Apple Being Sued for 'Purposefully Slowing Down Older iPhone Models' [Updated]

[linkboy]

It only last 3-4 hours though.

That's a limitation of the technology, both battery and the Switch itself.

The only way to get battery life is to make the battery bigger, that impacts the size, and the portability.

I'd love to have more battery life out of my Switch, but not if it impacts the portability.

Nintendo stuck the biggest battery in the system that they could without compromising the vision of the system.

 

[Tech198]

It is incredible, and most of messages here blame code/programming, commercial strategies. It is a normal behavior on a system based on a battery, CPU and GPU have power drain peaks, which you have only when doing something heavy like gaming. If the battery can’t give enough power it shutdown. Apple just prevents that, ONLY when the battery is old. But users are just complaining.

You can't take a company to court over something the user decided to ignore anyway and expect to win..... while they use degraded batteries..

Why didn't they get it replaced ?

 

[KingslayerG5]

To me, it's about bashing Apple's dishonesty. Their lack of integrity while being the most valued company in the world. Nothing to do with the quality of their products and services.

Apple got caught red-handed (or Reddit-handed). They had to be caught to admit it as this could have continued without being noticed.

The "Sony Timer" and even planned obsolescence is still a myth to some people. Apple confirmed what they were doing! This isn't like the Note7 debacle. This is something deliberate.

Apple then passes it off as a "feature." Like Face ID, a feature we never asked for! If this a feature, why didn't they add it to their Macs? Or why aren't Androids like that?

If it is a feature, why can't we have the option for the iPhone NOT to be throttled?

Control and compromise over choice and added convenience.

I was defending Apple last week thinking its a power saving mode. But try browsing the web at 600 MHz with an iPhone 6s! Apple only cares about their shareholders. Not their customers.

Sad part is others might copy it. Maybe not Google because they are really an Internet service company that makes most of their money from ads. So Pixels are safe and we would be aware of the throttling through benchmark apps. And Pixels only sell like 2-3M, tops. Android field is loaded. Pixels are not as mainstream.

Other Androids just don't sell 50+ million per model that iPhones do since Apple has iOS to itself. Others might copy it in other industries. Like Samsung adding a kill switch to their TVs like Sony "might" have did.

Being an Android guy, I could easily say to go to Android but it's not that easy. Android is not for everybody just like iOS isn't for everybody. The answer is not that simple. I have many relatives already used to Apple products. They can't just leave it that quickly.

I just hope karma bites Apple on the other side. Why do they need all that money anyway? They aren't even charitable. Are they building an actual space ship? A store on the Moon? They only seem to care about pleasing their shareholders by compromising their products.

I miss Apple Computer when they started off almost like a garage band that did indie rock. Underdogs. I miss Apple Inc from 2005-2011. I miss Steve. This is not the Apple we remembered. They sold out their consumers with planned obsolescence thanks to a sealed battery that degrades. They pushed the obsolescence even faster with this hidden feature.

The thing is, the battery can degrade as fast within a year! My brother owned the 6s. He told me last year his 6s' battery was degrading faster than his 5 did. Within a year, your battery could be so degraded, you will also be dealing with a slower phone.

Lost integrity.

2017 - Love my iPhone X!

2018 or 2019 - Welcome back to 2009. Buy new phone or replace the battery!

This company is the Apple that Eve ate in the Garden of Eden.

 

[Baymowe335]

A good kitchen knife.

Still needs to be sharpened.

 

[I7guy]

On the other side of it, it appears they were trying to mitigate an issue. I personally will not alter future purchase plans due to this.

Better communication along with a some more detail on the battery issue they were mitigating would have been nice.

After antenna-gate not throwing the baby out with the bath water.

 

[Baymowe335]

To me, it's about bashing Apple's dishonesty. Their lack of integrity while being the most valued company in the world. Nothing to do with the quality of their products and services.

Apple got caught red-handed (or Reddit-handed). They had to be caught to admit it as this could have continued without being noticed.

The "Sony Timer" and even planned obsolescence is still a myth to some people. Apple confirmed what they were doing! This isn't like the Note7 debacle. This is something deliberate.

Apple then passes it off a "feature." Like Face ID, a feature we never asked for! If this a feature, why didn't they add it to their Macs? Or why aren't Androids like that?

If it is a feature, why can't we have the option for the iPhone NOT to be throttled?

Control and compromise over choice and added convenience.

I was defending Apple last week thinking its a power saving mode. But try browsing the web at 600 MHz with an iPhone 6s! Apple only cares about their shareholders. Not their customers.

Sad part is others might copy it. Maybe not Google because they are really an Internet service company that makes most of their money from ads. So Pixels are safe and we would be aware of the throttling through benchmark apps. And Pixels only sell like 2-3M, tops. Android field is loaded. They're not mainstream.

Other Androids just don't sell 50+ million per model that iPhones do since Apple has iOS to itself. Others might copy it in other industries. Like Samsung adding a kill switch to their TVs like Sony "might" have did.

