Friday, January 2, 2009

Pantech PN-3200 Cellphone Rant

I wrote the letter below to Pantech, and then tried to send it via their customer reply service online.

I am stymied by the requirement in the image below, for something called a "Email host". Since I do all my mail through Gmail, I tried that and several other possible entries, none of which have worked. [NOTE: see update at bottom] So I remembered, "I have a blog!" I decided to post my Pantech rant here. Enjoy.

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Dear Pantech,

About my Pantech PN-3200: This is my second year of using this handset, and this morning I have been trying -- again -- to get the photos out of my phone.

There is room in the phone's non-removable memory for 400-some photos. It is full now, and yes, I know how to erase them. But can you tell me who decided this model would not have a data port? It looks like it has a data port, across the lower edge of the handset, but I have been assured by your tech support staff that this USB hatch is not actually a data port, and there is no cord or apparent use for this port.

And who set it up so that in order to get photos out, you have to mail them to yourself, and that only one at a time can be mailed, and that once you have mailed a picture, the album view reverts to the screen with the earliest photos, not the place where you were before you found and mailed one of the 400 photos?

I thought, since this handset is Bluetooth capable, if I bought a Bluetooth device for my system I could triage the photos that way. Silly me. Your Bluetooth is only equipped to support a headset or hands-free device, or a dial-up network.

Finally, my battery died about 15 months into the three year contract.

I will be up for a new contract in a few months. I have learned a lot from your PN-3200. Never take anything for granted, however sensible it might sound, research handsets exhaustively before buying, and steer clear of Pantech devices.

Noni
Now, I realize that it's possible that my problems have a simple solution. I may have set myself up for humiliation, ha-ha.

But if I am a smart woman with skillful reading skills, and I can't figure out the "simple" ways to solve these problems, even after discussing this with tech support, then perhaps there's a problem with the manual?

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UPDATE: As soon as I posted this, in accordance with Murphy's Law, I figured out what the "E-mail host" thingy was. So Pantech has received my letter, and I will tell you what comes of it, if anything. --NM