Questions about Various Resets

[chrislitzkow]

I am still facing the SMS/EMAILS won't vibrate issue and I would like to perform a reset to see if this helps. Can anyone better explain the various methods of "resets" such as:

1. Just rebooting the phone by cycling the power off then back on.

2. Powering on while holding the 'x' key. I've tried this and it powers my device up with an exclamation point icon, then seems to just complete powering up normally. Not sure what this is doing.

3. Pressing Shift + Alt + Delete. Seems to just reboot the device, again, not sure what it's really doing differently than just turning it off and back on.

4. Perform Factory Reset. I haven't done this yet, but I am tempted to try it. I know this will restore everything back to "new" condition... does anyone know if then when I sign into my Google account everything will be repopulated since I backup to Google? Will it automatically reinstall my apps, etc?

THANK YOU!

 

[herki]

The #2 option is the key here. That's what people used to manually update to 2.0.1.
When you get the ! icon, if you press the volume up button and the camera button, it gives you a menu of the different resets. I think there are 2, unless you have an update on your SD card, in which case you get the option to run that file too.

As for #4, I know that your contacts and calendar are recoverable. And you should be able to recover apps from the marketplace. I'm fairly sure that individual app settings, however, are not preserved.
I haven't done a factory reset though. Can anyone shed some light on this?

 

[chrislitzkow]

I also recently found out about "Safe Mode" which is activated by holding the menu key on the physical keyboard while powering up the phone. This is supposed to run only core android apps to that we can isolate if a third-party app is the culprit of certain problems. For me, I tried this and still I get no vibrate on SMS or email. Anyone else able to enlighted us on the various functions/purposes of the resets? Thanks!

 

[chrislitzkow]

Well, I just hit the Factory Data Reset, so we'll see what happens!

 

[VictoryCube]

Keep us updated!

 

[chrislitzkow]

Here is what happens when you do a Factory Data Reset:

DROID shut down after I confirmed the reset, then rebooted.
Prompts to (re)Program Phone with Verizon Wireless.
Sign-In to Google Account, follow some set-up prompts.
Google begins to sync, took approx. 5 minutes for mine.

Notification panel diplays "All applications installed", and sure enough everything is back including all of my apps installed from the Market.

All text messages and call logs are erased, contacts are restored. Google seems to have backed everything up very nicely.

Opening apps each prompt you as though they are new. For example, I had to sign in to Facebook again and agree to have it sync my contacts photos.

Rearranged my homescreen again, and things are all back to normal.

Unfortunately, this still didn't solve my problem... SMS/Email messages STILL won't vibrate! Uhhhgg.

 

[VictoryCube]

So, just be sure, you've gone into the settings menu with in the messaging app, and under notifications enabled vibrate, right?