Posted by vn01567
Well, the story goes like this:
yesterday I came back to Israel carrying my new T68i, this phone is not yet being marketed in Israel but is planned to go out on the local market in a few weeks.
When I tried to use it's bluetooth function, the bluetooth menu appeared in gray and when I tried to enter it, it announced "Currently unavailable". the last 24 Hrs I spent trying to figure out what went wrong with my new cellphone and this is what I came up with:
The bluetooth spectrum is forbidden for civil use in Israel, when SE Israel has decided to market the T68i in Israel, the ministry of communications ordered SE to disable the bluetooth function on the phones. therefor all the all latest SW versions disable the bluetooth function once an "Israeli" sim is detected.
Does any of you know what was the last version prior this nasty change? Is there any chance to downgrade my T68i to a lower version then I have (R2E006)? What would B the "cost" of doing so? (SW bugs, Etc..)
Posted by oholic
Hey
I got R2B and the bluetooth works for me with orange and cellcom sim cards (the blue led is blinking, didnt test it).
Posted by vn01567
When you go to the "connect" icon, do you see the "bluetooth" menu in gray or in black? if you press that menu, do you see the the menu "discoverable", "paired devices", etc.... ? or is the bluetooth menu is blocked?
Posted by Mimzo
If I understand correctly, you got your phone from outside Israel and then took it to Israel, right?
If so, how come the SW on the phone disables Bluetooth once your Israeli sim card is detected? (seeing as you mentioned this software alteration was made by SE Israel and not SE worldwide)
Does the sim have the ability to override the software on the phone itself? Im interested to know.
Posted by jplacson
The SIM may not have the power... but the security feature may be built into the phone's SW itself... once the PHONE detects an Israeli SIM, it disabled it's BT functions.
I wonder why it's forbidden...even in Bangkok, and I think even France! (At least the leaflet in my old HBH-10 said that)
Posted by peanut
The 2.4 spectrum is not available for public use in france hence BT, Home RF etc are banned.
Posted by vn01567
@ Mimzo
The SW is the same worldwide, what I wrote was that SE Israel had asked SW dept. at SE to make the change. there is no unique SW version for Israel, the feature is built in all latest versions and only disables BT when detecting Israeli sim.
Posted by Mimzo
@vn01567>
So if understand it correctly, SE have bult in a security feature which is hidden to most users but only gets activated when the SIM is detected to have compatible standards (such as those in Israel, France, Thailand, etc) - am I correct?
Forgive my ignorance, I am very interested in this but don't know much about it
Posted by vn01567
That is correct, I've put a foreign sim card in the very same slot and the BT was functioning perfectly. gossips here say that the BT specrum is about to B available in the near future and then SE will remove this nasty function and we'll B able to upgrade to the newer version and enjoy the BT.
Posted by Mimzo
@vn01567>
Good luck then. BT is amazing and opens up endless possibilities - a whole new world of communication
Posted by SonyBoy
too bad you didnt see my post before posted yours, look for the "bluetooth disabled by som card" forum, here at Esato, under "tips and tricks" forum here.
Posted by Summoner
Yep, SE disabled BT when Israeli SIM Cards are used in the phone. the only ones that don't have this catch are upgraded T68m phones... T68i's, since the R2B upgrade I think are blocked. I don't think it's possible to downgrade (that's what I was told) so you are pretty stuck...
And yes, BT is amazing
Ariel
Posted by 392MHz
as i remember R2B was the last soft to enable bluetooth in israel.
since R2E this is disabled.