Fix the Home Key With a Factory Reset

The Home key on my Google Ion/G2 stopped working yesterday. The key would still light up when pressed, but nothing would happen on the screen.

I run Open Home (and have for awhile), which could have had something to do with it. My phone was beginning to slow down and become less responsive, as well. Perhaps due to the newest batch of applications from the market. The only applications I had running at the time had been there for a couple of months, so I was pretty confident in them.

Either way, it seemed to be an application problem. After resetting the launch defaults on Open Home and the Android Home (Menu-->Settings-->Applications-->Manage Applications--><Select Application>-->Clear Defaults), the Home button still didn't work.

So rather than spend a lot of time trouble shooting, I just bit the bullet and did a factory reset on the Ion. I was a bit nervous, since I wasn't sure what a factory reset would do to a "special release" phone. Turns out, exactly what I wanted. After the reset, my Home button started working again. I reinstalled Open Home and a few other core applications, and I was back up and running within 15 minutes.

Since I'm on AT&T, I had to specify the APN settings before signing into my Google account. My contacts and calendar sync'd while I redownloaded my apps from the market. It was a surprisingly painless process. As a bonus, my phone now runs much smoother.