« Some thoughts about the leaked HTC WM phonesWhat is a smartphone? »
Dec 05

Problems with the Nokia E72

Symbian Add comments



*********
UPDATE:
I have now reported on the firmware update provided by Nokia, and general impressions of the E72 after 3 months of use.
*********

I mentioned in my "preview" of the E72 that opening and switching between programs was slow, partly due to the animations, and that I would not buy one until that was sorted out.
Well, I read that the animations could be disabled, so I tried that and sure enough all the lag completely disappeared.

Thus, I now own an E72.
It is a great device, but I have discovered a few problems with the the current version of the firmware, some of them quite serious.

Follow up:

  • A2DP is virtually non-functional on the E72.
    I say "virtually" because it works right after I reset the phone, but after the headset has been used in a phone call A2DP stops working all together.

  • Much worse though is that the regular Bluetooth connection is extremely unstable. I have had a couple of disconnects during phone calls, and it often disconnects and then reconnects from my headset in standby mode for no apparent reason.
    At best, the BT connection is very unreliable, and the E72 is by far the worst performing phone I have owned in this regard (a title that has been held by the Treo 650 until now, which was notorious for its lousy BT).

  • RAM memory is only about 40 MB after a soft reset, compared to the 80 MB that was reported on many sites, including on some of Nokia's own sites.
    Now some sites that had reviewed a "preview" version of the E72 stated that their phones only had 40MB but attributed this to their phones not having the final version of the firmware yet; this means that either A) they were in fact using the final version of the firmware or B) the phones that Nokia has sold to us so far are still running the "preview" version of the software.
    You be the judge.

  • UPDATE:
    Since the BT connection is very unreliable, I tried to put some calls on the speaker instead. But I immediately received complaints about the awful quality: it turns out that there is a very bad echo for the person on the other end.
    So to see for myself what was happening I asked my girlfriend to call me up from my E72 through the speaker, and the call quality on my end was indeed very bad. I could clearly hear my own voice repeating everything I was saying. A very unpleasant experience, and which unfortunately reduces the usefulness of the E72 as a phone even more.

This phone has huge potential: the overall speed of the device, the dedicated application keys and the keyboard makes for an extremely efficient device. And to be fair, the effects of the low RAM can only seen when you open a heavy website in the browser and it starts to shut down apps in the background. The rest of the time you can easily run +20 apps simultaneously with no performance hit (again, whoever said multitasking makes your device slow?).

But the Bluetooth issues are real and have already been reported on Nokia's discussion forums (here, here and here). Not even Nokia's own headsets guarantee a reliable connection, which just proves how badly it performs.

I would consider this to be a fatal bug on any phone, but on a business phone it is completely unacceptable. That is why I am very surprised by Nokia's reply that someone reported in one of the threads, where Nokia simply blames this on incompatible BT stacks and leaves it at that.

Consumers do not care about the technical mumbo-jumbo, they simply want a solution that works, just as it has with all the other phones and headsets they have used prior to their new E72. And if, as implied by Nokia's reply, Nokia considers this normal and that consumers should not expect the same kind of BT performance from their E72, then Nokia had better be completely open about this and disclose this to all potential customers.
Either that, or do what any professional company does: openly admit that they have a problem and that they are working on a solution for it, and provide a new firmware sooner rather than later.

So which is it going to be, Nokia?

UPDATE 2:
I contacted Nokia's support center regarding these problems a couple of weeks ago, and received this reply from them a few days later:

I have sent your questions and the links you gave me to the developers.
They will investigate and return to me with results, as soon as they return i will contact you again.

When I receive that reply I will post it here.
Stay tuned.

Tags: bluetooth, e72, echo, firmware, headset, nokia, problems, ram, speaker

39 comments

  1. § RagaBaSH Email said on : 12/15/09 @ 02:54
    And you think that the BT thing is a new bug in the E72?
    My company has been having massive problems with the BT stack in the E51 (which so happens to be the same as in the E71), with pretty much any car kit.
    Considering we have a fleet of 120 cars thats 120 employees who are intermittently available over their company bought phone.
    It's come to the point where several managers have opted for using an older S40 6120 phone simply for BT stability.

