UKC

I managed to kill my new mobile phone on Sunday thanks to the wonderful British summer weather so I'm back using my old HTC sensation phone. The only issue is that I'm now stuck on 3g while paying for 4G speeds and data volumes.
Apparently the phone is 4G capable but there's some sort of software issue that needs updating. When the phone was a current model and 4G was being launched I was told by T-mobile that they wouldn't give me the update to make my phone 4G unless I changed my contract to a fixed data plan rather than a unlimited data plan.
I'm now on EE with a 6Gb data plan but can't get the update. It's currently running android 4.0.3 with the HTC sense wrapper.
Anyone know what needs updating and how I go about doing it?

Thanks,

Gethin.

In reply to gethin_allen:
For the latest Android your easiest route is probably to use Cyanogen Mod.

The bit that controls the 3G or 4G (if it can do it) is the radio firmware. Are you 100% sure your model (and sometimes there are sub versions of a model) has a 4G modem?

I had the Senation XE and I'm sure it wasn't 4G. When I upgraded to a Nexus 5 I had my first 4G phone.

The Sensation was sold in the US as Sensation 4G - but not the UK version. Could you be confusing it with the Android 4.0 (ICS) update which was eventually released to the Sensation.

In reply to gethin_allen:

I managed to upgrade my note 2 to 4g by fiddling with a setting.
Settings->More Networks->Mobile Networks and then make sure Network Mode is set to LTE / WCDMA / GSM.

If you don't have LTE then the only thing I can suggest is to either buy a new 4G ready phone or root your existing phone and install vanilla Android on it and hope for the best.

Good luck!

LG Leon 4G, cheapest 4G phone on Carphonewarehouse from the known brands. Beats the HTC Sensation all round and has Android 5. It's not as cheap as fixing an old phone, but for £100 it's not bad.

http://www.carphonewarehouse.com/phones/lg-leon-4g/handset?colourCode=BLACK...

In reply to gethin_allen:

OK, so it looks like the person from T-mobile who called me offering to upgrade me to 4G on my old sensation if I accepted the new T+Cs must have been talking rubbish as I don't appear to have the LTE network type available and no 4G.

In which case, has anyone tried dismantling a HTC one Mini2?

I think the power button is stuck in the pressed position as it's cycling through the startup/poweroff, screen on/off stages.
I hoped it would be fine when dried out but it's been in a desiccator for almost 2 days now and is still doing it's thing.

In reply to gethin_allen:

Any ideas if blasting a load of electrical contact cleaner into the power switch would help or worsen the situation?

In reply to gethin_allen:

I wouldn't blast a load of anything into it... But if there is water in the switch, then you might be able to displace it with a more volatile liquid. At work, I'd use a non-rosin flux remover.

Assuming it's a manual switch, try pressing it a lot of times; again, you might displace the water from the switch.

The problem with things that have non-removable batteries is that the presence of water and electricity, and any ionic remains from the production process end up eating the PCB. This is especially true of anything with an old skool flash unit (say an old camera), that might have a 400V capacitor to power the flash... Fortunately, phones use white LEDs for flash, so there should be no need to anything like 400V. You may get lucky.

With no power present, you can generally dunk the whole PCB in a water bath (indeed, this is how they may be cleaned in production, even using a specialist detergent such as Safewash). We'd then use an airline to blow out the water, and a heater to drive out the rest; that's for custom builds, not production).

In reply to gethin_allen:


No, but you might find the ifixit guide useful:
https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/HTC+One+Mini+2+Power+and+Volume+Buttons+Replac...
As phones go, it doesn't look too bad. The only difficult bit looks like getting the silver foil above the screen off without damaging it.

In reply to Jack B:

That's really useful thanks I'll try and find some tools and a replacement button.