Advice on new handset

usignuolo

To cut a long story short, I work from home most of the time but periodically go on the road for several days. I then keep in touch mainly by outgoing calls or texts and had a simple Orange PAYG phone for that. Sod's law dictates I lost it last week the night before going on the road for 4 days so the next morning, with an hour to spare, I rushed into my local EE dealership and bought a cheap replacement handset.

I also bought a sim only business plan which I have been meaning to do for some time as it has lots of free text messages and minutes per month and works out cheaper for me. The phone is a Sony Xperia E. (I got it cheap with my Orange phone fund.)

It comes with the Sony desktop not the Orange one I am used and I am struggling to understand the features. In particular it does not appear to have speed dial and the call history back up is only 2 days. (I asked Orange about downloading their OS onto it and was told Sony do not permit this?)

So I am thinking of putting the Sony handset in a drawer as a back up and buying something better - in particular with speed dial and more call history capacity. I do not need a fancy phone as I used hardly any apps or play games much as when I am not on the road, I work from home. Anyone got any suggestions?

grumbler

usignuolo wrote: »

...The phone is a Sony Xperia E.

...I am struggling to understand the features. In particular it does not appear to have speed dial and the call history back up is only 2 days.

I have no idea what's 'desktop' for a smartphone, but it's very odd that the call log is that short. Are there any settings in the Call Log preferences to change?
Don't know about speed dial, but do you not have 'Favourites' at the top in the Dialer app? Also I prefer using Google's Gesture Search app instead.

So I am thinking of putting the Sony handset in a drawer as a back up and buying something better - in particular with speed dial and more call history capacity.

Just install some 'Custom ROM' instead. ATM my Cyanogenmod 2.6.37.6 shows the Call Log from Sep 2nd at least.

usignuolo

My previous phone was an LG but Orange had overlaid its "home" page with its own set of icons and layout which I had got used to. I wanted to get these on my new Sony for ease of use but Orange Customer Centre say they are not permitted to do this by Sony although they do sell other Sonys with their own Orange Home page layout etc. (And Vodafone actually sell the same phone with a speed dial option so I wonder if I was just being fed a line)

The young man on the phone at Orange/EE says no phone below an ipod or S4 will retain a call history of more than 2 days. Is this really true ?

System

No not true. I have a 3 year old phone right here with me and it has a log going back to 6 September - which is incidentally the date I last wiped its memory!

DUTR

usignuolo wrote: »

My previous phone was an LG but Orange had overlaid its "home" page with its own set of icons and layout which I had got used to. I wanted to get these on my new Sony for ease of use but Orange Customer Centre say they are not permitted to do this by Sony although they do sell other Sonys with their own Orange Home page layout etc. (And Vodafone actually sell the same phone with a speed dial option so I wonder if I was just being fed a line)

The young man on the phone at Orange/EE says no phone below an ipod or S4 will retain a call history of more than 2 days. Is this really true ?

No, it's not really true, I'm looking at my phone now, and it has a call log stretching back to the 1st November, on the bottom left of the call button there is an upside down house, touch that and you will see the rest of the call history on the right hand side there are three dots, touch that one and the options are show call history and hide call history.
The instructions for the handset can be found on the Sony Mobile UK site, there is a speed dial facility , it's not something I use other than for the voicemail number.

System

Apparently Android only keeps a log of the last 500 calls. So an app like this should be able to help:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.riteshsahu.CallLogBackupRestore&hl=en