    Nokia has been dropping the ball on this one for at least a year and a half. There is no excuse, and me? I'm lobbying for blackberry's.
  2. § A Hakim Email said on : 12/16/09 @ 11:35
    Hi

    The odd thing which happened to me is that the optical navi key stopped working. When I touch it it does click but gives me the error: item no longer available restoring default key settings.

    I can still manoeuvre with the side keys.

    Any idea how to reset this or reinstall this part of the drive of the navi key?

    Thanks
  3. § admin® Email said on : 12/17/09 @ 14:08
    @RagaBaSH:
    Wow, that is really bad.
    Nokia certainly seem to have problems with Bluetooth in general, I have read many complaints regarding BT.
    Let's see if/how/when they can resolve it.

    @A Hakim:
    I haven't seen that specific issue, but try searching for it on Nokia's discussion forums.
  4. § Rupert Everett said on : 12/18/09 @ 07:59
    tried the E72 as a move up from E71. Immediately noticed how slow and painful it is to use when compared with E72. Battery also ran out within 24hrs. I use Mail for Exchange and I think it can not cope. I returned to Vodafone and exchanged for another E72, exactly the same problems so I returned the E72 and I am back to my good old E71.

    My advice is don’t get the E72
  5. § Murali Email said on : 01/04/10 @ 15:40
    @Hakim: For the optical navi key error try this: When you press the "Home" soft key, you will see the task bar or apps running. Check if a "Phone Set up" wizard is running. Close it and reboot and check to see if navi key works.
  6. § Fislo Email said on : 01/23/10 @ 02:15
    I've been trying for weeks to connect my E72 to my home wifi network (on an Apple Airport Extreme). It is absolutely unusable: the phone randomly sees the network, sometimes connects for a couple of minutes and then loses the connection.
    Tried to play with network features, radio canal, security settings, everything I could think of... No change. Extremely frustrating. Is this a known issue?
  7. § admin® Email said on : 01/24/10 @ 11:31
    I haven't had the problems you describe - on the contrary I've had flawless Wifi connections so far.
    Are you sure it's not an issue with you Wifi modem?
  8. § Razor Email said on : 02/08/10 @ 13:19
    i plug iphone handsfree on my e72 n play song, its restart! wth is this is this any problem? help me!
  9. § Technology Blogged Email said on : 02/10/10 @ 10:19
    I have had no problems with Wifi on my E72. But rarely use that function anyway, as our damn workplace has an encryption code in place and the IT Support are rather secretive. At home I just use my laptop. It is strange to see these problems, although Wifi seems to be n issue with the latest Nokia handsets anyway.
  10. § jesse james Email said on : 02/13/10 @ 11:30
    i have had no problems at all with my E72 , however at the bottom of the screen i have a flashing message , but there are no inbox messages as i have deleted them , there are no emails etc , so totally confused ...and this problem started a few hours after i got the phone ...
  11. § Tarek Email said on : 02/13/10 @ 14:16
    E72 has problems in Arabic Language can't type numbers in Arabic and that is so bad Nokia can't solve this problem ?
  12. § JMan Email said on : 02/16/10 @ 02:31
    Does anybody have problmes using Mail for exchange? Mine doesn't work, period. Not with my work e-mail (server) and not with a normal yahoo (pop) account. It just doesn't sync/connect/download or whatever. It does nothing. and this was why I bought the phone in the first place.
    Any similar experiences?
  13. § Ben Davidson Email said on : 02/22/10 @ 14:37
    on my home page; there is a message icon at the bottom which is flashing at me even though i am 100% certain i hav no messages!! :@
  14. § Sean said on : 02/22/10 @ 23:21
    IF YOU ARE HAVING A PROBLEM WITH A FLASHING ENVELOPE ICON ON THE BOTTOM OF THE SCREEN CHECK YOUR SIM MESSAGES...IT MEANS YOU HAVE MESSAGES SAVED ON YOUR SIM CARD. GO TO THE MESSAGE SCREEN AND GO TO OPTIONS-SIM MESSAGES AND DELETE THEM. DONT COMPLAIN IF YOU DONT KNOW. ITS A GREAT PHONE
  15. § julian Email said on : 02/25/10 @ 09:58
    i have a problem with the message icon without putting my sim card in please help me thank you
  16. § felix Email said on : 03/01/10 @ 20:39
    my nokia e72 cannot connect to wifi. Do anyone have this problem to?
  17. § Soulmia Email said on : 03/05/10 @ 05:29
    So, I got the E72 as a Christmas pressie. While the phone itself is super cool. I found out to my horror the following:
    1. After setting up yahoo and gmail on the phone, the handset receives mails for a few days and then just stops. I have to do a master reset and then reinstall the email clients and then it receives mails for a few days again and then stops...and I have to constantly redo this process!
    I thought it was asim or network problem so switched chips and put it into my Nokia N95 and have had no issues with that phone.
    2. The earpiece (from where you listen to callers) stopped working and I could only speak using the speaker phone!!

