Thunderbolt ICS Update Issues

[giles16]

Me, my wife and every other Thunderbolt user  I know (people from AZ to NY) through Verizon are having serious issues with this update. I have been through tier 2 Verizon support and multiple hard resets through the Verizon store with the final verdict from Verizon "The hardware on your phone cannot handle the update. You will need to upgrade your phone." NO! Verizon should not put an update out for a phone they sell that cannot handle the update. To me and many others this is just a way to force you to upgrade a phone that was working flawlessly. Up until now I have been very happy with Verizon but finding out that I cannot revert to the old operating system that worked perfectly we are done with Verizon. Keep in mind this is not an HTC problem. The Thunderbolt is an awesome phone. So today we are going to upgrade. Not with Verizon but with ATT to change carriers and see how they do. We have already found that the monthly service will be a bit less through ATT for the same service. I would not be surprised that there will be a class action law suit against Verizon over this if there is not already one. If I do find one I will be joining them. 

[Bol]

I agree wholeheartedly with Mr. Giles16!

Verizon, Google, you should be ashamed of yourselves!

You have ruined many, many good, flawless phones, uselessly with your greed!

Very pissed,

Emilio.

Sent from my Verizon Wireless 4GLTE smartphone

[Lowcarb]

"To me and many others this is just a way to force you to upgrade a phone that was working flawlessly."

What a great strategy!   Ruin my phone with a forced update to get me to upgrade

- It forces me to be locked in for an additional 2 years

- They collect another $30 upgrade from me.

- They won't honor my Grandfathered Unlimited data plan if I upgrade so I'll be cut down to 2GB.

I've got to find a way to wait this out until all 5 of my phones are out of contract so I can say Good-bye Verizon.

Yeah.  I'm really mad.

[Lowcarb]

"We have already found that the monthly service will be a bit less through ATT for the same service."

I have a natural resistance to shopping cell phone plans but VW's ever increasing cost for decreasing service got me over my potential energy barrier.  Like giles16 I found that I can actually get better features from that same provider and for $10/month less.   Verizon Wireless wants to knock me down from Unlimited to 2GB .  I know, I rarely use more than 1.5GB in a month so they tell me I should not care. But I do care!  Turn about is fair play Verizon.  Since I rarely use more than 1.5GB per month you should have no problem keeping me on my current plan instead of ticking me off.  I'm not going to be a sheep and just take what you offer.  I'll just have to vote with my feet and leave. 

For $10/month less I'll get 5GB on my phone, and tethering included, and hotspot included and I'll get 3GB eachof my other two smartphones and I'll get more talk minutes than I ever use for my other two feature phones, and unlimited text too. 

So less $, more data.  Oh yeah!  No $30 upgrade fee.  And the new phone I want is $100 less there than from VW.

Counting the days until all my phones are out of contract.  Then I'll be again.

[Ann154]

Lowcarb,

Please be aware there is an activation fee when starting a new account at AT&T and in two years there will be a higher upgrade fee ($36).

[Lowcarb]

Thanks for the heads up on the upgrade fees in the future.   

Did you mean that the higher upgrade fees ($36) are coming to AT&T or to VW?

I get the activation fee waived and get a $25 credit to boot along with a corporate discount, which is a tiny bit larger than the discount I can get from VW, so it still looks good.   Besides, in my mind, they done me wrong.  So even neutral beats someone who done you wrong.

As for what happens after my 1st 2 year cycle somewhere else, well that will depend on what they do between now and then and what the competition looks like then.  2 Years is a entire generation in the semiconductor world, so a lot can change.  

I had a new phone in my cart and was ready to check out and re-up for another 2 years but VW would not let me check out without selecting a new plan.  A new plan that would give me less, but not cost less. 

Years and years ago when I became a VW customer they were the only provider who had good coverage in my area.  Not so much any more.

[Ann154]

The upgrade fee at AT&T is $36. Sprint is $38.

[barbarian25]

My Thunderbolt was working flawlessly until the forced update. Now it is a piece of crap, and whenever I called Verizon about it they give me a different excuse as to why the phone is performing so poorly. They say updates sometimes cause phones to work like that. I could not actually believe more than three representatives gave me similar explanations about it.

