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< Esato Forum Index > Sony Ericsson / Sony > Software, Firmware and Drivers > K850 Firmware Overview Bookmark topic

Glad to see I'm not the only one that still has the camera bug. Only tried taking one picture though so though it might just be something I was doing wrong, it would seem not though.

Roll on the next firmware update.......
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Posted: 2008-01-02 18:24:53
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The "3" handset I have just received has rica029 loaded. can someone update the first page with this info.

Also when will the newer version be available for "3"?

Cheers
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Posted: 2008-01-02 18:36:25
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You mean "downdate" the first page.
R1CA029 was the very first released firmware. Anyway, it's there...
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Posted: 2008-01-02 19:11:13
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I had to master reset my phone last night as after flashing it to 038 it would go from the standby screen to the screensaver and then just constantly display the screensaver with the backlight on full.

The battery life ain't brilliant in this phone but I wondered why it was draining in under a day! Still the only changes I have noticed is slightly better camera performance and slightly faster Media Manager (using the media player while trying to do anything else with the phone is still a chore)!
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Posted: 2008-01-02 19:52:55
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Hi, loaded 038 onto my O2 K850 yesterday with no issues. Haven't checked to much out but here are some of the things I have noticed:

1. Now have options on how much details to display in SMS list
2. Still no option to have pictures date stamped (my K800 had it - again, why did SE waste time changing the FW to remove this in the first place, it's supposed to be a cybershot afterall).
3. Camera/flash issue still not totally corrected. Beginning to wonder if this is a firmware issue or maybe just crap design (having a xenon flash is why I chose this over others phones - god knows what SE are playing at)
4. The 037 firmware would run with an 8Gb HDSC card with 6Gb of music but was painfully slow - 038 doesn't appear to have changed much
5. When deleting a picture from within Media, it seems to re-index, and with an 8Gb card this takes a long time (this didn't happen with 037).
6. Not sure if this is new, but scolling between pictures in Media has changed to fast moving/expanding image each time which looks quite good.



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Posted: 2008-01-02 20:44:52
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Ok I have been using the K850i R1DA038 for a week now so i thought it was about time to place my findings on here.
My phone is a K850i with R1DA038 Western Europe (o2) 4gb M2 Sandisk card

Now if i have missed anything out please either pm or post on here i will try to answer them all best i can.

***********************************************
One thing that i will advise any body to do, when you update the phone to the R1DA038, I suggest master resetting the phone. When i first installed the R1DA038 GPRS didnt work and the phone was slow and camera still poor, after master reseting the phone behaved very differently. (When master resetting make sure you have backed up all your data onto a memory card and saved all you contacts etc#
Master resetting your phone causes you to loose everything currnelty on the phone.
***********************************************


A bit of history first, This is the 5th K850i.
And i have had all the the current 3 firmwares at present.

1) The camera takes better shots all round (Inside and Out) However more noticeable that the the phone doesnt take black photos as much (This doesnt mean that its 100% perfect as its not) The phone on occasions can still take them, but its a lot less now.
However the phone can still take dark shots if you are not careful.

2) Media player is much faster in browsing songs and playing music when pressed. (Big improvement over R1CA029-037).
However there is still much more improvement needed. Some videos (mp4)are still out of sync by a quiet a few seconds and on occasion when playing videos (Any video formwat), the video will suddenly go into supper fast mode for no reason.

3) Java is much faster in response and I have also seen peoples comments that it takes an application a slightly longer time to load, On my phone thats not been the case.

4) Phone calls are very clear on either 2g and 3g singal and no transfer over problems from 3g to 2g

5) No video call problems at all which is the same as ther other 2 firmwares.

6) SMS and MMS icons are now shows as the same on the main screen when you receives a SMS or MMS, The Icons have also changed for T9 and Ab (Much nicer in my opion and clearer) Sms listing has also changed

7) Battery life is very good, I get on average 3 days with normal usage (eg 30 mins wap usage, 50 sms, 10-15 mins calls)

The phone menu (S) in generaly is much faster in opperating. However the phone will still lag if you are asking it to do too much at once or 2 things together, but no where near as back as R1CA029 - 037.

