Disabling EVDO on a Motorola Razr V3m from Verizon
January 19th, 2008If you don’t know what EVDO or CDMA are, my basic understanding is that they are wireless protocols used to transfer data between cell towers and cell phones. EVDO is the higher-speed, but higher power-consuming option. There are two reasons someone would want to disable EVDO: to save a little battery life, and as one of the steps to getting effectively free Internet on a laptop through their phone.
You know to which infrastructure your phone is connected by a symbol at the top of the screen. "EV" means EVDO, while "1X" means CDMA. (I think the 1 also implies the version of CDMA, but that’s over my head.) By default the phone connects to EVDO if it is available, otherwise it will connect to CDMA. The goal of this tutorial is to make the phone prefer CDMA over EVDO. Doing so shouldn’t have any effect on the performance of calls, though downloads through Get it Now would probably be slower.
So let’s get to it!
First, you need to put your phone in debug mode. This is done by typing "##DEBUG" ("##33284") into the phone as if you were making a call. You have to be quick about it. You know that it worked if the final digit, 4, isn’t displayed. Upon typing "##DEBUG", the phone should look like this: 
Now you can get in to the FTS menu. I don’t know what "FTS" stands for, but it allows you to change some settings in the phone that aren’t usually accessible.
To get into the FTS menu, now that you are in debug mode, press "CLR" and then the left soft button. Pressing that combination at any time will get you in and out of the FTS menu. Note that you do not hold "CRL" while pressing the left soft button.
Now press the right soft button ("NEXT") until you arrive at the screen that lists "HDR Pref" on it. 
Now press the down button until "HDR Pref" is selected. Notice that "PREV" and "NEXT" have changed to "EXIT" and "CHANGE". 
Press the right soft button ("CHANGE") until "HDR Pref" is set to "cdma". 
Press the left soft button ("EXIT"). The phone will be unresponsive for about 15 seconds. Eventually the screen will show the FTS screen briefly, display another screen, and then then settle on a final screen. I can only assume this is the phone restarting. 
Now you just have to get out of the FTS menu and disable debug mode.
To get out of the FTS menu, press "CLR" and then the left soft button. Now that you’re back at the home screen, notice that the "EV" symbol at the top of the screen changed to "1X".
The way you get out of debug mode is the same way you got in. Just type ##DEBUG from the home screen. Make sure that debug mode is disabled by pressing "CLR" and then the left soft button. If you don’t see the FTS screen, you’ve done it right.
You’re done.
Internet Anywhere Through My Cell Phone
December 28th, 2007
This image really does represent ultimate sadness for someone (like me) who is addicted to the internet. This icon in the system tray means means that the computer isn’t connected to any network. That means (dare I say it) no internet! I am proud to say, that this icon has no effect on any more. Is this because I’ve kicked the internet habbit? Hell no! I have grown contemptuous of the “no networks” icon, because I can connect my laptop to the internet through my cell phone. It my sound complicated, but the process is actually very straight forward. Here’s what I do:
First, I click on the network icon in the system tray.
Next I click on “Connect to a network”, and I see this window:
Next I click on “Razr Net Access”. and click connect. So I see the next screen.
I wait a few seconds, and that’s it! I have access to internet that, while slow, is still twice as fast as dial-up, and it only costs minutes on my cell phone. The best part is that when calls are free, so is the internet access, meaning “surf’s up” on nights and weekends. Also, while I can not initiate calls, I can still recieve calls normally wile connected.
There. In four clicks I’m connected to the net. How is this possible? Well, it took some initial hacking of my Motorola Razr V3m that I got from Verizon. Some of the steps in setting it up initially can get a little complicated, but since the end result is so elegant (and free) I don’t mind. In a later post I’ll explain how to set this up.
Unlocking a Motorola Razr V3m from Verizon
December 26th, 2007
That Razr that you got from Verizon can do more than you think! With an unlocked Razr you can actually make your own ringtones for free. You can even connect your phone to your laptop and get internet access that only costs minutes, meaning on nights and weekends that is also free. You can also grab photos and videos taken from the phone and transfer them directly to your computer. More over, you can even make a custom wallpapers that you made on the computer or found on the internet. Don’t like that annoying V-Cast animations that play when you turn your phone on or off? Get rid of them! Or better yet, put something there that you made yourself.
There are so many possibilities, but whatever you do, there is definitely one place to start: actually unlocking the phone. Doing that is usually tedious and confusing, but last August I made an “unlocked” settings file to remove the tediousness and a video tutorial to take away the confusion.
Note that this process only works on Motorola Razr V3m phones from Verizon. Also note that unlocking the phone probably voids the warranty. I haven’t heard of this process breaking any phones, but if it does, I’m not liable.
Enjoy!
edit, January 19, 2008:
It seems the server hosting P2K seem edit, hacktherazr.com, is down. P2K Seem Edit is now packaged with the readme file and seem file in the download below.
Verizon Razr V3m Unlocking Kit (Revision 3)
edit, January 29, 2008:
Here’s the list of changes that this process makes, taken directly from the readme.txt file included in the download:
Here’s what changed about your phone:
USB Transfers are enabled.
Dial-Up Networking is enabled.
The orange background on the outside screen is changed to the wallpaper.
The “vibrate then ring” feature is now available.
The “continuous backlight” option is now available.
The “classic”, “continental”, “attention” and “moonlit haze” ringtones are now available.
If you’re curious, you can look up the actual seem edits that were made by cross-referencing this list with this page.
Edit, February 18, 2008:
For those who forgot to make a backup of the default seem, or those who otherwise don’t have access to one, here’s mine: Verizon Razr V3m Default Settings
Note that in principal it is best to use the backup that you made yourself. My backup should work on your phone, though. (Please tell me if you find otherwise.)
Edit, March 10, 2008:
I am declaring comment bankrupsy. It’s too hard to keep up on all the comments, and there are people who are much more knowlegable about this topic than I am. If you have a question, then I recommend that you direct it to the hacking community at http://hacktherazr.com/forum or http://motorola.howardforums.com.
Comments with links to other good sources of information are still appreciated.
Thanks, and happy hacking! 
Edit, March 14, 2008:
An awesome reader explained how to put ringtones on the Razr without buying any software. I put his explaination in this other post. Thanks, Sendherastar!
Edit: March 28, 2008:
Izzyd has this to say:
Heya all, it’s been a while do to some personal matter,but after reading threw some of these posts I’d like to shed some light. For all you folks who have just gotten a VZW v3m things have changed from when it was originally released. With VZW’s new .01.19.07 firmware a lot of stuff from before will not work at all, and other things need to be done in a different manner which is why certain things do not seem to work right. Whatever VZW did in the new firmware has locked us out of things like using MPT to transfer ring tones it just will not happen, another thing is the seem edit for USB transfer on the new firmware is not needed they already have it done for you. I could go one and on but I see there is some confusion and I’ll do what I can to stop by more frequently to point folks in the right direction. One thing plz be specific tho and let us know what carrier you are with and what firmware is on your phone that does make a difference these days, 4 months ago it wouldn’t have mattered, but thx to VZW they threw us for a loop which is why we see so much more confusion now.
Edit: June 27, 2008:
Verizon has closed the back door of using a Razr as a dial-up modem for free internet access. When you try, every webpage you load just gives you a message saying something like “The device is not authorized”.