Posted by Lee/AR on 3/15/09 6:55am
Msg #280812

Need help. Cell phone problem.

Cell is a cheap do nothing but make/receive phone calls Sony Ericsson that's about 2 years old. Last night, it was sitting next to my computer & the computer 'clicks' whenever a call is coming in either to me or I don't know who in the area. (Perhaps pertinent info: Have a wireless router to another computer in the house.) This call was for me, and after the clicking computer, my phone rang/lit up and before I could answer it (less than one ring) it went black screen & stopped working. The "No" or Off button was glowing red (have never seen that before) and the phone stopped working.
After push/hold to turn on, hitting the clear button a couple of times, got the 'red No' to stop glowing & plugged it into the charger--usually this will light the screen momentarily. Nope... now I have a grey screen & it tells me "Charging only". Can't find anything in the phone manual that addresses this situation.

Can anyone tell me what the heck just happened and what I can do to get this fool phone back on????

Reply by ReneeK_MI on 3/15/09 7:09am
Msg #280814

No clue, but did you try ...

pulling out the battery and putting it back in (sort of like slapping it's little face). Seems to work with so many electronic devices, maybe it will work with this?

Reply by Michelle/AL on 3/15/09 8:59am
Msg #280820

When I installed my DLink wireless router, the

helpful technician told me that the router was known to interfere with other electronic devices. I asked her what she meant and she specifically said telephones. She offered this information (or at least this is how I took it) as a disclaimer and warning. I didn't ask her what I should do in the event it happened. I think this is what happened to you. Have you tried turning off/unplugging your wireless router equipment to see if that makes any difference?

Reply by Michelle/AL on 3/15/09 9:01am
Msg #280822

One more thing, you may want to check the manual for

your wireless router to see if they address this sort of thing, or call their help desk. In the meantime, if this is your only telephone source (I forgot what you said in your post) I would start forwarding calls from the dead cell phone to the house or to a new cell ASAP until you get it fixed. Good luck.

Reply by Ilene C. Seidel on 3/15/09 9:00am
Msg #280821

Take battery out wait a minute or two and reinstall battery it resets the phone.

Reply by Lee/AR on 3/15/09 11:21am
Msg #280826

Thank you all for the help. I do appreciate it.

However...for reasons totally unknown and completely inexplicable (at least to/by me) and, after fooling with it for an hour last night and again this morning, it suddenly came on and asked if I wanted to 'set the time'. Sure--why not--it's working and I'm trying to be cooperative, right?
Said 'yes', it set time AND THE DANG THING IS NOW WORKING AGAIN. G-d, I hate technology! About the only thing I "learned" from this is: Do NOT put the dang fool cell phone anywhere near a wireless router. And I don't even know if that's a really good and TRUE concept or my own new magical myth.

Reply by Susan Fischer on 3/15/09 12:52pm
Msg #280831

What the computer is picking up is the noise, or static

from the incoming signal sent from the cell tower. My (low-rent) speakers used to 'squawk' just prior to the phone ringing. They perk up their little 'ears' at a signal, but can't do anything with it so aren't affected.

My problem was solved (along with other annoyances) by getting great little Bose speakers. They seem to ignore the incoming cell signals, while vastly improving my listening pleasure. (My 'old' phone, also a very basic unit, began just eating up energy and wouldn't hold a charge, no matter the cost or frequency of new batteries, or free 'new and improved' sim cards. The phone folks just shrugged, and said, "It's old. You need a new one." )

Dr. Dad's well-considered guess is that as the technology improves to the cell towers, the newer phones keep up and the old phones are less and less able. The physics tell us that the computer picking up a passing signal can't affect a phone's operation because the computer (or speakers) aren't emitting any power- and therefore, are just picking up static. Hence, your computer/router/speakers - didn't affect the 'crashing' of your phone.

Of course, that's just the conclusion of a scientist.

Reply by PAW on 3/15/09 8:15pm
Msg #280845

Re: What the computer is picking up is the noise, or static

Sorry Susan, but what your computer is picking up isn't the ==incoming== signal, but the ==outgoing== transmission from the phone to the cell tower. There is a two-way dialog whenever you receive or make a call, turn on your phone, or turn it off, and of course, when holding a conversation.

If it were picking up the incoming signal, then you would hear the noise all the time. (If you do, you must be directly in line with a cell tower and really, really close.)

