[8125, K-JAM, P4300, MDA Vario General] J-Mac:
I have a new (four days old) Cingular 8125, and it got a bit antsy on me today.

After working flawlessly for three days, I was installing some applications on a new 1 GB mini SD card, soft resetting after each installation, when it returned after a soft reset and suddenly had no phone network. No "E" indicator, and an exclamation point next to the signal strength indicator. Uh-oh, thought I, before I broke down and cried! OK - not really, but I definitely wasn't happy about this!

When I checked the network settings, it said No Network under the GPRS setting. I called Cingular, spoke with a data rep, and performed a hard reset. (Had to use the "Clear Storage" app - holding the keys and soft reset wouldn't work). As soon as it returned from the hard reset, the Cingular software the rep had pushed out to me installed and phone service was restored. Which is a good thing!

But now I can no longer sync the device via Activesync 4.1. Nor can I install any applications; when I try, I get a dialog saying that the installation was unsuccessful. Windows installer or CAB installation, makes no difference. I can't successfully install anything on the device. I had scrubbed the mini SD card, except for a few folders filled with icons for use mostly in Pocket Informant and PocketBreeze. I figured that it couldn't hurt to leave them there. I also can no longer delete files or folders from the device. It's similar to not having Administrator rights on a Windows XP machine. As if everything is read-only, but I cannot change it.

I copied Smartkey over to the mini SD card via Explorer in Activesync, but whenever I reset the device I get a dialog saying that Smartkey cannot run, unknown developer, etc. I can't close the dialog right away, but it does disappear after about 30 seconds. If I open File Explorer and tap on the smartkey.exe file it does start and work normally - until the next time I soft reset.

Activesync will connect with the device but will not sync. Throws the attached error message. So I can explore the device but not sync. I tried deleting the partnership, performing a "repair installation" of AS 4.1 - no change.

As for the applications I had installed prior to all of this, they all seem to be benign - with two possible exceptions.

In Main Memory:

Pocket Informant

PocketBreeze

ContactBreeze

iLauncher

On the mini SD:

Resco File Explorer 2005

PDAMill's Gamebox Solitaire, Gems, and Classic

Dinarsoft's HandySwitcher and HandyMenu

Phatnotes 4.7

ListPro 4

Tweaks2k2

Resco Sudoku

Resco Keyboard Pro

All versions that claim to support WM5. All applications seemed to be working fine, with the exception of Resco Sudoku and Resco Keyboard Pro. The only change I had made with Tweaks2k2 was showing the time and date in the taskbar. Resco Sudoku locked the device up, with just a black background and 13 large colored orbs on the screen. I uninstalled it immediately. Resco Keyboard kept giving error messages when I tried to select it as the SIP. I had just uninstalled Resco Keyboard and performed a soft reset when it returned from that reset it had no phone network. Note that all of these applications had been working fine up until this point in time, except Resco Sudoku and the Resco Keyboard Pro. Hmm... Needless to say, I suspect that the Resco apps have a problem with WM5. But I owuld think that a hard reset should have cleared up anything those apps had done. Maybe not, though.

Anyway, that's when I called Cingular. Does anyone have any idea at all as to what could be causing all of this? Or better yet, what could fix this? Please!!

I'm very familiar and comfortable in WM2003/SE, but I'm completely new to WM5, so I'm not even sure where to look for troubleshooting.

Thanks in advance for any advice!

EDIT: Really sorry the thumbnail is so small - I didn't think that it would be, Click on it to read it. Thanks again.

EDIT: Error should read: 0x8000ffff Sorry about that.