"Busted" w850i - complicated, need advice

[sidratt]

Heya all,

I bought a w850i two weeks back, and at first I was delighted! But then it went bust. Now, I don't know the exact reason why, but I definitely did not drop it in water or on the ground or anything. Anyway, let me describe some of its symptoms:

- First thing I noticed was that it started to slow down... I mean REALLY crawl. The walkman 2.0 player would take a full three minutes to come up after I pressed the walkman button, then another 2-3 minutes to load up a song.
- Then the phone started to get totally unresponsive, to the point that I had to turn it off with the "10 second power-button emergency function" (?)
- Finally, when I started it up again, I got the good ol' WSOD.

Now, having looked through many forums, at this point I'm sure most of you will already have one answer on your mind.... "Flash the phone".

Thing is, that's the first thing I wanted to do. I downloaded XS++ and checked the CID and Firmware, this is what I had:

DBID: db2020
OTP CID: 49
EROM CID: 49
EROM color: Red
Operator: M_EAST_N_AFR
Firmware: R1ED001
EROM: R3A016

Anyway, at this point I chickened out and decided to take advantage of my warranty, so I sent it in for repairs. They took a whole week on the phone, and when it got back, initially it looked fixed. But within two hours the phone started to go unresponsive again, and the same set of symptoms as before cropped up....leading once again to that annoying WSOD.

So once again I started up XS++, thinking that the stupid repair center did absolutely NOTHING but waste my time, but see for yourself:

DBID: db2020
OTP CID: 49
EROM CID: 52
EROM color: Red
Operator: M_EAST_N_AFR
Firmware: R1KG001
EROM: R3A016

So I'm guessing they flashed my phone? In any case, I'm sending it back to them today...

Anyway, here are some of my questions:
- Is it possible that this is a hardware problem? Have any of you encountered a prob like this? I think it might have something to do with overheating...after all, I live in a country where 45^C is normal summer temp...
- If its a software prob, and I have to flash it myself, will I be able to? CID52 DB2020 won't cause any problems? I read that its impossible tocustomize a CID52, but i just want to repair the firmware....
- What are the most common causes of WSOD? Is there something I could be doing that is causing my problem?

Hope you can help me out!