Just got my "firmware bitch" V3c...

I finished doing the "impossible": a fully working K1m on Movistar (first on Venezuela, AFAIK), with Java+EvDO data!

Here are my notes about my process:

- There are two Telus updates available: 03.13 and 03.14. Go with the OLDER one, because 03.14 will flash, BUT Java stuff will be unusable because they will hang as soon as you enter those sections (Think of it as a "Java brick"). The app manager freezes, and the MP3 player will freeze the entire phone UI. You only escape in this case is by hitting END/Power (I thinked at first that my K1m was not "Java-capable", after 8 flashes with different monsterpacks: stock Movistar, DST, two Alltel MPs... Finally i discovered that it was Telus 03.14 that was useless)

- Any MotoUI monster pack seems to be suitable for this flash, as long as you update them with Telus 03.13. Hell, if you have a stock, unmodded Latin American (or any MotoUI-based) K1m, you can save some time and go directly with the Telus update! I decided to go with DST instead Telus update will put some stupid branding, but most of it can be unbranded anyway.

- P2K05 seem editor works nicely with my K1m. So forget about the ancient V710 seem editor Same for P2K Commander: 4.9.E is the version that works best with V3m/K1m (V3c users will need to use 3.3.0 or older)

- As for the backups: I did the entire backup set as stated in Mark's guide: instead of PST i used RSD General 5.2.9; my RSD Lite is 3.9.1, my Radiocomm version is 11.7, and my QPST is 2.7b310. There are some things that i skipped because carriers over here don't use them:

* /dmu/10.key (no such file to backup)
* ERI (useless here since all carriers here own their networks and don't do any inter-network roaming)
* PTT (useless, no such service exists here)

However, when restoring...

* I skipped the Radiocomm seem restore process. I only restored my partially-edited 2742 and 275a seems from my Movistar FW. No problems so far... and as a bouns, they already come pretty much unlocked in a stock phone
* I restored my service programming with RSD, then with QPST. The exact order doesn't matter, but if anything goes wrong, restore in this order.
* If you choose to flash from Movistar or Movilnet, there will be some skin mismatching issues: unlike ALL OTHER K1m FLASHES, these come with the original V3c/m skin set (Moto/Scarlet/Techno, and a extra Movistar skin in the former), instead of the K1m set (Alkali/Disco/Glow). This will cause some issues with the Java skins (font/item colors mismatch with the Telus skins). You may want to restore the skins from a V3c Telus filesystem backup in this case, BUT KEEPING THE FOLDER NAMES (Moto skin files go to Alkali, Scarlet goes to Disco, and Techno goes to Glow. The Movistar skin will cause Techno to have no Java skin?). I haven't tested this, since i flashed to DST, and Alkali is a perfect match for my piano black K1m
* No MIP/ERI fixes needed: EvDO data works without no extra effort! Voice/text works without no problems. I haven't tested MMS because here in Venezuela, there are no MMS delivery between different carriers, and i don't have another Movistar phone to test... FYI, there is only one MIP profile Also EvDO is still rock solid after flashing
* Shared secret keys are bogus in LA flashes? My 01d2 seem dump shows "Alltel" in plain text where it should be my HA shared secret (also seen in RSD). Since it's a dump of a perfectly clean Movistar FW... Odd?
* AKEY backup is not needed... because you CAN'T read it from your own phone (unless you pay a CDMA Workshop license). Anyway, like ESNs, monsterpacks don't touch the AKEY, so you're safe. Don't mess with it, OK?

OK, now onto the good, the bad, and the ugly:

The good (AKA: Why i flashed the thing?)

- Java. Do i need to say more? And, no more "Brew Selector Editor" needed!

- HELL GOD, NO MORE STINKIN' "Download Zone"! (AKA "$crew-It-NOW")

- Safe to flash over almost anything that does not say "Verizon"

- Very litte branding

- My Movilnet V3m "unbranded" mma_ucp works fine there (after some minor edits to rename the BREW menu entry)

- Opera Mini rocks over EvDO

- The MP3 player, albeit criticized by many, has a MUCH BETTER UI than standard Moto MP3 player. It's well organizated, it's faster to navigate, has more stuff to manage your songs, and it even shows cover art in the outer LCD Also, the song filename length limit is no longer there! Of course that a K1m will never be an iPhone (yuck!), but at least, Telus did a good job there.

