Lumia quality issues

[SpatiallyAware]

/rant


We were just about all blackberry with a few iphones until the lumia 900 came out. IT tested it, liked it, and started buying them for employees. I believe we had 5-6 before I was told they all had issues.. Primarily a 'rattling' vibrate, which was loud enough to hear in meetings. Another common problem (at least 2 of them) was that they would turn off with no warning. That is unacceptable in a business environment.

~5 were warrantied for one reason or another, and in every single case the ATT 'refurb' replacements were TERRIBLE. The screens were missing the oleo coating, and the glass was sticky like a window pane. They all had blatantly obvious crashing issues, none of which were fixed by wiping the phone. They were terrible. Our ATT rep ended up replacing them all.


Alright so fast forward to the lumia 920... I buy one right to test after release...

And..... within one month my 920 had an obnoxious loud rattling vibrate, just like the 900s. Also, the screen had tons of tiny micro scratches from me unlocking it. I promise, I do not have diamonds in my fingerpads. I have never had an issue with any smartphone having these microscratches. I talk to ATT, they swap it for a refurb, which is turning itself off and crashing.


What is the deal? I had high hopes with the quality of the nokia phones, that they would be as durable as blackberry, but they are consistently terrible. Every time an employee gets a new phone it's minimum 2 hours wasted setting up a new one. Every refurb is a lemon. I love windows phones, but if this is indicative of the quality then we will have to go back to iphones and blackberry.

 

[mrpiggy]

Well, if it's for business and you guys like Win phones, there's no reason to not try the AT&T HTC 8X's Win8 phones. It does everything the Nokia 920 does and the one real standout of having a better low-light camera shouldn't matter in a business use phone.

Personally I have a 920, but I do think Nokia has had QC issues lately as there have been too many reports of stupid issues like rattling buzzers, etc. Luckily I have not had any major problems, beyond the dust specs in front camera (which I never use, so no biggie). I think with all the layoffs and other corporate re-organization issues, Nokia is having a hard time making their build quality standards as they used to have since these windows phone got pretty popular.

 

[webdave]

The scratches are probably just the oleophobic coating. I've seen threads on XDA forums with people that had those micro scratches and buffed off all of the coating down to the bare gorilla glass.

 

[biostud]

Sounds like some of the first batches that went to the US has QC issues.

 

[amdhunter]

I just got a notice yesterday to stop posting about my bluetooth issues in the Nokia forums. We've bought a few in my organization and all of them freeze hard when using anything bluetooth related.

Have you ever tried to hard reset a phone while driving a stick shift? It's incredibly hard. Also, since you can't use a bluetooth headset (or audio) you risk getting a $110 ticket every time you get a call.

Lumia 920 is a complete failure.

 

[SpatiallyAware]

I just got a notice yesterday to stop posting about my bluetooth issues in the Nokia forums. We've bought a few in my organization and all of them freeze hard when using anything bluetooth related.

Have you ever tried to hard reset a phone while driving a stick shift? It's incredibly hard. Also, since you can't use a bluetooth headset (or audio) you risk getting a $110 ticket every time you get a call.

Lumia 920 is a complete failure.

Hm, I'm not sure about my other employees but I don't use anything bluetooth related. I'll check to see if it's turned on.

 

[amdhunter]

This thread made me go ahead and call Nokia instead of complaining about it. They set up an RMA no questions asked. lol

All I said was I can't use Bluetooth at all and the update didn't fix. They said they'll either replace the electronics inside or replace the item free of charge.

Literally took 5 minutes from when I called them to RMA. I must not have been the first to call them with the issue.

Annoying since it's my work phone, but whatever.

 

[zerogear]

I just got a notice yesterday to stop posting about my bluetooth issues in the Nokia forums. We've bought a few in my organization and all of them freeze hard when using anything bluetooth related.

Have you ever tried to hard reset a phone while driving a stick shift? It's incredibly hard. Also, since you can't use a bluetooth headset (or audio) you risk getting a $110 ticket every time you get a call.

Lumia 920 is a complete failure.

You realize this has been patched, correct? Mine hasn't had a hard freeze since the update.

 

[Nebor]

I haven't had scratching, rattling or bluetooth problems with my Lumia 920... The only issue I had was some devices don't have the newest version of the bluetooth remote control software (AVRC?)

 

[Nintendesert]

My mother had to return two Verizon 822s due to issues with the screen and no apps being able to run. They'd all crash. 2/2 with shitty quality from two stores in two different states.

She ended up just getting a Samsung Note II which she loves.

At this point I won't pick up a Nokia phone and would rather wait for Samsung or just get the HTC if I go with WP8. I'll stick with 7.5 for now.

 

[blurredvision]

Just wanted to buck the trend and say I've not had any quality issues with my 920 in the 2+ months I've had it now. Just the occasional phantom battery drain that always seems to correct itself after a charge (that happens maybe once every 3 weeks). No lock-ups, no reboots that I've been privy to, no scratches.

 

[amdhunter]

You realize this has been patched, correct? Mine hasn't had a hard freeze since the update.

Mine kept freezing after the patch. And so did 30 pages worth of other users in the Nokia forums, not including those people complaining in the WPCentral and Microsoft forums.

