Confusing, isn't it?

New phones are a computer.  Like all computers, they are hastily
programmed by humans before they are actually ready for primetime and
fully debugged.  Everyone is screaming at the programmers to "get it
out the door, FAST!"  So, like anything else made for computers, the
firmware, the program that makes the phone do what the cellular
company wants it to do, is as buggy as a Florida swamp.

So, as soon as you buy it, take it back to the service desk and ask
the nice man to upgrade the firmware to the one with only 374 bugs,
instead of the 2738 bugs it came out of the box with.  (No, they don't
open the boxes and upgrade the firmware when a new one comes in.
That's a hoot!...(c;)

In order to control what companies your new phone will connect to, a
scheme was developed so that the company could instruct the phone on
who it wanted the phone to talk to, wrestling this important decision
away from the customer, who may connect the phone to a system that
makes the company less profit, or (gulp!) costs the company extra
money when the customer connects it to Y cellular in the company's big
DEAD ZONE everybody knows about in Oakbrook.  So, the "Preferred
Roaming List" (PRL in selluliars jingo) was invented.  It tells the
phone who the phone is allowed to connect to when the phone can't find
"Mother", its home system.  When "Mother" is gone, it finds a signal,
gets that signal's ID number and looks up in the pre-programmed list
you can do nothing about bypassing to see if it's allowed to talk to
the system, before connecting.  Hmm...not on my list....look for
another system....hmm....no more systems around....display NO SERVICE
to the poor sap holding the phone....making believe there are no
signals, even though that's a total lie.

It doesn't ask you if you want to pay extra roaming charges to use
Y-Cellular's tower that's looming over the spot you're standing in
that would kill you if the tower fell on you.  That's not profitable
for the beancounters.

Get the picture?  It's about CONTROL and MONEY, same as always.....

They get away with it because "everybody does it" so you really have
no choice.  I call it choosing "the lesser of evils".  The government
bureaucrats are all paid to look the other way......

It wasn't always that way.  But, that's what we have now.....

Larry W4CSC

"Very funny, Scotty!  Now, BEAM ME MY CLOTHES! KIRK OUT!"

The latest software version for the vx4400 is version 08, shown as TE4VZV08
on the sticker on the box.  If you don't see this number (it might say
TE4VZV06) when you purchase the phone, ask the service technicians to update
the phone for you.  Updating phone software isn't something that you *have*
to keep up with.  Verizon doesn't send out notices saying that a new
software version is available.  Usually what happens is that a user finds
they have some sort of problem and CS will recommend that your software be
updated.  Or, people find out (like through this newsgroup) that there is a
new software version and want the latest one.  I personally found that
upgrading to version 08 from 06 solved the problem of my phone going into
analog too quickly in low signal areas.

PRL stands for "preferred roaming list."  You can get the latest PRL by
pressing *228 SEND while on the Verizon network and following hte
instructions.  This is something that Verizon recommends you do periodically
so that you are able to roam with carriers with whom they have roaming
agreements.  If you follow this newsgroup you'll find that sometimes
updating your PRL benefits you, in that you will have roaming capabilities
you didn't have before; and sometimes it does *not* benefit you, you'll lose
roaming capabilities.

Hope that answers your questions.  I really like my vx4400 but I'm not a
"phone freak."  Before this, I had a BAM-201 for three years so maybe
anything would have been an improvement!

Ileen