    Sent the phone to Nokia Care several times and even had a technician visit my residence to see if it was a network issue - no solution.
    Anyone have any idea what this is???
  18. § raj Email said on : 03/05/10 @ 12:51
    I tried 2 Etisalat sim cards(UAE) on my newE72, but attending any call its disconnecting automatically,for confirmation i tried with DU sim card its working perfectly, can anybody tells whts the plm?
  19. § Lasantha Samaranayake Email said on : 03/06/10 @ 01:49
    I bought E72 in last December 09.
    1) When headset connects to listen to radio phone started to malfunction. I had to remove headset and reboot it again.
    2) It gets heated lot and battery goes down
    when in 3G network.
    3) Many people complain that my phone is not reachable.
    4) The battery steel cover is easily to come out.

    However I have been using its many good features like instant mailing, maps, camera, GPS, Mail attachments... Nokia should develop
    better software for this.
  20. § Saurabh Email said on : 03/10/10 @ 23:27
    Suddenly the space key of my E72 stops working.pls let me know if ther is any solution
  21. § Barbara Email said on : 03/15/10 @ 09:11
    Hi had 2 new E72's in as many weeks and have had to return them both. The text at the top of the screen disappears in Personalisation, Contacts and when Messaging, to name but a few. I've checked, its not the LCD and they both had the most recent software installed. I'm hopefully getting a third problem free third phone this week. If however, it's the same as the others, is it worth keeping and hoping that a future software upgrade will fix the problem ?
  22. § admin® Email said on : 03/15/10 @ 10:09
    @Barbara

    I haven't experienced or heard about your particular issue.

    One thing to keep in mind regarding Nokia's firmware updates is that they tend to be few and far between. I'm sure that the previous firmware update was the result of so many people having reported on the severe BT problems that Nokia realized had to do something about it quickly.

    If you like the phone and don't have any other problems with it, and you think you can live with that screen problem for a fairly long period, then by all means wait. But I wouldn't hope for a firmware update anytime soon to be honest; if I did then I myself might have waited a bit instead of deciding to get rid of my E72, as I explained in my last post.
  23. § Peter said on : 03/20/10 @ 05:34
    hey all,

    I have my E72 for some time now and have/had many problems.

    Sync email problems were solved by using my time capsule instead of the older US Robotics router. Guess new routers support something more than older ones??

    If you don't close your applications the memory gets full. My result: phone jam and sms messages que up without delivery. Sometimes you get a warning with the question to close some app's. Best thing to do is to reboot your phone. you'll find surprisingly a lot of new messages in your (sms) inbox.

    I once had some problems rebooting, screen stayed white, after while it worked again, but all my sms-messages were gone.

    I think that the E72 does a lot in the background from time to time, when so it slows everything really down or even messes up phone calls while doing so ...
    Good thing to do is to disable all the automatically syncing, ... options and by controlling them manually you'll find out your phone works already al lot better!!

