Android / Thunderbolt

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Don't!

STOP! The first thing that will happen when you connect your phone is it will prompt you to install some Verizon Vcast software. Don't!! The only software you need is "sync" software, the windows version is called HTC sync. It is free. The Verizon software will cost you monthly charges, and/or make your phone harder to use. You have been forwarned.
Don't do the Verizon update sequence that starts with *228, apparently it can cause problems with your sim card. (this sequence was sometimes used to keep the phone from roaming to a different network or something, google it to see.

What do all those little pictures mean at the top of the TB (Thunderbolt) screen?

That is called the notification area. Swipe your finger from the word "verizon" down, and it will open up and you will normally see explanations of what is what. Stuff appears there to "notify" you that something is on, off, arrived, or is amiss..

I have found a small chart of what these are, Click Here

Problems with keeping your data connection

First, note that your broadband data connection will be OFF if you have WiFi enabled. If you are on broadband data, you SHOULD see either a 1x (slow), 3G (faster), or 4G (fastest). Since 4G is not fully rolled out, do not be surprised if you are on 3G much of the time. In a really bad area, you might be down to 1x.

This is specifically about "losing" your data connection. Unless you are in a hole, canyon, or the desert, you should not lose it. If it goes away frequently, then you want to reset the user data on the phone (this does a number of things). BEFORE you do this, BACK UP your data on your phone, and try to be in an area that has good 4G signal strength. Then go to the settings... "SD & phone storage".... and select "Factory data reset"....

Syncing

On windows, download and install HTC sync: http://www.htc.com/us/support/thunderbolt-verizon/downloads#310 works great and fast, works with Outlook, of course. My HTC sync version is: 3.055.17

On a mac, use the google sync, sync your email, contacts, etc. to google, and then the phone will sync to google. That's the best way.

Every time you connect your TB to your PC it will open the Verizon Vcast page in your default browser. No way to stop this unless you root the phone or sign up. If the phone icon in the PC's notification area does stays has a red X on it (small picture of a phone), then go into the phone settings.... connect to pc... and set the default connection type... you can set it to HTC sync, or you can set it to prompt you each time, depends on what you want. Don't worry if you also have USB debugging enabled, leave it alone.

Note: if you are syncing to an iTunes playlist each time, your sync time will take 10 minutes if you have a good sized playlist, EVEN IF you have no changes! I do not change my playlists very often, so I turned that sync off, and just sync contacts and calendar, that only takes a few seconds.

Add your password to voice mail settings

go to: settings... call... voicemail settings
if "voicemail service" does not say "my carrier" underneath, then select "voicemail service" and then select "my carrier"
select voicemail settings, and change the *86 to *86#P----# where the 4 dashes are replaced with your voicemail pin
done

now it will dial, pause (the "P") and then enter your voice mail pin

Verizon junk I'd like to get rid of

There are a number of applications I'd like to delete on the phone, but you have to root the phone (get root access, it's Linux) to remove them.

Turns out that there is a directory called "cdrom" and there is an "autoplay" setting. So just like your PC that does autoplay when you insert a CD function, this "CDROM" directory does an autoplay when you hook up to USB.

The problem may be a file in /system/etc/cdrom.iso ... been told to delete it, but now you need root access...

Software & Firmware versions

menu... settings...about phone... software information:

android version - 2.2.1

baseband - 1.39.00.0627r, 0.01.69.0625r (pretty sure the 0627 and 0625 are June 25th and 27th)

kernel version - 2.6.32.21-g0606a3a

build number 1.70.605.0 CL343953

software number 1.70.605.0

browser version - webkit 533.1

pri version 1.41_002, 1.64_002

prl version - 15027

ERI version - 5

GPS lock slow?

There were some early reports of the problem, the latest software version has materially increased the speed of GPS lockup.

1 - Clear the cache in Maps
2 - Download 'GPS Status' from the market
3 - While in GPS Status, Reset the GPS Data and Download the new information (access both by hitting soft button 'Menu', and choosing 'Tools')
4 - Go into settings, choose 'GPS & Sensors' and select 'Auto-download AGPS Data' and set it to 1 hour (not sure if this even applies to the TBolt, but I did it anyway)
5 - Go into Navigation, set it to Navigate to any address, and wait for it to lock and start giving you turn by turn instructions.

Important note for the secret menus below:

There are 3 menus below... when you exit one of the menus, the system "remembers" what sub-menu you were in, so if you come back into the menu, it might look different than described below, that's because you went straight to the sub-menu you were in last.

Secret menu - interesting, but not really useful

call ##7764726, (##PROGRAM) then hit call.... password is 000000 (6 zeros)

You are now in the "EPST" menu.

