I bought my N8 from The Nokia Shop at Heathrow Terminal 5 on 4 January 2011 on my way back from a working in the North Sea. After about 3 or 4 days it suddenly started restarting itself at random intervals. I checked various blogs/forums and found out it was possibly a firmware upgrade related issue. Not overly concerned at that stage just really chuffed with my new toy and it's features.
Two weeks (19th Jan) later I returned to Heathrow for another offshore trip and purchased, from the same Nokia Store, two more N8's - one for my girlfriend and one for a work colleague. I discussed the random restarting issue with the salesman who informed me it required a firmware update to sort it out.
My phone and the two new ones were stored onshore, safely for the 21 day period I was away. I returned to SA on 11th Feb and gave my girlfriend her new phone. Well wouldn't you know it a mere 3 days after she got it and transferred all her data across from her E71 it suddenly switched off and wouldn't switch back on even with the charger plugged in. After an hour or so I was able to switch it back on but as soon as she tried using it it switched itself off again. The battery is fully charged and holding the power button for 8 seconds doesn't do anything. I've even tried the hard reset (volume down button + camera button + menu button + power button) but absolutely nothing happens - it is dead!
My phone is still restarting randomly even after updating the firmware and OVI store software - very disappointed with the N8 to date. Worst is Nokia Care listed in South AFrica (Durban) returned my email saying the email account no longer was active!
Does anybody know what I can do to solve the problem and how can Nokia say this is a problem with a small minority of phones when complaints from arouund the globe are being posted to forums and blogs regarding the exact same issue? Does anyone actually have an N8 that works properly?
I have not given my colleague his phone as yet but will be interesting to see if it does the same thing! Nokia Store at Heathrow Terminal 5 sucks and is palming off inferior quality merchandise knowing full well the customers may not be able to return for sometime, if indeed ever! I've always backed Nokia and always owned a Nokia but this has put me off completely - can't trust the phone to work when you need it to!
