Official known Bionic problems reported from Verizon

[bezerk19]

Is it OK to use this thread to discuss the issues listed, or would you prefer to keep this to posting about known issues?

The reason I ask is that I've experienced something with mine that I would like to put forward and see if it's related to a particular thing I saw mentioned in the OP....regarding how apps interact with the user and with the removable SD Card.

What kind of problems are you experiencing?

 

[vnyislesv]

What kind of problems are you experiencing?

So listen to this crap.

I get the BSOD every once in awhile, call, talk to tech support, nothing works (duh) so they overnight me a phone.

I take it out of the box, put my sd/sim/battery in. Turn it on. Its slow as hell. Then sync, takes forever for 100ish contacts. Then I click text message and the screen starts going crazy. Flashing/jumping around. Won't let me do anything. It was like a virus got into it and made it go apeshyt.

Turn it off/on and same thing. I go to the VW store and they can't help me at all. Nothing. Call and "sorry, we'll send you another phone overnight".

Great service we have here. I called/emailed the DM in my area and am waiting on a response. I will be getting the Razr when it comes out, free.

 

[thewza]

So listen to this crap.

I get the BSOD every once in awhile, call, talk to tech support, nothing works (duh) so they overnight me a phone.

I take it out of the box, put my sd/sim/battery in. Turn it on. Its slow as hell. Then sync, takes forever for 100ish contacts. Then I click text message and the screen starts going crazy. Flashing/jumping around. Won't let me do anything. It was like a virus got into it and made it go apeshyt.

Turn it off/on and same thing. I go to the VW store and they can't help me at all. Nothing. Call and "sorry, we'll send you another phone overnight".

Great service we have here. I called/emailed the DM in my area and am waiting on a response. I will be getting the Razr when it comes out, free.

good luck with that. verizon stores are useless.

 

[vnyislesv]

good luck with that. verizon stores are useless.

Same district manager helped me YEARS ago. I'll get a Razr, just need to wait a few weeks.

 

[thethreelaws]

What kind of problems are you experiencing?

well, az i read through your post again, i suspect that my problem is related...

i knew i was about to have my week old bio replaced...so i waz trying to find backjp apps....the problem is that, even though i selected 'SD-CARD' in the settings of every backup app i tested, none of thsm backed up to my sd card. they all backed up to the internal storage location.

problem was that i did not realize this till i was at best buy getting the replacement (for other issues)........i wanted to transfer everything (including app) back to the replacement bio and couldnt cause it wasnt on the removable sd card (for reasons i think i now unxerstand)... so i had to fire up the old bio, transfer al backup files to the removable sd and then to the internal storage before being able to 'restore' any of the data to the replacement bio.

i assume now that this is because of tbe difference between sd card and sd card ext (you know what speling i mean).

right?

 

[bradm77]

The Bionic is a GREAT phone............ when you aren't pulling the battery and rebooting!! I have the great fortune to live right on the edge of two towers, one VZW, one Alltel. I can literally go from 2 bars on VZW to two bars roaming on Alltel just walking around inside my house (and my house ain't THAT big).

Because of the signal loss issues with the Bionic, I am doing at LEAST 5-6 battery pulls/reboots per day! After numerous factory resets (which did not help at all), VZW is swapping me out for the Nexus when it releases. I am outside of the 14 days, but have been a VZW customer for 13 years and have four lines, all with smartphones on em, and all with unlimited txt/data, so I was insanely lucky enough to get someone at VZW to make an exception to get me out of this Bionic NIGHTMARE......

I have been a HUGE Moto cheerleader going all the way back to the original Q smartphone and Razr flip phones, but after the Bionic, I am DONE with Moto forever!

The first Q was buggy, but bearable
The 2nd gen Q was awesome
The original razr (wifes phone) was great
The OG Droid was a home run
The X was, quite honestly, the BEST smartphone I have ever owned!

Even after all that history, the Bionic is a deal-breaker for me & Moto. If I lived somewhere in a big city when I never lost signal to begin with, and only had to do battery pulls for the "black screen of death", I might be able to wait it out for this alleged software update, but I am beyond disgusted that Moto would release this phone, this late, after countless delays, and STILL have it be a train wreck.