NAM - General - shows your phone number and seems to allow you to rename the NAM and Authentication key, I would NOT touch these!

NAM CDMA settings - retrieves a number of CDMA settings

Feature settings -

Voice Privacy - mine is enabled - an extra layer of encryption on the CDMA voice data

Lifetime calls - shows total call time - the only useful thing here

Display Grouping - says "retrieving settings" - mine gets to 36% and locks up the phone - don't waste your time

Phone directory grouping - shows 3 emergency numbers, 1 & 3 are 911, #2 is 112

1xev-do data parameters - looks like the similar to CDMA settings

Another secret menu ##778# - useful

##778# (call)

You will get a menu to View or Edit, select the appropriate one.

Selecting Edit will require a password. password is 000000 (6 zeros)

You are now in the "EPST" menu, but there more items than the above menu.

Display

NAM Settings

CDMA Settinsg

Home SID/HOME NID -

Modem settings -This is the one that can be used to make phone use either the old 3G network, or the eHPRD 3G network, more below.

PRL - shows PRL parameters

Security - looks like some user ID parameters, like email addresses..

Data Parameters - gives you the "Package Dial String" which is set to #777 in my phone

Phone Directory - Sets 3 emergency numbers, and looks like the autodiad name and numbers for the 10 speed dial numbers

M. IP Settings (A whole bunch of them)

I found this menu when I first got the phone. There was no 4g, and the eHPRD network was down.

The eHPRD is the specialized 3G network used only on the Thunderbolt and supports voice and data at the same time and faster 3G/4G switching.

If the eHPRD network is down, then you can set the phone back to using the old 3g network.

Go to modem settings and then Rev A, change it to enabled. You need to remember to hit the menu button and "Commit Modifications" the changes. It will reboot and the problem will be fixed as you will now use the standard Rev A 3G networked used on all other Verizon 3G devices and of course if you have 4G it will use that if its available.

Also, VPN is not working on 4G and eHPRD, so by making this change, I can VPN to my work network. I'm been working with Verizon since the day the phone came out, but no VPN solution on 4G, shame on them.

Another note, when you first set up the phone it automatically provisions this setting based on whether or not eHPRD is available in your area which is why when you hard reset it fixes the problem for people as the phone will then automatically change this setting to Rev A enabled since eHPRD is down.

Another secret menu ##4636## - useful

call *#*#4636#*#* (*#*#INFO#*#*)

you are now in the "Testing" menu.

Phone Information - this is where you can set a number of parameters, including what data protocols the phone uses., you can force to 3G see "making VPN work" below.

Battery Information - Shows the battery status, whether it is charging, health, voltage, temperature, how long since last boot.

Battery History - more detailed usage on the battery, i.e. what has been using the battery, the screen, bluetooth, etc.

Usage Statistics - information on which programs have been using time, how many times they have been launched.

WiFi Information - 3 sub menus with more information and a ping test on one of them.

Making VPN work:

Background:

The Verizon 4G devices have their own private pool of IP addresses, always starting with 10. The 3G devices seem to have a pool of IP addresses starting at 75.

The Verizon system "knows" if you have a 4G or 3G device, so whenever your 4G Thunderbolt connects, it gets an IP address starting with 10 no matter if you connect in 4G, 3G or 1X mode.

The 10.x.x.x network does not support VPN, for some really stupid reason.

But the older 3G network does. 75.x.x.x.

Procedure:

Step 1: Force phone to use old 3G network for 3G data. Use the ##778# EPST menu above. Set the Modem Rev A to enabled (be sure to confirm). This makes it so whenever you are in 3G mode, you are on the "old" network, and your VPN will work.

If you are in a 4G location though, you are stuck, so what you do is set the phone to NOT go to 4G.

Step 2: Force phone into 3G mode. Use the *#*#4636#*#* menu above to force the phone into 3G max. (you might get 1X mode in a bad area, as usual)

Enter the menu, select "Phone Information" (by the way, there is an app called "LTE onoff" that will take you to this menu directly, get it.

Now scroll down, and set the preferred network type:

CDMA auto (PRL) and CDMA only are the ones to force to 3G... I need to determine the difference.

EvDo only does not work for VPN

CDMA + LTE/EvDO auto - this is the normal mode for the phone to get 4G and drop back to 3G when no 4g is available, BUT the 3G dropback won't VPN

LTE mode - 4G only

After selecting, I hit the "refresh button" 3 lines down. That should make the indicator change on the phone. Sometimes it takes a while... and sometimes a reboot helps, or turning wifi on and off.

Now your VPN will work.

Remember, this is not the normal or preferred setting, the default setting is "CDMA + LTE/EvDo auto"

A Different Launcher?

