Tag: Voicemail

BlackBerry Bold Firmware Upgrade

I upgraded the firmware on my BlackBerry Bold 9000 from the default 4.6.0.167 to the 4.6.0.266 version using the instructions available on the CrackBerry.com forums. I went ahead and followed the directions, and the flash went successfully. The majority of my settings were restored. I had to enter user names and passwords for the YouMail client and the Google Apps sync client. However, the Pandora client retained its credentials correctly.

I had decided to upgrade my firmware because I had begun experiencing a lot of dropped calls and data connectivity issues. I often had to browse to a website or turn the radio off and on to start receiving email again. My Bold caused my speakers to hum constantly as it toggled between 3G and EDGE networks. After the firmware upgrade, the data connectivity issues and the speaker hum have gone away, but the phone still drops calls more often than it should. Many people had reported a battery life improvement relative to the 167 firmware. I didn’t notice this initially; however, when I updated the YouMail client on my BlackBerry, I discovered a new option to disable polling for new voice mails. Once I disabled that, my battery life improved substantially. After the update, I was also able to connect to Marquette University’s wireless network from my phone. It’s possible I had done something wrong in the past; however, I suspect the version fixed some little bug that made it incompatible with the wireless network on campus.

Despite AT&T’s delay in releasing updates for the Bold, I recommend this update if you are experiencing any problems with the current version of the firmware.

Edit: After using the new firmware for a while, I noticed the annoyance of the Visual Voice Mail icon in the application switcher. Since I cannot quit the application, I decided to find a way to remove it. A forum post on PinStack.com has the solution:

Another option is to simply remove all the vvm cod files from the java folder (7 of them) and then start up dm or apploader and run the through the process. It should tell you that it doesn’t recognize those files and remove them.

java folder is located: C:\Program Files\Common Files\Research In Motion\Shared\Loader Files\9000-v4.6.0.247_P4.0.0.206

Of course the version number is different, but once I removed the files and ran the loader again, the icon disappeared.

Recording Cell Phone Voicemails

My girlfriend Clarissa asked me if it is possible to save a voicemail message that is stored by her mobile provider’s voicemail system. The short answer is no, but I figured I could do better.

Google released Google Voice which replaces GrandCentral. I went ahead and upgraded my GrandCentral account to a Google Voice account. It went smoothly, and now my Gmail account is integrated with my old GrandCentral account. I have my Google Voice account configured to ring my office phone, my mobile phone, and a Gizmo5 SIP account.

Back to saving a mobile voicemail message. Since it costs to dial out through Gizmo, I figured I could place the call through Google Voice and answer it with the Gizmo client on my laptop. Then I could use Gizmo to record the voice mail message and then send it to Clarissa. I entered her mobile number on Google Voice and hit dial. I answered it on the Gizmo client, but pressing # did not prompt me to enter her PIN to check her messages. When I tried doing the same thing on my office phone, it worked fine. After a bit of creative thinking, here is the solution that I came up with:

  1. Dial my Google Voice phone number on my office phone, and then answer the call in the Gizmo client.
  2. Start a new call on my office phone, and dial Clarissa’s mobile number.
  3. When Clarissa’s recorded greeting starts playing, hit #. When prompted for her PIN, enter her PIN.
  4. Conference the two calls together on my office phone, and mute myself on the office phone and in the Gizmo client.
  5. Hit record in the Gizmo client.
  6. When the message is done playing, hang up the conference call on my office phone, and hang up the call in the Gizmo client.
  7. Edit the recording to remove unnecessary audio from the beginning and end of the message.

There you have it, an elaborate solution to record voicemails stuck in your mobile voicemail inbox. I have been using YouMail to avoid this problem, and I plan on helping Clarissa switch to it soon.