Thread: New n900 owner _may_ have bricked unit
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jaem
2010-10-28 , 02:00
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#3
Originally Posted by eachna View Post
I ordered an n900 from Amazon and it arrived over the weekend.

I installed the Nokia "suite" software (the one with the calendar/contacts/etc). As something of an aside, that software sucks. It seems it's "not fully" compatible with the n900. Bleh.

Anyway, after spending an hour or two trying to import my Google contacts into the suite software, I gave up. I left the n900 plugged into my laptop on the USB cable overnight and went to bed.

The next day, the n900 was black and wouldn't power up. I fiddled with it a bit and then it occurred to me maybe I hadn't left it with the right connection (I have other devices that only charge on USB if not 'mounted').

So, I plugged it into my wall usb cable for two days (I had other stuff happening and couldn't get back to it).

On my way out the house to work, I grabbed the n900. It appeared to be powered off (black screen) but there was a green light, which seemed encouraging. I put it into the phone pocket on my purse and walked out.

Now, I think the phone may be bricked. I can get a (mostly) black screen with some faint backlighting, and bright white dots, and then it goes to a totally black screen. If I plug it into a computer with the black screen, the pc wants to install new hardware so the phone is "on".

I can also get to the black screen with the faint (not backlit) nokia logo and the usb symbol in the upper right as described here:
http://www.maemofanatics.com/how-to-...ur-nokia-n900/

Could I have bricked it just trying to load in my contacts?
"Bricked" tends to get used rather imprecisely. If you're asking "could loading contacts have wrecked my install", I doubt it - at least, not that in and of itself. "Could the PC Suite software have wrecked my install" is a different question, but I've never used it. :P
Originally Posted by eachna View Post
Could the OTA 1.3 update installed automatically without me approving it?
No, definitely not. Nokia doesn't pull that kind of nonsense, so no need to worry there. It's your phone, and updating is your choice - heck, you could go download the original version from Nokia's downloads site and flash that if you really felt like it.
Originally Posted by eachna View Post
Would those white dots indicate some other problem?
The white dots are just a booting progress indicator. It sounds like the phone is just not booting fully, maybe due to power issues. There are plenty of discussions around here about how to fix such problems if they occur. I'm not sure, in your case.
Originally Posted by eachna View Post
I did take out the SIM card (before I put it on the wall charger) since I needed a working phone. Should I put it back in?
To my knowledge, that should make no difference. I certainly used mine for months before I even bought a SIM card.
Originally Posted by eachna View Post
If it is bricked, is there a way to recover from it on a computer that doesn't have admin privs? My laptop's been temporarily lent out and all I have access to for the next two weeks is a work PC running Windows XP.
To be honest, if that were the case, I'd be tempted to recommend using the Linux flasher for recovery. It's more reliable, but it's a command line program. I guess that's not an option, though.

In conclusion, I can't help you at all, but hopefully I've clarified some things. :S
 

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