Loud bleeps for every key press when trying to enter the contact name etc.
Non-predictive text entry worked!
A reboot has restored ability to use predictive text to enter a new contact's name.
Such a fundamental thing like adding a contact should have been more rigorously tested before release, surely?!
this is on RM-235 12.046.
The phone had not been switched off for a few days and I'd propbably only used the music player, made/received a few calls, transfered music files via "mass storage mode" and perhaps a bit of web via wi-fi.
The phone had also exhibited the behaviour where the loudspeaker option did not work on a call but the reboot seems to have fixed that aswell.