Being an Android guy, I could easily say to go to Android but it's not that easy. Android is not for everybody just like iOS isn't for everybody. The answer is not that simple. I have many relatives already used to Apple products.

I just hope karma bites Apple on the other side. Why do they need all that money anyway? They aren't even charitable. Are they building an actual space ship? A store on the Moon? They only seem to care about pleasing their shareholders by compromising their products.

I miss Apple Computer when they started off almost like a garage band that did indie rock. Underdogs. I miss Apple Inc from 2005-2011. I miss Steve. This is not the Apple we remembered. They sold out their consumers with planned obsolescence thanks to a sealed battery that degrades. They pushed the obsolescence even faster with this hidden feature.

The thing is, the battery can degrade as fast within a year! My brother owned the 6s. He told me last year his 6s' was degrading faster than his 5 did. Within a year, your battery could be so degraded, you also be dealing with a slower phone.

Lost integrity.

2017 - Love my iPhone X!
2018 or 2019 - Welcome back to 2009. Buy new phone or replace the battery!

This company is the Apple that Eve ate in the Garden of Eden.

Did you ask for an iPhone? Good companies generally don’t listen to consumers because they don’t know what they want.

FaceID is incredible. I love it and didn’t even know I wanted it.

Calm down. This isn’t going to hurt Apple and they’ll fix it. They could have been somewhat more transparent, perhaps, but they are fixing an issue that exists with all lithium ion batteries.

 

[albebaubles]

Incredibly difficult, determining a battery's % of usefullness as you do not know the processing requests it will face in the near future. Do I give you percentage of battery left from full charge? % left from degraded battery's 'new' full charge, current battery level / current cpu load?....you get to 5% in any scenario, expect a shutdown imminently.

My issue with Apple is the lack of transparency, the removal of the battery info from settings/about - it reeks of deception and certainly implies something amiss with 6-7s iPhones (would really like to know if this applies to iPads -- why not provide the same level of 'help' to them? That in itself is another smelly bit'o'fish.

Well I have, and have seen multiple old MacBooks, Windows laptops, Android and Palm devices that suddenly shutdown before the battery gauge goes below 5%.

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So don’t update. Problem solved.

And there is nothing unethical about what they are doing, in fact it’s entirely ethical to ensure the product keeps running as well as possible.

c'mon -- it nags incessantly to upgrade.

 

[Gilligan's last elephant]

Did you ask for an iPhone? Good companies generally don’t listen to consumers because they don’t know what they want.

FaceID is incredible. I love it and didn’t even know I wanted it.

Calm down. This isn’t going to hurt Apple and they’ll fix it. They could have been somewhat more transparent, perhaps, but they are fixing an issue that exists with all lithium ion batteries.

Not sure about that. Once a legal action is raised in the EU, Apple will have a problem. EU is not happy with the way Apple have been avoiding taxes. In fact, Norwegian "consumer affairs " organisation have raised concerns.

 

[justperry]

That's bologna and a bs excuse.
There's many many devices out there with "powerful" CPU's that do not shut off randomly.
Its clearly a battery defect and when they replaced them in those 6S iphones they never had that issue again.

Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, mine differs from yours so it's Bologna and BS in your point of view.

It's a fact that there are lots of people which charge their batteries more than once a day, do this over the course of one year and you end up with a degraded battery which can no longer sustain currents as it used to be when it was new.

 

[yostp]

Throttling is a decent work around and short term solution to prevent the phones from randomly turning off (which is far worse to have a device that doesn't work at all).

The problem most people have is Apple hasn't been upfront with it and hid this throttling in a software update and didn't tell anyone they were doing it. All while denying there was any problem at all.

THe correct solution would be to inform users when their phones are being throttled due to the issue, and offer a repair program so that they can get a new battery installed restoring the phone to original performance.

I think the biggest issue the the lack of transparency from Apple and how they tried to hide that there was a problem

 

[78Bandit]

Not without regular sharpening. I know this, I am an avid cook

How about a cast iron skillet then? Supposedly a 100 year old Griswold is the best thing ever even it has had no care outside of a quick scrub with coarse salt when it gets particularly dirty.

 

[firewood]

Notwithstanding the above, my iPhone is throttled at 600 MHz or 839 MHz (far away from the nominal 1.4 GHz that it SHOULD have)

Why does Apple affirm that my battery doesn’t need to be changed BUT they throttle my CPU at half it’s speed “because the battery is not performing at its best performance”?

You trust that CPU speed number that some app reports? I don't. (because (1) the real clock speed of an iOS processor is a private API, and (2) I write my own benchmark code)

Maybe your device seems to be running at half speed for some other reason, not the battery.

Benchmarks apps offer report lower / wrong MHz, if you read it from an app. Maybe it is paranoia. I used many iPhone 6-6s that have many years of use and fly.

Yup. My iPhone 6 and 6s are running at the same full speed as when they were brand new years ago. Even after OS updates.

Sad part is others might copy it.

