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Things you didnt know your cell phone could do!

Don't know how much of this works or on which cell services but I thought it was interesting.
THINGS YOU NEVER KNEW YOUR CELL PHONE COULD DO.
There are a few things that can be done in times of grave emergencies. Your mobile phone can actually be a life saver or an emergency tool for survival. Check out the things that you can do with it:
FIRST: Emergency
The Emergency Number worldwide for Mobile is 112. If you find yourself out of the coverage area of your mobile;
network and there is an emergency, dial 112 and the mobile will search any existing network to establish the emergency number for you, and interestingly this number 112 can be dialed even if the keypad is locked. Try it out.
SECOND: Have you locked your keys in the car?
Does your car have remote keyless entry? This may come in handy someday. Good reason to own a cell phone: If you
lock your keys in the car and the spare keys are at home, call someone at home on their cell
phone from your cell phone. Hold your cell phone about a foot from your car door and have the person at your home press the
unlock button, holding it near the mobile phone on their end. Your car will unlock.
Saves someone from having to drive your keys to you. Distance is no object. You could be hundreds of miles away, and if
you can reach someone who has the other "remote" for your car, you can unlock the doors (or the trunk).
Editor's Note: It works fine!
We tried it out and it unlocked our car over a cell phone!"
THIRD: Hidden Battery Power
Imagine your cell battery is very low. To activate, press the keys *3370# and your cell will restart with this reserve and the instrument will show a 50% increase in battery. This reserve will get charged when you charge your cell next time.
FOURTH: How to disable a STOLEN mobile phone?
To check your Mobile phone's serial number, key in the following digits on your phone: * # 0 6 # A 15 digit code will appear on the screen. This number is unique to your handset. Write it down and keep it somewhere safe. When your phone gets stolen, you can phone your service provider and give them this code. They will then be able to block your handset so even if the thief changes the SIM card, your phone will be totally useless. You probably won't get your phone back, but at least you know that whoever stole it can't use/sell it either. If everybody does this, there would be no point in people stealing mobile phones.
And Finally....
FIFTH:
Cell phone companies are charging us $1.00 to $1.75 or more for 411 information calls when they don't have to. Most of us do not carry a telephone directory in our vehicle, which makes this situation even more of a problem. When you need to use the 411 information option, simply dial: (800) FREE 411, or (800) 373-3411 without incurring any charge at all. Program this into your cell phone now.

Great tips

And most of it's not true! weeeee...
http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/household/cellphones.asp

The thread deserves locking, but I'll leave it open for flame-age.
But thanks valkster for posting the info either way. Live == Learn.
v

For the second tip, this also works for me, but I have to be hitting the window with the phone at the same time repeatedly, and very hard, but eventually it gets me into the car.
For the third, I think it's actually *48554253# but it only works on T9 phones while writing a message.

[Q] DTMF problem when dialing D2G GSM

I have a D2G that I'm using an AT&T SIM in for GSM use only. The phone stays in GSM mode all the time.
I'm having an interesting issue with the way the phone detects that it has completed a call.
On a normal CDMA phone (my DX) after you dial a number and hit send, the "call timer" starts counting up as soon as the phone has connected to the network and the call starts ringing. If you want (though there would be little reason to do so) you can bring the dialpad back up and start sending DTMF tones even while the other end is still ringing (hasn't answered yet).
On the D2G in GSM mode (don't know about CDMA mode because I've not used this phone in CDMA mode) when you dial a call, the call timer doesn't start counting up until the phone senses that the other end has actually answered (receives a connect signal). While the line is ringing (before anybody answers) you can bring up the dialpad, but pressing keys does not send any tones. Once the called party answers, pressing keys then sends tones.
The problem comes when trying to dial into a conference bridge where you have to enter the bridgeline passcode, or while trying to use a calling card. Both these systems appear to not send the "connected" signal when they first answer. They wait until you get connected to the desired conference call, or until you've entered all the calling card information and are rung through to your ultimate target before sending the connected signal.
Since the D2G in GSM mode is actually waiting for this "connected" signal before starting the call timer, and since it won't allow you to send DTMF tones until the call timer starts, it is basically impossible to use a conference bridge or calling card.
I have tried numerous add-on dialers, but all hand off to the OEM phone/dialer app after initial dialing. I've tried add-on DTMF generators, but of course they just generate the tones locally (speaker) and not onto the ongoing call. I've been all through build.prop, etc. looking for a setting that would tell it not to wait for a connect signal to enable the "connected" behavior and not found anything.
Putting pauses or waits in the dial string doesn't work either because the phone doesn't even start "pausing" or "waiting" until it senses that it has connected (which doesn't happen before the other end gives up waiting for me to enter the code).
That's the really irritating part. When the conference bridge or calling card system gives up waiting and connects me to the thing that tells me my time to enter the codes has expired and it is going to hang up on me, then it sends the "connected" signal and I can enter all the tones I want on top of the "please call back when you can figure out how to use a phone" message.
I've had someone running a newer firmware test to see if they have this same behavior and they do. If anyone wants to see if they have the issue, they could call the Sprint calling card access number (800-366-2255) and you should find you can't enter any tones once it has answered. Again, this is on a D2G in GSM mode. I'd expect in CDMA mode it would work fine.
Possible avenues of resolution:
Make the phone treat the call as connected immediately instead of waiting for the other end to answer
Have an external app that can send DTMF tones on an active call (Google says that is a common desire that is generally not possible)
Somehow make the built-in dialer allow number presses to generate tones even if it doesn't think the other end has answered yet
Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

