[myTouch 4G General] tmagritte:
You could try T-Mobile but when I did that (I live in Toronto) they said they won't do warranty exchange for non-T-Mobile customers. I had been told by the person who sold it to me that they would do exchanges but only ship to American addresses. However, T-Mobile told me that that is not the case and unless you have an account with them they won't honour any warranties. They told me if I have a problem with the phone I need to contact the manufacturer for warranty service: HTC.

I had a long and sordid exchange with HTC (don't know if I posted on this thread or another one) but basically it ended up with them telling me that they are aware of the screen issue but that it is just that some screens come from a different supplier but are up to spec and not considered defective (therefore not eligible for warranty repair) and also that if you are not the original owner of the device the warranty is void anyway. This was someone from corporate who had the attitude that I was trying to scam them from the start, though, so your experience may differ. I did, in fact, later speak with someone else regarding repair for a different issue and they gave me an RMA without issue. I had a chance to try another unit, though, and it turned out that the issue seems to affect all units so there was no point in sending the phone in except to hope they replace the screen. I did report the screen as another issue when they set up the RMA but was told they would replace the screen "if they deemed it was defective".

In either case, HTC won't send out an advance replacement the way T-Mobile will, so you will have to ship the phone to them, pay shipping to them and a customs/duty fee for the return and be without the phone for 10-15 days (if I recall correctly). And then it still seems like a gamble as to whether they decide to replace the screen or not.

Can't hurt to call HTC anyway. They generally are very nice and polite and fairly helpful. I'd recommend not admitting you purchased the phone form a non-authorized source (I don't much like to lie, but in this case you may be better of saying it was a gift and you're the original owner just to be safe). If you can get someone who's aware of the screen issue and tell you they'll replace it through repair it may be worthwhile, with the caveat you'll probably be spending somewhere between 30-50 dollars for shipping and at least 2 weeks without the phone.

As an addendum, every time I contacted HTC I got an email asking to fill out a survey. I did decide to fill one out after my poor encounter with corporate and left a rather scathing report. About a week or so later I got an unsolicited call from HTC, having read my account in the survey and committed to try and resolve the situation to my satisfaction. At that point I had already sold the phone out of frustration, so there wasn't really anything I could ask him for, but I'm sure if I still had the phone and asked for a replacement they would have obliged. For what it's worth I was pretty impressed that they'd respond personally to a survey form. They really do seem to take their customer service very seriously and that did resolve the bad feelings I had had about them. I ended up buying another MyTouch 4G (with a good screen). I had looked at some other phones and was leaning towards a Samsung Vibrant but after seeking one in person, I found the screen colours way too oversaturated. The black level and viewing angles were unbelievably good (they put even the good MyTouch screen to shame) but the colours just looked over the top to me. I can see how some would like that (just like some people prefer the "vibrant" setting on their TVs) but it's not for me. There just didn't seem to be any other phones in the same class as the Vibrant or MyTouch 4G so I ended up going for another MyTouch 4G.

Also to note, the better screen IS considerably better in terms of contrast at off angle, but it's not as good as an AMOLED. There's still some colour shifting and the background still shows backlight bleed and is particularly susceptible to colour shift. Where it's much better is that the foreground colour doesn't shift so much or so quickly fade out (especially white and bright colours) the way it does with the poor display. It's particularly visible when looking off-centre from the top - looks decent on the good display, quickly turns pretty much all white on the poor display.