How the E815 dies
I have a Motorola E815 cell phone. This morning, I was reminded why it hasn’t been an entirely satisfying experience. The E815 has excellent reception (on Verizon’s network) and lots of software features that work really well. Unfortunately the mechanical quality leaves a lot to be desired. The E815’s weakness is the socket where the wall charger attaches. My first E815 crashed as I was unplugging the charger. I unplugged it and the phone rebooted. This had happened several times before, but this time the phone got to a certain point in its boot cycle and rebooted again. I couldn’t even turn it off using the end/power key–I had to remove the battery. Fortunately there were about three weeks left on the warranty, and Verizon eventually got me a new one that worked (on the third try). Last night, I plugged in my phone before bed and set the alarm. Early this morning the alarm went off, so I opened the phone and hit the “end” key to shut it up. The phone rebooted and came back to the alarm screen. I unplugged it and hit “end” again, and it worked. Moral of the story–be VERY careful when plugging/unplugging your E815 charger, and try not to do anything with the phone when it’s plugged in. Also, sign up for Verizon’s free backup service to save your contacts in case the phone dies, and transfer your photos and ringtones to a micro-SD card.