And you thought Verizon users had it bad?

[unixronin]

My gods, Telstra could teach even Verizon an entire trunkload of tricks when it comes to crippling phones.  I recently bought an unlocked Motorola RAZR2 V9, and, yes, sure, it's unlocked, it works with a T-Mobile SIM card, but holy Hastur in a merrywidow, even the damn PHONE MAIN MENU is locked out.  'Setup' allows you to do one thing:  enable or disable the Bluetooth indicator.  Not Bluetooth, mind you — just the indicator.

What in the name of all good bits does Telstra expect their customers to use their phones as?  Clubs?

Anyway, right now I'm in the process of trying to reflash the phone with new, generic Motorola firmware. Also, shaking my head at the sheer stupidity inherent in Motorola's software update tool, which will only update the firmware of a phone that is still within its original warranty.  Planned obsolescence...?

Comments

[ithildae]

Motorola also has hardware locks on their Droid phones so that trying to load an unapproved version of Android will permanently brick the phone. Cell phone companies are fighting to keep user lock with every trick they can think of. One of the reasons I have not entered those waters. (I have a tracfone. I seldom use it.)

[unixronin]

Yes, the inclusion of circuitry in newer smartphones that irrevocably physically bricks the hardware if it detects "unauthorized" software installed is one of the reasons I have precisely zero interest in every buying any of the modern wonder-smartphones. Hey, Motorola, Apple, all the rest of you guys — exactly which part of I BOUGHT THIS DEVICE, IT'S MINE NOW was it that you didn't understand?

[ithildae]

I am sure they understand, they are just fighting it, hard. Other than withhold my funds, I am not sure what I can do about it. From my perspective, no amount of functional value is worth giving up control of my hardware.

You also see it in the software arena. Apple is bad, but Micro$oft's Genuine Windows Advantage, that phones home about EVERY software package that you attempt to RUN to make sure it is ok with Bill just drives me fruit. I sometimes wish the internet moved to a metered billing plan so that the Micro$oft background stuff got shut down. (It might do something for spam and bots too, if people had to pay for traffic.)