J2ME socket connection - sockets

Question

I'm trying to implement a socket connection in my J2ME device. However I'm having some issues.
1- Sometimes the socket connection would just hang-up. I'd send a request, the server would get it and reply back but the response is never read by the client.
2- No timeout on socket: When the connection hangs, I'm forced to wait the whole 1 minute default timeout before I'm able to go out of the connection attempt. I've tried setting a timedTask to cancel/kill the thread executing the connection but I've had no success.
Any suggestions as to 1- why this could be happening (1) and how to properly implement a custom timeout for a j2me socket connection (2).
Thanks in advance,
Oscar
SOCKET Connection
String reply = "";
int ch;
try {
String name = "socket://" + socketIp + ":" + socketPort;
request = "request to socket";
socket = (SocketConnection)Connector.open(name, Connector.READ_WRITE, true);
os = socket.openOutputStream();
os.write(request.getBytes());
is = socket.openInputStream();
while( true) {
ch = is.read();
if(ch == -1) break;
if(ch < 0 && ch != -1){
break;
}
reply += (char) ch;
if(ch == '?'){
break;
}
}
socketReply(GlobalFunctions.Split(reply, "|"));
} catch (IOException ex){
socketError("Error: " + ex);
} catch (NullPointerException ex){
socketError("Error: " + ex);
} catch (ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException ex){
socketError("Error: " + ex);
} catch (StringIndexOutOfBoundsException ex){
socketError("Error: " + ex);
} catch (Exception ex){
socketError("Error: " + ex);
} finally {
try {
// Close open streams and the socket
is.close();
os.close();
socket.close();
} catch (IOException ex) {
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
TIMED TASK (For custom timeOut)
TimerTask timerTask = new TimerTask(){
public final void run()
{
try {
renderBack(displayIndex);
errorDialog(0);
is.close();
os.close();
socket.close();
t.interrupt(); //Thread running the whole connection process
} catch (IOException ex) {
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
};
int timeOut = 20000;
timer = new Timer();
timer.schedule(timerTask, timeOut);
The timed task would work, meaning, it'd "execute" the timed tasks (at least the display change) but still the socket default timeout would be running because after 1 minute it'd throw me the "TimeOut" exception.