I hate the way companies brand phones. I think it’s only Orange and Vadafone with Orange being the worse. They even lock out functionality in favour of their cross phone “home screen” which is completely unusable and out of date!

I am now on T-Mobiel with a Samsung E-900 and couldn’t be happier!

Wish I had flashed it now, would be great to update my software even on my new phone. Currently when you create a new media message the input language is Dutch. That can’t be right :p

Ok, fine, I’ll bin the post that I’d half-written two weeks ago on exactly this subject, Mark! (This, I suppose, is what I get for being lazy with my blog)

Whilst I wasn’t nearly as cautious as you were with the process on WotanServer, I did the same thing with my K800i and am just as happy with the result as you.

And now there’s actually a decent Mac OS X theme for the K800i (unlike the tripe that can be found in various other locations).

And I’m glad to hear it’s not just me that thinks Vodafone’s branding is utterly abysmal: those icons remove every ounce of usability from the menus in favour of their watered-down red-white and blue motif.

It’s not just me with the Vodafone branding! Luckily, it’s not a requirement on the 68XX. Even so, whatever, I’m yet to come across a phone that makes sense to use, and actually syncs successfully every time with iSync, on a regular basis.

The vodafone branding on the phones is just bonkers, and I’m sure it’s marketing dept and middle-management on a power-trip gone mad. And then executed badly.

The K800i is a great ‘little’ device. I was looking for a non standard great looking theme. Guess I found one, thanks! :)

I have to admit, I’d not even tried using the phone’s built-in e-mail client: I just created a bookmark to https://mail.google.com/mail and NetFront/GMail seem sort themselves out and give me a mobile-friendly version.

I did, however, just try to use the e-mail client and got exactly the same result as you: it sat there trying to find the server for a few minutes, and then proclaimed it couldn’t find it (or rather, it had timed out). It’s times like this, I wish there were tools like ping and tracert for phones? (And yes, I know there probably are for Symbian phones)

I’ve been debating doing the same thing with my w810i. Mine was unlocked so I don’t have the branding problems, but when it updates it thinks it’s from Europe. I’m not sure I want to spend money just to convert it to USA.

I’m happy that iSync works with my phone, hopefully they’ll add yours soon too. I’m just relieved that I have so many features working now. I had Verizon and they do the same thing as Vodaphone. The interface for the phones is there own. It’s ugly and they lock things up. Ugh. (I’m enjoying them trying to get me to stay… they want me to sign another contract (advertising 2-3 years, I didn’t even do that when I was with them) just to get a phone minimally better and spend even more money with them, what a bunch of idiots).

As for the email not working it’s probably because of the reset to default settings. There’s a page in the Phone Support area that will send you a data message after you select what country and provider you have, etc. It hsould enable the features.

I have just bought a Vodafone K800i also. To be honest I wasn’t that bothered by the icons - I have seen far worse like the hideous home page thing that Ornage ‘add’ to the Nokia Series 60 phones and then don’t enable you to remove it!

Plus, I am lazy and like that everything works perfectly on my phone. Plus, I now work for Vodafone so…

Anyway, thanks for the OS X theme - just what I was looking for.

Mark, I just noticed the clock that’s shown in the status bar is white? Is this intentional (i.e. you’re trying to hide it), or something you overlooked?

Thanks very much for the theme, I was about to download the theme creator myself for the very same reason :)

With regards to your GMail access; can you still access any of your data services, such as web browsing or RSS feeds? Part of the custom firmware usually includes the data profiles needed to access your network’s services, including all of that lovely proprietary stuff.

Might have to borrow someone else’s Vodafone branded phone to copy the settings over from.

This phone OS branding that Vodafone and Orange do (I’d actually say Vodafone are the worst of the bunch) annoys the f**k out of me.

Vodafone just destroy the appearance, and brand it to death (badly), where as Orange seem to mess about with functionality.

My solution - switch network (as well as writea letter to Vodafone some years ago - looks like that was a waste of time hey!). Vote with your feet!

Any chance you could make the images used in the theme available? It would be great to resize and tweak them to suit other, similar, Sony Ericsson phones (like my Z520).

Or is there a way of extracting the images from the .thm file that I’m not seeing?

Is the DCU-60 Cable the cable that comes with the phone? Thanks

Wils35: Yeah, the DCU-60 is the included cable.

Thanks Steve, Now need to sign up an account with wotanserver, will keep posted in here to see how it all goes following the instructions given above.

Hi all ... I also really dislike the girlie menu icons on my debranded K800i so if anyone finds a way of getting rid of them I’d like to know. BTW I found a really good Theme Creator here (seems to have a more user-friendly UI than the Sony Ericsson one) http://www.myforum.lasyk.net/showthread.php?t=7839 ... regards Roger

Roger i think you have misunderstood, We are saying we dislike the vodafone branding and orange branding so we ‘Debrand’ (flash) the phone with the original Sony Ericsson os. I think your saying that you dislike the os on your phone now which if the phone is unbranded then you already have the Sony Ericsson os which i personally really like and in no way could say its girlie, Unless your on about the screens colour being pink or something, therefore you have probably got a girlie theme set.

