silence isn't golden

Not only did the internal speaker in my my old Nokia 6610i fail not long after I got it, but so too did my Openmoko Neo Freerunner (GTA-02v5) (or so it would seem)!

*Grrr*

I was testing someone else's microphone+earphone's hands-free kit on the 'moko earlier on in the day, which didn't seem to phase the device as it simply didn't work, but after putting my phone on silent a few hours later, the 'moko now has no audio output except from the headphone jack!?!

After re-installing koolu's Android (v1.0_beta7), the thing still refuses to output audio to anything but the external headphone jack and I suspect that it's either the switch pins inside the female jack are stuck or the internal speaker has broken. I am yet to boot it with 0m2008.12 via uSDHC to confirm that it's a hardware fault.

The 'moko certainly has been a very interesting device to toy around with, but it has proved to be quite troublesome, making me want an iPhone 3Gs. If I can't get the audio issue sorted out soon, I will most likely get one. Problem is trying to buy one outright as I fear that no providers will because they all seem to list plans, but fail to give full price or outright purchase details *sigh*.

UPDATE 13/07/2009 @ 15:12
The 'moko now intermittently rings, but the microphone is still muted making calls impossible.


UPDATE 14/07/2009 @ 12:38
I found out from a scumb^H^H^H^H^Hcustomer service person @ Allphones, that Apple are not allowing retailers and telcos to sell the iPhone outright because it's apparently not cost-effective for them to do so.

Lucky for me, I have a friend who is willing to sell me his 16Gb 3G one for the cost of his 3G-s upgrade.


UPDATE 21/07/2009 @ 09:42
I found the link to the Australian Apple store online and I will be using half of my tax return on buying an iPhone. *sniff* Good bye 'moko... You have served me... err... not so well... :P