Constant DROID issues... please, help.

[droid_user_123]

I got the Motorola DROID sometime in February and ever since, it has been nothing but headaches.

I have had FOUR replacement droids, all with different issues, and I'm extremely sick of having to call Customer Care to get anything done.

First, almost every DROID I have had had an issue with the screen during a call. Either they wont dim when held up to the ear and I constantly put people on speakerphone, hang-up, or mute them. I've also had one that wouldn't reactivate the screen once I was ready to actually end the call.

A few of the replacements I've had have had this issue with the screen registering that I'm pressing a letter three times or a period, when I'm only pressing ONCE.

And the most aggravating problem is the email. I pretty much pay $30 a month so I can have my email. Do I get my email? Sometimes, when I'm lucky, I guess. And if I do, it's always an hour behind. When I delete a message and the next time I check my inbox, the message I just deleted just shows up again.

No one can hear me during a call. It's aggravating. Literally, I sometimes have to scream.

Ever since I've been getting replacement phones, all have had this feeling as if the slider is going to fall apart if I push it up.

Two of my headphone jacks have went bad. Well, actually, Verizon couldn't even guess what was wrong with that. They just said "that's not normal. would you like a replacement?".

What else? Oh, I am highly displeased with the fact that the black paint on the rim of the phone is peeling off. My software-crappy phone now has looks to match.

I am just so sick of these phones. I'm receiving another replacement tomorrow, and this will be the FIFTH one.  Does anyone have any suggestions about what I can do? Honestly, I don't have the money to go buy a phone at full-retail, and I really dont have the money to spend cancelling my contract and moving to another company either, but I don't want this phone anymore. I've spent numerous hours on the phone with customer support trying to resolve many issues, which is normally either doing a reset or a battery pull, and I am just soooooo sick of it. I do not want this phone. I hate it. If my replacement works like I want it to, I'll be pleased, but I am about 99% sure it won't. So, does anyone have any suggestions?

Any help would be greatly appreciated, especially help aimed at making me like my phone, but I've tweaked the settings a million times, I've reset the phone with Customer care and I do daily battery bulls and nothing has helped.

Thank you.

[martianspy]

Are you using any kind of case with the droid? I ask this because some cases can interfere with the sensor in the top left that dims/undims the screen. Also if you have a magnetic case it can make the screen turn on and go into car mode or dock mode.

I use a slide-out case so there is no way I'll make unintended calls while it's in my pocket and there is nothing permanantly conected to the phone so I can fit it in the car dock and the desktop dock.

As far as voice quality, try checking "voice privacy" under phone settings. It will help block out background noise if you're in a loud car or loud area.

Are you using gmail for email? My gmail has worked really well, but I haven't tried using other email with the droid.

So far I have had perfect luck with my droid. My wife got a bad one (dropped calls constantly) so she got a replacement, so far so good. Maybe you've just had some awful luck and have gotten 4 duds. I hope your next one is better.

[droid_user_123]

No, I'm not using a case. I don't have anything on the phone.

And no, I don't use G-mail. I use yahoo.

Oh. And I didn't get my replacement phone today, the FedEx rep I spoke to said it's in a crate at a local warehouse, which frustrates me anymore.

I love Verizon, they are hands down the best phone company out there, but it's beginning to seem like I have awful luck.

And thanks. I hope it's better, too. Otherwise, I really do not know what I will do.

[pax323]

I myself keep having multiple different issues with my droid. This is my second one. I use Msn email. I do have my gmail account set up on my phone as well, but my msn one as my main account. I have been in and had the phone looked at several times. This last time I was told that msn doesn't work well with droid phones. I have deleted the msn from my phone, having it work correctly for a couple of days then start dinging several times in a row and loading the same message over and over, or not getting an email at all. I was also told that there are some apps that will cause issues with other apps. I was using Handcent at the time and took it off and changed over to ChompSMS. Honestly I am not crazy about the Chomp app because of the way you have to reply to a message and miss my Handcent. The other thing that I have noticed is that not only are different issues happening with my phone from the SD card making a noise when turning the phone on and off, apps running that shouldn't be running, but now my phone keeps getting hot.

I like you am hating my phone and the fact that I am stuck with it for the next two years until my upgrade. I loved my blackberry in the past and I think that the both of us should have phones that we are going to be thrilled with. I honestly think that after you have changed phones a couple of times that you should be allowed to change to a different phone. No I am not saying to one of the brand new phones, but something that is within the same price as what you paid for your phone. I honestly have a couple of friends that have the Eris and they love them.

