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Apple on iPhone 4 Reception: Signal Strength Display Issue Only, Software Update Coming

Overall this is increasing my worry.

I am happy Apple finally issued an official public response to the issue.

But not happy with what has been said. First off, they are blatantly admitting to incorrectly displaying reception on all iPhone's to make users think they are receiving better reception then they are. Yes, I know I know, displaying the bars is a more complex process then what we think; but, with that said, apple knows damn well what we think 5 bars mean, and what 1 bar mean. They either should have changed the display from the get-go (iPhone 1st gen) or made a public statement about the dynamics of bar display. We've been duped for quite some time with the iPhone regarding reception.

Secondly, and most importantly, this does not address the dropped call issue. They can not claim (IMO) that this phone gets better reception then previous iphones, because for me and others it does not. I've dropped more calls with the iPhone 4 within the first week of owning it, then I have with my 3G in a year, literally. And I am in the same exact house, town, city, state, that I've always been in. I still have my 3G, and have used it since, and can not only visibly see that the reception is better (by the now said faulty display), but I can also hear my reception is better. No dropped calls. I've also had many phone calls on the iPhone 4 where the person on the line can hear me all the sudden but I can here them. This has cause me to hang up and redial numerous phone calls.

The simple fact remains, people are dropping phone calls with the iPhone 4 in the same exact locations where the iPhone 3G(s) is getting average to great reception.

So, I guess I just have a "defective" phone? Which means apple should be able to trade it out for a new one, free of charge (no restock), and they should do so for everyone that is having the same issue.

I don't want a free bumper for a phone that is defective when there are iPhone 4's in supposed "perfectly good working condition". I want one of the good phones. And obviously, me and a ton of other people don't have that right now.

Overall: :mad:
 
Also, what about the videos of the iP4 refusing to load pages when it's held at the bottom? That wouldn't be caused by the bars showing incorrectly.
 
Did Apple do a speed test while holding the phone? Its considerably different. This press release does not explain the drop in speeds or the drop of calls, unless its the software that drops the call because it thinks it has no signal when it actually does. But that does not make sense either because they said the phone is displaying more bars than it should be, so the phone will be dropping calls easier? This does not make much sense to me..
 
Apologies for not reading the more than 1000+ posts on this thread, but does anybody else find it odd that Apple will take weeks to correct a simple formula? :eek: Isn't this one line of code or at worst a simple subroutine?

Any, all of this is beginning to remind me of Spinal Tap and the '#11' guitar.... :rolleyes:
 
Steviejobz said:
No, but I and others dont create 50 posts a day talking about how the phone works. There are 1 or 2 threads for that and we post in those. The minority is always the loudest.
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You must either be new to forums or the concept of consumerism. I'll give you a 101 lesson.

You will rarely hear from people that have no issues. They go and use their phones, cars, toasters, faucets, watches, etc. Occasionally someone will be SO happy with their experience that they'll contact the company and praise them for their product or service.

90 percent (fact out of the air) of what a company will hear are complaints or problems.

Case in point - have you called Apple Tech Support just to say "Hey - I got my iPhone 4 and it's great." No? Why not? Because what's the point.

People call customer service when they have an issue.

A lot of people go to message boards for the same reason. They go to research and/or find out if other people are having the same issues as they are to make sure that what they are experiencing is the norm.

Hence the posts about battery life, camera splotches, Bugs in the OS, etc.
 
fuzion said:
Agreed. 'Cause thats my damned phone in my damned hand on my WiFi.
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But of course. It is yours and showing the WiFi indicator, obviously, but I see something that you don't seem to understand.

And thank you for agreeing to name calling, because now I won't bother to explain it here. Hey, I only developed a new Signal Strength Indicator for the iPhone... but what do I know. Right?

Next.
 
You use your brain!

dijisurf said:
It can't be a design issue because most of the ip4s are working just fine. it is either a software or physical on some devices. if it was a design issue ALL ip4's would be having the same problems.

user your brains... i thought tech followers were smart......maybe not., excluding apple haters...
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1. iManufacturer, maker of the iCar decided to use a soft alloy to make the engine from as it saves weight. By the time they realise that the new alloy can cause issues, the Chinese already started manufacturing.

2. You need a car, you buy an iCar.

3. Owners start to complain that the engine cuts off on the motorway, when driving in a sporty fashion or when it's hot.

4. iManufacturer denies everything.

5. They keep denying and downplaying the issue.

6. iManufacturer suggests not to drive at high speed and not to push the engine over 4000rpm. Customers argue that if they wanted to do that, they would have bought a scooter.