Are you trying to say you use the phone on AT&T in USA?
Try switching phone to GSM/UMTS in settings instead of 'global' I remember having some issues with ring back tone while in global mode using GSM network which went away once I switched to GSM/UMTS only.
Sent from my DROID2 GLOBAL

leobg said:
Are you trying to say you use the phone on AT&T in USA?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yep. Other than the undesirable behavior of the call progress timer, it works perfect. Although the data works great, I keep data disabled because on AT&T prepaid data costs like 1 cent per kilobyte. That doesn't seem like much until you think about 1024 kilobytes in a megabyte which means you're paying $10.24 per megabyte which is insane. Fortunately I can bring up 3G Mobile Hotspot on my DX (which has unlimited data) and tether my D2G through my DX and have full Internet. It sounds retarded, but the only time I use this setup is when I need my DX to do mobile VPN for work, and then use my D2G for voice calls. AT&T prepaid is only like $1.99 a day for unlimited voice and text, and you only pay on the days you use it (which is almost never for me).
leobg said:
Try switching phone to GSM/UMTS in settings instead of 'global' I remember having some issues with ring back tone while in global mode using GSM network which went away once I switched to GSM/UMTS only.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the suggestion. Actually I was already in GSM/UMTS mode but tried switching it to "Global" mode. Unfortunately the behavior was the same.
Somehow I imagine if I trot down to the Verizon store to ask them about it they won't really be super inclined to help. I have considered trotting down to the AT&T store where I bought the prepaid SIM and seeing what they think. But I don't imagine it would be good for much other than the amusement of their confusion.

Droid 2 Global is configured so it doesn't get service with any GSM/UMTS provider located on the teritory of the United States of America. How is yours working on AT&T is really a huge surprise to me and many other members of this and other online forums.
This so called "band lock" (google for Droid 2 global band lock) can reportedly be circumvented, but there is no publicly available method to do it. Unless you got yours 'band unlocked', it is not supposed to get any service from neither AT&T nor T-Mobile. Or maybe you bought it from someone who was working on this 'band lock'
Could you share more info with us?