I am honestly afraid to go back into Verizon because every time I leave feeling unsatisified, or **bleep**. I do what I am told, but then a couple of days later I am back to the same or similair issues.

Please Verizon help us out with our droids

[Droiddudeaz]

The Android OS is based on Linux and developed by Google and HTC among others. It is biased toward gmail since gmail is from google. I have my main email account on gmail and the phone syncs all of your email contacts into the phone automatically. I also have a yahoo acct and google doesn't offer the option to sync with yahoo and hotmail, live.com etc. The only way to update you mail with non gmail accounts is to open that email, hit munu and touch refresh or turn the phone off  and back on.  It probably would be easier to open a google gmail account and get all of your contacts you want in the phone into your gmail contact list. You'll find then that your email updates regularly and you can easily integrate your facebook contacts and update that way too......It kind of sucks, but Google wants you to use their email - gmail - and makes it harder for people that have yahoo or hotmail etc. Hope that helps.

[pax323]

I know about the way that the email system works and that they only want you to use your gmail account. There were many issues that were going on with my phone besides just the mail.  I only named a few.

Not everyone receives a phone that will work perfectly. After many hours of working with the phone and talking to people, setting my phone back to factory settings it was still having issues. Verizon must have felt the same thing as they sent me a new phone that has been working just fine. My son bought it from me and I am now waiting on an eris to be shipped to me.

I use to work for HP and know a lot about computers. Before just stating that it is "user error," people need to remember that these are things that are electronic and that can come with problems or develop problems. If electronic devices were perfect then there wouldn't be chat boards such as this.

[#7]

I said "some" user error.  Also, this board is to help with any problems including electronic or user errors.  The odds of getting 5 defective phones are extremely low.

[PJNC284]

"Told me about Task Killer and I have that app running."

Task killers tend to cause a lot more problems than they solve.  Not sure why support technicians and reps continuously recommend them in an effort to improve battery life and performance when the gains are almost negligible.  It's fine to use them to kill a misbehaving app here or there but the Android OS includes a method to do that so you're just adding another app to use more resources by using a task killer.  The average user doesn't understand the Android OS memory management and misuses the task killers which is guaranteed to cause issues.  I bet 90% of the problems people have are either app based which can be the case since the market is wide-open with no review or related to the misuse of task killers.

[droid_user_123]

Jimfitzgerald, please, don't take what I'm about to confront you with as me being rude and lashing at you, but I'm highly frustrated as it is. So here goes nothing...

It's splendid that you got a perfect DROID and all is well for you. But, before you claim that it is "user error," maybe you should check what issues I'm having.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if a phone has a sensor that is suppose to shut the phone's screen off whenever you put it next to your ear, is that "user error" on the customer's end? Uhm, no sir, I believe it isn't. And honestly, how could there be user error behind dialing a number , pressing send, and putting it up to your ear?

Is it user error that my headphone jacks just completely went whack? Hmmm, again, I think not.

Is it user error that whenever I go to press a letter on my virtual keyboard, it will register that I have pressed that letter three times? I don't understand what I'm doing wrong. I mean, as far as I was informed, with touch screens, you just barely touch the screen on the letter you want and that's what it's suppose to select... I guess, that too, in your opinion, would be considered user error.

Sure, the email part, I can see that being user error, but whenever you're on the phone with Verizon Customer Support and they're giving you the instructions, (Although I will admit, Verizon CS reps don't know more information than the customer calling in with the issue) that this too is user error?

Maybe, you, my friend, should re-evaluate what you said. Clearly, it should be obvious that none of my issues are user error.

Oh, and as far as the odds of getting 5 defective phones goes... Sure, the odds are low. However, not as low as you apparently think they are. If you check many other forums based on Motorola DROIDs, there are many people out there that have had 5 defective DROIDs. I think it would be fair game for you to reword what you posted, or offer some type of help. Thanks for telling me that you believe there is some "user error" going on. I realize that's what it appears to be, but if you  jimfitzgerald, since there is apparently some "user error", and I see that you've posted a lot, is there anything I can do to keep from causing all of this error when calling, getting broken headphones, and a off-registering screen? I'm getting really frustrated and it seems like you know a lot more than me, since you read my post and could automatically determine the culprit was "user error".

would have taken the time to read what I wrote, you would have realized that it's not possible for it to be simply user error.

Oh, and to you getting the Eris. Sounds like a good deal! I don't blame you for taking up an offer like that! I'm the only person included in my plan, so, I'm not really certain of this, but I believe I would have to change my plan and everything to add a line and do an upgrade. Yet again, thanks for the update! Maybe whenever I'm completely at my wit's end, I'll ignore the extra fee and do it! Getting rid of this phone would be rahter... relieving, to be quite honest.

