Oooohhh, Technology...

Technology -- sometimes it seems that you can't live with it, and you can't live without it!

For a while, Carl's phone has been locking up, particularly when he is taking pictures. Since he is the primary blog photographer, he takes a pictures frequently... I have been encouraging him to get a new phone, and he has been researching... but he really didn't want a new phone, just for his current phone to work better. 

You may remember that he had a problem with his phone back in August, 2023 (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2023/08/lancaster-central-market.html). At that time, it was diagnosed as a defective motherboard, and, even though it was out of warranty, Google had extended the warranty because they recognized that they had manufactured a number of phones with motherboards that were failing. Google replaced his phone with a refurbished Google Pixel 5A -- the same type that he originally had.

A few months later, my phone failed (also a Google Pixel 5A), and I also received a refurbished phone from Google under warranty that they had extended, but they sent me a Google Pixel 6A.

We were concerned that the lock-ups could signify that his "new" refurbished phone was now about to fail, and, sure enough, when we were with Steve, Shay, and Addi, Carl's phone locked up and nothing that we did could get it to restart (Steve said that it was due to cuteness overload with pictures of Addi, and we all agreed that was probably the cause!). 

We contacted Google and they asked us to take it in to UBreakIFix for diagnosis -- we did that and left it with them, and they determined that it was, again, not fixable (although no one said "motherboard", we're thinking that is the problem). We called Google back, and since UBreakIFix had the phone, we didn't have to send it back to Google, UBreakIFix would take care of returning it. At this point, Google has said that a new phone will be sent by 23August. We are pretty sure that it will be another refurbished Pixel 5A, but they haven't actually told us.

Just a couple of pictures to document our problems...

To identify the phone, you need to have its IMEI number -- the instructions on the problem reporting website tell you how to get this information from the phone... as long as the phone will turn on, the instructions will help! But, if the phone won't turn on, one option is to look at the box in which the phone came (yeah, right, we carry that with us in the rig - not!), or to look at the carrier of the sim card... we went by the Verizon store, and the fellow there pulled out the carrier of the sim card from the phone -- do you see that tiny little 15-digit number on the black plastic? Yeah, I couldn't see it either...

... but... since I took a picture of it, I could zoom in on my phone and write it down.

I could use my phone to contact Google through their website, putting in the IMEI of Carl's phone, and got a call back from Google within a few minutes.

When we got to UBreakIFix, we were happy to see that they are an Official Repair Provider for the Pixel Phone by Google. Though we didn't know it when we dropped the phone off, this provided a quicker, easier way for the phone to get sent back to Google and a new phone to be sent out.

Technology, you can't live with it, you can't live without it!