"Oh great, just what I need to distract me while I'm driving, a telemarketer...But wait, that's strange, that's not my default ringtone for any type of call."
I quickly retrieve my phone from my side pocket to see that it is my significant other! Now something is really strange, because they have their own specific ring tone, which just happens to be "Chris Brown - With You" at the moment.
I answered and talked, but was perplexed about what was going on with my phone the whole time.
I started fiddling. Made sure profile is still set to "custom," CHECK. Made sure ring tone was still physically (electronically?) in the phone and not deleted by some random Windows Mobile 5 bug, CHECK. Tried to set personalized ringtone back to Chris Brown....SCREEEEEEEEeeeeAAAAAAAAAAAAEEEEEEEERRRRRrr (screeching halt)!
"ALERT - This ring tone file is corrupted or unavailable. Please choose a different ring tone."
I was a little upset at that point because corruption is never good, and this Samsung Smartphone has always been pretty buggy. At least it has worked for the major functions, even if it was with some little workaround every time (this is in reference to the alarm which can not be turned off and/or starts multiple instances of itself simultaneously, leaving the only good way to stop the alarm as turning the phone completely off and then hoping you remember to turn it back on later.)
Once I got home I did some checking online to see if others were experiencing the same effect. Of course there are no technical articles provided by Microsoft nor Samsung, two very large computer/electronics companies who know their products have issues, but there are several forum posts. From what I could find, the problem is not version specific to the Windows Mobile OS being used, both 5 and 6 apparently yielded the same issue. The only workaround I could find is a factory reset (format) of the phone, to bring it back to default settings in every way. "AAAARRRRRGGGGGGHHHH," as Charlie Brown would say.
Then the plot thickens. It's not just ringtones. I can't play any of the media files on my phone, which leads me to believe it has something to do with Windows Media Player, but I'm not computer guru, so what do I know?
Before this happened, I was already in the (painfully slow) process of trying to sort through text messages I have received over the past year and a half, but now I can't save any of them. I was recommended one program, which did in fact allow for backing up SMS/MMS messages, but it wasn't compatible with the Samsung BJ II yet. The option in the forum posts was to use dashwire.com, a service which uses your phone's data connection (I don't have a data plan) to connect and upload all your phone settings so you can transfer most of them back to your phone once you've reset it (or lost it and get a new one, etc...). Of course I refuse to pay AT&T to upload a backup of my phone, for an issue caused by the phone I purchased from them...call me crazy! Finally, their phones are only covered up to one year from purchase, for defects and such, and I was never able to register the phone with Samsung because their website kept giving me the error that the SN was not valid (great, leave it up to Let's Talk to screw me again!).
As far as I'm concerned, BJ now stands for Buggy (or Broken) Junk!
If anyone knows of any solution, which doesn't involve me deleting all my personal files, please let me know - I may be stuck with this AT&T default ringtone for every sound my phone makes, for a while.
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