Apple Addresses 2018 iPad Pro 'Bending' Controversy, Says Subtle Deviations May Be More Visible Due to New Design

[john123]

As I’ve said in previous posts, I’ve long suspected that the real story is that the “flat” design (first for the iPad line) is what is making these normal variances more noticeable. The last product made with a similar design was the iPhone 5/5S, which was much smaller. It had its own cosmetic issues (the easily nicked chamfered edge). My guess is that Apple might return to a more rounded design if it sees a change in sales trends or complaint activity, just as it did with the iPhone 6 to the present. But the flat design has some advantages, such as easier integration with the Pencil 2.

The point is that this is a cosmetic issue. There’s no evidence that anyone’s iPad Pro has stopped working because of the small “bending.” Of course, Apple is a company obsessed with aesthetics, so if it sees that “bending” is an issue with the current generation it will look to make improvements in future generations. But every design of every Apple product, even back in the Steve Jobs era, made trade-offs between aesthetics and functionality. Steve Jobs approved the G4 Cube that literally overheated and cracked. He also probably lost millions of sales of white iPhone 4 models trying to get the right tone of white. He wasn’t perfect.

Your theory is totally plausible.

And it is absolutely true that this is a cosmetic issue.

But for a company that's stock and trade for decades has been aesthetics, this kind of thing is especially egregious. Steve was notorious for his "we have exacting standards" and "we won't ship junk" speeches. That's part of why when these things happen, they get more press than they would coming from other companies.

But that's very, very different from what the other fellow said, which was, "all products have tolerances so this is OK." That exhibited faulty inductive reasoning—and it just didn't pass the smell test either, which is why so many people are up in arms about it.

It's also the kind of thing that really should have been noticed in prototyping and QC.

 

[mikethemartian]

Feel free to ask me any engineering questions if you have doubts. My focus is communications and signal processing theory and hardware design. Systems architectures in the same disciplines as well.

Again...what is your background, other than buying an Apple product in 1980?


"Now it's an open MacBook Pro you can bend"

Now? Of course. BTW, I'm not talking about at the hinge.

Without looking it up what is the convolution of a Lorentzian function and a Gaussian function and is there a closed form solution for the resulting function?

 

[9081094]

Then you are missing out. I had the iPhone 6S (not plus) and the current iPad Pro. The iPad is a much more solid device. Remember that the “built like a tank” 10.5” iPad Pro was only 1mm thicker. It’s not as if the new design is anorexic. It’s just that they are switching to more eco-friendly alloys as well as a flatter design.

It would be very easy for Apple to reinforce the structure inside and not that expensive either. I’m sure they were aware of it before they launched the device.

My guess is that they hoped all would buy cases, etc. to give it the more rigid structure it should have in the first place.

 

[tknelson]

I see macrumors is using that misleading and completely unrelated picture again.

The picture does NOT show a freshly-unboxed iPad.

The user who posted it on MacRumors (link) said it did NOT come bent from the factory:

​

The only bent thing here is MacRumours respect for the truth.

THIS. It's obvious from the picture that this unit was BENT and not WARPED. (this should be warp-gate, or curve-gate, not bend gate, because these devices are not bent!)

 

[GregJohn]

Got mine delivered yesterday and I don’t have any bend as far as I know lol, but then again for 2500$ I would hope it didn’t.

 

[furi0usbee]

As I’ve said in previous posts, I’ve long suspected that the real story is that the “flat” design (first for the iPad line) is what is making these normal variances more noticeable. The last product made with a similar design was the iPhone 5/5S, which was much smaller. It had its own cosmetic issues (the easily nicked chamfered edge). My guess is that Apple might return to a more rounded design if it sees a change in sales trends or complaint activity, just as it did with the iPhone 6 to the present. But the flat design has some advantages, such as easier integration with the Pencil 2.

The point is that this is a cosmetic issue. There’s no evidence that anyone’s iPad Pro has stopped working because of the small “bending.” Of course, Apple is a company obsessed with aesthetics, so if it sees that “bending” is an issue with the current generation it will look to make improvements in future generations. But every design of every Apple product, even back in the Steve Jobs era, made trade-offs between aesthetics and functionality. Steve Jobs approved the G4 Cube that literally overheated and cracked. He also probably lost millions of sales of white iPhone 4 models trying to get the right tone of white. He wasn’t perfect.

I don't pay Apple Tax for a "cosmetic issue." I wouldn't stand for a bend in a $200 device, let alone $800, $1000, etc. I paid $2200 for my 2012 retina MBP. It wasn't bent. It's still kicking today (I'm typing on it). I remember the days when Apple didn't sell bent products.

 

[Bawstun]

Proper way to address this...

Apple Spokesperson: “They are defective, and we are sorry. Please bring your bent iPads into your nearest Apple store or mail it to us for a full-refund or replacement.”