HERE, WE HAVE TWO OPTIONS:

7. a) You don't drive outside town, you only do short journeys, so you don't experience the problem. Nevertheless, your iCar has the same engine so the car would produce the same symptoms, if driven at high speed or enthusiastically.

7. b) For the same reason, your car becomes a national or global joke and nobody can take it seriously. Resale value plummets and at one point, when you are visiting your grandma, you leave town to discover that you car is unfit for purpose. You want to have the car repaired, but iManufacturer claims that you've had a 30 day return period. Period.

8. What do you do? Ask Steven Paul Jobs! Good night, children and good night, day-dreaming adults!
 
dvd4455 said:
My wife and I both upgraded to the iphone 4 from the 3G. We never had a problem with our signal or iphone internet speeds until we upgraded. Our Att signal is usually pretty strong in this area so, even though both our phones have the dropped bars issue when held, we seldom experience a dropped call. However, we do have major issues with the data speeds on both iphone 4's when compared with the 3G or 3GS.

Our neighbor still has his 3G and he is consistently getting faster data downloads on his 3G than we are on our iphone 4. I've done extensive speed tests on each phone and our iphone 4's data speed is much worse. (regardless of if we are holding the phone or not)

I've called att and they said Apple is working on a fix. I called Apple and they said it's the at&t networks fault. (Data works great on the 3G in the same location so I don't see how it can be att's issue. otherwise the 3G would preform poorly as well from the same location)

I even wen't into the att store and showed the reps the issue. They used the demo 3GS at the store and we compared it with both my wifes and my iphone 4 and on every test or internet site we tried the 3GS was much faster at loading pages. Sometimes our iphone 4 would even time out. The rep said it's a definite problem with the iphone 4 and they have seen it with many customers. He said he would expect apple to have a fix shortly. But now Apple is saying it's simply an error in how they display the bars. APPLE - This is more than just a "wrong formula" in how you display the bars.

I'll be returning both our iphone 4's before my 30 days is up if Apple does not address the issue before then.
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There you go.

My story as well, to the penny. I will be in before the 30 days as well. Problem is, I gifted my 3GS to my son. :eek:
 
WeemanWise said:
I seem to have lost the "signal problem" My bars won't decrease no matter how I hold the iPhone.

Not quite sure what I did though...
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This is the crux of the matter. The little indicator of signal strength is not very meaningful to start with and can be altered by other things than signal strength. There was an interesting article out recently saying that on all phones that little signal meter is almost useless.

http://blogs.chron.com/techblog/arc...nes_signal_bars_are_almost_meaningless_1.html
 
So it will no longer be a Cardassian signal reading. There.. Are.. FOUR.. Bars!!

(Except when there really are five)

30 days to return it for a full refund (no restocking fee then) - can't say fairer than that. Not sure what else Apple is supposed to do!

I use a bumper to protect it anyway, so I'm happy enough.
 
Guys -

This is apple - they don't care what you think! You may think they care, but with all the yelling and crying and all that jive, apple just says to you: "don't worry, we'll fix this slight issue".

I don't know but I will wait for this patch to solve this issue. If it doesn't fix it, then I'll just live with a case for now, then sell my phone when the iPhone 4S comes out.

Or better yet, buy a WHITE one because the antenna issue is most likely why they delayed it! (or I hope it is)

No bluray? Apple don't care. No esata ports for your macbook pro? Apple don't care. No more than 3 USB ports (that's on the 17" only), apple don't care. No IPS lcd on any of the macbook pros? Apple don't care. No 512MB on the iPad? Apple don't care.

You see, apple doesn't even bother with what you care about - they design, build, and test their own stuff regardless if you like it or not.
 
dmelgar said:
Wow.
Lets ignore Apples letter admitting the problem.
Lets ignore Anandtech's excellent review, especially its final words.
Lets make up our own scenario with no evidence to justify keeping our defective phone.

Go ahead, keep your defective phone that Apple admits and won't fix.
Ignore other competitive phones which are as good or better because they're not Apple products. Because Apple always makes the BEST products which NEVER have MAJOR defects and because they ALWAYS resolve customer issues.

Or maybe... just maybe... ditch the defective phone while you still can and buy a real phone that does as much without the fundamental problem.

Just a thought
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I'll keep my response simple. I believe you need to read all of the materials in front of you closely—very closely.

Anandtech's analysis comes to a very similar conclusion. Something is wrong with the way iPhone 4 figures out signal strength. This is a buggy software issue.

Apple's release states the same thing: buggy software causes misreadings of the cell signal.

I only propose that the buggy software is just a little more buggy than Apple is letting on.

