Hi All,
Well I got my SL5000D back from Sharp about 4 days ago. YEA!!
::Flashback Start::
Early August I bricked my Zaurus while attempting to flash to Sharps 3.x rom for the SL5500. Bad idea and a big mistake. As has been reported on this site, this pretty much leaves you with a broken Zaurus that no-one can fix except Sharp.
After calling Sharp's tech support I was delighted to learn that Sharp has/had a program (more on that later) that will fix our poor SL5000D. The Zaurus would need a new bootloader and the works. This service was free to everyone with the SL5000D. I was excited to hear this, so I shipped the Zaurus away to Sharp.
With the Zaurus I sent a 256M compact flash so Sharp could provide the latest SL5000D rom, just in case I had to flash again. After about 2 weeks, I was sent an email with an estimate for repair. $95 plus shipping ($104 total). Was not happy to see this, so I called Sharp's support.
I was informed that this program was no longer available and that I would be charged for the repair. I asked them to send it back without fixing it. Since they had 'worked' on the Zaurus, I would have to pay $50 for the diagnosis plus shipping. After another hour on the phone I told them to just fix it and send it back. Several calls later asking where the Zaurus was, I finally received it (1.5+ months total time).
::Flashback End::
Anyway, just so everyone knows, if a Sharp Rep tells you its free, its not. Its going to cost you just about the same as buying one on eBay. Also they did not provide the ROM on the CF card, so glad I sent that along. Back to hunting for a Stock ROM for a SL5000D. I know, I know, OZ 3.5.x is much better, but its nice to know I could flash it back to stock if I needed to. So if anyone has the ROM (Sharp insists that 1.3a is the latest for SL5000D), please ping me.
Thanks,
-- DawgTool