leobg said:
Droid 2 Global is configured so it doesn't get service with any GSM/UMTS provider located on the teritory of the United States of America. How is yours working on AT&T is really a huge surprise to me and many other members of this and other online forums.
This so called "band lock" (google for Droid 2 global band lock) can reportedly be circumvented, but there is no publicly available method to do it. Unless you got yours 'band unlocked', it is not supposed to get any service from neither AT&T nor T-Mobile. Or maybe you bought it from someone who was working on this 'band lock'
Could you share more info with us?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The phone has been unlocked with the TBH/DBU unlock. It is running 2.4.29 firmware and has to stay on 2.4.29 for the unlock to be preserved. The unwanted call progress behavior (the purpose of my original post) has been tested and confirmed on another phone running 2.4.330 so it's not a 2.4.29 issue. I'd bet that all of the Blur dialers probably do the same thing (disable tones after Send and until the call progress timer starts running). Just in CDMA mode the call progress timer starts running as soon as the call starts ringing and in GSM it waits for an actual connect signal. The D2G is truly like two complete phones in one, so seeing this type of disparity in behavior between the two different modes (I assume when in CDMA mode it would work just like all other CDMA models and not have the issue) isn't really surprising at all. I would expect that anybody who is using the GSM mode of their D2G would have this issue when dialing into a conference bridge or calling card provider where the "connect" signal is not given until after all of the secondary dialing has been completed. It would seem however that this issue would have come up before since I can't be the only person that works for a huge company and spends most of his day dialed into conference bridges for meetings (and might just want to dial into those meetings from his spiffy GSM phone).
I've been though the AOSP source for the phone/dialer before (when troubleshooting something else), so when I get a chance, I'll go through again and find the section where it enables and disables the tone sending. I'd guess it would be trivial to remove the part that disables tones during the period between Send and call-progress-timer-start, compile it, and just replace the dialer on the phone. I've been through all the build.prop and everything else hoping a setting would jump out at me, but no luck.
About the TBH/DBU unlock -- after the unlock there's nothing special about sticking an AT&T, TMobile, etc. SIM in there, but I only have first hand experience with the AT&T. I just went into the local AT&T store and told them I wanted to buy a prepaid SIM. They asked what kind of phone and I think I told them I had a Samsung Captivate (not that it really matters). The SIM was basically free and I put $25 on it. Stuck it in the phone, changed to GSM/UMTS mode, phone blurred while it was changing modes, and now has AT&T banner on the lock screen. Pretty much a non-event.
I didn't get a chance to go down to the AT&T store yet, but I plan to. If nothing else I'd like to test calling into the same Sprint calling card number from another GSM phone -- especially an Android phone if they have a working model there -- and see if it too has a problem.
Sorry for rambling. I hope I addressed your questions.

My friend MotoCache1 is the "other" member of TBH, just an FYI!
We haven't discussed the status of the band unlock on XDA out of respect for the rules here regarding paid services.

Well, that explains the things
Btw- mine is on Rogers Canada, i can use comma to add pause to dial extensions conference bridges without issues.
However, when I try my Telus Canada sim in, when I dial number, dialer says hang up, 00:00, then connects the outgoing call, sort of like a call back service, but without ringing back - hang up, then the very next second call connects and phone issues ring back tone. But this "hangup" on the middle prevents me from dialing extensions or conference bridges bu using pause in the number dialed. Everything else is fine (data, messaging/etc). So it is kind of crippled on Telus. Wonder if it is the same thing you get on AT&T.
Sent from my DROID2 GLOBAL

Hmmm. Interesting. Forgive the ignorance, when using Rogers is that CDMA? Or are you using GSM for both carriers?
I tried the same scheme, using commas in the dial string, but unfortunately the phone doesn't ever get to the part after the commas because it waits for connect before continuing the dial string. I don't get the hang up behavior you describe though. I'm a complete newb to GSM, so what I'm about to suggest may be stupid, but I wonder if the carriers have any sort of call handling parameters that are stored on the SIM?
I happened to be in a VZW store to get an extended battery for my DX and asked them if they had a demonstrator D2G in GSM mode so I "could test a bug I read about on the Internet". Moments after the question left my mouth I realized I was stupid for asking it, and he confirmed that by saying "no, we can't use the phones in GSM mode because GSM on that phone doesn't work in the US". Oops, duh.
He asked what the bug was and I told him. He said that he hadn't heard of that, but it sounded like something that would be fixed in a software release. He looked to see if any such releases were listed for the D2G, but found none. Surprisingly (to me anyway) there is a recent release listed for the D1 to fix an "unwanted recipients" problem (for messages), and some other thing (I don't recall).
I'm at Bike Week right now (sitting in the bath tub typing this on my DX -- yay Swype) but will give the AT&T store a shot when I get back. I'll also borrow a buddy's Tmobile SIM and see if it behaves any differently. He has an actual Tmobile branded android phone, (a Samsung, but I don't remember which one right off) so I can do the conference bridge test on his phone too.

