done, no need to find hidden menus or anything. Steps below.
- Go to eBay.
- Search for "unlock htc hero fido".
- Sort by price.
- Review seller's feedback to verify they're not a scammer.
- Purchase unlock code.
- One the phone is finished charging, insert sim card and power it on.
- A notification window pops up asking for the unlock code.
- Enter the unlock code and job done!
Having unlocked the network, my Hero was now fully charged and on the Fido network. Voice calls worked immediately, but 3G data did not because all of the internal data network settings were preset to Telus servers. Stepping through the first time setup wizard got the basics going and the phone functioning ok. Location detection worked fine, time settings were correct when left on "detect automatically".
Issues Out of the Box:
I found the following needed to be addressed before I was happy with the phone.
- HTC widget for combined clock and weather showed the wrong weather. I found this super annoying. The location detected was correct, right city, timezone and everything but the weather was displaying as 20 degrees celcius outside when in reality it was minus 19 degrees celcius. (Fix below)
- SMS time stamps were wrong. Texted my friend who replied but the timestamp on the reply was 8 hours too early which screwed up the message threads. (Fix below).
- 3G data did not work because as mentioned above, the network settings were all set to Telus. (Fix below)
- Picture messaging (MMS) did not work because the network settings were all set to Telus. (Fix below)
- Phone always shows the "R" for roaming even though I'm a Fido client on a Fido network. (No fix found yet)
The weather portion of this HTC widget showed the wrong weather for the "current location" despite correctly identifying my city. Manually adding the city to the list provided the correct weather but that's not what shows up on the home screen. Here's what I did about it:
- On the home screen, remove the clock/weather widget by holding it and dragging it to the "remove" area. Now you have a big blank space on the home screen.
- Click the + icon to add a widget.
- Select HTC Widget > Clock > big clock and weather widget.
- Don't use the "current location" for the weather setting, manually select your city from the search.
- When the widget loads, the default city showing on the widget is the one you selected. Job done!
As mentioned above, the timestamps for text messages on my Hero on Fido were all messed up for incoming messages. The reasons for this are outlined in detail on this and other forums and are irrelevant to how to get it working. First, I installed ChompSMS from the Market which has other benefits such as showing messages as speech bubbles and makes following a conversation quick and convenient. This displayed the messages in the right order but still didn't fix the timestamps meaning that the timestamps would not display in the app. Here's what I did about it:
- As mentioned, download and install ChompSMS which displays the messages sent and received in the right order.
- Download and install SMSFixTimes app from the market. Run it.
- When the app loads, read the instructions and click "Configure/Test".
- It shows a sample message and both the received time (when the message got to your phone) as well as the timestamp on the message as it moved through the network (which is wrong).
- Look at the difference in time. Set the "automatic offset" for the right number of hours so that the received time matches the network timestamp. This app simply modifies the network timestamp by the number of hours you select so that the time received matches the updated message timestamp. Handy! (For me, this was +5 hours as I'm in Alberta).
- I didn't bother with "Fix existing messages" but all new messages were stamped correctly.
- Note that in the notifications window, the time on the message is still wrong as it reads this stamp before the app has a chance to modify it. However, ChompSMS now shows the correct received time on the message and again the messages are in the right order for the conversation. Job done!
The 3G data settings (APNs) were preset for Telus which was no help to me at all. There are many posts on other forums on correct APN settings and I tried all of them with varying success. Here's what worked:
- On the home screen, press the Menu hardkey and choose Settings.
- Select Wireless Controls > Mobile Network Settings
- Make sure data roaming is on, and "Use only 2G networks" is off.
- Under network operators, I selected Fido manually to ensure I'm not accidentally roaming onto Bell or Telus.
- Select "Access Point Names" aka (APNs).
- Deleted the ones that were there.
- Hit the MENU button > New APN.
- Used the following settings:
- Name: Fido Internet
- APN: internet.fido.ca
- Proxy: 205.151.11.11
- Port: 8080
- Username: fido
- Password: fido
- Server: <blank>
- MMSC: http://mms.fido.ca
- MMS Proxy: 205.151.11.13
- MMS Port: <blank>
- MMS Protocol: Wap 2.0
- MCC: 302
- MNC: 370
- APN type: <blank>
- Power the phone off and on again. 3G and HSPA indicators came on after booting up and acknowledging the "you are roaming" message. (See below for more info). Job done!
I was getting notifications that I received multi media messages but I couldn't actually get the pictures to download at first. Here's what worked:
- Follow the instructions above to set the 3G APN settings up. Included in that APN configuration are the servers for the MMS server.
- Once the APN kicks in, I was able to turn on "Automatically downlaod" for the picture message preferences and now the pictures show up in Chomp SMS perfectly.
Always Roaming Issue:
I don't have a fix for this yet. Based on posts I've found on this and other forums, there may not be a simple fix for this if using a Fido sim card since the the MCC and MNC numbers for Fido and Rogers don't match but they share a network. Its a bit annoying getting the warning all the time but a small price to pay to have the Hero working on a cheap Fido plan.
Getting Value from my Hero:
Signed up for this forum and did a bunch of reading. In particular, followed lekky's excellent tips and apps post found here:
http://androidforums.com/htc-hero/20511-htc-hero-tips-tricks-useful-apps.html
Hope that helps people get started, feel free to PM me to update this post if I've said something incorrect.
Cheers,
Perihelion