I had been looking to make the jump to a smartphone. My
previous phone, my trusty, battle-worn QWERTY LG enV VX9900 was great, beacuse
all I really used it for was texting and making calls; however, I wanted to
also be able to write and check emails, access my Twitter and, if necessary,
look up stuff on Wikipedia and have access to Google for regular searches.
Unfortunately, due to the crushing cost of Verizon's data plan, I was unable to
justify the cost of doing so, and stuck with their regular text plan, thank you
very much.
Finally, though, my contract with Verizon was up, so I went
searching for a reasonably-priced QWERTY phone on which I could install apps,
check email, sync m calendar, etc., etc. Through my searches I discovered that
Nokia made a number of phones that fit my criteria perfectly, most notably the
e71 and the e75. Both are gorgeous monuments of engineering, but unfortunately
the cost of the handsets was prohibitive at best. I snooped around for another
few months but nothing really exciting came down the pipe (although HTC's Touch
Pro 2 proved to be equally beautiful and useful) - that is, until AT&T
offered a branded, locked-down version of the previously
internationall-unlocked e71, their e71x. The e71x looks like a jet-black,
polished version of the silver-and-gray e71, the only visible difference being
a tiny AT&T logo on the stainless-steel body. That, however, is only the
beginning of how different those phones are.
I went down to my local big-box electronics retailer and
picked up the e71x on sale with my new AT&T plan. The reason I was
attracted to this phone was because it claimed to be abel to sync up with Gmail
and the Google calendar and contacts without problems. However, these claims
were made with the e71, not the e71x. I'd soon find out exactly what that
meant.
After the guys at the big-box store got my contacts shifted
over from the old phone to the new phone (a service I'm infinitely grateful
exists), I brought the phone home and started the process for getting the email
systems synced up. It had been recommended to me to skip the AT&T
XpressMail and Microsoft Exchange setups in favor of Nokia's own Messenger
software, which indeed seamlessly synced up with my Gmail. However, that's
about as far as I got.
The con to the seamless pro was that I could see the mails
in my inbox, and reply to them, but I could not access my contacts to write a
totally new email. This, as you can imagine, was frustrating to say the least.
Additionally, I hadn't yet found ANY way to synchronize the calendar, despite
visiting many Nokia- and AT&T-friendly forums.
Admittedly I made some halfhearted attempts to set up
XpressMail, following the advice of one of the guys at my local AT&T store,
but that led to a mysterious problem of ghost inboxes shownig up with nothing
in them for email accounts that didn't exist. I also made forays into setting
up the Exchange server software but I very quickly found myself in over my
head, trying to answer questions that didn't appear on any page of the manual.
So I was left with a system of "try a new app, find it
doesn't work, and hard-reset (format) the phone." I repeated this about
four times before I finally grew frustrated enough to throw out a blind query
for help on my Google Reader account. Lo and behold, the answer came from my new
friend Nancy
(@nancy_martira), who happened to know someone who worked for the Nokia
corporation. She was able to get me in touch with someone who knows what
they're talking about, and I was able to figure out about 95% of my problems.
What follows is a paraphrased conversation we had, with my obvious technical
deficiencies elided for reasons of saving face.
"Keeping in mind the ultimate goal of having my
complete Google suite (email, contacts, calendar) synced to my phone, I need to
have certain pieces of software installed on my phone so that the local server
protocol (be they POP3 or IMAP; this problem appears to exist for both) can
push the information to my phone and vice versa.
"The major program I tried to use is Google Sync,
naturally. This was a
program created for the Symbian60 (s60) operating system build 3.1. Google Sync
works by talking to another piece of software, written by Nokia, called Mail
for Exchange (abbreviated MfE or sometimes M4E) - note
that this is actually linked off Google's website as a necessary step in
installing their software.
The problem here is that when AT&T locked the phone, the
OS jumped from build 3.1 (for the unlocked e71) to build 3.2 (for the e71x).
Unfortunately something was lost in the transition and when I try to install
the base Nokia MfE software (admittedly labeled quite clearly as for the e71
non-x) it plainly says in an error message on my Nokia's screen that the
software is not compatible with the device. This is after I had done a complete
hard reset and rendered the machine as new as it came out of the box.
Using other third-party applications runs into the same
problem; another popular program, Nuevasync, runs on that same server software
as Google Sync and I get nowhere installing it.