Both Rogers and Telus now sport GSM/UMTS (Telus only UMTS) networks. Gone are the days when Rogers had CDMA network, almost 10 years now. Telus still has CDMA alive, but they are phasing that out. My CDMA radio is sleeping, until I get to the States next time I guess (my D2G is active on a pay-go plan) I will be doing some travelling in May/Jun across Europe, so I will try with european sims too.
Sent from my DROID2 GLOBAL

leobg said:
Both Rogers and Telus now sport GSM/UMTS (Telus only UMTS) networks. Gone are the days when Rogers had CDMA network, almost 10 years now. Telus still has CDMA alive, but they are phasing that out. My CDMA radio is sleeping, until I get to the States next time I guess (my D2G is active on a pay-go plan) I will be doing some travelling in May/Jun across Europe, so I will try with european sims
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the details. Interesting that you see two completely different behaviors just by changing the SIM. That leaves the question of whether the difference is due to the way each network is handling the call progress, or if it is some sort of information on the SIM itself that makes the difference.
I looked into SIM editors to see what sorts of things the various editors claimed to be able to read/edit on the SIM. I haven't seen anything along the lines of call processing characteristic parameters, etc., so I'm leaning toward the difference being in the signaling received from the network. I'll be able to get a better idea of what's going on when I get back home and can experiment with a Tmobile SIM, and/or put my AT&T SIM in another phone and see what it does.

OK, back from Bike Week (last week actually) and grabbed a T-Mobile SIM. Really odd results. The very first call I dialed on the T-Mobile SIM, the call timer started immediately, and I could send DTMF tones immediately. Every call since then has exhibited the same behavior I was seeing with the AT&T SIM -- the call timer doesn't start until a formal connect happens (which the calling card and conference bridge sites don't send upon initial connect -- thereby preventing sending the tones to access the service).
I spent just a little time going through the source code of: [platform/packages/apps/Phone.git]/src/com/android/phone/CallTime.java and found the spot where the call gets switched to "active":
Code:
/**
* Sets the call timer to "active call" mode, where the timer will
* periodically update the UI to show how long the specified call
* has been active.
*
* After calling this you should also call reset() and
* periodicUpdateTimer() to get the timer started.
*/
/* package */ void setActiveCallMode(Call call) {
if (DBG) log("setActiveCallMode(" + call + ")...");
mCall = call;
// How frequently should we update the UI?
mInterval = 1000; // once per second
}
I started looking around to see "who" all calls that and right off I only see CallCard.java calling it. I was expecting to see it called somewhere in PhoneApp.java (after observing a connect or something), but it's not called there.
There's lots of hunting yet to do, but I wanted to post progress in case anybody out there cares.
In some hunting I happened to stumble on a pretty detailed page outlining the exact same problem on an iPhone. It's understandable that this type of problem might exist and persist on a closed source device like an iPhone. Fortunately, something like this should be very solvable on an open source device.
I haven't had my buddy with a T-Mobile issued Android phone (Samsung Vibrant) test this yet. That's on the "to do" list.
More updates as I have them.

So what I've figured out on this is that you pretty much just can't use conference bridges or calling cards on a GSM phone. I've used my Tmobile and AT&T SIMs in a bunch of phones now:
1. Droid 2 Global
2. Droid Pro Global
3. Motorola Napoleon
They all do the same thing. Heck, the Napoleon isn't even Android - it's Windows Mobile. I also tried with my friend's Samsung Vibrant (which he has on Tmobile) and it does the same thing -- call timer never starts running and if the call timer isn't running you can't generate tones to put in your access code for the conference bridge, etc. Apparently the AT&T iPhones do the same thing, so again, this is a GSM thing.
Which begs the question again -- doesn't anybody with a GSM phone need to call into conference calls? I was under the impression that most big companies used conference bridges for most of their meetings.
Anyway, when I get some time I'll get back to taking a stab at hacking on the dialer -- just no free cycles to tackle it right now.

It must be something with that conference bridge you are trying it on. I know many phone switches do not connect the call while you are in the IVR/menu trees - it is usually done in order to avoid inaccurate call metrics on the receiving end. We are running a contact centre in our company and I know how important this is (and we do it to - we don't connect the call until operator answers the call). Billing is not supposed to start until call is connected on the receiving end. Apparently GSM operators like T-Mobile and AT&T care about call connect parametter and Verizon is simply ignoring it, I guess.