End message.

No spin, no 5 paragraph diatribes of customer service yadda yadda spin and this or that.

They’re defective.

We’re sorry.

The end.

Good lord how much longer will the shareholders tolerate this? Arrange an emergency meeting and fire Tim Cook, NOW!

 

[truthertech]

It would be very easy for Apple to reinforce the structure inside and not that expensive either. I’m sure they were aware of it before they launched the device.

My guess is that they hoped all would buy cases, etc. to give it the more rigid structure it should have in the first place.

Yes, that's the ticket. Tim and the upper brass sat around and discussed how they were about to ship a major product that was defective and that would disappoint and anger customers, and they could easily fix it for little expense, but they shrugged their shoulders and decided that everyone would just buy a case anyways. That's how it's done.

 

[furi0usbee]

Proper way to address this...

Apple Spokesperson: “They are defective, and we are sorry. Please bring your bent iPads into your nearest Apple store or mail it to us for a full-refund or replacement.”

End message.

No spin, no 5 paragraph diatribes of customer service yadda yadda spin and this or that.

They’re defective.

We’re sorry.

The end.

Good lord how much longer will the shareholders tolerate this? Arrange an emergency meeting and fire Tim Cook, NOW!

That's how it should be. But instead its, "You're looking at it wrong. If you just look at it with another angle, there is no perceivable bend."
[doublepost=1546727341][/doublepost]Apple should sell us the iBar. A genius can weld a steel bar to the edges of the iPad. Done. Get your battery replaced at the same time.

 

[Bawstun]

That's how it should be. But instead its, "You're looking at it wrong. If you just look at it with another angle, there is no perceivable bend."

They’re trying to protect brand image with dishonesty. And it is going to backfire - again (as the battery issue/lawsuits did and have). Why can’t they just be transparent? We get it, Apple is like Starbucks, it’s just coffee. To get people to pay the premiums you are charging, you need a valuable brand image. We get it. But when you begin placing a larger emphasis on maintainimg brand image and forego quality and honesty, you WILL EVENTUALLY FAIL.

I don’t understand how nobody sees this. I don’t understand the lack of care over the fractured product lines. Apple is becoming a MESS and nobody sees it because of their stock price. Simply baffling. I give it 10 more years.

 

[steven3130]

I’ve treated my iPad Pro 11” the same as all my previous iPads. It’s held up well.
[doublepost=1546726411][/doublepost]
Of course, Steve Jobs made most of his billions from selling Pixar to Disney. Apple was a pet project for him in 1997. Should we bring in Michael Bloomberg to run Apple?

Like most complainers nowadays, I can’t give a solution to my complaint lol.

*Biased statement alert* Bloomberg would be a godsend over Tim Cook.

I’m just not a fan of Tim Cook, especially after his interview and the end of 2018.

 

[truthertech]

Proper way to address this...

Apple Spokesperson: “They are defective, and we are sorry. Please bring your bent iPads into your nearest Apple store or mail it to us for a full-refund or replacement.”

End message.

No spin, no 5 paragraph diatribes of customer service yadda yadda spin and this or that.

They’re defective.

We’re sorry.

The end.

Good lord how much longer will the shareholders tolerate this? Arrange an emergency meeting and fire Tim Cook, NOW!

You've got a hell of a straw man argument there. No one is spinning anything, other than the people who wrote the article to get your clicks and have you all spun up. For the last time, 400 micron tolerance is industry leading. The photos you've seen are vastly beyond that, and no one at Apple has spun anything. If you are one of the rare people who might have got one, or if you simply don't like it for any reason at all, simply return it for a full refund or exchange.

So unwind yourself from the axle you've got yourself wound around. Tim Cook is not going anywhere. Apple is about the report the 2nd highest revenue for a quarter EVER! They added a 100 MILLION new activations in 2018 and in most developing countries set records.

 

[Arctic Moose]

The person who posted this picture hasn't answered any questions posed by other readers. There sure are a lot of people torch-and-pitchforking this "issue" and not posting any evidence of how widespread this really is, or what the *absolute* truthfulness of their circumstance is: slight bend out-of-the-box? Negligence and riding the Bendgate wave trying to get a new unit? And is it constrained to LTE devices only due to the antenna design? That's how the Apple support document reads. It's just unfortunate there's so much stupidity that it's difficult to distill it into truly objective experiences from consumers who made it past 10th grade.

I have answered every single question.

 

[Mr.Blacky]

My iPad Pro has also a tiny bend (when it's lying on the back, the top right corner is a slightly levitating), but... IT'S A FIRST GENERATION IPAD PRO!! HOW COULD THIS BE, WHEN THIS IS CLEARLY AN ISSUE ONLY WITH THE NEW IPAD PROS???