It won't matter, though. I'll be using my sexy iPhone 4 as long as I understand what the problem is. Trust me: if it were a more serious problem, I'd probably switch back to the iPhone 3gs. But—as I said—the 3gs is having similar problems because of the goddamn baseband software updates.

I'm not making up this scenario—I swear to you.
 
0dev said:
Apple.
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No they didn't. They said if you hold it a certain way you might lose signal. That's blunt enough for me. The software fix is intended to more accurately reflect the drop in signal, so that it doesn't go from 4 bars to none, but instead from a weak 3 bars to none.

It's not going to fix the antenna placement.
 
fuzion said:
touche. BUT. The single jog dial controller hasn't changed, only the software has been updated to make it easier to navigate.

:)
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I'm sure iDrive works fine, but the thing with a phone is... it's something people learn to use when they're like 5 years old, and they've spent thousands of hours talking on one. To ask them to suddenly hold it differently is like asking them to grip forks and pencils differently. Even MENSA members would have trouble reprogramming such habits. And the iPhone isn't just something you hold up to your ear, it's something you type and surf and watch video and play games on and take pictures with. People have different grips for different tasks, but since it's fundamentally a phone, they want it to be able to receive calls at all times. In my case the problem spot wouldn't be an issue when I'm making calls because I don't hold the phone there even though I'm a leftie, but it would be a problem when I'm texting or playing games and probably when I'm taking pictures, and I sure don't want the signal to drop to "no service" when I'm NOT using the phone as a phone.
 
keyofnight said:
Of course, this mundane explanation doesn't have the added benefit of making our lives seem more dramatic. We all could use a little action in our lives. Going to the Apple store to return our phone, having to argue with Apple's "Geniuses," and so on… we tell these stories like war stories. But we should not let our desire to have interesting things happen to us cloud our judgment. I know it sounds nice to say, "That shady, back alley company is ripping us off because they knew this was a problem. Now they want us to buy bumpers. They intended for this to happen! It's a conspiracy, bro!" —but conspiracy theories don't help us in the long run.

Cheers, guys.
Click to expand...

This was great. Well said.
 
OK - new assumption. Their software fix DOES fix the issue.

Why does the press release NOT explain that the algorithm changes "everything" in terms of how the phone functions - searching for a different tower, etc.

All they comment on is how it APPEARS to the user. Basically they are saying the fix they are making is visual.

IF (and I say IF) the fix did MORE than that technically - IE - made the phone work harder or not given signal strength and/or used a different tower when x vs y, why not say that? Why make the press release just about the visual aspect.

Playing devil's advocate and being cynical - I'll admit that I think it's because it's a bandaid. The fix is just that - visual. It's not going to have any effect on keeping signals or switching towers based on strength reported.
 
douglasf13 said:
Considering that I'm on 5 person plan with ATT, my whole business ecosystem revolves around Mac, and there are restocking and plan cancellation fees to deal with, just returning the phone isn't as easy as it seems.

Unfortunately, I'm just going to have to use a case, which is akin to putting plastic on your couch, IMO. My 3G survived 2 years without a case, and I don't want to add bulk to the phone (or cover up the design.)

Apple should have put the connection between the GSM and Wifi antenna (the black strip) on the bottom of the phone close to the microphone area. That would have reduced the amount of contact during phone calls, I would imagine. Beautiful form, poor function.
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Att has other phones and you could go back to your 3GS. Just return it it's simple
 
Reception problem not software

I do not own and Iphone 4 (yet, but soon depending on what happens with this issue) but after reading the reports of the reception problem I can understand what the problem is. It is a simple miss match of antenna. I am to understand that the 2 aerials used by the phone, WiFi and cellular, are incorporated in the metal around the edge of the phone and are separated by the thin black strips, one on the top and the important one on the left bottom corner. When your hand comes into contact with the bottom left corner your hand is effectively joining the 2 aerials together, because it conducts, and therefore causing a miss match with the antenna, just like the VSWR being out of range on the old CB radio equipment.
Someone with an iPhone 4 can help me out here by testing this theory by putting a pair of rubber gloves on and putting their hands on the bottom corner and see if the drop in signal is as dramatic as it is without the gloves. You will, as Steve Jobs says, lose some signal by covering the antenna in any way but see if it isn't as bad as with your bare hand. I am interested in your findings.
If I am right the only real way to cure this problem would be to put a non conducting coating around the edge of the phone, or bumper, or change the design to put the antenna/casing joints (thin black strips) on the bottom and top of the phone, where nobody touches when using the phone.
Let me know what you think and, Steve Jobs, if you're reading this and think I have a good point and maybe I'm right I am open for a job if you have one for me, I'm fed up of being self employed and not appreciated. :)
 
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