The bad (AKA: Why i would want to go back to my original FW?)

- No Spanish: only English and Canadian French. This totally suckx. Hey, Telus, so Latinos have no right to use their nice canadian phones, eh? Should i ever move to Canada, i will avoid them

- Telus MP3 player is ANNOYING SLOW to load: up to 1 minute, compared to near-instant launch time for the Moto MP3 player. IT's also sloooow to scan for songs in your memory card (my 200-song collection took 30 seconds on Moto MP3 player, and TWO FULL MINUTES in Telus! At least it gives a "Estimated Time to finish" display...)

- Telus MP3 player is also not skinnable... unless if you count the softbutton labels, that take the skin from the active Java skin. Telus "barney purple" just SUCKS.

- Again, the Telus MP3 player drains battery faster because it NEVER shuts down the display, only the backlight, no matter how much is your display timeout. Again, i do long weekly trips in busses, and this is NOT good if you must waste 6 hours in each trip. Sum that to the fact that all RAZRs (and some other Moto flip phones) don't shutdown the main LCD when you close the flip (design bug?) until the display timeout elapses, when it shutdowns BOTH LCDs.

- USB Mass Storage Mode no longer works: the menu option is still there, but it does nothing: the phone only works as a modem when plugged to a PC. And no, AT+MODE=24 does nothing (at least in Windows)

The Ugly (AKA: Why Motorola firmwares sux)

- Setting custom ringtones can be quite difficult. I still use the "rename MP3s to QCPs" to avoid getting my ringtones listed in the MP3 player (it's not funny to listen Hello Moto just after the last MTV hit, and while i love my ringtones, they're just that... RING-TONES!), however, they don't get listed in the ringtones list when you try to pick one. The "fix" involves a seem edit to enable the "Apply as Ringtone" (already present in my Movistar 2742 seem). Go to the Sounds folder, apply as ringtone each file that you want to get listed, and then, go and fix your ringtones in your active sound scheme

- Why Openwave don't use the splash screen in Telus firmwares? Seem edit needed?

- How the heck i can get rid of that "Telus Musique sans fil" MP3 player splash screen? It's nice, but i'm on Movistar

- I can no longer see my active SID (i don't care that on Movilnet, but Movistar still uses a LOT of SIDs, from their ancient Bellsouth days, when they charged $$$$ by national roaming). Instead, i just see "Registered on TELUS", inside Network Settings

- I hate touch-sensitive keys... If you're playing music in your K1m and close the flip, it's annoying when, by picking up the phone, your handpalm contacts the media keys... and you know the rest. So, handle with care (this is why i prefer my V3m)

- BREW is mostly a fiasco in Latin America. Movistar already no longer provides BREW for CDMA users (only Moto phones still have their branded "Download Zone", all other CDMA phones don't even have Java, unlike their GSM handsets), and while Movilnet is still pushing BREW even in their lowest-end phones, they are now rolling out GSM handsets too... also with Java. NOBODY wants over-priced apps. Sooooo... PLEASE, MOTOROLA, unleash those DST Java Latin American monsterpacks!

- Some Java MIDlets don't run, instead they just hang the installer (example: MeBoy, a Gameboy emulator). Some others do run, but with messed up keys (example: NYC Urban Golf, where the menus are almost unusable with the D-pad/softkeys).

Final result: Latin American K1m + Telus Java = the perfect Moto CDMA handset. Stay tuned for more experiments with this litte, cute K1m

A few notes after 1 week of flashing my K1m...

- Testing data has been a nightmare, but not because of the flash, it's just that Movistar 1x/EvDO data plain sucks (remember that they're killing CDMA over LA because of their even crappier GSM rollout). However, Opera Mini connects a bit better than Openwave (and yes, Movistar WAP proxy is also pure crap)

- Same for streaming video: i've tried to watch Movistar live TV channels, and although the MVOD video player launches, it's unable to connect to the streams. Well, it also failed in the original Movistar FW, so... Need to try YouTube there

- The "display always on" issue is common for all Java apps, not only for the Telus MP3 player.

