November « 2008

Archive for November, 2008

iPhone 2.2 Firmware

Saturday, November 29th, 2008

iPhone 2.2 Firmware upgrade is a big dud for me. 10 minutes after I agreed to upgrade, my iPhone (3G, less than 2 months old) was completely unusable. So the entire Saturday was almost all wasted on trying to fix this issue. The symptom:

iTune will try to connect to iPhone, but report “Can’t activate iPhone, … insert correct SIM card or type in PIN code to unlock SIM card”;
iPhone has only emergency calling capability, nothing but the connect to iTunes picture is displayed.

First made a couple of tech support calls to Apple. The first rep suggested the usual reboot, hard-reset, reinsert Sim card steps; the second rep suggested restoring to factory default setting. None of these made any change. Finally Apple tech support concluded that the 2.2 firmware probably disabled/corrupted the SIM card. So a trip to the AT&T store ensued.

AT&T storeÂ determined it wasn’t the SIM card, as a new card and restore process failed to make any difference.

So finally to the Apple store. After some paperwork, a replacement iPhone works just fine with the SIM card and the new 2.2 firmware.

Total cost: $0;

Time spent: 4 hours.

Posted in Technology, Toy | No Comments »

Credit Crunch

Saturday, November 22nd, 2008

Here is another sign of credit crunch hitting credit cards. We just received a letter from Citibank informing us that the purchase APR has been raised to 13.99% + prime with a minimum of 19.99%. The same day we got a letter from an affiliated card (store credit card) that GE (the issuing bank backing those store cards) is reducing the credit limit by 40%. Last time we checked not so long ago, we have 800 credit score. So I don’t know what would be the rate or credit limit cut for people having average credit scores.
It doesn’t affect us in either cases since we never use up the credit limit or carry a revolving balance. But for people really need the money, life will become even more difficult. As traditional banks falter, maybe this will create more openings for new payment management solutions – Paypal, Amazon etc – to grab more market share.

Posted in Money | No Comments »