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Analyst Claims Design Fix for iPhone 4 Signal Issue Being Deployed

WhySoSerious said:
so.....umm...basically, MR is reporting on what some guy has said will happen......and all the other things the same guy has said will happen still haven't happened?

wow. :rolleyes:
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you do realize they are reporting on a rumor. and that the name of this site is mac RUMORS.

roll your eyes now.
 
mattster16 said:
When the antenna was revealed by Steve in his keynote I remember seeing all the 'tabs' around the inside face of the antenna with screw holes. I remember thinking that each of those connection needs to be properly insulated and better not be making any kind of unintended electrical connection with internal components and the production tolerances and consistencies required would be important.

Anyways, this explanation seems plausible to me (I'm in no way an expert on the subject so I won't pretend I really know what I'm talking about). It could also explain why some don't seem to have the issue and some do. An inadequate insulator could be a culprit. If this is the case I'd expect Apple to repair or replace ALL phones, a la Toyota pedal recall.

I guess we'll see tomorrow...
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We'll if the Toyota analogy is correct then it will be a voluntary recall where those with issues can bring in there phone to an Apple store for the repair. Not an easy fix for those of us that live some 1.5 hours from a store. I'm sure it will be an overnight repair as well. But as you say, we'll see tomorrow.
 
Intarweb said:
But it doesn't fix the problem. It masks it. The problem is still there.
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So does the plastic exterior on most cell phones in history mask this issue. It is an inherent issue of antennas. Not some Steve Jobs attack on college kids. Try defining things reasonably instead of the alternative.
 
henhowc said:
Hopefully this will go into the white iphones that haven't shipped yet.
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Which would be even more interesting. To know that this defect was indeed known...and being applied to the white iPhone since it was delayed from the start.
 
I think tomorrow will go something like this.

- Talk about the display fix
- Every phone has this signal attenuation problem
- We are enhancing the design to make it better
- We are extending the return/exchange period to 2 months.
- If you think you have a signal strength issue, get it replaced with in 2 months of purchase.

It will not be termed an official recall ( voluntary or otherwise ). It is an enhancement which Apple is providing for free, if so desired within two months.

That should put an end to this saga and we can all move on.
 
JAT said:
So does the plastic exterior on most cell phones in history mask this issue. It is an inherent issue of antennas. Not some Steve Jobs attack on college kids. Try defining things reasonably instead of the alternative.
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Yep, except old school cell phones with plastic cases weren't designed and sold to be held with *no* plastic case. Or further, in many cases had consumers refuse to cover them in any casing at all because it's just too beautiful a work of art to be covered.

I sold a used car once whose seats were all torn up. Just put seat covers over them and problem solved, right? It's as if the problem never existed!
 
Helianthus said:
Why is this not feasible? 500,000 hours x $18 = $9,000,000

Average genius wages taken from here = http://www.glassdoor.com/Hourly-Pay/Apple-Mac-Genius-Hourly-Pay-E1138_D_KO6,16.htm

$9M is peanuts compared to the revenues generated from the phone, and their overall earnings. This $9M will go a long way in enhancing their image.
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This also assumes that 9 mill people will bring their's in for repair. I'm thinking this number is much smaller. Most, albeit nonvocal, people likely have no reception issues with their IP4 (like me) and would not want the trouble of driving, mailing, waiting, etc. to have someone pop the shell on their beauty and risk messing with the internals. Then again, allot of posts on this site indicate some pretty OCD individuals that are probably going to go to the APPLE store at 10 in the morning waiting for the GO sign from Stevie for a free repair.:rolleyes:
 
ender21 said:
Yep, except old school cell phones with plastic cases weren't designed and sold to be held with *no* plastic case. Or further, in many cases had consumers refuse to cover them in any casing at all because it's just too beautiful a work of art to be covered.

I sold a used car once whose seats were all torn up. Just put seat covers over them and problem solved, right? It's as if the problem never existed!
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At this point that's all just semantics.

There are several solutions right now, may be another tomorrow. The one thing that TRULY is not a solution is ranting about it online.
 
liavman said:
I think tomorrow will go something like this.

- Talk about the display fix
- Every phone has this signal attenuation problem
- We are enhancing the design to make it better
- We are extending the return/exchange period to 2 months.
- If you think you have a signal strength issue, get it replaced with in 2 months of purchase.

It will not be termed an official recall ( voluntary or otherwise ). It is an enhancement which Apple is providing for free, if so desired within two months.

That should put an end to this saga and we can all move on.
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I think you are dead on. But I also think, that Apple will offer some sort of iTunes App Store credit (say 30$) to excuse for the hassle.

I also think they will explicitly announce, which serial numbers are candidates for the issue, as I think it's a manufacturing problem and the issue is resolved with the new phones.

And I definitely think they will pull out some statistic, how 90% of the users are more than happy with their current phone though it may be affected by the issue. To put the stock back up, they will also announce some sales figures.
 
JAT said:
At this point that's all just semantics.

There are several solutions right now, may be another tomorrow. The one thing that TRULY is not a solution is ranting about it online.
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Indeed. "Truly" outcry from consumers that they have problems with a product has *never* affected any sort of solution. Oh wait a minute....

Though I wouldn't classify anything I have written as a "rant." Merely participating in a forum for discussion centered around a topic on which many people share mutual interests.
 
if, as suspected, there's a fixed design (hence why ship times have gone to 3 weeks on the store?), it'll be a simple swap in store.

in the history of iDevices apple has NEVER done in store takeapart repairs - whole unit replacements are done and its relatively simple process in the CRM system. this can be done by non-genius employees, rather than taking up genius time doing physical repairs. most of the bars have a large enough load of Mac repairs already.

also, those of your complaining about your screen protectors, tough. theyve never paid for replacements on screen protectors on previous iphones or ipods.

