GSM Howto

[Nick Guenther]

On 10/18/07, Kai Winter <kaiwinter at gmx.de> wrote:
> Since a few day I own a Neo. After getting it alive with OpenMoko and
> even Qtopia (which ran both great) I tried to make a phone call.
>
> Now, I'm giving up. After reading many entries in bugzilla and of course
> the wiki I'm frustrated that no where could something be found like "how
> to make a phone call" explaining the whole process from choosing the
> right kernel and rootfs to make the necessary changes at the system.
>
> I already played around with this ttySAC0 Device, I even could
> communicate with the network via AT commands. But the UI (OpenMoko nor
> Qtopia) couldn't. Somehow the gsmd and ttySAC Device can't get a connection.
>
> Can't anybody write a COMPLETE howto. I think this prblem concerns so
> many developers...

First, check that you are not in a gsm850-only zone. The TI Calypso
modem has problems with 850; they are looking into fixing this. I'm in
a gswm850 only zone and I am very sad.

When you say "could communicate with the network" what do you mean? I
was able to read off my service provider's name, sometimes (AT+COPS?),
but was never able to get a carrier signal to actually make a call
(ATD). Can you post a transcript of one of these sessions?

Here is my transcript:
AT-Command Interpreter ready
AT
OK
AT+CFUN=1
OK
AT+CPIN="1234" [this PIN is constant for all Rogers SIM cards, appearently]
ERROR
AT+COPS [repositioned the cursor to the start of the line and hung for a while,
then put a newline and:]
OK
AT+COPS=? [slowly waiting...]
+COPS: (2, "ROGERS", "ROGERS", "302720")

OK
AT+COPS?
+COPS: 0,0,"ROGERS"

OK
ATD
NO CARRIER
ATD+1XXXXXXXXXX
NO CARRIERAT+COPS
OK
AT+COPS?
+COPS: 0,0,"Rogers Wireless"

OK
ATD
NO CARRIER


Some relevant links:
http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Manually_using_SMS#GSM_Modem_Setup
http://bugzilla.openmoko.org/cgi-bin/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=256 <-- an old bug
http://bugzilla.openmoko.org/cgi-bin/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=788 <--
a new bug involving the serial/gsm multiplexing which you might run in
to (can hardlock the neo if you're not careful)

-Nick