I am planning to do a hard reset, and if it does not work like it used to before the update, then I will be thinking about moving my service to a different provider too.

All they try to do is force you to upgrade your phone after a couple of years. Buy a new phone, and if you don't then we screw yours so you are forced to do it anyway.

I was very happy with the way my Thunderbolt was working right until the day after that update went on. I am now the most miserable person on earth whenever I try use it for either phone calls, navigation, or any other feature.

Shame on you, Verizon for being so greedy!

[barbarian25]

I finally decided to do a hard reset on the phone, and it is back to working flawlessly again. I did not really want to do the reset, since you lose all your information in the process; but it was the only choice left. Even though it was irritating having to do that, now I am happy to use my phone without being so frustrated with its slow performance.

Try doing the factory resetting, and it will get rid of the issues. Make sure you save all needed information, or write down names of applications downloaded in the device before doing it. It is a pain, but it will make your phone go back to normal working condition.

I am happy I did not get to switch it by an iPhone like I was planning, and tried doing the reset instead.

I had been battling it these issues with the phone for months, but now I am a happy Thunderbolt user again!

[Lowcarb]

Barbarian,

I'd be interested to hear from you in a month or so to see if your improved performance continues.

My phone was totally unusable following the initial upgrade to ICS.  I had very poor battery life, no 4G, 3G only in a very strong signal area and it could take 30 seconds to recognize a touch to the screen. 

Doing the factory reset did take my phone from being 100% unusable to being only very unpleasant to use most of the time and only unusable 20% of the time.  

I still have times where I can't get the phone to react in time to answer an incoming call.    \

It has steadily degraded since I did the factory reset.    I wing up clearing cache and rebooting it daily to keep it at all usable.  

I don't think I should have to do a factory reset every month and cut my apps to a bare minimum just to be able to keep using the phone. 

[barbarian25]

I agree with you, and that is one of my future concerns with the phone. Why would anyone have to do factory resets on a phone to make it work properly? I am not very concern about getting rid of half of the applications I had in my phone before, since I was not using most of them anyway. I use most of them them in my iPad now. I understand that can be a problem for many who do rely on them like I did before though.

Just like you, my main concerns about the phone are, will it go back to working so poorly in the future like it did this time? And if it does, will this be something I will have to continue to deal with month after month?

I really hope I don't have to, but in the case things go bad with it again, then I will definitely consider switching providers. As of right now, I will be using the phone, and be very aware of those issues. I also had to be constantly clearing cache to get my phone to work properly, though that did not seem to help at all. I could not answer any phone call on time, and I totally gave up on using the internet or any other feature because of how extremely slow it was performing.

Even though things got back to normal when it comes to its performance, and the fact that I am very happy with it now after so much struggle getting it to work like it is supposed to; the worry about those issues coming back again later is in the back of my mind.

Let's just hope that won't happen again!

I will post my experience with it in a month or so to see how it goes.

[Lowcarb]

My wonderful experience today.

Phone seemed to be working and responding normally until I tried to make a call. 

Selected a name from my phonebook

Tried to make a call.  No response, pressed it several times.

Entered the number manually and pressed call.  No response.

Got frustrated, set the phone down and went to get my landline phone.  When I come back the phone is now finally dialing the number.  This is at least 2 minutes after I 1st tried to make the call.   

I completed the call on my cell and hung up.  I figured I better reboot the phone so I held the power button and selected RESTART.   While the phone was in the process of shutting down it dialed that call again!!!!!  Can you believe it?  I could hear the person on the other end saying hello before the phone shut down and restarted.

I hope I'm never in a situation where I need to rely on this phone to call 911.

[ho0424]

After ICS update, my phone was totally useless, and it seemed back to normal after I did factory reset, then it was anther disaster began, randomly my battery drained from full charge to 3% in 20 minutes, battery overheated, phone delayed sendig txt, dialing and answering.

From hardware point of view, Thunderbolt is not capable of handling ICE, not only because of not enough memory, but also it only has single core CPU, just like you have old 486 computer, you load Windows 8 on it. nothing will run smooth. I believe Verizon also know this very well.

I am a Costco member, no upgrade or activation fee if you purchase a new phone at Costco, I am going to take advantage the promotion this week on HTC One, transfer all my 5 lines to AT&T, and say "GOODBYE" to Verizon