I'm a former mac genius and I don't envy my former coworkers one bit over the next few weeks!
 
but

robwormald said:
if, as suspected, there's a fixed design (hence why ship times have gone to 3 weeks on the store?), it'll be a simple swap in store.

in the history of iDevices apple has NEVER done in store takeapart repairs - whole unit replacements are done and its relatively simple process in the CRM system. this can be done by non-genius employees, rather than taking up genius time doing physical repairs. most of the bars have a large enough load of Mac repairs already.
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but, apparently they HAVE been ramping up to do repairs IN the store. Not sure if that could be leveraged for this potential problem but they plan to be able to do screen, battery, water damage and other repairs in the store in the near future.
 
I may only be an electrical engineer not an RF engineer, but if the problem is that your skin's conductivity "shorts" out the two external antennae and detunes it by touching them both at the same time, I fail to see how adding some sort of "internal insulator" how this helps the problem of losing signal. If your hand touches both antennae on the outside, there's still going to be the electrical "short".

I'll wait for an official analysis before I believe it.
 
robwormald said:
if, as suspected, there's a fixed design (hence why ship times have gone to 3 weeks on the store?), it'll be a simple swap in store.

in the history of iDevices apple has NEVER done in store takeapart repairs - whole unit replacements are done and its relatively simple process in the CRM system. this can be done by non-genius employees, rather than taking up genius time doing physical repairs. most of the bars have a large enough load of Mac repairs already.

also, those of your complaining about your screen protectors, tough. theyve never paid for replacements on screen protectors on previous iphones or ipods.

I'm a former mac genius and I don't envy my former coworkers one bit over the next few weeks!
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My wife had a broken screen on the inside of the LCD on her old 3GS. She took it to the Apple Store and the Genius Bar told her they would replace the display only, but not the phone itself. The guy went into the back for about 10-15 minutes, came back out and voila. Fixed screen.

Is it possible that they actually swapped her phone out with a different one and transferred all its data over, but only told her they'd replace the screen?
 
ender21 said:
Indeed. "Truly" outcry from consumers that they have problems with a product has *never* affected any sort of solution. Oh wait a minute....
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Those that create the solutions do not read this thread. I (well, probably many people, but I know I got an email back) managed to get ESPN to change one thing about their Wimbledon broadcast this year, by reporting to THEM.

Though I wouldn't classify anything I have written as a "rant." Merely participating in a forum for discussion centered around a topic on which many people share mutual interests.
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If the shoe doesn't fit, it must not be yours.
 
goMac said:
Internal in engineering means it will simply be part of the phone. It doesn't mean it will be on the inside of your phone.

An external solution would be a case.
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You are so wrong, please refrain from posting. Thank you.
 
derek4484 said:
I may only be an electrical engineer not an RF engineer, but if the problem is that your skin's conductivity "shorts" out the two external antennae and detunes it by touching them both at the same time, I fail to see how adding some sort of "internal insulator" how this helps the problem of losing signal. If your hand touches both antennae on the outside, there's still going to be the electrical "short".

I'll wait for an official analysis before I believe it.
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I think it's a connection to the battery to shock you so you move your finger. The insulation is to protect the phone when shocking the user.
 
mytakeontech said:
Analyst from my firm has said that

Apple has internally confirmed that there are no design flaws with the iPhone design pertaining to the signal drop. It is also heard (of course from reliable sources) that in tomorrow's conference, Apple is going to tell the same thing to the world. Some of our unreliable sources have mentioned that Apple is going to announce exchange policy for iPhone 4 for those people who are facing signal drop issue until their issue is resolved. If they are still not satisfied, Apple is going to pay for their 1 month of service with ATT and buy them Droid.x or whatever phone they want.

Apart from a few unreliable sources everything is from reliable sources. If our reliable sources turned out to be not so reliable, we will search for new reliable sources but we will keep reporting what our new old reliable sources that turned unreliable say.
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People should be prepared that Apple is going to come out and further hold their ground. Everyone expecting Apple to do some sort of mea culpa may end up seriously disappointed. I think people here who have problems way over-estimate how many people are having an issue, and are going to flip out all over again tomorrow.

I Still have not seen any evidence that this is as widespread as some people here wish it was, for whatever reasons.

I posted elsewhere earlier that it could just be Apple saying, "The phone works fine, if you have troubles with yours please exchange it, if you can't get one to work for you, then we will give you a refund."

I guess we will all see tomorrow.
 
SixPenceRicher said:
WTF? What's an "internal insulator"?

The antenna problem is very simple -- touching both antennas over the dielectric gap result in signal attenuation due to a detuning (change in effective inductance) of the antenna. I don't care what kind of "insulator" they put in phone, it won't make any difference. The only solution is to insulate the metal antenna from touch by hiding it internally or coating it with a non-conductive coating that prevents anything conductive (fingers, metal, whatever) from detuning the antenna. Very simple Magnetism 101 stuff.

Frankly, I'm surprised that the analysts haven't caught on to this yet, but they continue to spew all sorts of pseudo-science postulations about how to fix this problem.

BTW, an in-store fix is relatively simple -- just tear the phone down and replace the original antenna with the non-conductive coating version. 10 mins max, though your wait times will vary.
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They are analysts. They don't know what they are talking about.

The new saying should be, "Those who can't, analyze".
 
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