Just my 2 cents worth, your mileage may vary

 

[MadMako]

Known Issue. 9-8-2011. Customer duped in to thinking this would be one hell of a phone. In actuality, it's a mess like every other phone we put out.
Solution, take said phone to the grand canyon and heave ho it over the cliff.

I went through 4 BlackBerry Storms and 3 OTA updates before VZW/RIM had it stabilized. I thought I had learned my lesson in early adoption before buying the Bionic. Well, it looks like a repeat performance with VZW/Moto.
Stupid me thought that after a couple of years with the architecture, the product family would have been more mature.

 

[MadMako]

What will you do when you come upon issues with the Nexus? Just sayin'.

 

[Vehtemas]

good luck with that. verizon stores are useless.

That's why I got mine at Costco. 90 days and I get the phone replaced with a brand new one out of the box, no issues with having to deal with Verizon refurbished crap...

 

[bradm77]

Madmako - If the Nexus has issues that cause me to do 5 or more battery pulls every single day, I will get rid of it as well. I've been an early adopter for a long time, I get the "bleeding edge" thing, and I am OK with glitches here and there. But because of where I live the signal drop issue is a non-stop never ending battle that, to me, makes this Bionic not even useable. I spend more time rebooting the damn thing than I do actualy using it.

 

[thethreelaws]

Madmako - If the Nexus has issues that cause me to do 5 or more battery pulls every single day, I will get rid of it as well. I've been an early adopter for a long time, I get the "bleeding edge" thing, and I am OK with glitches here and there. But because of where I live the signal drop issue is a non-stop never ending battle that, to me, makes this Bionic not even useable. I spend more time rebooting the damn thing than I do actualy using it.

Sorry to be the ignorant goof here, but I am a newb....so, I guess I get a little leniency for that wen I ask this...

Is this ("5 or more battery pulls every single day") a real problem that is currently being experienced by a huge number of Bionic users, or just something limited to a few hackers?

The reason I ask is that, I'm not getting anything like that. I have not had to pull the battery once yet, whereas I had to do it at least once a day to my Storm from the day I first got it....in fact, when I went in to Verizon to deal with it, they told me that RIM actually recommends doing a battery pull on the Storm 1 every day......found same recommendation from them in writing online, and that's when I installed a tool called QuickPull that I could schedule to do it automatically for me overnight.

Now, while I'm still very new to the Bionic....and to Android altogether actually (got my first Android phone, the Bionic, two weeks ago), I will probably eventually want to root my phone in order to use some of the more sophisticated apps I've seen out there (app, data and rom backup and recovery for starters). Is this battery pull problem (BSOD and other issues) actually happening to folks like me where I'm at presently, or only once they start getting into rooting, romming, etc?

 

[bradm77]

Not rooted or rommed at all, factory default. MOST of my problems stem from being on the edge of signal, I think.

 

[Thom]

Not rooted or rommed at all, factory default. MOST of my problems stem from being on the edge of signal, I think.

You might give EVRC-B a try to help with your location. It is documented as the second entry in ... http://androidforums.com/motorola-droid-bionic/421050-useful-how-tos-tips.html.

If you do try it, let me know the result.

... Thom

 

[bradm77]

Gonna try it for the next day or two, will let you know......

 

[Vehtemas]

You might give EVRC-B a try to help with your location. It is documented as the second entry in ... http://androidforums.com/motorola-droid-bionic/421050-useful-how-tos-tips.html.

If you do try it, let me know the result.

... Thom

I am also going to try this out since my flat is on the edge of a network.

I would laugh if this is what the big OTA fix does =P

 

[xiteg79]

that is definitely a long list! Though the only real problem I have is the data connectivity between 4G and 3G.

 

[bradm77]

Tried the change here, had to change each time I rebooted, no improvement or change at all here in SE Ohio.

 

[NastyNos]

Problems since September...has any of these been fixed lately?

 

[floridaman]

Madmako - If the Nexus has issues that cause me to do 5 or more battery pulls every single day, I will get rid of it as well. I've been an early adopter for a long time, I get the "bleeding edge" thing, and I am OK with glitches here and there. But because of where I live the signal drop issue is a non-stop never ending battle that, to me, makes this Bionic not even useable. I spend more time rebooting the damn thing than I do actualy using it.