Oh, and to those of you trying to solve my email issue; Here's the solution I view as the best yet. Accessing your mail provider's website (in my situation that is yahoo). Sure, it's aggravating having to do that, but that's the only solution I've found to work relentlessly at this point.

[pax323]

Yeah going through and switching phones and adding the line has been a bit of a pain, but I know that it will be worth it in the long run.

If you know of someone who has an old Verizon phone where you can just put the third line on it for 10 bucks extra a month, it will be worth it in the long run.

And yes I totally agree with you that some people don't sit down and fully read what people are saying about thier phones. They have a perfect phone and instead of saying "well I believe that you got a bad phone," they go right to blaming it on user error instead. My thought on this is if they aren't going to help possibly resolve things for someone having issues with thier phone then they don't need to reply at all and let someone on here help us work through the issues with our phones.

[PJNC284]

The Eris will probably just bring more issues as it's underpowered and battery life stinks.  Not to mention it's EOL(End of life) and has just been removed from Verizon's website.

[pax323]

Good Grief what is wrong with you people?? So negative. All smartphones batteries don't last very long. Hence plugging it in to charge it and getting a task killer so everything isn't runniing and eating up the battery. So what if its been removed from Verizons site. Doesn't mean they aren't still going to cover the phone unlike what Sprint does with their phones.

Anyhoo. I am unwatching this thread as my Eris will be in today.

[bhunter82]

I have a HTC Droid Eris and am on the 3rd phone since December.  My son has the same phone and has had no problems at all. 

The truth is that sometimes you get a bad phone and sometimes you get very unlucky and get 2 bad phones.

My issue is also that I no longer trust the ERIS and I am stuck with it.  Verizon should be willing to exchange the phone for the Incredible since I am only 7 months into my two year contract and they have stopped selling the Eris, but they will not. 

Hope this Eris hangs in there.

[Tinkerbell2614]

The problem is with Yahoo themselves. They are the only POP server that does not like to cooperate with mobile devices. I'd reccomend changing email servers.

[#15]

You can flame me all you want.  I still believe there is some user error involved.  Good luck getting it resolved.

[pax323]

Ok here is a bit of info that I found out yesterday. I went to the verizon store and told them for one I was totally burnt on the motorola droid. I just don't trust it and I have had it with the issues. Also, I noticed that by 10 am my battery was about dead and I hadn't been on the phone, which was just another aggrivation. They asked questions such as do I know that the battery life isn't that great. I told them that I hadn't been on it and my battery was about gone. Told me about Task Killer and I have that app running. I told them about the other random apps opening and running when I haven't even touched my phone, my email issue, and so on. The guy got into my account and I guess he saw that I have been having issues right and left. They have ordered me another droid and it will be here tomorrow or friday.

Here is the info and what I am going to be doing. The guy gave me 2 options, because I told him even if "IF" this one worked I hate my phone. I don't trust the droid to work for me. He told me 1) I could buy the HTC Eris (which is the phone I have researched and picked) outright at the full retail price. I told him that would leave me broke and asked him if there was a way to bill me for it, which they don't. 2) Is this. Get an old Verizon phone, activate a third line for 10 bucks a month, they will take my Eris and put my phone number on there, and just have the other phone as an extra phone. I jumped all over #2 because its just 10 bucks a month more and I have my phone. My son is going to buy my droid from me and let me have his EnV2 for the line as he wants a smart phone. I am then going to turn around and let my 14 year old have the ENv2 incase she needs to call us and not burn up our mins. (She has sprint for now.) Even if I wouldn't have had my son to fall back on I would have probably ran out and bought a really cheap verizon cell. I would have then sold the new droid to one of the many companies that buys them, and still gotten my Eris. It is the only way to get away from the droid and not have to keep it for the next two years. When the two years comes up on that third line then I will just not renew it. Buy then my daughter will be on verizon.

But anyway sorry if I went into a bit of a speal, but I find this a win for everyone in my family, especially for me. I have two friends that have the Eris and they totally love the phone. Plus actually it was the phone I first wanted outside of the Omnia II. I did countless hours of research on these phones. The reason I didn't  get one of these phones in the first place is because I was on a budget at the time and bought my phones from Walmart. They have only a select few at the store and the droid was one they were selling.

I hate to be spending out more money, but when you have totoally had it with something sometimes it just turns out to be the best option in the end. Thankfully on the 2nd I will have my new Eris.

Hope this info helps.

[#17]

I have had my Motorola Droid since January and have had no problems.  I have to believe there is some "user error" involved here.