Two Qtek 8500 problems - clock and voice tags

[TheTetherer]

I really like this new Qtek 8500 phone, but I've run into two annoying problems so far:

The clock: I keep finding that my phone's clock jumps by several hours. I've seen go both foward and backward, but typically by whole hours, and typically by 5 hours, which is my Eastern US time zone offset from GMT (not counting Daylight Saving Time).

Is the "Automatic Time/Time zone" setting a bad feature that I should turn off? Can I leave it turned on, but then if I do, do I need to play some trick like setting my time zone to GMT?

Voice tag: I set up a few voice tags for voice dialing, and they do seem to work, but they never play back. After recording a voice tag, I'm supposed to hear it play back, but I don't. I'm supposed to be able to click on the field showing that there's a voice tag that's been set up and hear it play, but nothing happens when I do. If I go back and look at my contacts after adding the voice clip, all I see is the option to "Add Voice Tag", as if there's no voice tag already there, even though I can speak into the phone and get that contact to dial by voice.

I tried to find a way to reach QTek customer support, but couldn't find anything that will work for me. I've sent an e-mail to the online store where I bought the phone (phonesource-usa.com, who I was already pissed at for their unfriendly "all sales final" policy -- they refused to take the phone back even before I'd opened the box), but I'm beginning to wonder if I've been sold gray market merchandise.

Other people have apparently been solving a problem with missed phone calls (not a problem I've experienced yet) by installing iMate Smartflip software on their Qtek 8500s. Does that sound like a good approach to my problems? If so, anyone know where a good "how to" on doing this can be found?

[Mike Temporale]

The clock: I keep finding that my phone's clock jumps by several hours. I've seen go both foward and backward, but typically by whole hours, and typically by 5 hours, which is my Eastern US time zone offset from GMT (not counting Daylight Saving Time).

Is the "Automatic Time/Time zone" setting a bad feature that I should turn off? Can I leave it turned on, but then if I do, do I need to play some trick like setting my time zone to GMT?

Make sure your device is set to the right time zone, and the same for your desktop. When you sync, the time is pulled from your computer. So if it's different you'll see the clock on your phone jump around.

Voice tag: I set up a few voice tags for voice dialing, and they do seem to work, but they never play back. After recording a voice tag, I'm supposed to hear it play back, but I don't. I'm supposed to be able to click on the field showing that there's a voice tag that's been set up and hear it play, but nothing happens when I do. If I go back and look at my contacts after adding the voice clip, all I see is the option to "Add Voice Tag", as if there's no voice tag already there, even though I can speak into the phone and get that contact to dial by voice.

Odd. Is your phone in silent, headset or meeting profiles? Otherwise I can't think of any reason why you wouldn't hear it.

Other people have apparently been solving a problem with missed phone calls (not a problem I've experienced yet) by installing iMate Smartflip software on their Qtek 8500s. Does that sound like a good approach to my problems? If so, anyone know where a good "how to" on doing this can be found?

You won't find any instructions here. We don't allow that kind of stuff here. ;) ROMs are copywrited material, so from a legal point, you can't just put another ROM on your phone. From a technical point, it may work, but you risk lost functionality as each ROM is tuned to the manufacturers device. It may be an HTC StarTrek under the hood, but i-mate is welcome to tune it differently than Qtek and even offer different chipsets. Just look at the WiFi / no WiFi in the various tornado's out there.

[TheTetherer]

Make sure your device is set to the right time zone, and the same for your desktop. When you sync, the time is pulled from your computer. So if it's different you'll see the clock on your phone jump around.
Both my computer and my phone are set to US Eastern Time. The phone has gone from the right time to the wrong time without any intervening connection to a computer. I'm not sure how often the phone updates its clock from the mobile network's time, but I suspect that that's when the time goes screwy.

Odd. Is your phone in silent, headset or meeting profiles? Otherwise I can't think of any reason why you wouldn't hear it.
Nope, I've yet to take the phone out of the Normal profile yet. I've also recorded voice notes and have played them back without any problems. This just seems like a weird software glitch to me.

You won't find any instructions here. We don't allow that kind of stuff here. ;) ROMs are copywrited material, so from a legal point, you can't just put another ROM on your phone.
I'd gladly try a Qtek firmware update if and when one become available, and if and when I can figure out how to get proper support for this phone.

There's no clear software/firmware version numbers I can find, just the Windows Mobile version number, and "Radio Version" and "RIL Version", whatever the hell those mean. For whatever its worth, those numbers, respectively, are: 5.1.195 (Build 14955.2.3.0), 4.1.13.17_02.32.31, and 2.002.

[TheTetherer]

I got the "all sales final" guy to agree that this phone was defective and that since Qtek didn't have any official US support that he'd offer me a refund, since any phone he'd send back would likely have the same problems, and I'd not be able to get any replacement he could sent fixed.

If Qtek had US support, these problems weren't so bad that I couldn't have lived with them for a short time, but I wouldn't want to be stuck with the phone like this forever, or have to hack the phone back to health on my own with BitTorrent-acquired software.

I'll wait three months (like I should have in the first place anyway) until my Verizon contract runs out, and if this phone still looks like the best choice, I'll get the i-mate version of the phone, which sounds like it has more reliable software than the Qtek, as well as US tech support.