 

[Applfan81]

I just wonder what this does with secondhand value... i would never buy anything that was bent...

 

[newellj]

Who knew that thin aluminum over a large area would be prone to bending if the design and manufacturing aren’t done correctly?

It's really a design issue, I think. The case is essentially jointed at four points, held together with some sort of plastic or polymer. Apple's support doc says "we're using really good materials and manufacturing processes" but in reality it's an inherently weak, maybe even fragile, design.
[doublepost=1546728251][/doublepost]

Apple says the max tolerance is 400 microns (0.4mm) anything above that and you can have a replacement.

All the pictures show iPads with much greater bends. So Apple would replace units like this.

This seems to me like a fake story.

I disagree. The design and/or materials and/or manufacturing process are inherently weaker than prior iPads. The fact that Apple will replace them has nothing to do with whether the product is safe in the wild.

 

[lewchenko]

If you buy one of these, which I doubt you will, just take it out of the box and see if there is a bend. If there is one, return it within your 14-day return period. You don't need to give them a reason. Then get another one.

So many replies like yours who miss the point entirely.

What happens when it bends after 14 days from normal use? Apple won’t replace. You are stuck with it and probably can’t sell it on.

Putting an iPad in your rucksack is normal use for example yet there are reported bent photos now of them. I do it many times a week with my iPad Air 2. No bending.

Blaming the customer is not acceptable here.

Let’s face it , we have no stats here for % returned or % that have failed post 14 days.

For me it’s enough to not gamble a grand on.

This wouldn’t be an issue at all if Apple had simply made the frame stronger.

 

[Shiro_Simba]

You've got a hell of a straw man argument there. No one is spinning anything, other than the people who wrote the article to get your clicks and have you all spun up. For the last time, 400 micron tolerance is industry leading. The photos you've seen are vastly beyond that, and no one at Apple has spun anything. If you are one of the rare people who might have got one, or if you simply don't like it for any reason at all, simply return it for a full refund or exchange.

So unwind yourself from the axle you've got yourself wound around. Tim Cook is not going anywhere. Apple is about the report the 2nd highest revenue for a quarter EVER! They added a 100 MILLION new activations in 2018 and in most developing countries set records.

So read this

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT209403

It’s clear the iPad is strong and durable , Apple says so.

And watch this

The above statement holds true to iPad 2010, not 2018

 

[Juan007]

This is a non-issue made up by Apple bashers and paid shills. Do you know how small 400 microns is? Take a meter, divide it in 1000, then take less than half of one of those pieces. That's how much this product bends. Unless you have an electron microscope you're not going to notice. Your "flat" TABLE probably bends 10x as much as the new iPad.

 

[truthertech]

I was prepared to drop $1,200 on a new iPhone this month, but I may be rethinking that.

There's no "maybe." If you aren't going to make your decisions based on the anti-Apple posters on this thread, how they heck are you going to trust any decision you have to make? Get on with it. You are either "woke" or not. How can you even consider any Apple product when some unknown person puts a picture of a bent iPad on a web site and all Apple can say is they've got the industry leading machining tolerances, but if you don't like it, just return it??

 

[newellj]

Um, so what's the problem? People aren’t satisfied with this response? The vast majority of ipad pros are fine. If you think you have an issue, you’re covered. Nothing to see here folks. Move along.

I returned an LTE 11" Pro. I don't know whether it was bent out of the box or got that way being used (very carefully), to be honest. But if it's that fragile, and if I want to stay on a 3-4 year cycle with my iPads, replacing it with another LTE 11" Pro doesn't seem like a great idea.

 

[furi0usbee]

This is a non-issue made up by Apple bashers and paid shills. Do you know how small 400 microns is? Take a meter, divide it in 1000, then take less than half of one of those pieces. That's how much this product bends. Unless you have an electron microscope you're not going to notice. Your "flat" TABLE probably bends 10x as much as the new iPad.

I've yet to see a bend less than 10,000 microns thank you very much. So unless these people are simply sitting on their iPads or bending them for fun...

 

[kmj2318]

Again, just like the previous article, macrumors made no attempts to clarify the photo. Is this photo a normal variance or not? Each bent iPad looks to be bent more than 400 microns. Is it just a random photo of a bent iPad or does it actually relate to the story?

 

[newellj]

Speaking of which, I find the new design uncomfortable to use. My wife had to get a bulky case to hide the square edges so they didn’t feel sharp with extended use. That kind of defeats the purpose.

I also noticed that and was surprised. It's a thin and light design, so it sort of doesn't make sense to me. It must be the sharp corner on the underside...

 

[Pakaku]

Pakaku Addresses 2018 iPad Pro 'Bending' Controversy, Says Subtle Purchases From Apple May Be Less Visible Due to Faulty Design And Irresponsible Buisness Decisions