[Q] silly settings question for foreign travel

hi all
so I am going out of the country later this week and had a simple silly question. I want to be able to use wifi on my phone for late night email checks. I do not want to accept calls or send text or use any data over the network.
are these the settings I need:
wifi - on (duh!)
mobile network - off
data roaming - connect to data services when roaming - off
Is there a setting for roaming for regular calls? I do not see it. note this is with a rooted inspire using rcmixkingdom.
thanks

aeneas3 said:
hi all
so I am going out of the country later this week and had a simple silly question. I want to be able to use wifi on my phone for late night email checks. I do not want to accept calls or send text or use any data over the network.
are these the settings I need:
wifi - on (duh!)
mobile network - off
data roaming - connect to data services when roaming - off
Is there a setting for roaming for regular calls? I do not see it. note this is with a rooted inspire using rcmixkingdom.
thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll try and answer your questions, but I would still recommend you contact your mobile provider and confirm first. This is from my personal experience.
BE PREPARED ... THIS IS A LONG REPLY
Whenever you leave your service area, the area covered by your mobile provider's network, you enter what we call "roaming." Two things can now happen. Either your phone will not work at all in terms of calls or data, or everything will work. It depends on what agreement you have with your provider. With me, for example, I had long ago called my provider and asked them to NOT allow my phone to operate if I went "roaming." Then, suddenly, when I visited the U.S. last week, I realized that my phone wasn't working and remembered what I had told my provider. A quick phone call to them corrected the issue.
All that being said, if you are set up to roam with your provider, you need to consider a few of things.
One, you need consider where you're going. If you're in Canada, and you're traveling to the U.S., roaming charges may be somewhat expensive. If you're doing the reverse, visiting Canada from the U.S., the same would probably apply. However, if you're going overseas, your roaming charges could be quite expensive, as much as several dollars per minute, depending on the country. Data can also be expensive. For example, with my provider (Rogers - Canada), I have 500MB of data with my monthly plan; however, when I visited the U.S., my plan no longer applied, and I would be charged 3-cents per KB, or a whopping $3.00 per MB. I ended up buying a 10MB extra service fee for $10.00.
Okay, let's consider what you want to do.
If you only want to use WiFi, it will work perfectly if you have the WiFi name and password (if applicable). If you do NOT want to be able to take calls, send texts, or use data, you MUST TURN THEM OFF. Keep in mind, too, that certain programs may automatically access Data for up-dating, such as weather, stocks, sports scores, currency exchange rates, etc. You can turn off this automatic function, which I would suggest. I don't know exactly where this function is on your phone, but you'll have to check it out. This applies to the SYNC function as well. Turn OFF sync to make sure it doesn't accidentally access Data.
Now, for your other question re local phone calls. Once you leave your service area, your phone either works, or it doesn't. There is no other choice. If you don't want to accept calls from home, or make long distance calls, then you have to turn off roaming. If roaming is off, you cannot make local calls either.
Also, keep in mind that if you did make local calls, they would all be considered long distance because, as far as your provider is concerned, your phone's area code is static. If you leave your area code, ALL calls become long distance even though, if you're in another country, and you only want to make a phone call across the street, it will still be a long distance call. Think of it this way, billing begins the moment you press call on your phone, yet in this case, that call effectively begins from you home area code. Therefore, to make a call across the street, it would be identical to making the same call from you home, plus roaming charges.
There is one work-around for the local call issue. You could buy time from a local provider in the country where you will be travelling. This may end up being quite inexpensive. Think of it as a pay-as-you-go plan, if they offer it. So, you would simply remove your existing SIM card and replace it with a new one from the provider in the new country. Use it for local stuff. It may even include data, who knows?
When I visit China, which is rather often, I have a "pay-as-you-go" SIM card which I have with me when I visit. I always keep a balance on the account so they don't cancel it. Then, when I arrive, I make the SIM switch, and voila! Cheap local calls.
Peter

If ALL you want is data for email and internet, turn airplane mode ON (I use a power widget to have this close at my fingers, but you can long push the power button and the option is there as well as in menu>settings>wireless & networks) then turn wifi back on.
Airplane kills all radios, then you have the option to turn wifi only on (specifically for those airlines that provide wifi).

thanks guys! I figured I was going to call AT&T today to make sure but stealthpsycho - airplane + wifi will work wonders. I just tested it out at home and it is beautiful I am going to turn off roaming by calling just to make sure as well. In case I need to reboot and forget that airplane mode is not on.
thanks again!