One thing that has made me a bit crazy is when using the TB in landscape mode, the stupid launcher screens stay in portrait mode.

So, trying the ADW launcher out, the icons will rotate to match theTB orientation.

You also want to download an ADW theme, and probably "home switcher" which will let you change between the sense and a different launcher.

Utilities

Nice set of widgets to turn bluetooth, wifi, gps, etc. on off by Curvefish, GPS, Bluetooth, Wifi, and brightness... the brightness is one of the few that will allow you to set auto also, you can change the names on the widgets so when you rotate the screen you can still read them.

Voice dialing

I finally figured it out. It is not a problem with the bluetooth. It is a problem with the phone being setup correctly. I tried Bluetooth's from Motorola, Blue Ant and Jawbone. None of them would come up with the correct phone number when I hit the button on the bluetooth and told it to call such and such.

This is what I did.

Go to Menu, settings, applications, manage applications. Select All. Scroll down to Phone (HTC Corporation), click on Clear data. This will clear out a bunch of stuff in the phones brain. It will not kill applications or other data in the phone, just the cobwebs in the phone system itself.

Then do a restart.

After the restart go to Menu, settings, applications, manage applications. Select All. Scroll down to Bluetooth Share, click on Clear data. This will clear out a bunch of stuff in the bluetooth portion of the phones brain.

After this it started working on the Jawbone ICON. So, I tried by Motorola 710 again and it works also. Now I hit the button on the bluetooth, wait for it to say "Speak now", wait for a second or two, the phone will display listening, then say call such and such on mobile, or at home... Mine works every time now!

Mac syncing:

look at touchdown

good

companion link

there is a product that will sync with microsoft exchange

Accessories

Keyboards: I tried an old bluetooth keyboard, it tried to pair but never worked, I found that you have to make sure you use a keyboard that has a SPP profile, not an HID profile. I found one that works,
Finally got the desk dock, it's great. With the Gingerbread update, now it has a nice home screen that you can show pictures from your gallery. Unfortunately, it zooms the picture you have when in landscape... pictures show properly if you are in protrait, but in landscape, it chops off the top and bottom of your pictures. After a lot of experimentation, if you have a 960 x 540 pixel picture (the size of the screen), then you need an overall size of 1560 x 878 to not see a white border on the bottom of the screen. It still shows less of the picture horizontally though, still figuring out how to tweak. So make a blank picture in photoshop 1560 x 878. Now paste a 960 x 540 picture into it.
Car dock: HTC6400MNT - finally got one, it's easy enough to use (won't work with the extended battery) and sturdy and well made (made by igrip - HR GmbH & Co. KG in Germany). It is supposed to automatically shift to landscape mode and pull up the car menu, but I found that erratic, so I added a shortcut to the screen. Recommended.
Screen protectors: I think the glass is good enough that you can pass on this
Cases:

Browsers

Firefox has a mobile browser, but at this time, the Dolphin HD browser works better, especially with flash, and other plugins. The Firefox browser does support HTML5 as well as the PC version, so I will eventually go there, it's getting better all the time.

Increasing battery life

read this great post: http://www.droidforums.net/forum/htc-thunderbolt/132327-tips-help-improve-battery-life-thunderbolt.html

changing to different launcher...

widgets for gps, bt, etc - ones by curvefish work well...

Droid 1 notes:

secret menu ##7764726 password 6 zeros

Greg's web site!

Main Menu

Who's Online

Don't!

What do all those little pictures mean at the top of the TB (Thunderbolt) screen?

Problems with keeping your data connection

Syncing

Add your password to voice mail settings

Verizon junk I'd like to get rid of

Software & Firmware versions

GPS lock slow?

Important note for the secret menus below:

Secret menu - interesting, but not really useful

Another secret menu ##778# - useful

Another secret menu ##4636## - useful

Making VPN work:

Background:

Procedure:

A Different Launcher?

Utilities

Mac syncing:

Accessories

Browsers

Increasing battery life

Recent additions and updates

Main Menu

Who's Online

Don't!

What do all those little pictures mean at the top of the TB (Thunderbolt) screen?

Problems with keeping your data connection

Syncing

Add your password to voice mail settings

Verizon junk I'd like to get rid of

Software & Firmware versions

GPS lock slow?

Important note for the secret menus below:

Secret menu - interesting, but not really useful

Another secret menu ##778# - useful

Another secret menu *#*#4636#*#* - useful

Making VPN work:

Background:

Procedure:

A Different Launcher?

Utilities

Mac syncing:

Accessories

Browsers

Increasing battery life

Recent additions and updates

Another secret menu ##4636## - useful