HTC HD2 Camera Problems?

[Matt]

If you read our HTC HD2 review last week you may recall that James mentioned some issues with the camera in our review device, he noticed a purple-ish halo or 'pink splodge' in the middle area of the photos.

At the time neither James nor I took much notice of this, putting it down to odd lighting conditions rather than a specific camera issue. However, there are more reports coming in from other users about the camera quality issues and now even HTC have confirmed that this is indeed a caused by a hardware fault and as such can only be resolved by repairing/replacing the handset itself.

 

Dear valued HTC customer, Thank you for your enquiry about your handset. This is a hardware issue and you can contact your re-seller to exchange the device for another one or contact us and we will send this device to be repair. If these steps have not helped, please let me know by responding using the link provided and I will be happy to check again for you.

 

Shame to hear that this is an issue that comes right on the back of many reported problems with battery life. Again, if you are experience either of these problems please post on the forum and left us know!

 

Posted by: Matt

[Source]

[ Post Tags: HTC HD2, battery problems, camera problems, windows mobile, HTC, tracyandmatt.co.uk ]

[ijob]

Indeed Matt,

Thanks for sharing this with the wider community. I too put it down initially to lighting conditions but as the week went on, I realised something was wrong. The image I took on Friday shows the problem to the extreme. Normally the pink is confined to the centre.



So, after reading your post about HTC customer service being so good, with a turn around of 7 days, I got in touch with them and they have arranged to pick it up tomorrow for repair.

Lets hope they will address the SMS problem too.

This is something that has made my phone unusable, as I use texting as a form of communication for work. SMS messages are not getting to their destination. Some arrive the next day, some don’t arrive which has caused me some issues with friends and work colleagues.

I have contacted HTC through email who advised me to try a newer sim card from another operator. I purchased a new sim from O2 and sent a batch of sms messages from the new sim to my contacts, only one reached its destination. This didn’t help.

Wish me luck

[BartekGo]

Here, I took pictures to show you what's the problem, you won't notice it on every day pictures but you will on white background...



And here's the problem

[andrewb]

Thanks Matt

I have the same problem just showed the wife - I also put it down to the light

I am going to contact T-mobile and see what they say -doubt they will be too pleased if I'm honest

Also going to ask them why the You tube client and the sat nav were taken off the release from T-Mobile

Just when I was liking the phone!

Thanks again great site

[BartekGo]

What do you mean that you tube is taken off?
and T-Mobile doesn't even sell them yet, only vodafone those...

[andrewb]

I have had mine with T_Mobile for a week

the You Tube App is missing,so is the copolot software both missing

going to call tomorrow

[BartekGo]

how come that T-Mobile haven't got them listed on their website? as far as I'm concerned only Vodafone has them.

[andrewb]

I called them and they had it in stock

big mistake

cant post the photo I took - very pink

[BartekGo]

well, HTC HD2 has only one true problem with is camera but I don't use it at all, the other problem is battery but my seem to get much much better after couple charges, today I only used 40% when 2 days ago I would use 70% so I'm happy with battery although bigger battery would be very nice.

I really like and enjoy my HD2 and I think that is awesome, iPhone had faults as well, here's the list of them:
not multi functional
non replaceable battery
Battery Life
Many Errors when calling and texting
No Flash
No memory card slot - you can't exchange data
Only way to access data is by connecting to PC + you can only access music, video, apps.
Speed - switching applications takes ages
Safari Stability
Bluetooth - well it's useless cause you can't do anything with it
and list goes on and on.

while HD2 has some mirror program errors that will get fixed very soon, I haven't experienced any error with my HD2 yet

[andrewb]

spoke to T-Mobile about the problems having (Camera contacts being deleted etc) and I am sending mine back - and will look at my upgrade again next month - still like the HD2 but there appear to be too many little problems

[ianjd]

That's annoying; I can see a central pink hue if I photograph a white area. I probably wouldn't have noticed this without a white test, though; I wonder if this is a problem with only some units or all of them? Either way, given they're still a bit thin on the ground, I might wait a couple of weeks before deciding what to do, if only so the HTC engineers are more familiar with the issue.

[ianjd]

I pinged the HTC Support folk anyway, and got this back...

"We are aware of the issue but it’s not a common fault with this device. It has been determined that this is not a hardware fault but a software issue and there should be a hotfix to be released soon to resolve it. Please monitor our website for the hotfix release."

Which is a little self-contradictory; if it's a software issue, shouldn't it be present across all devices? I guess what this means is that the lens has been (mis)designed with a bit of a chromatic abberation that not everyone is noticing, but they're going to Hubble it away with a little bit of code...

[Matt]

"We are aware of the issue but it’s not a common fault with this device. It has been determined that this is not a hardware fault but a software issue and there should be a hotfix to be released soon to resolve it. Please monitor our website for the hotfix release."

It also contradicts the response received in the original post wherein HTC state that it's a hardware defect that can only be rectified by repair or replacement. To be honest, looking at the sample pictures I cant see how this can be a software defect. However, it might be possible to rectify through software with some kind of colour balance technique.

[BartekGo]

well, cameras are more complicated then you think, I'm still trying to work out how lenses with defect could pass the quality test...
any way cameras are very complicated and they adjust the brightest, contrast and all that stuff so it could be software issue as well.

[Matt]

well, cameras are more complicated then you think, I'm still trying to work out how lenses with defect could pass the quality test...
any way cameras are very complicated and they adjust the brightest, contrast and all that stuff so it could be software issue as well.

Wouldn't rule anything out. Some owners are now saying that if they leave the cmaera 'on' for a little while before taking a snap then that seems to reduce the problem which could suggest that it's the CCD and when it's 'warm' it's better. Who know, I'm sure there will be some official line on it soon.