Went to Vietnam a few weeks ago. Turning on airplane mode and then turning wifi back on does the trick you want.
Sent from my MB860 using Tapatalk

W00t! I gots a thx!!!
You're very welcome. I use this trick a lot at the school where I work, b/c I have no cell signal and I want to prevent cell searching. It's also a useful trick if you want to install market apps that AT&T blocks (I.E. PDAnet)

Easy way I go to Japan all I do is take out the sim. Wifi on.
Sent from my Inspire 4G using XDA Premium App

[Q] Questions about hidden settings in Android 2.3

I have quite a few questions some hidden settings I found while using ANYcut app.
My phone is the Epic 4G and on Gingerbread leak EH17 if that matters.
1) MSL code. I did some google searches and found that is an algorithm to determine the ESP and other things. What is the algorithm? If a phone had a bad ESP could you change the MSL to make Sprint think there is a clean ESP?
2) Cell broadcast SMS. What is this? And what is it for? some of the settings are Emergency broadcast, administrative, maintenance, local weather, area traffic reports
general news:
local
regional
national
international
And those same options for other types of news also
3) Data Create. I think this one is self explanatory. But is this for the maximum number of each I can store on the phone before it deletes them. So if i set the maximum number of texts in my inbox to 500, that is the maximum I can store?
4) Dial up networking. I thought this was going to be the 3G but I was wrong. What is it? I turn it on and click on the connection settings but nothing happens why?
5) Dock settings. Its obvious. But I herd that you can connect your phone to the a computer via USB and have it act as a dock and play songs or videos through the speakers on your computer. Is this true?
6) DUN. It has a picture of a computer with 2 green arrows. And 2 progress like bars, labeled, RX and TX. Any ideas? I was thinking it might have to do with USB activity.
7) EVDO settings??? I am on the Sprint network. Why would they not opt this options out of there SDKs? Isnt EVDO T-Mobile network? But I am on a leaked build so maybe they haven't removed it yet?
8) Preconfig? I really not sure what this is. It says sales code and then an input field. And at the bottom a button that says install and one for cancel. What would this be for?
9) License settings. most of the options are obvious but there is one for expiry reminder. whats that? reminds you when your DRM content is going to expire?
10) MMS Provision Settings. some settings are transaction logs, optional field attendance, UA string, UAP url, and test modes. Anyone know what this is for?
11) Now one that is just called advanced. Some options are home orig. vocoder. homepage vocoder, roam orig. vocoder. whats this for?
12) USB Logging(DM) One section is Function, with the options of, enable and disable. And other section called Type. the options are CP only, AP only, CP+AP. No idea about this one
13) WiMAX CT. there is a button at the top that says open device. then options of max num of used FA, FA Index, BW, FA index. Are these settings for WiMAX networking?
14) WiMAX Mode Change. The options are, SDIO, WTM, DM, USB, Auth modes. What are these different modes and what do they do?
15) WiMAX LineTest. Optioins are, write eeprom, power on, power off, write mac with and input field, and read mac. any ideas??
16) Work mode. it says Work Mode :2 and then a button that says set work mode. and i can set it to 1, 2 or 3. what are these different modes for?

Bump - Anybody want to jump in and help the op?
Wow, with all the brilliant minds on here no takers? Or is the question too big for anyone to take a stab at?
First off, as someone who somehow burnt out my 4G chip, I would suggest that anyone reading this be very careful, search here and google before fiddling with settings. lol
Since I am doing research to see if I can get my Wimax to work better I will answer a couple of questions a day, however anyone feel free to jump in.
1) MSL code. I did some google searches and found that is an algorithm to determine the ESP and other things. What is the algorithm? If a phone had a bad ESP could you change the MSL to make Sprint think there is a clean ESP?
The MSL code or (Master Subsidy Lock) is how a phone carrier keeps the phone from going to another network, however some phones including the E4GT can be found through using Android Debug Bridge (adb) a command line tool that lets you communicate with an emulator instance or connected Android-powered device - or even easier just go to the market and download, for free, Get My MSL which will display your Master Subsidy Lock code.
2) Cell broadcast SMS. What is this? And what is it for? some of the settings are Emergency broadcast, administrative, maintenance, local weather, area traffic reports general news:localregionalnationalinternationalAnd those same options for other types of news also
According to Wikipedia:
Quote:
Cell Broadcast is not as affected by traffic load; therefore, it may be usable during a disaster when load spikes tend to crash networks, as the 7 July 2005 London bombings showed. Another example was during the Tsunami catastrophe in Asia. Dialog GSM, an operator in Sri Lanka was able to provide ongoing emergency information to its subscribers, to warn of incoming waves, to give news updates, to direct people to supply and distribution centres, and even to arrange donation collections using Celltick's Cell Broadcast Center, based on Cell Broadcast Technology.
All for today. Peace