    Grtz, Peter
  24. § stuart Email said on : 03/22/10 @ 14:43
    Wow all the same problems I am having with my E72. Got mine in January 2010 and it was fine for about a week. Now very slow. When you send an email it times out on the backlight (30 seconds) most times before the screen comes back. Sometimes I have to even pull the battery

    It went back to Nokia as I reported all this and they claimed I did not even tell them why I was sending it back, but hey claimed they fixed the bluetooth (I did not know it was broken) but it is still very slow.

    I also thought this was upgrade from Nokia E71 but it does not seem to be. I am back to using My E71 until Nokia fixes this piece of junk!
  25. § mac quin Email said on : 04/07/10 @ 10:31
    Poor quality because NOKIA phones are now made in China. As simple as that.
  26. § Raj Email said on : 04/08/10 @ 01:50
    Unable to connect blue tooth sterio head st instantly, phone it will show connected but when you switch the music player , you cant hear song , only when you restart your mobile & connect the head set then only the music can be heard , this issue is very annoying as every time i need to restart my nokia E72
    please check this issue or suggest solution for it
  27. § Himanshu Khagta Email said on : 04/09/10 @ 13:59
    "But I immediately received complaints about the awful quality: it turns out that there is a very bad echo for the person on the other end.
    So to see for myself what was happening I asked my girlfriend to call me up from my E72 through the speaker, and the call quality on my end was indeed very bad. I could clearly hear my own voice repeating everything I was saying. A very unpleasant experience, and which unfortunately reduces the usefulness of the E72 as a phone even more."

    Same Problem . . . Its really annoying when people cannot hear ma voice . . .

    and secondly
    Space bar stops working now and then and the phone had to be restarted to make it work again.
  28. § Feet Email said on : 04/19/10 @ 12:13
    I recently purchased Nokia E72, The phone looked gr8 and appealing , the email was so easy to configure, i thought i have got the best phone, until the day i tried using the blue tooth head set,

    1. On connecting to the blue tooth head set, phone shows message as "Connected" when i switch the music player there is no sound heard only if i restart the phone then only the music is heard.

    2. In the home screen the popup for select connection keeps appearing its irritating dont know how to disable the popup.

    3. When forwarding a long text message to many recipient like about 10 to 15 recipient after adding the recipient , phone automatically converts the text message to multimedia message.

    4. In office applications , the convertor & zip software i have no idea how to use it.

    Guys if you observed the same issues kindly report to the service center .

    I did they told me the firmware need to be updated then we have to check , i just hope the software upgrade will resolve the issue , else i swear i will never go for nokia phone


    If any solutions please suggest to my mail id
    feetliknsoles@gmail.com

    Thanks
    Feet
  29. § Mian Aamir Email said on : 04/26/10 @ 04:30
    I had these Nokias chronologically: 8800, N-90, 6300, E-71, N-97, and finally E-72-1(the latest and much bragged about business model). I am frustrated with its BT performance. It just does not connect with my Toshiba R600. Nokia blames at the BT Stack 6 which is installed on my notebook--both Toshiba's as well as Microsoft's. I downgraded to 5 too but it didn't work. Anyway out of this frustration or should I say goodbye to Nokia?
  30. § Feet Email said on : 04/26/10 @ 12:04
    Hi All,

    In my last post i mentioned few problems the one mentioned below is fixed now,

    The blue tooth head set had manufacturing defect nokia said and replaced the bluetooth head set its now working fine

    1. On connecting to the blue tooth head set, phone shows message as "Connected" when i switch the music player there is no sound heard only if i restart the phone then only the music is heard.