9) I havnt had one freeze or lockup on the phone since being used.


Now to some questions i know people are asking and a couple of bugs.

1) Time in the standby screen - This will never be ava on the K850i as the screen is TFT Technology, K810 and earlier models use TFD Technology.

2) Date and time isnt present on the photos which is very strange, Im not sure why SE omit this function, but there must be a reason.

3) I have still had a corruption on a couple of pics using media browser. The bottom half of the pics are showing blue lines. The pic is displayed fine using file manager and on my computer.

4) Why is alarms and not filemanager in the main menu is a puzzle, but from what i understand, SE would like us to use the media menu instead.

Like i said if i have missed anything out then please let me know


R1DA038 is ava at SE service centers to be updated.
However SE are still placing R1DA038 on the SEUS and can take upto 4 weeks from the start to place on there. From what i understand SE are hoping to have most of the firmwares on there by W05 / W06.

The current networks can be updated using SEUS
O2, Voda, T-Mobile, Tim.

Some Generic phones can also now be updated (Although this is still a bit uknown)
HK Branded
Central Euro
Nordic



**** Its still recomended to reboot your phone at least once a day to gain the most optimal performance and memory from the device ****

[ This Message was edited by: darrengf on 2008-01-02 21:09 ]
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Posted: 2008-01-02 21:35:14
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that is truly sad news

I was so hoping the 038 firmware would make drastic improvements to the camera performance - its almost impossible not to since the performance of 029 and 037 are so unbeleivably poor, but it seems 038 doesnt help. I was also hoping for general speed up of phone operations, but no.

so sad - the K850 is the only SE phone I ever regret buying, I just want to throw it into the bin.

Camera is rubbish (my K750 is better), the touch buttons doesnt work 2/3 of the time, handling speed is painfully slow in all operations (my w910 is much quicker)

so sad
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Posted: 2008-01-02 21:42:20
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numb, I can assure you that the camera on the K850i using R1DA038 is much better than R1CA029-037, the phone is alot faster too, but like i said there are still improvements to be made.

The K850i is a new bread of phone using the A200 platform and therefore has many many bugs. The phone will improve over time, but i can honestly say that it wont be until 6 more months that we really see some major improvements.

My own personal opion though and I am a loyal SE fan, I am also disapointed with the K850i expecting much more that wasnt delivered.
I still think that the build quality is poor for a flagship model and think that the designers have got it horrible wrong with the battery cover.
Missing features of like time and date stamp on photos is to me poor and the software and design team really need to come up with something better, or infact changes need to be made to management?

I think that SE will release a newer version of the K series sooner than we think, The K850 is a headache for them, bad publicity, poor returns, customer complaints isnt helping either.

I think even SE are embarresed about the phone too, here in the UK there is very little publicity about the phone, most shops have removed the K850 photos and there are very few adverts in books about the phone.
The nokia N82 also beat the K850 for photo quality and won the phone camera of the year.

K850 has also got a poor start of, being delayed due to problems and its still having problems now. The A200 platform is very good, but i think SE didnt relise how many problems it was going to cause. but the A200 platform is ready and future upgradeabiltiy in new SE phones. So its here to stay, just lets hope it has more success in future SE phones.


The K850i will be one phone that will come and go very quickly with the K800 and K810 out living it.


Little bit more info, Se return return rate on the phone is high 20.2% which is 1 in every 5 phones being returned.

[ This Message was edited by: darrengf on 2008-01-02 21:04 ]
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Posted: 2008-01-02 21:48:50
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I've had the new firmware for a few days now and can concur it is an improvement on the 1st update we had, phone defiantely feels faster but I'll reserve judgement as to if this is a permanant fix or partly due to the removal of the battery and reboot as thats helped mine a little before.

I hope this wasnt the BIG fix as its far from perfect, I still get some dark pics, no where near as many but they do randomly happen. I also had the phone freeze in the 1st 12 hrs after updating.

Im gradually learning to love this phone after the major shock of it not living up to expectation and the hype of a flagship product.
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Posted: 2008-01-02 21:59:49
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It's strange that the new firmware is available for some branded handsets, but not unbranded!
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Posted: 2008-01-02 22:27:32
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