[Not-Fixed] How to install new Z3 D6603 LTE on AT&T network

[Not Fixed] see bottom of this post.
It is fairly easy to install a new D6603 to work completly on the AT&T network. It is not so easy to find the answer of how to do it in the threads and posts. I tried many suggestions and wasted a lot of time. Hopefully this will save you from that fate.
First you must know that you can't use the IMEI number of your new phone if you want it to work completly as it should. If you use the Z3 IMEI you will have trouble with data of various sorts and the phone will go off line when on LTE after 20 or 30 minutes and you will not receive calls or SMS messages. I do not know why but it has been suggested that the AT&T network does not recognise this phone so it causes trouble.
If you have an AT&T nano-sim from your old phone then just put it in the phone. (Cut downs work but can cause other problems some say.) When the SIM is inserted for the first time into a new phone there is a prompt that asks if you want to download the APN. Hit 'yes' and the phone downloads the APN itself.
If it does not ask then go to Settings>More>Mobile Networks>Prefered Network Type and be sure LTE (Preferred) is selected. Then connect your phone to the internet and then go to Settings>More>Internet Settings and select AT&T. You should be good to go.
If you need to get a nano-sim then go to the AT&T store or call and they will give you one or send you one for free. You will need to use the IMEI number from a LTE phone that is already on the AT&T system. You can use your old phone or borrow the number from someone. If the rep installs the sim in the Z3 with the 6603 IMEI don't worry. Just call support later and tell them you sent your new phone back and want to go back to your old IMEI or have a new IMEI (from an existing AT&T phone). They will enter it and off you go. The phone from the IMEI will show in the picture on your account page. Big deal!
Update: This worked for hours last night but this morning it is back to not receiving calls. Simply turning wifi off and it began to receive calls as GPRS was switched back on. My wifi was on which has been said to cause problems. I will test with wifi off and report back. Had "no service" instead of AT&T on upper left of lock screen. A full shut down for several minutes than re-boot solved that.

YMMV. I've been on ATT with a Z3 purchased from Sony store for several months and it was registered in an ATT store by scanning the IMEI off the box followed by updating Internet settings in Setup. ATT online shows unknown model but everything works including LTE and MMS. There is something else involved when problems like this occur probably some setting not getting reset. I registered the Z3 on a new line with a new Sim card because I wanted to take my time moving stuff off my old phone--this may have avoided the problems.

JudH said:
YMMV. I've been on ATT with a Z3 purchased from Sony store for several months and it was registered in an ATT store by scanning the IMEI off the box followed by updating Internet settings in Setup. ATT online shows unknown model but everything works including LTE and MMS. There is something else involved when problems like this occur probably some setting not getting reset. I registered the Z3 on a new line with a new Sim card because I wanted to take my time moving stuff off my old phone--this may have avoided the problems.
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I've also had no problems with my Z3 on AT&T. Works great, receives sms/mms immediately, etc..

esheesle said:
I've also had no problems with my Z3 on AT&T. Works great, receives sms/mms immediately, etc..
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AT&T's system sometimes takes a while to get updated with new IMEIs that trigger LTE provisioning for a users' account.
Once your account is provisioned for LTE you never have to worry about it again, but sometimes if you have a phone the system doesn't recognize, it is a pain to get AT&T to properly provision your account. Supposedly properly trained in-store reps can do it - the key being "properly trained" - Never try to do anything "unusual" by calling AT&T customer service, and NEVER use a franchise/kiosk in-person for service - make sure you're at a corporate-owned store! Even then, some stores might have incompetent staff. I've been lucky that all of my local corporate stores are pretty well staffed.

So you are saying that your Z3's with wifi and LTE on with AT&T are working as they should?
With LTE off my phone responds normally with wifi on. With LTE and wifi on it will not respond to calls after a 30 minute sleep. It does not show missed calls. Calls go straight to voice mail after 2 rings. Could you tell me what level your LTE dBm's are? Thanks!