Ok i finally got my WotanServer code tonight so after writing this im gonna go try flash my k800i and get rid of the horrid Vodafone branded os.

Was meant to do this yesterday but didnt get my code through till tonight.

Will post my results in here.

Buggered my phone, Followed all the steps and it wont go through the please wait loader? get 3 qtrs of the way through and dont load.

OMFG,, I swear on my life just after trying once more it worked,, i cannot believe it, straight after my reply above above i put in SIM card then put in battery and thought actually no i am not gonna turn it on in case it might bugger it more, then i took out battery after about 5 seconds of being in there , took out my sim card then put battery in once more and tryed, but this time as it loaded onto the black screen with SE logo i pushed (on vodafone branded phone the green call button). then no loader screen went straight to normal mode or flight mode, i chose normal mode then it let me view a demo.

Very strange but true.

Mark if you read this can you tell me did you find the same things on yours,

First time after flash i turned on phone to get to loader screen, then the loader bar got half way and didnt move after 15 seconds of waiting, i got paranoid and turned off then turned on again then i waited longer this and got three qtrs of the way on loader bar then stopped but after 3-4 attempts which is when i posted that my phone is buggered.

Then after post that i done what i mentioned at top, now its working????????????

Any way thanks for info on your site.

Yes the theme, i did put it on when i had the vodafone os but i had the vodafone red strips at each bottom corner for the buttons, but now i have flashed the phone and put the theme on its very good, good job with making that theme.

I liked how you made the strip at the bottom transparent (think i spelt it right?) where the CALLS and MENU writing is.

How do you make it transparent?

Do you just not load an image then select clear or transparent or something?

Thanks for the theme.

would you have bought a nokia n73 if it had been out? im looking to upgrade my SE w800i and the N73 looks like a good contender to what you bought (check out the flickr integration!)

Dunno to be honest, just looked at the nokia n73 now and i think there overall about the same. the reason i picked the sony ericsson is because i had the K700i and the k750i which i was very happy with both of them at the time of purchase. Nokia put me of there phones by my old nokia having a mind of its own and switching itself off.  The good thing with that nokia is the carl zeiss optics, but does that phone have the Blogging service on it like the SE K800i does have? Also does that nokia n73 have instant messaging on it like the SE K800i does?

hi, i was using my new k800i and all of the sudden the screen goes blank white and now my phone wont turn on no matter what i do. i was wondering if anyone new what the problem is?

Just came to this site as I bought a K800i and desperate need to have the font sized increased specially when texting. ANy ideas anyone on how to do this? Thanks..

Hi Mark

Great post, its exactly what I was looking for.
I totally agree regarding the Vodafone branding it really spoils the phone.

I’m from South Africa and I have been waiting for this phone since its been release. About two days ago Vodacom received their first stock. I couldn’t resist so I got me one. I really like the phone but the branding turns me off. This is the first Vodafone phone I owned it will be the last.
I’m really keen in flashing my phone but I have one concern.
Vodacom happens to be the only SP that has the phone, do you think I’ll have major problems if I reset it, I’m hoping it would not to get networks problems.
I don’t actually use a Vodacom sim, I use another SP called MTN. Phone works fine now, but will it be ok after?
I thing can probably get the data setting for mms,email,sms and wap and add it afterwards.

One more thing, does your K800 get shipped with a memory card? With my luck M2 cards will take forever to be released in SA :( .

Please send me you thoughts regarding me flashing my phone.
Regards
Thaabit

Mark,

Great theme, thanks.

I’ve tweaked it to add in the brushed metal background on the input 1 and input 2 screens.

http://www.mattmecham.com/downloads/k800theme.zip

I thought it was interesting… If you open the 800 theme in the Sony editor you can re-save it as something else. So although the backgrounds don’t line up, I successfully installed the theme on my W810i. I haven’t had any time to play with it and tweak the backgrounds or anything. Any chance you’ll release the elements individually for editting Mark?

Mark,

I came across this and thought that you and other k800i owners may find it handy.

Sony Ericsson K800i iSync plugin
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20060817214102586

Thaabit:

Use the WOTANSERVER and lead that came with the phone and just Debrand the phone, I understand you are a bit wary of this idea but your k800i is really no different to the other people’s k800i.

Just make sure you follow the steps above and everything should be fine.

Can any Sony Ericsson K800i users who read this please visit My Space Website so we can sort out sharing more k800i stuff like themes, games, etc.

http://wils35.spaces.live.com/

Cheers

Like the theme in principle, but mixed with Orange branding, it doesn’t quite go. A bit like spaghetti and soy sauce. Yuck.

Not brave enough (or all that fussed) about debranding, but two things that *have* got my goat are the following:

1. “Blog this” doesn’t appear in the More menu after taking a photo.
2. “Update service” is nowhere to be seen in the Settings > General menu.

Orange have told me to go to my local store for help, but since there aren’t any new firmware updates, I can’t quite see how that’ll help (unless there’s something I don’t know about yet.)

Any pointers?

Thanks,
Will