- There is no fix for the missing USB Mass Storage support on the Telus flash

- I didn't performed the online ESN switch (no such service in our carriers) / airplane mode stuff when flashing. I just flashed the damn thing! Fortunately, nothing was broken after restoring the service programming

- OTA programming (*228) is totally useless in Venezuela. Only Movilnet uses it for ACTIVATE SPANKIN' NEW PHONES (*22801). Dialling *22801 in a Movistar yields funny results: it will connect to the Movilnet network So, don't worry, you will not hose your phone if you try it here.

- As for the messed-up keys in your Java apps: They're because every phone brand and JVM implementation have different keymaps. Unfortunately, Telus and Bell phones (using Esmertec's Jbed emulator) have a quite different keymap that almost no MIDlet recognize You have three options:

* Get Java Adapter for Mobile (JAM), load a K1m keymap profile (find it @ HoFo, or find a MIDlet called "keycodes" to get these on your own), and hope that it does not screw-up your MIDlet. For me, this has ALWAYS failed (either it does not fix nothing, or it fuxxors the MIDlet with "class not found" exceptions)

* If the MIDlet is open-source, and if you know Java... grab NetBeans, hack the app there (again, you do need your key codes, see first option), recompile it, and see if it works I had to do it once, for a Japanese dictionary called "Suiteki".

* Bug the app author to get a fixed version Don't forget to send the keycodes!

- It's just me, or the ringtones are not so loud in the Telus flash?

- After loading my Movistar seem 275a, now Openwave always ask me permission to launch it ("Additional call charges may apply"). How can i get rid of this stupid warning without having to go back to stock Telus 275a seem?

- Bluetooth OBEX works (both FTP and OPP). Haven't tried Bluetooth headsets yet...

- Anyone knows if 2GB TF cards do work in this FW? Or we're still limited to lame 1GB cards, like the V3m?

- Ah, i forgot this litte but important note: I did all flashing/hacking under WinXP SP3, both Home and Professional, both pirate and original licenses

Despite the minor issues, i'm loving it

Now, i'm wanting to flash again that old "AKEY-b0rked" V3c... I have some new ideas, after reading a gazillon of posts at HoFo...

- Since we can flash V3c FWs on V3m's, it's safe to crossflash a V3c with V3m monsterpacks? In Mobile-Files, i've read that it can be done with MetroPCS phones without problems... and as a bonus, phones are more stable when "upgraded".

- I REALLY, REALLY want to play with Sprint flashes... Yes, i know the dangers (high bricking risks, no data at all if even you get a successful flash), but i want to try something new. Also, their Java specs are much better than Telus/Jbed FWs. Also, who knows if we can get data working in our carriers? It's a really, really tempting experiment

- And, just for fun... i also want to try a Verizon flash, to see how much their UI sucks

Stay tuned for more...

I know, but... even if i set a backlight timeout, it only shuts down the BACKLIGHT, not the LCD display

Well, at least i didn't get a brick, so it should be safe. Anyway, i will try putting back my Telus 275a seem, and starting to hack it (there are some Moto flash tech docs for the L7c/E816 flashes that give a good layout of this seem, so...)

I don't care much about data right now (at least with my spares, i will most likely never flash my main V3m)... It's more a "proof-of-concept" about what can be done with this flash. Sprint is most like "uncharted waters"...

It depends on how the app does process the input. Very basic apps do rely on native UI components, so input is not an issue here (try compiling any of the NetBeans samples, for example). More advanced apps provide their own UI components, and do recognize a wide array of layouts, but since Jbed's JVM is so uncommon... Blame the app coders and CDMA carriers for not doing their correct development job.

Cool, i can get dirt cheap TF cards over here. I will pick one, to try and see...

You would gain a nice MP3 player, and a (slighty) more stable software

Expect some news from me in the upcoming days...

Remember that some people told me that "AVOID FLASHING TO SPRINT"? Well, curiousity killed the cat

Just kidding, i didn't bricked any phone today, but i DID flashed to Sprint... i flashed my botched-AKEY V3c with a couple of V3m monsterpacks: the latest generic (DST 01.1E.00R), and a old Sprint (00.43.00R).

