Last night I decided to upgrade firmware of my Nokia E71 to the latest available V200.21.118 when I saw the very long list of changelog posted on few of Nokia / Symbian blogs.  The improvement in  WLAN, VOIP, Camera, Email functionality was of interest to me.

Well as everyone is aware firmware upgrade of any product is not for weak hearted and it is equally tough for Nokia phones. Before proceeding with firmware upgrade using Nokia Software Updater, you are required to make backup of our mobile data using Nokia PC Suite as all your data is wiped out when you flash the firmware of your mobile.  Although all your data gets backup properly, but at the time of restore, PC Suite cannot restore back your most important of all the contact list. And Yes you also end up losing other important data like stored messages, calendar entries, notes etc.

It is a known issue and your only saviour is Nokia’s own tool ‘Nokia_Contact_Transfer.exe’. But it is not so easy to locate this tool on Nokia site and I had to spends one precious night  in November 08 just to locate it and all other tools I could lay my hands on were paid products. This tool is cool as it auto detects and shows all backup files stored on your desktop.  And it helps you select correct stored backup file and recover / restore all your contacts data from the backup file. And this tool is so fast that you refuse to believe your eyes.

Anyway I am happy that I upgraded E71 and it was really worth the efforts I had to put in. And I do have a story to tell about my upgraded N71 but that will be coming tomorrow.