I downloaded the ROM and did not care if it bricked my device, because it was nearly unusable. It constantly lost the flash card, constantly decided it no longer wanted to open any applications, constantly decided to stop answering calls, etc. It is now nearly FLAWLESS with WM6 on it. Once I got used to WM6 on my Cingular 8525, I just hated going back.
Palm and ATT are just taking too long to get this out. If you announce this in March, why in the Hell is it taking 5 months to get this out, especially since the 8525 WM6 "unnoficial" updates have been around since then?
I just found out one interesting feature: you can control voice mail playback using the directional pad. I have a screenshot in my blog.
It works really well on Vodafone's VM system, even though the feature is for the AT&T service.
That feature has been available for quite some time. Also, it's not tailored toward any particular system, as it is full programmable to whatever keypresses are required by the system of your choice.
I loaded it up to my Treo 750v because I was tired of waiting for palm/Voda to release an update. I'll probably flash with the palm or Voda WM6 ROM if ever those get released but for now I'm just happy I finally have WM6 on my Treo even with all the AT&T crap that I don't need and won't use.
I just did this with my 8525. Besides little annoyances with WM5, I had big annoyances which some said were fixed with WM6. They were right. There were stability issues. I did soft resets several times a day. The biggest issue for me was Microsoft's terrible Bluetooth stack. I have a new car with built-in Bluetooth. The phone would often not connect. It would randomly drop the connection. I sometimes had to turn off and restart Bluetooth several times to get it to connect. It would not transfer the phone book -- all at once or even one entry at a time. Toyota's website said this was a problem with all WM5 phones, so they listed them as not compatible. I almost didn't buy the car because I spend so much time in it and needed the handsfree functionality. WM6 has actually fixed all of this, so I assume Microsoft fixed their Bluetooth stack. The BT connection is almost instantaneous, the phonebook transferred automatically, the connection never drops <quick prayer>.
I see this as both a Microsoft and carrier problem. Carriers want to tie you into features of their service, not just lock the phones. If these were apps in RAM which could easily be removed, they would have less of a hold on us. I think MS designed an OS model which helps carriers customize the operations of their phones. When Palm, or HTC, or whoever else upgrades their OS, it's not just a matter of adding the drivers specific to their hardware. They have to add in all the customized junk each carrier wants, so for even a single model of phone, they may have to create a dozen custom ROMs. They would much rather spend their resources on new device development and I can't blame them for this.
AS a regular PPC customiser I flashed a WM6 rom nearly as soon as they became available. After flashing a few different variations I found one that workslike a treat on my Orange UK M3100 & haven't looked back since. I would recommend it to anyone.
I honestly believe that MS needs to cut a new deal with the network operators. To me the situation is exactly the same as if I bought a Toshiba laptop, but couldn't get access to MS updates until Toshiba decided to release them as an OS update! I can't imagine MS allowing PC vendors control over how users access windows updates.
Orange UK were the first company here to introduce the 'smartphone' and windows mobile generally. Their update process was laboured at best, and now it appears to have dried up altogether. I don't think anyone is under any illusions that this is purely because the network wants to sellpeople a new phone with the new OS on it, rather than allow them to upgrade their old handset. I think this is a fairly false marketing plan, as many users would update their handsets regularly anyway, but would feel much more valued as customers if during their year contract they recieved some benefits & upgrades.
The mobile market is now utterly saturated. I think that network providers should consider how they keep customers attached to their networks, rather than losing them to churn. A very big part of this service for me personally would have to include OS updates from MS.
All that said, and to echo the sentiments above, thank god for XDA Developers!
I think it's not so much that people are clamoring for WM6 as they are struggling for fixes to the problems with the current 750 implementation. I've read some people talking about how their 750s run flawlessly, but the sense I get is that this is NOT the majority of users. Most people seem to have problems ranging from minor nuisances to major failures and they want the device to become much more stable than it is.
Some examples - the 750 is often sluggish and freezes, the alarms still don't work 100% correctly (even after the fix) calls still drop, etc. etc. and people are tired of it and looking for ANYTHING that will help the situation.
Fixes have been promised almost since the release of the device and WM6 was promised, I believe, for an August release. I think people think WM6 will clear up a lot of their problems so they're jumping on it, even at the risk of bricking the device.
I think this probably should have been made available a while ago (with a warning that it was still a beta product), but that Palm/AT&T/etc. should NOT be held liable if you brick the device installing it - it is NOT the official release and you therefore operate at your own risk.
The current model of MS providing the core OS and then having the carriers modify it is foolish and dramatically slows down the break/fix schedule. Perhaps the break/fix process should be separated from the feature set process. MS could control the break/fix process end-to-end and let the carrier add/remove features on their own schedule (rarely do these seem to change during a device life cycle).
What we see today is that MS blames the carrier and the carrier blames MS and nothing gets done in a timely manner. In that sense, Apple kind of got it right (if they carry through) by controlling the device and the software/OS on it and not letting the carrier get into the mix. The head of Nextel made comments that this model was going to force the carriers (back) into being common carriers and not service/content providers. He thought this was a bad thing. Seeing how poorly they handle software development I tend to think they should be limited to a carrier-only state.
Come on MS, come on Palm, step up for once and actually own the problem and resolution instead of just saying "the carrier has to release any updates"! Then maybe most people won't be so quick to download test versions of software and still expect support for it.
I'm kinda surprised you guys posted a link to a illegal rom.
The point of the post wasn't to say "Here's the ROM, go download it", rather it was to take you to a discussion post that had more info on the subject. Not my fault they happened to have a link to an illegal ROM in that thread
Besides, just breezing through that post will confirm that it wasn't all roses for everyone who decided to try that ROM. User beware!
__________________ Dr. Jon Westfall, MCSE, MS-MVP
Executive Editor - Android Thoughts
News Editor - Windows Phone Thoughts
With WM5, I had the volume issue each time that I powered off the device or soft reset. I would need to run the fix each time. Now with WM6 I have soft reset and powered off the device a few times with no trouble.
Main reason I wanted this ROM was for the upgraded e-mail features, which all seem to work great so far.
I initially experienced problems with the update failing. After looking back, I think the problems may have been caused by the SD Card Reader on my laptop, that has since ceased to recognize any cards. After I got a USB Card Reader, formatted the card to Fat32, copied the file over. The upgrade went much quicker and completed successfully.
I'm reminded of the time I bought an HP4150 partially based on the fact that HP advertised that the OS could be flashed/upgraded. No update to WM2003SE came and the 4150 (and the 2250 as well) quietly dissappeared from the marketplace. HP lost a lot of loyal customers that year.
In that sense, I applaud people (XDA Developers, particularly) who have taken it upon themselves to cook new ROMs for themselves and the community at large. Technically it's a grey area since you are dealing with propretary software and firmware. So far no company has taken action against these people but I'm wondering when the other shoe will drop.
On the other hand, if you flash an untested and unauthorized firmware into your device and brick it then it was your risk to take, and your responsibility. This is an expense that should not be incurred by either the carrier or M$, no matter how impatient or p'ed off you are.
No one likes to be strung along like Treo users have this year, or HP4150 users were in 2004 but that is not an excuse for what is impatience on the part of the consumer.
I've flashed my hi-end device (jasjar) with atleast 6 different ROMs over the past year, still no official release for the device yet. I've heard of people brinking devices but It's worth it to me.
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