Many iPhone SE Users Experiencing Bluetooth Phone Call Audio Issues [Fixed]

[usarioclave]

Don't think this problem persists "all over the industry." If it's a problem between WiFi and bluetooth, I've only ever had problems with Apple products. Linking my Bluetooth mouse and headphones worked perfectly with my PC, but I always have issues with my MBP.

It's usually caught in UAT. We have a whole bunch of ODM hardware that had WiFi/BT problems that they had to rebuild. Ask your hardware partner (if you have one) about BT interference issues; they're legion.

If you have access to hardware release notes you'll probably see entries for BT interference. BT interference can also be caused by USB circuit problems, which is really weird IMO.

 

[Somian]

I recently bought an iPhone SE and i'm experiencing the described issues. I have a 2014 Audi A3. My old iPhone 5S always worked fine. But with the SE, the bluetooth is unusable. I can barely understand people.

I restored the SE from my 5S backup, so the configuration should be the same and it's also the same car and SIM card/carrier. I also unsuccessfully tried to re-pair it.

 

[MagMan1979]

dozens of users

It's amazing how "dozens of users" all of a sudden widespread issue, unbelievable!

iOS 9.3 is crap. The same for OS X 10.11.4.

Basis for your BS statement? iOS 9.3 is statistically the most stable version of iOS in YEARS, and has been absolutely brilliant for me on all my iOS devices. As has OS X 10.11.4. Gotta love mindless commentary like this...

 

[dannyyankou]

I don't think this is exclusive to the SE, I was having issues on my 6s on the latest public beta.

 

[Col4bin]

I've always had bluetooth connectivity issues affecting all of my iPhones starting with my 3GS, to this day with my 6 Plus. Heck, even my Nexus 6 sometimes drops and forgets formally established parings or can't reconnect at times.

Day 1 stuff here. Carry on.

 

[jaymzuk]

Early adopter? Is that really a suitable moniker given it's essentially iPhone 6S guts in an iPhone 5 shell?

 

[nt5672]

I recently bought an iPhone SE and i'm experiencing the described issues. I have a 2014 Audi A3. My old iPhone 5S always worked fine. But with the SE, the bluetooth is unusable. I can barely understand people.

I restored the SE from my 5S backup, so the configuration should be the same and it's also the same car. I also tried unsuccessfully tried re-pairing it.

Welcome to low power bluetooth. Thats how Apple is able to make idevices so thin. Remember the SE has the 6 internals and the improved low power bluetooth.

 

[nsblum]

Not a bug, a feature. It's designed to sound best in AppleCar. Sound is intentionally degraded for use in other makes.

Seriously, not sure how something this important wasn't caught in beta testing. No problems myself w/ iPhone 6 and 9.3 w/ BMW 435i.

And what beta testing happened for the iPhone SE? This is not an issue with the software if only one phone that was just released has the issue.

 

[brewmonkey]

I wonder how so many of these issues seem to be escaping QA at Apple - especially issues like this that seem to be a pretty core use case scenario. Maybe Apple has too many irons in the fire and should regroup, focusing on core competencies with a very limited number of devices (do we really need that many iPhones to pick from?) that each have much higher quality.

 

[Col4bin]

There has been a long standing issue with iPhone Bluetooth connectivity in Honda vehicles. The only way to keep our iPhones connected during phone calls in our 2013 CRV is to turn the iPhone Wifi off. It's ridiculous.

http://www.autoconnectedcar.com/201...-than-ios-8-in-cars-but-could-cause-problems/

Same as with my 6 Plus and Nexus 6 in a 2013 Acura MDX (Honda). From my experience with BT connectivity issues in general across all devices and platforms, not 100% blaming it on the SE. BT is ready for it's next evolution (whatever that is).

 

[r3dflame]

It's amazing how "dozens of users" all of a sudden widespread issue, unbelievable!

It's widespread when you have people exchanging their phones and experiencing the exact same issue on the replacement, even when set up as new.

 

[kevinkyoo]

Nothing new to see here. Carry on.

Hm, so we should just ignore these inherent problems that should have been fixed a long time ago. Gotcha

 

[uid15]

Celebration! THIS IS MY 1,000th POST!






If you want to know how ridiculously poorly conceived and executed the Bluetooth protocol is, watch TWiT's "Security Now" show, episode #280. I've heard this episode twice over the last year, and it goes into incredible detail.

Show #280:

An excerpt from the show #280 transcript:


"Steve: Yeah. The logo, apparently in whatever wacky language they had, HB, Harald Bluetooth, in some language is something that looks like an asterisk, and then something that looks like a "B." And so that's actually, that's where that logo came from, where it's that sort of that pointy, looped "B" with funky little lines coming out the back side. Actually, if you look at it, you can sort of see an asterisk embedded with a "B." And so that was the source of the logo. So they introduced this in '94, after a couple years of work. And then about four years later Ericsson was joined by Nokia, IBM, Toshiba, and Intel to form the so-called Bluetooth SIG. They were the original members of the SIG. And now it's literally thousands of companies.
The spec started off a little rough because it is, as I said, it shows its age. It is just a disaster of a protocol. If you sat somebody down with the spec - which by the way is 1,200 pages, I mean, it's like the U.S. tax code - if you sat them down with it, there is absolutely no chance at all that they could produce something that worked with anything else. Their stuff would work with their own stuff, but there's no chance they would have interoperability. And not surprisingly, that was the big problem with Bluetooth in the beginning was that people would implement their Bluetooth technology, and they wouldn't be able to connect with anything else. They could work with their own stuff, but not anybody else's equipment.

