The biggest problem which still plagues my Nokia 6600 is that the phone is difficult to turn on after it has been turned off. When I try to turn it on the backlight will illuminate, but the boot sequence stops there (eg, the Nokia symbol won't show, etc). Often it can take up to 30 attempts before the phone will boot and sometimes I just give up. The strange thing is that it will work without fail once it is running. The first thought, of course, is that something in the hardware is broken, but that usually means that the device is dead not temperamental.

I won't go into too much detail about why I decided to put my phone in the freezer, though the seed was planted after a conversation with my friend Simon regarding my phone issues. At some point we talked about possible circuit-contact problems due to something warping as a result of high temperatures. The theory had some holes, but that's what we were working on.

A couple of days later, I was ready to try and reformat the internal memory to see if that would cure my reboot problems. I turned off the phone to start the process, but I then remembered that I had forgotten to synchronize the latest changes in my address book with my computer. I tried to turn it back on without success and I gave up after 40 or so attempts.

I remembered the conversation Simon and I had about the circuit board. Being desperate and having nothing to lose I put the phone in the freezer for awhile. I left it in for a total of 40 minutes though I tried to restart it periodically. After about 20 minutes it turned on right away! I was both happy and surprised! Just to make sure it wasn't a fluke, I turned the phone off and on several times and it booted without any problems (though the display/CPU were a little sluggish because of the cold).

In the end I was able to make a final backup and do a synchronization before I started doing other radical fix-it things with my phone.

As final words I will say that there was a little more condensation buildup on the phone than I felt comfortable with only because moisture and electronics don't mix. So midway through the process I started to put the phone in a plastic Zip-lock bag and squeezed out most of the air to keep the condensation to a minimum. I think this is better to do this before you put the phone in the cold.

Do this at your own risk.