XSet

(Or how I learned to stop worrying and love the Pebl)

I’m something of a nerd right? Ok, ok, no need to scream so loudly. I am a nerd , simple. And as part of my nerdy world is the simple fact that I need my phone to sync with my computer. Mainly because I can’t be arsed top manually transfer 500+ contacts and god knows how many calendar events.

Because I’m a nerd I want this to happen via bluetooth when I press a button. Nice and simple. So the new Pebl is sat on my desk ready to be paired with el laptop and commence syncage. I’d even gone so far as to update the OS on the laptop as the latest version includes native sync support for the U6 - great!

Hour 1

So, start the add new Bluetooth device wizard on the Mac … and bingo pairing starts, asks for a PIN, enter the Pin, pairing successful … but, no services have been detected on the phone. Ok.

Try it again and same result. The phone is paired but nothing actually works. I can’t send anything, can’t sync anything and can’t browse anything.

So google the problem - aha! It’s a known issue and all I have to do is upgrade / flash the firmware on the phone. Trouble is to do this I need a program that isn’t immediately available and only runs on windows. Plus drivers for the comm link.

Hour 2

Google, google google and I eventually end up with most of the bits I need. The firmware file has been downloaded, the drivers are sat on my drive. To get the flashing program I need to register for a forum to access their downloads. “Your registration has been successful. Details will be emailed to you”… YAY!

Hour 3

The email finally shows up to allow me to download the software. Download, dump the whole lot onto the mini windows box and start installing…

Windows XP is required. FUCK! Of course being a dev box it’s running Server 2003. Well what the hell, I’d been meaning to rebuild it for a while anyway so I can tri-boot XP, 2003 and FC4.

Make sure everything is safe on the backup partition and …. Reinstall Windows XP!

Hour 4

Still reinstalling but apparently Windows XP is faster and more reliable than ever before … I hate those splash screens.

Hour 5

Done. Now looking at a fresh and slightly bemused copy of Windows XP SP2.

Run the flasher install again and … bang “Default drive of D detected. Installation will now quit”

WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? You’re on C:, Windows is on C: there is no default set to D: or anything like it … just fucking install.

Google, google, google.

Hour 6

Turns out, do to the fact that the world hates me today, the D: drive has been designated as a system partition at some point. Don’t know how but you can’t change it or disconnect it in any way. So I run a quick reg hack to see if I can get the drive letters swapped out.

And now it won’t boot at all!!! Fanfuckingtastic.

Hour 7

Dive into the sitting room and quickly try the install on my dad’s PC. And bugger me if it doesn’t take first time! Quickly check the flash file, run the FLEX update and 15 minutes later - one fully flashed PEBL. Now to test the bluetooth.

Pair

Send file

BINGO!!!

A little under 7 hours to get it all working. And this for a new phone and a pretty common OS. Heaven help you linux users out there.

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If anyone would like the exact process I went through (i.e. You got here looking for a solution to the same problem) then please leave a comment. For legal reasons I’m not going to go into too much detail here.

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