"Of course, I have tried taking a different approach
entirely with a different protocol. I've downloaded and installed Nokia's own
email software, named simply Nokia Messaging (keeping in mind that again this
was designed for e71 non-x) - this installs perfectly and works GREAT for
replying to e-mails already in my inbox, but for some reason it categorically
refuses to display my contacts! Unfortunately this means that I can't write a
fresh email to anyone who doesn't have an email sitting in my inbox."
I also go into detail about my inabilities to sync my
calendar, etc. I honestly sent out this email without any great hope of getting
useful information, or any information of any kind, actually, in reply.
Instead, I got a whopping 2,000-word response for a guy named Dustin. Again,
shortened, abridged and paraphrased, here's the helpful response:
"The E71x comes ready to use Mail for Exchange with no
external download. It can access the web from the device and install the
correct version. All that you need to do is start the Email Settings Wizard by
pressing Menu > Messaging > Set up Em. When the wizard opens press Start
> Mail for Exch. Then enter your Google Account as follows:
Email Address:
Password:
Username:
Domain:
Mail for Exchange server name: m.google.com"
(Here, I had already found one thing I had been doing wrong,
as in my previous attempts to set up an email system, I hadn't known what to
enter for the Domain or Mail for Exchange Server blanks.)
"After you enter this information the device will
connect to the Internet and download the correct version of Mail for Exchange
that works with the Nokia E71x. Download and install. The version shown should
be 2.09(158).
"By default only your Email will be synchronized. Since
this is not supported by Google we need to change this. Press Options> Edit
Profile to change these settings. Open Connection and verify the following
settings are selected:
Exchange Server: m.google.com
Secure Connection: Yes
Access Point: If you have the unlimited data plan you should
select Internet.
Sync while roaming: Default is Yes, always but this is a
decision that you choose.
Use default port: Yes."
(Now, here's the really interesting part. Their exchange
server software isn't totally compatible with Google's Gmail system, so really
we're just doing all this to get the calendar synced up. This follows.)
"Synchronize Calendar: Yes.
Sync calendar back: I strongly suggest not doing All
entries. This takes up space and execution memory and can result is poorer than
expected performance of the device.
Initial Sync: Delete items on phone.
Synchronize tasks: No (Not currently supported by Google)
Synchronize contacts: your choice"
(I tried contact sync but it didn't work as I had
anticipated, and after hard-resetting and going through this process again, I
opted to not use it. More on that later.)
"Initial sync: same as calendar setting
Synchronize Email: No (Not currently supported by Google)
"If you are set up to be Always Online, the device will
begin it’s sync run with the next change that arrives. If you want to
synchronize everything now, which is likely the case, simply scroll to Current
Status and press the center select key, then Yes to begin synchronization. This
should get you up and running with your contacts and calendar."
So, after that gargantual email I was able to finally get my
calendar synced up. It's not that I'm necessarily a busy guy, but I like to be
able to carry my calendar with me so I can add things as they pop up.
Moving on, I discovered that the order in which I did things
affected their operating abilities greatly. The four major things I needed to
do were:
1) install my phone contacts
2) sync calendar
3) Install Nokia email for my Gmail-checking needs
4) configure phone
Ideally one could install all of these individually at any
point, but unfortunately there were several instances of phantom Inboxes
showing up, so I had to go through a nine-hour-long trial-and-error gauntlet to
see what would work. What I found to work best was:
1) Go through the above steps and sync the calendar FIRST.
If this is successful, then you can move on.
2) Install phone contacts. I did this using data backed up
from my original phone though a program called Nokia PC suite. WARNING - do NOT
use PC Suite to sync your calendar or emails or anything else except
applications that have nothing to do with the calendar, and contacts. Otherwise
information can be duplicated or corrupted, etc.
3) Once you're successful with that, the rest is easy. You
can throw Nokia Messenger on there for Gmail syncing (still no Gmail contacts,
oddly enough), and other applications (I have a few on there, like a Twitter
app and a 3rd-party web browser, etc.).
In closing, I am definitely impressed with Nokia's customer
service; however, the guy helping me seemed greatly surprised when I suggested
that all these sync necessities (Google Calendar, Google Contacts, Gmail
itself) be in ONE software suite. He said he'd pass the idea on, since there
was interest.
Engineers. Hah.
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