Comments on: Service in the USA – Nokia Software Update

By: Petey

Petey — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 16:46:48 +0000

It is now July 2009, will Nokia ever release the v31 firmware update to its n95-3 NAM users? We’re still stuck with version v20.2.011.

By: Hemal

Hemal — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 15:33:07 +0000

Sir/Madem,
I am united citizen write now out of usa . i need my cell phone unlock .Where i have to contect .

I am in India .

By: Amy Gahran

Amy Gahran — Thu, 22 May 2008 16:03:37 +0000

Ricky, I’d agree with you that handsets need not come with the latest firmware IF Nokia’s firmware update process wasn’t PC-only and (in my experience) a nervewracking, risky nightmare to undertake. I understand some N95 users (including you, as you’ve said elsewhere) have had an easy time with it, others haven’t. It seems like the process has run very differently for different users, so I don’t know what’s up with that. Maybe it’s incompatibilities with various flavors of Windows, I dunno. But it’s definitely a problem.

Expecting a new customer to have to undergo such an ordeal immediately after purchase (as I did) simply to gain access to the functionality they *thought* they were buying is, IMHO, not reasonable. If you’re paying $600 or more for a phone, it should just work as promised when you get it and not put obstacles such as an obtuse, lengthy updating process in your path right from the start.

Point-of-sale updates would be great — but for most of the country (outside of NYC and Chicago, so far), the only way you can currently buy an N95 is through an online retailer like Amazon. Even Nokia (which charges the highest price of all to buy an N95 online) has outsourced its US sales to LetsTalk.com, which isn’t great at order fulfillment let alone service IME (I ordered my phone from Nokia/LetsTalk first, but got so disgusted by the pointless delays LetsTalk introduced into the process that I cancelled the order and bought from Amazon instead).

Online retailers generally are extremely unlikely to open a product, update it, and test that it’s working before shipping.

Basically, I don’t care *who* fixes this problem, but until it gets fixed (either by Nokia offering a more uniformly easy and reliable update process, including a Mac-friendly version, or by handsets getting updated before shipping) it’s going to make more and more US folks wary of buying a high-end Nokia phone.

IMHO, of course.

- Amy Gahran

By: Ricky Cadden

Ricky Cadden — Thu, 22 May 2008 02:57:17 +0000

I’m not sure I understand the big deal behind a handset being sold with outdated firmware. There’s no way to control how long it has been sitting on a shelf before being sold, and on certain handsets, firmware can be outdated rather quickly. It would be a disgusting waste of resources if every unsold handset with outdated firmware had to be shipped back for updating before being sold, in my opinion.

When you buy a computer (a PC, anyways), the first thing you have to do is hook up to the internet and updated 80% of the software on that machine. It’s not a big deal, that I can see.

However, that being said, I *would* like to see more facilities in the U.S. providing firmware updates at the point of purchase, as a way to prevent this. Do the 2 Flagship stores offer this? What about authorised retailers such as MobileCityOnline or the BestBuyMobile stores?

By: Amy Gahran

Amy Gahran — Wed, 21 May 2008 16:20:32 +0000

Thanks, Marc. OK, that makes more sense from a mfr perspective — but it’s still whacked from a consumer perspective %-/

- Amy Gahran

By: Marc

Marc — Wed, 21 May 2008 00:12:33 +0000

@Amy The red N95-3 was released, and possibly manufactured, after the black and bronze versions.

I’d imagine that any of the devices that were manufactured after the latest firmware release would have that firmware.

By: Amy Gahran

Amy Gahran — Tue, 20 May 2008 18:35:46 +0000

That is so very odd!!! I’d hope that Nokia could correct this in the future so that all versions of the product have the latest firmware when shipped. From the customer’s perspective, you should *not* have to worry if your color choice affects your firmware version!

I’d love to know why this discrepancy happened.

- Amy Gahran

By: Marc

Marc — Mon, 19 May 2008 23:24:25 +0000

@Candido 11.2.009, which at time of writing remains the most current for the N95-3.

By: Candido

Candido — Mon, 19 May 2008 05:12:18 +0000

What version came with the Red N95-3?

By: Marc

Marc — Sun, 18 May 2008 17:49:35 +0000

Robert is correct, the N95-3 Red did come with the latest firmware. That said, I too am glad to hear that finally it will be getting a firmware update.

Next up, an easy way to add Chinese fonts to the N95-3? Please? You’re a *global* company Nokia!