If they are providing a speed boost when the battery is fresh and new (but I can't detect that), then other competitors just might, since it provides a better out-of-the-box experience.

 

[albebaubles]

Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, mine differs from yours so it's Bologna and BS in your point of view.

It's a fact that there are lots of people which charge their batteries more than once a day, do this over the course of one year and you end up with a degraded battery which can no longer sustain currents as it used to be when it was new.

I generally leave my iPhones plugged in all day with short periods of out of the house use. If I am hoe the phone is on a/c power. I've never once had to replace an iPhone battery. MY 6+ was a tad problematic but I never did bother to change the battery.

A Consumer should need not worry about how many times they've charged their phone or burning the battery completely during use. The freaking device should have a decent enough battery (IF THE BATTERY IS NOT REPLACEABLE) to at least last 3 years. Good Dog, look at the price of the X - they want me to replace every other year at that cost - without gaining *any* advantage in cellular speeds? nonsense.

 

[KingslayerG5]

The Apple in your eye that broke your heart. This Apple doesn't have a worm right through it. It is a snake wrapped around an Apple and that snake is named Tim Cook.

Apple should change their logo to this...

 

[Gilligan's last elephant]

Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, mine differs from yours so it's Bologna and BS in your point of view.

It's a fact that there are lots of people which charge their batteries more than once a day, do this over the course of one year and you end up with a degraded battery which can no longer sustain currents as it used to be when it was new.

And the reason that they have to do that is because the iPhone batteries are under specified.

 

[Baymowe335]

Not sure about that. Once a legal action is raised in the EU, Apple will have a problem. EU is not happy with the way Apple have been avoiding taxes. In fact, Norwegian "consumer affairs " organisation have raised concerns.

Apple follows every domestic and international tax law to the letter.

They have the money to appeal endlessly and pay any ruling against them.

 

[Altis]

It does that only with old batteries, otherwise the device would shut down. It is a form of protection. Just buy a new battery, they should be changed after about 3 years of use

A) NO. It does that with batteries that are still within the "Healthy - do not replace" condition by Apple's own techs.

B) If it weren't for this third-party discovery, you would have absolutely no idea that changing your battery would improve performance at all.

C) Throttling is happening to people's iPhone 7's that were bought this year.

 

[albebaubles]

The Apple in your eye that broke your heart. This Apple doesn't have a worm right through it. It is a snake wrapped around an Apple and that snake is named Tim Cook.

Apple should change their logo to this...

No, snake needs to look more ineffectual.

 

[Fixey]

Guess next update will have an option to turn off the power saving mode, I realy don't understand why he is going to court because Apple has tried to maximize the battery life of his iPhone, I have a MacBook Air that could do with that option right now, lets hope apple includes it for macOS and have an option for zombies, we need speeeed we neeed ohhh im out of powwwerrrr... grrrr

 

[Phonephreak]

Just pay they $80 and move on. You may be right, but it’s $80.

They won’t replace the battery. Hence my big problem.
[doublepost=1514069792][/doublepost]

Mine is a year old and it's still fast.
The only thing Apple really did is making these iPhones so fast (A.. CPU) that batteries of today are not able to supply the peak currents those CPU's need, hence throttling needed.

Some people charge their phones twice of more a day because they are the whole day on their (damned) iPhones, thus their batteries are wasted within a year.

So suddenly now apple processor are so powerful that batteries suddenly can’t power them properly. God lord.

 

[albebaubles]

Guess next update will have an option to turn off the power saving mode, I realy don't understand why he is going to court because Apple has tried to maximize the battery life of his iPhone, I have a MacBook Air that could do with that option right now, lets hope apple includes it for macOS and have an option for zombies, we need speeeed we neeed ohhh im out of powwwerrrr... grrrr

If it is only 6-7s -- they need to compensate the individuals to move them to an 8 where this issue does not exist. clearly there is a flaw in those devices. I loved my 7. I've had it since April '17. -- in that time I've lost 60 mAh in capacity. My 6+ is in a drawer in a different state so I cant check it.

 

[Phonephreak]

Apple follows every domestic and international tax law to the letter.

They have the money to appeal endlessly and pay any ruling against them.

So you admit Apple is wrong and can use their money to continue shady dealing. Because they can afford to pay the fines. Smh

 

[Gilligan's last elephant]

How about a cast iron skillet then? Supposedly a 100 year old Griswold is the best thing ever even it has had no care outside of a quick scrub with coarse salt when it gets particularly dirty.

A skillet is not a knife. Cast iron pans are intended to have a protective film caused by use. Not sure of the name for it. Patina?

 

[Glideslope]

so you believe Apple has done nothing wrong?

You need to read the post I was replying to.

 

[Gilligan's last elephant]

Apple follows every domestic and international tax law to the letter.

They have the money to appeal endlessly and pay any ruling against them.

So why have the EU ordered Apple to pay 13 billion euros to the Irish government?
Edit: For pedant, that figure may not be fully accurate. Based on memory ;-)