[8525, TyTN, MDA Vario II, JasJam General] yewl_do:
WM5 downgrade did not resolve front buttons problems

I have had the same problem for quite a while now. I upgraded from the official WM5 that came with the TyTN to the official WM6. After a while the buttons on the front started to be intermittent. As well as the memory card "disappearing" and QWERTY keyword randomly dying (resulting in display fixed to landscape mode), both resulted in a hard reset to resolve. Anyway, to cut a long story short I contacted HTC who said they would repair the problems under warranty (as it was still in warranty) but due to my very misfortune the device suffered liquid ingress THE DAY BEFORE I SENT IT OFF!!! Thereby voiding the warranty (as notified by HTC after inspecting the device).

So, I would have to sort this out myself. I tried various unofficial ROMs, all of which work "for a while" (maybe a day or two) and then go back to being intermittent, and then not working completely. I have also used a WM6.1 ROM which seemed to work for a lot longer, but then stopped working just like the rest.

As of today I finally downgraded from WM6.1 as I was reluctant to do so before as I love some of the new features of WM6.1. But I took the plunge to see if it would resolve the button problem, as it was becoming a pain not having those buttons working. And the answer is........NO! After just a few minutes of me setting the device up the buttons ceased working.

I find the problem quite strange. I am a computer professional with an electronics background, and I am not convinced the problem is either software or hardware related (i.e. I am not convinced which is the problem). I have dismantled the phone on two occasions and all connections are connected perfectly. I have changed the ROM numerous times and tried different version of WM but all to no avail. One of HTC's solutions is to check whether a button is stuck, but all buttons are fine.

I have recently purchased Tomb Raider for Pocket PC, and within that game I have on numerous occasions "lost" the front buttons (on the occasions that the buttons were working). I happen to play about with other buttons, and after pressing the Comm Manager button all the front buttons returned to working order (but then they would stop working again shortly after). I tried this numerous times in Windows Mobile (6.1) when the buttons ceased working and it did not resolve the problem, however it still does in Tomb Raider.

After downgrading to WM5 I have noticed that with every power on and power off all the buttons and lights works correctly (in WM6.x if the buttons had ceased working then the lights would remain on even when in standby). So, it would appear in WM5 you can restore the buttons functionality by pressing the standby button twice (once to turn it off and once to turn it back on).

So, I am puzzled. Is it hardware or is it software? Any ideas? Is it a driver issue? Is it not informing a chip somewhere to power up the buttons? Is it a loose connection? Who knows? HTC certainly will not tell me (obvisouly because they want me to pay for them to repair it).

So, any ideas?

Adam

BTW the memory card problem and QWERTY keyboard problem were resolved by using an unofficial ROM.