So over the years there has been a code base, essentially, that has been refined and is available to people who want to implement Bluetooth, that basically is more useful than the spec. The specification is just - it's horrendous. People who have used Bluetooth are aware that it's not something that you have to configure. So the goal, Ericsson's goal, this was going to be a consumer network, something where these things could somehow find each other in a process called "discovery," and just interoperate. However, they also wanted it to be secure.

So what they did was they created this notion of pairing, where you pair two Bluetooth-enabled things through some sort of an easy-to-use process. Devices may or may not have screens. They may or may not have keyboards. It could be, for example, just speakers, where it's somehow going to just work. Yet you still want there to be this pairing process. So what Ericsson worked out is this notion of a device being discoverable, which if you've got a user interface that is on your device, you can typically turn that on and off.

One of the most important things to do in security with Bluetooth is have your device not be discoverable by default. That is, you only want it to be discoverable during the period of time that two devices need to literally discover each other because having it be discoverable begins to open it up to some security problems. Mostly they're implementation problems of the particular vendor that has put things together. And the history of Bluetooth security has been compared to other histories of security relatively okay. We'll talk in a couple weeks about where this has not been okay. But the number one problem, the chief source of trouble has been that people have left their devices in a discoverable mode rather than not."


Now you can't complain about it so much.

 

[MagMan1979]

It's widespread when you have people exchanging their phones and experiencing the exact same issue on the replacement, even when set up as new.

Again, a few dozen people does not quantify a "widespread issue" when millions upon millions of the SE's have been sold into active circulation.

Also, this is not confined to the iPhone SE, as users with other model iPhone's and even Android phones are reporting this.

Quit trying to follow the OP and sensationalizing this, when no such sensationalization is warranted.

 

[latndude]

It's widespread when you have people exchanging their phones and experiencing the exact same issue on the replacement, even when set up as new.

I've always had bluetooth connectivity issues affecting all of my iPhones starting with my 3GS, to this day with my 6 Plus. Heck, even my Nexus 6 sometimes drops and forgets formally established parings or can't reconnect at times.

Day 1 stuff here. Carry on.

the last iPhone that connected and kept a good level of sound with a phone call was my iPhone 4 and my Nissan Altima,, after that they got worst and worst , is an older Nissan , perhaps their Bluetooth implementation in newer cars is better , but when I use my iPhone 6s plus the quality of the outgoing call is not good, to the point that I opted to answer using the phone instead of the Bluetooth car connection, perhaps , this problem will benefit everybody if Apple decides to do something about it.

 

[Col4bin]

the last iPhone that connected and kept a good level of sound with a phone call was my iPhone 4 and my Nissan Altima,, after that they got worst and worst , is an older Nissan , perhaps their Bluetooth implementation in newer cars is better , but when I use my iPhone 6s plus the quality of the outgoing call is not good, to the point that I opted to answer using the phone instead of the Bluetooth car connection, perhaps , this problem will benefit everybody if Apple decides to do something about it.

In my current vehicle (Acura MDX) the hand's-free BT calling is very quiet over the speaker, to the point where I need to blast the volume and quickly turn it back down when a call ends or drops to avoid rupturing an ear-drum when the radio kicks back on!

 

[BornAgainMac]

Seems like a software fixable issue for Apple to fix. Not a Gate issue.

 

[harvester32]

I have a 6S and until 9.3 I never had this problem but am experiencing the same symptoms as described. It's horrible and hopefully they can find a fix. Seems software related as before 9.3 I never had that issue and now I get it every 2-3 phone calls.

 

[kagharaht]

iOS 9.3 is crap. The same for OS X 10.11.4.

It's sad but I have to agree. After all these betas and updates, core issues still persist.

 

[uid15]

Many macrumors members complain about their socks being slightly the wrong shade of black, so how much more will they complain about this - an issue which Apple WILL fix.

Complaining without following that with a constructive remedy or suggestion, is pointless. If you're gonna complain, demonstrate a pragmatic plan of how you would propose fixing it, SANS MORE COMPLAINING.

 

[MagMan1979]

It's sad but I have to agree. After all these betas and updates, core issues still persist.

And yet iOS 9.3 is statistically the most stable iOS in years:

http://appleinsider.com/articles/16...new-release-in-years-app-analytics-firm-finds

 

[Chupa Chupa]

And what beta testing happened for the iPhone SE? This is not an issue with the software if only one phone that was just released has the issue.

1) That's not so. Every iOS device has it's own sub-build of iOS. It's why if you have multiple iOS device and you update via iTunes you have to download the version for each respective device. It's not one for all. For example when 9.3 was released it was discovered that the some older iOS devices were susceptible to an activation error that could brick the device.

2) Beta testing is for hardware too. This could be a s/w issue, h/w issue, or combination of the two.

 

[Tiger8]

Not a bug, a feature. It's designed to sound best in AppleCar. Sound is intentionally degraded for use in other makes.

Seriously, not sure how something this important wasn't caught in beta testing. No problems myself w/ iPhone 6 and 9.3 w/ BMW 435i.

I think Apple software quality has gone downhill due to mediocre testing. Whomever it is running QA department should be fired. All those bugs (like this, the link from mail) are just too common, no excuse for not catching them early.

 

[joueboy]

According to the previous article, iOS 9 is the most stable OS that Apple released.

 

[uid15]

Newsflash:

It's a NEW MODEL. Bugs happen, life happens. Get over it.

/Newsflash.