Ask Verizon Wireless to push a hybrid PRL. I had the same problem with signal loss and the hybrid PRL solved that. You will have the same problem with the Nexus thus you need the hybrid PRL.

 

[scoobaspeaz]

The Bionic is a GREAT phone............ when you aren't pulling the battery and rebooting!! I have the great fortune to live right on the edge of two towers, one VZW, one Alltel. I can literally go from 2 bars on VZW to two bars roaming on Alltel just walking around inside my house (and my house ain't THAT big).

Because of the signal loss issues with the Bionic, I am doing at LEAST 5-6 battery pulls/reboots per day! After numerous factory resets (which did not help at all), VZW is swapping me out for the Nexus when it releases. I am outside of the 14 days, but have been a VZW customer for 13 years and have four lines, all with smartphones on em, and all with unlimited txt/data, so I was insanely lucky enough to get someone at VZW to make an exception to get me out of this Bionic NIGHTMARE......

I have been a HUGE Moto cheerleader going all the way back to the original Q smartphone and Razr flip phones, but after the Bionic, I am DONE with Moto forever!

The first Q was buggy, but bearable
The 2nd gen Q was awesome
The original razr (wifes phone) was great
The OG Droid was a home run
The X was, quite honestly, the BEST smartphone I have ever owned!

Even after all that history, the Bionic is a deal-breaker for me & Moto. If I lived somewhere in a big city when I never lost signal to begin with, and only had to do battery pulls for the "black screen of death", I might be able to wait it out for this alleged software update, but I am beyond disgusted that Moto would release this phone, this late, after countless delays, and STILL have it be a train wreck.

Just my 2 cents worth, your mileage may vary

Just wondering...why are you considered roaming on Alltel towers? I used to live in SE Ohio area (near Portsmouth Ohio) and Verizon bought out Alltel when i lived there (2 years ago). I actually was a US Cellular customer then Alltel bought them out in the area...then Verizon bought out Alltel so for the past 3 years I have been a Verizon customer.

If you are considered roaming on Alltel towers in that area that would be very odd.

 

[bradm77]

Just wondering...why are you considered roaming on Alltel towers? I used to live in SE Ohio area (near Portsmouth Ohio) and Verizon bought out Alltel when i lived there (2 years ago). I actually was a US Cellular customer then Alltel bought them out in the area...then Verizon bought out Alltel so for the past 3 years I have been a Verizon customer.

If you are considered roaming on Alltel towers in that area that would be very odd.

Not sure why, but when dialing *228 i either get an activated phone or "welcome to alltell"

Academic at this point, the bionic is factory wiped and being used as a paperweight on my desk until the Nexus comes out. It will have the same tower swapping that all vzw phones have in my house, but only the bionic required a reboot every damn time signal dropped...

 

[samlembo1955]

Has the November patch been released yet?

 

[Thom]

Has the November patch been released yet?

Not yet.

When it is available in your area you can simply go to Settings | About phone | System updates and instal it.

... Thom

 

[thethreelaws]

Not yet.

When it is available in your area you can simply go to Settings | About phone | System updates and instal it.

... Thom

When I go to that place on my phone, I get the message,
"Check for update is not available at this time.
Try again later.".


Now, it doesn't say that the update itself isn't available, but that 'Check for update' is not available.
Does that mean what it says, (i.e. the update checking mechanism or service is, for some reason not working or unavailable), or is it rather poor English, and it really means that no updates are available?

Curiouser and curiouser (sorry...I just saw the musical, 'Alice in Wonderland' last night)...

 

[Thom]

I get the standard inane message when I try it.

As I reported in another thread ... when I went through a Droid X OTA upgrade a year or so ago it was released incremtally to various regions around the US. A few weeks before it was released in my region I got a message similar to the one you reference.

When you hear it is avaiable in your region it will probably "magically" be available to you. If it isn't I would go back to where I bought it.

Until you hear it is available in your region I think all you can do is wait.

(If I was a betting person I would bet your region gets it before mine.)

... Thom