My contract with Verizon Wireless was due for renewal, so today I bought a Samsung Alias 2 from them. It’s my first cell phone with a QWERTY keyboard… I don’t send text messages often, but when I do, a decent keyboard will make it less tedious. The e-ink buttons are nifty, but I really wish the external display had a 24-hour clock. The internal display can be configured to use one, so why not external? Ah well, I’m not going to review the phone. That’s already been done plenty elsewhere.
As the phone was released only this month, I couldn’t find a means online on how to disable EVDO, but I suspect geek intuition lead me to find the solution myself. I’m not going to discuss EVDO in detail… I’ll leave it to you to figure out if you need it or not, and consequences of disabling it. Suffice to say, disabling it may tremendously increase battery life. It certainly does so on my phones, but your mileage may vary.
Anyway, to disable EVDO on a Samsung Alias 2 (SCH-u750):
Go to Menu
Go to Settings & Tools
Press 0 (Phone Info)
Press #
Enter unlock code (default is 000000)
Press OK
Press 4 (Pref Mode)
Select CDMA Only Mode
Press OK
Press END
That was easy!
There’s a number of other options in the SYSTEM INFO menu, but unless you know precisely what you’re doing, I suggest you don’t touch anything.
