My one week old 2215 is experiencing the following problems:
- Can NOT wake itself up for scheduled backups, or for alarms. Instead, these happen when the unit is powered on after the scheduled time has past.
- Often the unit immediately (3-5 seconds) powers off after a manual power on
These problems are especially bad when they all happen at once, e.g.: backup scheduled for 3AM, meeting reminder set for 7:30AM, 2215 manually turned on at 8AM during said meeting to take some notes, whereon it immediately sounds the alarm, initiates a backup, and powers down -- only to display a completely garbled screen on power-up, thus requiring a reset. Note that these antics DO NOT LOOK GOOD TO OTHERS PRESENT AT THE MEETING.....
This is my first HP product, and I am a bit dismayed to find that I can't seem to find out how to get waranty service. (Also included in the 2215 packaging was a pitch for "care pack" coverage, but I haven't been able to find out how to sign up for those deals, either.)
I also understand from reading other internet sites that these problems are fairly common with the 2215 -- but is there a solution????!
Any advice/pointers/fixes/SOLUTIONS *greatly* appreciated!
Thanks,
-frank
Note: If you are the author of this question and wish to assign points to any of the answers, please login first.For more information on assigning points ,click
here
I understand your frustration Frank. This is the third iPAQ that I've purchased, and still own. Starting with the 3870 I experienced the intermittent failures with alarm waking the unit up. It continued with the 5450 unit, and I was really hoping it was resolved in the newest version, my new 2215.
I had hoped the new version of the operating system would correct the issues, but like you, I am quite disappointed these issues still exist.
Probably should have returned the new one, but I like it's form factor so much.
The only solution that has ever been presented to try and address the alarm failure is to go into the clock settings and change the time zone to something else, hit okay, then change it back to what it was, hit okay. That seems to reset something with the alarm-keeping system and can often provide some temporary resolution...but it will come back.
My new 2215 has the "feature" of spontanious starting a dial up connection with my mobile phone?!
And I'd like to get rid of the horizontal scroll bar in PIE, but that's probably a Microsoft thing. I tried the "fit to screen" setting, but that gives problem when reloading the page (automatically shrinks a Flash movie).
Well, in the hour since I posted my troubles here, my 2215 has learned a new bad trick: as with the previous reply, my 2215 now wants to connect to *something* every half hour or so. As I don't have any connections set up, the result is that it keeps popping up a dialog to the effect of "no connections defined, and no modem found"....... This is supremely anoying, to say the least.
I don't mind when new technology has a few bugs, I pretty much expect it. BUT, the bugs shouldn't be glaringly obvious problems that cause major headaches -- they should be hard to find obscure issues that are very difficult to reproduce!!! ESPECIALLY in a device aimed at CONSUMERS! (Note to HP QA people: think, "would my mom use something like this?")
Another one with regular unwanted attempts to connect. Wondering what this does to battery life as it appears to fall quickly even when Ipaq not in use.
Also got the 'will not switch on without soft reset' problem if left off for a while.
I have the 2215 as well and so far have not had the problems described above. I have not tried to do scheduled backups however. One problem I have had was not being able to get a Blue Tooth USB key to communicate with the 2215. I tried for several hours. I boiled it down to an imcompatability with the Blue Tooth device and Pocket PC 2003.
A little over a week on a 2215 with the following observations in case they help.
I am currently not using bluetooth or any other wireless sync. Also, I have not configured any scheduled backups.
Alarms (notifications) work as I expect, that is, if the unit is off, it powers up and gives off the alarm signal. So your issues may be related to the combined configuration of notifications & backup. (I agree its perfectly reasonable to expect and use these together, just offering my experience FWIW). I find it a challenge to easily navigate the myriad of configuration options to know that there is not some option you must enable to have the unit power on for these.
Regarding the other reply that mentioned the unit trying to establish a connection every 30 minutes, I had a similar experience (on a shorter 5 minute time period), which I tracked down to an option setting in synchronize. There is a setting for wireless synchronization (a "mobility" tab in the menu) where you set the time period (i.e. 30 minutes, 5 minutes, etc.), and a button in the regular options screen that says "in peak times, use the mobility setting". When this box was checked, it then tried to sync every 5 minutes (the setting I had entered), and trying to establish the connection was associated with that.
Anyway, I'm reasonably satisfied so far, a few quirks I'm still trying to learn or work through.
My problems with the 2215 are similar but different. My 2215 will lockup and require a soft reset to be able to turn it off or continue using it. Conversely, other times it will not turn on when I push the power button and in that case it also requires a soft reset to re-enable the power button.
It also does not always power on when an alarm goes off. I can hear the alarm, but I have to manually turn on the unit to see what the alarm is for.
After talking to Tech Support, I did a "hard reset" and did not reinstall any 3rd party software. The same problems came back. I returned my original 2215 to Office Depot for a new 2215. Thought that solved the problem, but I'm having the same problems with the replacement.
I guess I'll return this one to the factory for a no charge fix. Their policy is really good. HP will send you a mailer to return the unit and will send it back after service - all at no charge.
One last thought to tech types who might understand this better than me. The ROM version of my slightly older h1910 is 1.07 and yet the ROM version of my brand new h2215 is 1.00! Could this older ROM with the newer O/S be the cause of some of the problems.
Frank and all,
I found this on another forum. Apparently, there's a bug in the interaction of timed backups and alarms that causes two different problems: First, alarms may not sound because the iPAQ shuts itself off before it can happen. Second, it will sometimes power itself down 10 seconds after you power it on.
The work-around to the problem is [sigh] not to use the timed backup or battery monitor feature on the iPAQ backup software until HP fixes it. (see the attachement for the specific options I'm referring to)
Use Google to translate it if you don't read Deutsche.
Essentially, the DB_notify_events database (which, incidentally, stores alarm-type events) is incorrectly extended by a few duplicate entries every time you do a soft-reset (!!!) Not only do these duplicate entries take up space, they also cause problems down the line. After about 30 soft-resets, it may take up to a minute to re-boot the iPAQ and it might hang entirely. After about 50 soft-resets, ActiveSync may cease to function.
The solution (for now) is to download this little (6.5MB) utility which will erase those erroneous entries every time you do a reset. Download the file and place it in the /Windows/autostart folder on your iPAQ. It does it's job very quickly. You'll probably not notice it's there except it will prevent the above disasters.
Hopefully, now that HP is aware of the problem (not through this forum, mind you. I've sent a note to HP directly), they'll be able to issue an official patch and work this (and the Sprite Software patch) into an upcoming ROM update.
Funny you'd go to Dell... Yeeccchh, they've never been more than a name brand clone company in my opinion, and lack the real depth that HP or Compaq can provide if you pay attention and ensure you're talking to the right support people.
I love the H2210 and think it's a fabulous product. Haven't had any issues with it.
To those who's iPAQ intermittently says cannot make Internet connection, I'd like to share my experience. My iPAQ 2210 used to do that also, it then turned out to be due to my inbox's attempt to check/retrieve mails after I configured a POP account in inbox. If you do have POP account set up in inbox, perhaps disabling the periodic mail check can stop the automatic connection attempt. Hope that helps.
Printable version
;)