I was told not to give them my imie# but, after recvng the minisim I had to call them in order to 'provision' it to work at all and they needed that #. I have never had any problems personally and am assuming this may be because you gave them the wrong #. Again I am only guessing. Oth, if I had had a different imie to give, I would have done so myself.

It is very strange and I am feeling it is more signal strength related than how you provision your phone. (Once it is provisioned correctly.) It seems that more people have less problems when they already have a nano-sim and just plunk it in the new phone. This might indicate that they already had a strong signal from the get go. My old HTC One + get's a better signal than the Sony in the same locations with the same (new) SIM. With the Devilcase bumper on it gets 5% less. My very limited tests yesterday seemed to indicate that it was signal strength related. I am not enough of a conspiracy theorist to imagine that AT&T would program their system to not function correctly with sims that are provisioned with these Sony phones which they are obviously ignoring for some reason. Or am I?

I had all kinds of problems with the Z3 on AT&T. The IMEI caused an issue since AT&T linked it to a flip phone and therefore couldn't provision LTE. I changed it to an old AT&T LTE device and then I was able to get LTE but was having the same issue with calls going directly to voicemail and texts showing up hours later in bunches. I found the solution was to switch off LTE in the quick settings menu. All calls and texts came through and on time while LTE was off. If I needed a data boost to stream, I turned it back on until I was finished streaming. This was while on KitKat. After upgrading to Lollipop, I was able to keep LTE turned on and calls and texts still arrived on time.

I use data rarely. Mostly wifi. If I don't leave LTE on, my phone reverts to wcdma preferred. And why can't LTE just work without me having to constantly turn it back on? What bugs me is having the APN settings greyed out. I want to be able to turn it off. If anything it seems the phone itself is preventing me from accessing the sim. It feels like I'm borrowing something which contains lots of MY private data. I know my phonebook is stored locally but I also noticed there is no option of specifying the sim or not. Anybody know how to switch APN on and off? In fact, overall even rooted, I still feel like I have almost no power over it. I can't even disable the cellular connection without going full on airplane mode and I do not trust that. I don't even fly so that needs work for sure. Dumb question but could I buy a working nanosim from say 7-eleven that my apn switch will work with?

"Anybody know how to switch APN on and off?"
On my Z3 on OTA stock Lollypop I have an icon in quick settings to turn LTE on and off. Drag two fingers down from the top of the screen. If no LTE icon then select the pencil icon at the top and select the LTE icon. There is also a mobile data icon switch there.
To turn off your radio completly you can get the Advanced Signal Status app and select additional info at the bottom and click phone information and turn off radio. Probably a number of ways to do it but that is one.
Sim contact storage was a way to move information from phone to phone. You can still do it but not really necessary with cloud backup and storage. Google does it for me without me having to do anything which I like. I still save contacts to the sim just because I can. Export and import in your contacts app menu.

johnboatcat said:
So you are saying that your Z3's with wifi and LTE on with AT&T are working as they should?
With LTE off my phone responds normally with wifi on. With LTE and wifi on it will not respond to calls after a 30 minute sleep. It does not show missed calls. Calls go straight to voice mail after 2 rings. Could you tell me what level your LTE dBm's are? Thanks!
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Works fine here. I don't pay attention to the dBm estimates since these aren't measured with calibrated test equipment and vary widely. Those numbers are basically worthless.
The only valid comparison is data performance in a given environment (ideally a difficult weak-signal one) - and at my desk with very weak signal, every phone I've ever used performs similarly to the Z3.

"Those numbers are basically worthless."
True, but we have narrowed this down to the possibility that it might be signal related so it is worth a shot. If people whose phones are working fine would measure the LTE dBm on Advanced Signal Status at the location where their phone sits and works well the most we might possibly see some measure of difference in the phones that are not working. Most of the non-working phones seem to work sometimes so signal strength is the next best parameter to rule out. Thanks!
Here are the screen shots of my phone with LTE on, LTE and wi-fi and LTE off and wi-fi.
How do the working phones compare? Does your CDMA (voice) also go to 0% when LTE is on and GSM = n/a?

Thanks. I think adv sig nfo actually works. I'm amazed actually. I can't find the phone's native greyed out apn switch anyways which really makes no sense.