After getting ATT/Cingular to take the subsidy lock off my phone, I decided to flash it with the generic International Motorola firmware. The advantages:

• The Motorola firmware is not “branded” and gets rid of all of the “Shop Cingular” links, menu items, etc.
• The quadband firmware claims to support all 4 GSM bands (instead of the 3 that the Cingular firmware supports).

The downsides:

• The Motorola firmware is not “branded”, and I had to re-configure any Cingular specific settings that I like, such as the MediaNet connectivity settings and Cingular Video bookmarks.
• The Cingular version of the phone has a slightly different button layout than the Motorola generic version (the Clear key is swapped with the Cingular Video key) and I had to remap those keys back to match the custom key layout.
• Because I flashed the phone, all of my previous SEEM edits and java fixes were lost, so I had to repeat them.

As daunting as the downside list is, I have to say that getting rid of all of the Cingular branding was like a breath of fresh air. You really don’t notice how bad the branding was until it’s gone. Then you just notice all of the extra room in the menus, bookmark lists, etc.

My phone started out with the following software:

Firmware: R2611LD_U_96.71.95R
Flex: USIZRGBLCINUSR26111083

I upgraded using: R26111LD_U_96.71.95R_LP0003_DRM0001_VSTU_207_0D_JPNA_ R26111IZRGLBDST01NA_01_USIZGBLDST01R26111018_1FF

The tool I used was Random’s Flash & Backup (version 3.06) which costs $9.99 and is well worth the small fee. Before upgrading, I made a full backup of my phone, and I strongly suggest that you do so too if you try this!

I activated the bootloader by turning off my phone, holding down the * and # keys, and then tapping the power (red) button. My phone had bootloader version 03.02.

After flashing with the Motorola firmware, my phone worked correctly. (Note that if you do this before unlocking your phone, it will have a “Subsidy Lock code” warning message, but the phone will still work. The Motorola firmware expects that the phone is unlocked, and if it is not, it will issue a warning message.)

To get the phone “working” again, I did the following:

• Configured the Cingular/AT&T MediaNet (data network) settings:

  https://cingular.atgnow.com/cng/tutorials/KB74359.html

  • # Name: MEdia Net
  • # Homepage: http://device.home
  • # Proxy 1: 66.209.11.32
  • # Port 1: 80
  • # Domain 1: Leave Blank
  • # DNS 1: 000.000.000.000
  • # DNS 2: 000.000.000.000
  • # GPRS APN: wap.cingular
  • # Username: WAP@CINGULARGPRS.COM
  • # Password: CINGULAR1
• Using P2kCommander , I

• Removed a/mobile/certs/root/x509/kjava/j2me_domain_registry.sm   to unlock java apps (allows “ask once” as an option when accessing the network).
• Edited SEEM 005B_0001 to swap clear/cingular video keys…
  – 3E is “Browser Key” and 25 is “clear key”
  -On the Cingular phone keyboard layout, you want:
  Offset: 0x10 – to be 25
  Offset: 0x1E – to be 3E

To get it just the way I liked, I also did the following:

• Downloaded GoogleMaps and GMail to test java, and because I use them a lot:
  URL: www.google.com/gmm
  URL: www.gmail.com/
• Used Mobical.net (via SyncML ) to restore my phonebook and datebook entries. (You did back those up using SyncML before you flashed the phone, right?)
• Edited SEEM   004a_0001 as follows:No SIM card required! Normally, most cell phones will not even boot up without a sim card installed. This is kind of annoying if you just want to play the java Zelda game on an old phone you have laying around. By editing an entire byte (changing it to zero, or clearing all of the bits) at offset 4D I am now able to boot my phone without a SIM card.

  Record .mp4 movies (instead of .3gp) Normally the cell phone records .3gp movies, but it supports .mp4 movie recording if you change offset 1A1 to 03 (set bits 0 and 1 to on). Note that this SEEM edit was originally reported as offset 1d1, which does not work, so if you are working off of an old version of the seem_map.txt file it may have the incorrect data. I have verified that 1A1 set to 03 works correctly on my Cingular V3xx phone.

• Edited SEEM SEEM 0032_0001:Ability to choose what type of message to send (SMS vs Voice Msg, vs Email),
  (voice message feature doesn’t seem to be supported by AT&T/Cingular)
  Change Offset B1, Bit 0, to on (1),

  Advanced networking menu (search speed)
  To enable this menu, toggle Offset B1, bit 3 to off (0).

  Data Transfer Icon: Turn on bits 0, 1 and 2 in offset D0 (on = 1).

• I also added a few custom MIDI files (for ringtones) to a/mobile/audio.
• I added a few Java applications that I really like from getjar.com:
  FreeFlight, Pipes, 5ud0ku, RSSReader, tieoncell, yoda