Word on the street is a bad batch of phones went out. Mine also has the rattling camera issue. It's annoying when I get a call because all you hear is a vibrating camera. Ugh

 

[amdhunter]

I haven't had scratching, rattling or bluetooth problems with my Lumia 920... The only issue I had was some devices don't have the newest version of the bluetooth remote control software (AVRC?)

AVRCP worked incredible on my Lumia with JVC KW-NT800HDT...until it froze 2 minutes later.

 

[amdhunter]

My mother had to return two Verizon 822s due to issues with the screen and no apps being able to run. They'd all crash. 2/2 with shitty quality from two stores in two different states.

She ended up just getting a Samsung Note II which she loves.

At this point I won't pick up a Nokia phone and would rather wait for Samsung or just get the HTC if I go with WP8. I'll stick with 7.5 for now.

Going to buy a Note 2 for my father this weekend. He finally is admitting his BB 9930 is garbage.

I can't wait to set it up for him. He likes my Nexus 4 a lot, and I think he is going to be extremely happy with the Note.

 

[Nintendesert]

Going to buy a Note 2 for my father this weekend. He finally is admitting his BB 9930 is garbage.

I can't wait to set it up for him. He likes my Nexus 4 a lot, and I think he is going to be extremely happy with the Note.

She really liked the stylus and the bigger screen. It definitely hit a market with older folks that can't really see as well as they used to and are used to using pen and paper. I think you and him will like it.

 

[zokudu]

Lumia 920 here. Had it for ~2 weeks, No issues with battery life, rattling, random reboots. Nothing as far as I can see. Do have a screen protector though.

 

[pantsaregood]

I've been using a Lumia 920 for a month now and haven't had any of these issues. The vibration on the phone was initially bizarre to me, but it wasn't a rattle. I was used to the somewhat violent vibration of my HTC Titan. The Lumia 920 was, comparatively, subtle when vibrating.

Did the refurbished unit you received from AT&T have the Portico update? As soon as I received my phone, I updated it. Apparently some Lumia 920s were shipped with a buggy version of the software that caused crashes and reboots. I haven't had an issue with either, though.

I don't know what to say about microscratches, either. My screen is scratch free, as is my nephew's year old Lumia 900 and my aunt's (who is a bit clumsy) Lumia 820. Perhaps, as some people suggested, there was a bad batch?

Also, if you're ever sold a phone without the oleophobic coating intact, the screen will scratch quite easily. Gorilla glass isn't particularly scratch resistant - it is mainly shatter resistant. Without a proper oleophobic coating, keying your screen will scratch it horribly.

I'd try to contact Nokia directly about your problems. They're pretty good with warranty service.

 

[Zstream]

I purchased two Lumia 900's at launch, different colors and no issues except for poor talk battery life.

 

[el-Capitan]

I've been sporting a 920 for abt 2 months now. No issues with the device apart from the known WPA(1) joining issue with some Wifi networks.

I'm actually very happy with it and don't want to miss it.

 

[Saffron]

I've owned my Lumia 920 for almost a month with some issues; I'm on my third phone.

The first Lumia 920 I got had a bad microphone and second came DOA with a bad antenna. The Lumia 920 I have now has been issue free, going on three weeks now. Even though I was unlucky to have to deal with two phones DOA I don't hold it against Nokia because ANY company can have QC issues.

The Lumia 920 is an awesome phone and I would be hard-pressed to not have it. WP8 is a great OS, though, apps are limited but apps are constantly being added that I used to have on my old Android OS. I would highly recommend this phone to people regardless of issues reported, because overall it's a great phone! The first batches of DOA phones are getting returned and the good ones are on the shelves.

 

[jacktesterson]

Interesting.

I was curious to try this phone but my Android love prevented me from doing so.

The build quality and rumored camera (before release) had me excited. Kinda glad I waited out for the Nexus 4 at this point.

 

[biostud]

I've had mine for 3 weeks, only one freeze. Otherwise no problems.

 

[Bacstar]

Got the 920 since they were released. Only a couple issues so far with blu-tooth music streaming in my car:

1. Would disconnect and play from the phone after having a text message read aloud, and then dictating and sending a reply.

2. If I walk away too from car and drop blu-tooth connection, I can't reconnect until I restart the car.

So...it could be a problem with the Uconnect or the phone, not sure which. Otherwise, love this phone.

 

[Deeko]

So I got a warranty replacement on my 920 today, and I think it's the "new" model. Looks ever so slightly differently, and the weird rattling vibration is gone (so far at least). We'll see how it goes.

 

[IamDavid]

Very strange. I, along with 4 coworkers have been running the 920 since launch. All upgrades from the 900 and not 1 of us have had ANY technical problems. I've shattered my screen once but it was 100% on me.

We are extremely heavy Outlook and Excel users with past experiences with Iphone and Blackberrys. Our IT department LOVES Windows phones and not one of us would switch back...

The micro scratch thing is real. We all see it but it's not that big of problem if any at all. The camera quality FAR out ways any "micro" scratches..

We did have Bluetooth issues the first couple weeks but that was corrected with an update.