Skip to main content

The phone swap

The original Virgin Mobile logo.Image via WikipediaNot a repeat.

My new Samsung Intercept kept shutting itself down, and the Internet consensus was that it was a hardware issue and that Virgin Mobile will immediately replace the device. I emailed customer service, and I just told them the bare minimum:

"Hi, my phone is a couple of days old and it keeps shutting itself off."

Their reply came after a couple hours:

"We are sorry for your problem with your phone. You can either go back to the store and swap it, or we'll send you a replacement and a prepaid return envelope."

My reply:

"My retailer sucks. Please send me a replacement."

They said sure, asked me to verify my shipping address, and FEDEX'd a replacement phone. Just like that. NO buts, no excuses, they simply overnighted a replacement phone and a prepaid padded pouch to return the old phone. I could get used to this kind of customer service.

The phone swap was actually really simple and I was done in about 45 minutes. It went more or less as follows:


  1. Shut down old phone, removed the non-OEM microSD card.
  2. Inserted OEM microSD card of new phone into old phone.
  3. Started new phone.
  4. Activated the phone through the Virgin Mobile website. This involves typing a long serial number twice, then typing a sequence in the phone's keypad. About one minute to do this, and about four more to complete the reboot.
  5. At this point the new phone was functional.
  6. Logged into my Google account. Within a couple of minutes, over 700 Google contacts and my calendars were in sync and Gmail was ready for action.
  7. Installed Lookout Mobile Security, hoping that the backups would include the apps I had already installed and maybe my passwords. Wrong, the free version only backs up contacts, which is fucking stupid since the contacts are in sync through Google. Assholes.
  8. Went to the Android Marketplace website, where to my delight I was able to push to my phone all of my applications in less than 10 minutes.
  9. At this point I had spent about 20 minutes messing with the phone. I spent another 25 logging into apps, rearranging menus, that kind of thing. 
Overall it was pretty much painless, but I would have really liked if the Lookout Mobile Security could have restored my apps list. Or if the Marketplace app could pull everything back down in one shot.



Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

On sleep deprivation and Incan Monkey Gods

From: Dilbert comic strip for 08/03/1992 from the official Dilbert comic strips archive. I was trying to show this strip to a coworker who is dangerously toying with the harsh mistress that is Insomnia. What shocked me is how quickly I was able to look up the strip, which was published when he was just 11 years old, and two weeks before my just-out-of-college ass shipped out to US Army Basic Training.
Post a Comment
Read more

Add custom speed settings to your ifit map workout

Ifit.com allows you to build a workout walk/race/bike route simply by clicking on a Google Maps interface. You can then use a compatible ifit-enabled workout machine to recreate the route automatically. The problem is that the user interface still isn't final, so there are features in place that aren't exactly obvious. For example, if you create a workout your machine starts at 1 MPH, because that's the default. But how to set it to start at say, 3 MPH? Easy, just switch from map view to graph view: That button switches from the Google Maps interface to a chart that allows you to visualize and control effort: You can't change the elevation, this is fixed due to the geography that you selected. But you can drag the yellow (speed line) to change the speed of your device.  What if you want to have segments at different speeds? Easy, just click and drag and it will break the line, and you can drag each segment of the line independently: ...
1 comment
Read more

All the President's men: Obama enjoys 20-MAN motorcade and splashes $1.5m on Hawaiian holiday | Mail Online

All the President's men: Obama enjoys 20-MAN motorcade and splashes $1.5m on Hawaiian holiday | Mail Online This is just silly. If you are the President of the United States, and you want to impress your childhood friends, why go through the trouble of flying down to meet them? Especially since the country is having a rough time lately, that's a lot of money! Here's how I would had done it: Find the next "VIP" government flight between Hawaii and DC that still had two seats left. Put the two guys on that flight, if anyone asks about them they are "under Presidential Orders." When they get to DC, pick them up in a Secret Service Yukon and drive them to either Blair House or the White House, where they'll stay as guests for a weekend or whatever. Plus they get to hang out with their buddy who happens to be the President of the United States. And all of this at very little cost to the taxpayer, since the VIP flights would had happened regardless, the fr...
3 comments
Read more