About the Generic firmware...

- it DOES NOT include the MP3 player, so if you want it, avoid DST and stick to Vivo (or try with Movistar or Movilnet... the nearest thing to DST is Movilnet, because it has litte branding, and no gay iconpacks, while retaining the useful BREW MP3 player)

- it works nicely on a V3c with no hacks needed

- it does detect a "ghost" TF card... There is a seem edit to disable storage device switching, but still...

It's boring, it does not work as a base for Java, but V3m DST just works on a V3c, if you want to try "the latest of the latest" But since IS BOOOORING, i did something more risky: flash from it to Sprint. I picked the older 00.43 FW, since i've read about 00.48 problems when flashing away from it. Switching from bootloader 108(Alltel_V3c) -> 10B(DST_V3m) -> 006(Sprint_V3m)...

The flash was sucessful, and i was greeted with a yellow-ish Sprint UI, a bastard mix of Verizon and Motorola UI. Not bad, but MotoUI is clearly the best. And now, my impressions:

- As expected, data is NOT working and will NEVER work on this FW (even if i fix my AKEY issue...). Each single time that i try to enter the browser, the music player, or some other multimedia features, the phone will prompt me to "initialize Power Vision"... and it stays there for a long minute, when it times out and it says "sorry, no data for you". It's more like those Japanese cellphones ("keitai"), where the multimedia features are tied to the carriers, and can be used only with their service (even if you "unlock" the handset to use with foreign SIM cards...)

- The UI seems to not be skinnable? Help here, plz...

- JAVA IS DAMN FAST. PERIOD. Telus/Bell Jbed "emulator" is a huge piece of crap compared with this. i can finally run a Gameboy emulator on a CDMA RAZR with a playable framerate

- Talking about Java, you will need ANOTHER JAM key profile if you want to adapt key mappings on your MIDlets. I need to find a keycode dumper that runs on Sprint V3m FWs, because the one that i had even refuses to install.

- Bluetooth is crippled in a rather odd way: OBEX Object Push is blocked (trying to send files between this phone and my V3m/K1m results in errors), but OBEX FTP works without problems.

- Camera is annoyingly SLOOOOOW, and the image quality is rather low, when compared with other firmwares. If you love your RAZR camera, avoid flashing to Sprint at all costs.

- Haven't tried flashing away yet... but i will not bother for now.

I'm sooo bored that i may even try flashing that sucker to Verizon Nah, just kidding... or not?

First off I'd like to say thank you for blogging your adventure here. The entire RAZR/SLVR community at large has really been working hard to make these J2ME conversions easy, and as techies we all fail miserably at explaining things simply.

While grumbling through Google's cache of slow-to-live HoFo threads I found this gem:
http://www.howardforums.com/showthread.php?t=1402639
Postings:
ljordan 01-09-2009 20:47
GoldMembr 01-10-2009 16:51

The Telus 03.14.00 flash is only part of the problem. The real problem comes in when you upload the jbed files. BitPim and P2K Commander create the file system differently, that's why some folders show up in one and not the other. The simple answer?

Use P2K Commander to create these folders:
/a/motorola/shared/jbed/
/a/motorola/shared/jbed/skins/
/a/motorola/shared/jbed/skins/Alkali
/a/motorola/shared/jbed/skins/Disco
/a/motorola/shared/jbed/skins/Glow
(Include any other skin directories you may be using)

Upload the appropriate files into at least the skins. Change the permissions of every file and folder to 0005. Restart and enjoy.

There may be a purpose to uploading the jbed files, but I haven't found the need yet. What it all comes down to is that the files are there, but some software couldn't see it. We should do research into the differences in the files written, hopefully come up with something universal. But I digress.

It works, I'm using it, data and all. I'm going to do a little more reading on your problem here. Sprint records their ESNs, so getting data will require either service or free wap. Point is I've killed that service message on a Palm Treo without service before, but it was 2-3 years ago and I wrote down nothing. I promise nothing, but I'm willing to help.

A small wave again to the community. I've lurked for about 5 years, and I've tore up me some Moto SLVRs and RAZRs. I have dominated Palm Treos. Fun Fun.

Edit: For accuracy: I actually did this on a Moto SLVR L7C.