    Thank
    Feet
  31. § Loh SC Email said on : 05/05/10 @ 02:50
    The Nokia E72 is advertised to support MSN Live Chat together with Yahoo, GTalk, and their own ovi talk. Try to set up the chat other than Ovi Chat and you will be thrown back to sign on screen. There seems to be some legal and connectivity issues here between Nokia and Microsoft? Help!!!!!
  32. § FP Email said on : 05/07/10 @ 01:21
    My E72 just hangs - I cant even switch it off - and each time I need to remove the battery and restart the cell phone - My previous phone (E50) is far better.
    Most disappointing investment
  33. § Faseeh Warind Email said on : 05/25/10 @ 01:28
    I bought my E 72 in January.
    I have been a faithful customer for the Nokia phones for nearly a decade now and have been seriously disappointed by this one.
    The main problem that i have been facing is that the Space Bar stops working at least one time, everyday. I have to restart the bloody phone just to get it working properly again.
    And whenever that happens, the service light which the phone has when it is locked keeps on blinking even when i am using it. These two problems go side by side and both have to be fixed by rebooting the phone.
    I went to Nokia Service Center and all i got from them was that they can't seem to find any problems with this set. Updated the software so many times and returned my phone telling me it perfect now and i still have this problem.
    Either the Nokia people are ignorant fools who think their products are the best and nothing is wrong with them or the fact that Korea and China are finishing their products is actually screwing everything up for them (although the back of my phone reads Finland).
    Either way, i am so disappointed. I will sell off my phone within the next month and go for a Blackberry.
  34. § admin® Email said on : 05/26/10 @ 14:15
    To be fair, I never had the spacebar-problem with my E72 though I have read about it many times.

    What firmware are you using? Presumably that bug was fixed in the latest firmware 031.023
  35. § Faseeh Warind Email said on : 05/30/10 @ 13:36
    I updated the latest firmware. It works like a charm. No Blackberry for me, this phone is god-sent.
    Its amazing when it works fine.
    Finally! :)
  36. § Jai Email said on : 07/07/10 @ 09:13
    Hi all,

    I have bought my E72 about 5 months ago. In this meantime I have faces 2 problems which 1 of them is just the same, speaker phone not working well enough. But the other one might be something new. My video shooting becoming stuck on and off after 6sec when I used MP4 High Quality setting on a nokia 4GB memory card. But surprisingly, it does not stuck if I use Nokia 128mb memory card.

    Is there anyone facing the same problem and have the solution? please help.

    Thanks.
  37. § feet Email said on : 07/08/10 @ 12:54
    Hi All in my previous post i mentioned few problems now al are resolved & no issues

    The problem of text message getting auto converted to multimedia message is resolved , the problem is because i have restored my contact back up using the nokia back up format file , actually then the service center people suggested me to enter manually all the contacts to phone , so i did that and then tested it , the problem is no more exisitng


    But the nokia back up file has a problem it has some defects

    Thanks
    Feet
  38. § rony Email said on : 07/17/10 @ 23:33
    my E 72 is restarting automatically when i am chatting or listening song. and some times dosent work the space button! when i reboot it works fine again.
    this is the most bad problem i ever face.
    please help me....
  39. § Jason Email said on : 07/18/10 @ 18:53
    Haven't had any BT or speaker phone issues with my E72, but have had a problem w/ it randomly restarting. Sometimes it will just restart once and other times it will continuously do it for over 10 minutes eventually staying off completely. Pulling the battery during this cycle does not stop it. I called Nokia service and they had me perform a soft reset. The only thing this did was cause the GPS to stop working correctly. Upon calling back they wanted me to do a hard reset, but I have programs installed that I won't be able to re-install. Tried a firmware update and it said I have the latest one.

    Has anyone else had this kind of issue or have any idea how to fix it?

    Thanks.

This post has 2 feedbacks awaiting moderation...

Leave a comment


Your email address will not be revealed on this site.

Your URL will be displayed.
(Line breaks become <br />)
(Name, email & website)
(Allow users to contact you through a message form (your email will not be revealed.)
Contact. ©2010 by admin. blog software / PHP hosting / blog ads.
Design & icons by N.Design Studio. Skin by Tender Feelings / Evo Factory.
Entries RSS Comments RSS Log in