Reply by Susan Fischer on 3/17/09 11:48am
Msg #280965

Yep, you're right. It's the outgoing part of the

'conversation' that the badly shielded speakers are picking up. My bad for trying to paraphrase Dad, and assumiing I understood. But it really doesn't make any difference - out or in, it's the speakers picking up RF signals they should be shielded from receiving, correct?

Can you think of a reason the audible 'chatter' could crash a cell phone? There is no RF energy coming from the speakers themselves. They are extraneous receivers of the outgoing signals from the phone, as you correctly identified. Audio frequency is entering the room from the speakers, not Radio Frequency.

Reply by Gary_CA on 3/15/09 1:23pm
Msg #280834

Okay Lee, here's the deal... well a couple deals.

#1. It is common for computer speakers to squawk just before a call if the cell phone is close to them. When your cell phone gets the call it transmits some "I heard ya" data and right next to the speakers they'll pick that up. No problem, doesn't hurt the phone or the computer, if it irritates the human enough they'll learn to put the phone someplace else.

#2. Wireless routers can interfere with cordless landline phones because the both operate in the 2.4Mhz range. But they rarely do. If they do you can mess around with the channels on the router or the phone or both to resolve it. I've seen hundreds of routers in homes, and nearly all homes have cordless phones and I can think of one time I changed the router channel to fix it. No problem. I know of no issues with wireless routers and cell phones. No problem.

#3 Sometimes cell phones freak out and have to be reset. One way to reset them is to take out the battery. On some phones that's about the only way, or at least the easiest way.

In conclusion... I think the speaker squawking and the phone freaking out were unrelated...oh there might have been some connection, or maybe not. But two common occurrences hit you on the same night. You just got lucky.

If it happens once in a blue moon, cuss at it and go on. If it starts happening twice every moon quit being a tightwad and get a new phone. (Said with love from a fellow tightwad...well I spend on electronic stuff but I'm tightwaded about most things.)

Reply by Lee/AR on 3/15/09 3:03pm
Msg #280835

Thanks for the edjamacation, Gary. I do believe you, but...

even tho' you have given me a logical, technical explanation for this just being a coincidence, I will continue to follow my new magical myth of keeping those 2 troublemakers far apart.
As to being a terrible tightwad...well, yeah, I am, BUT I am tremendously annoyed--even outraged--by things that are only 2 years old being considered obsolete, trash, throw it out, buy a new one. That just isn't right. It's not. A side OT comment: If the companies we work for would stop being such terrible tightwads, too, then I could afford to get a new phone. (Had to work that in somehow.)

Reply by Susan Fischer on 3/15/09 7:02pm
Msg #280842

Planned obsolescence does stink. It's the product of that

greedy mindset - that corporate mindset - that every year has to be more gigantic than before so that shareholders get richer and richer.

Remember Made in America? When we made well-constructed clothes? We 'looked for the union label' and bought at fair prices durable goods. Durable. Washing machines, vaccuum cleaners, refrigerators, stoves, cars, tools, equipment and machinery; when carpenters and pipefitters masons, and so many other trades built this country. We grew and distributed our own food. Our wokforce was well-represented at the table, were paid good wages with benefits, growing our middle class dreams. Not perfect, but we were a strong and steadily prosperous America.

Built to Last became Built Too Fast = Planned Obsolescence. Cut corners = faster porduct turnover. When the 'corners' became Labor Costs, outsourcing was the answer. Union busting became an industry, well-funded by Big Business. Shoddy products, sold through Mega Stores helped put the corner grocery store and all of the work-a-day workforce in every neighborhood out of business. Local/regional trades with fewer and fewer opportunities for young workers to learn and become Journeymen and Masters.

Planned Obsolescence was only one strategy for Big Business - another, deregulation of the finance world, opened the doors to untold wealth; trillions of dollars vaccuumed up by the top 2%. The rest of us today are crushed under the weight of their fall.

But not dead. American Labor is not dead. American hands, wiith Yankee Ingenuity, and good, tight reins on Big Business again, we'll retool, rebuild, and get back on track. It's what we do.

(Had to work that in somehow.)

P.S. Ever notice that when a cool techie thing comes down in price, a new/improved thingie is about to be released? Electronics is one area where we're lucky if a thingie last six months.

Reply by Maureen_nh on 3/15/09 9:29pm
Msg #280848

Re: Planned obsolescence does stink. It's the product of that

Hear! Hear!/ nm