Windows Phone Thoughts: A Warning To All Pocket PC Owners Regarding ROM Updates

This happens every time there's a major new ROM update, so it bears repeating here again. I've been seeing reports from people who have been getting their Toshiba e740's back from the recall, and when they try to do a restore, it doesn't work. Here's why:

When Toshiba sends back your repaired e740, they will have applied the EUU3 ROM update and done a hard reset in the process. Most restore programs will do a ROM check to ensure the device it's restoring to is a match, and as you can guess, it will generate an error. Although you're only backing up data in RAM, the RAM and ROM are deeply intertwined. The EUU3 ROM update can be performed without a hard reset - it only updates ROM areas - but I always perform a hard reset to be on the safe side. When I did the EUU3 update on the XDA without first doing a hard reset, Windows Media Player 8.5 mysteriously stopped working a few hours after the EUU3 update.

Your mileage may vary, but I view major ROM updates as a good excuse to get rid of the accumulated junk on my Pocket PC and start fresh.