[David Cooper (OP)]

Three old Motorola phones used by members of my family (two T180 and one V547) have as of late Saturday been unable to make or receive calls, though text messages still work. The fault is not in the sim cards - moving them into another make of phone is all it takes to get them working normally. The network is O2 and O2 says there's nothing wrong with it, though they won't say if they've changed anything.

I doubt many people are still using such old phones, but if anyone has one of the models of phone named at the top I'd be interested to know if it has developed the same problem or if it works normally, and which network you're using it on.

[CliffordK]

Those phones don't look that old.  Somewhere I still have my old analog Motorola Flip Phone.

The Motorola T180 is listed as only GSM 900 / 1800, while the V547 is listed as GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900.

I could imagine the phone company changing frequencies, at least near your house.  But, the V547 should pick up multiple frequencies.

Both phones are listed as a "2G Network".  I've never really figured out what the different G's stand for.  However, most of the phones on the market today are either 3G or 4G.

You might verify that the phones that work are either 3G or 4G. 

Then, perhaps call your phone company and see what changed.

[David Cooper (OP)]

Good news - they're all working again. Contacting O2 yesterday about it may have led to them fixing whatever it was they'd changed. It's a relief to have the T180 working again as I was planning to convert it to using 3 AA batteries instead of AAAs to get really long usage out of it between charges - the back won't fit on it any more if I do that, but with 3D printers I should be able to design a new one for the purpose.

[imatfaal]

My motorola startac still works - my young and much hipper nephews and nieces are incredibly jealous as it now has huge retro appeal.  And the G in 2G etc is I believe Generation

[techmind]

Three old Motorola phones used by members of my family (two T180 and one V547) have as of late Saturday been unable to make or receive calls, though text messages still work. The fault is not in the sim cards - moving them into another make of phone is all it takes to get them working normally. The network is O2 and O2 says there's nothing wrong with it, though they won't say if they've changed anything.

I doubt many people are still using such old phones, but if anyone has one of the models of phone named at the top I'd be interested to know if it has developed the same problem or if it works normally, and which network you're using it on.

I know you said they're working again now. Phones of that era will be 2G (GSM). If they send/recieved SMS then they're on the right waveband etc. Sounds to me like O2 made some kind of software "update" in their system which was incompatible with your Motorola phones' voice/telephony system. Who knows which system (if either) was in the wrong (violated GSM standards) - but if it affected enough people / O2 got enough complaints, I imagine they'd roll back the upgrade quite swiftly... (which it sounds like they did)

[David Cooper (OP)]

I hope that's the case, but when I contacted them they knew nothing about the problem and that was 24 hours after it began, so I suspect very few people are still using phones as old as those ones, although many probably still have them in a working state and only use them occasionally as spare phones - they wouldn't have noticed that a few days went by in which their phones wouldn't have worked.

[chris]

I suspect, David, that with the number of call centre operators and the shift patterns in industries on the scale of mobile providers, even if quite a few people complained then it would take a while before the message trickled down to everyone at the public-facing side of the business. And not that they'd necessarily want it to be made public either, because that sort of confession might lead them down a legal path they were unwilling to pursue...

Chris

[evan_au]

Eventually, old 2G phones will no longer be supported.

The newer 4G technologies make much better use of the available spectrum, and support advanced techniques like multiple transmit and receive antennas, and switching to a local WiFi cell when one is at home or at work.

Eventually, the old phones will just waste too much spectrum to be supported any longer, and the telco will force you to upgrade you handset (this will not affect many people - the average person updates their phone about every 3 years). To avoid a public backlash, they will probably give you at least a year's warning.