Hope this isnt true......or maybe so it answers our questions about poor 3g

P

philly's finest

macrumors newbie
iPhone 3G connection woes may be due to chipset: report
3:33 AM EDT August 12, 2008

LONDON (MarketWatch) -- An immature chipset solution from Infineon Technologies AG may be at the root of reported connection problems with Apple, Inc.'s 3G iPhone, Nomura analyst Richard Windsor said in a note to clients Tuesday. He said some iPhone users are having trouble getting a 3G connection and hanging on to it. Hiccups reportedly include a high incidence of dropped calls, switching onto the slower EDGE network while the device is stationary and loss of reception while in good coverage. "We believe that these issues are typical of an immature chipset and radio protocol stack where we are almost certain Infineon is the 3G supplier," Windsor wrote. He added that because the problems are likely to be embedded in the low-level software and the chipset, a firmware upgrade from Apple is unlikely to fix the problems, giving rivals Nokia Corp. , HTC and BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion some time to get their user experience up to the iPhone standard.
 
thankfully my 3G works fine, but I hate to hear these things about new phones. As guinea pigs, we must go through this, unfortunetly.
 
i dont really seem to have any issues here but i know plenty of people that do.....if this really is true tho, think they would do a recall?
 
I believe it, considering my friend's Samsung gets 4-5 bars of 3G in a given area to my iPhones 1-2 bars.
 
Hi,

I've gotta admit that my iPhone 3G reception isn't upto par, in my living room my old Nokia N75 got 5 bars 3G, my wifes Samsung gets 5 bars 3G and my iPhone gets 1-2 bars 3G in the same place.

Hmmmmm...


Bri
 
hmm, This is just conjecture and supposition by a market analyst who may or may not have a vested interest in knocking down Apple's stock price.
I have no problems at all with 3G connections - it shows 5 bars most of the time, and when I move to an area that doesn't have 3G, the call follows me: I've had no dropped calls in the month I've had the phone
Any problems are at least as likely to be down to AT&Ts 3G network.
Also, you can't do comparisons between phones from different manufacturers by looking at the signal strength: different phones report signal strength differently
 
I agree with Phil in that it's probably not entirely accurate but I have seen weird things happening with 3G on my iPhone, such as I tend to get either 1 bar or 4/5, never really anything in between. When I'm outside in Belfast I will get a full 5 bars, but I'm more used to seeing just one.

Last night however, I was sitting at my computer holding my iPhone and in certain (very limited) positions the signal would jump from 1 bar to 5. Very strange.
 
I didn't go 3G yet.... still have Version 1. After watching this Forum, and experiencing what happened with the $100 voucher on the 1st iPhone.......
Well, you would have to be dreaming to think Apple would recall 3 million iPhones. It would be more like them to tell you to prove the problem, and then offer you a $100 voucher.
 
i know this was just a market analyst's opinion but if you surf the net about this issue, you will see that alot of articles are starting to pop up about this.....and like it says, not everyone will experience this issue.....apple does make awesome products but they may have gotten a little sloppy with this one.....
 
in response to phil

i know you dont want to believe it, but when other users in different countries are experiencing the same problem, how do you pin point that on at&t soley.....dont get me wrong, i love apple products, but dont you think this website should be boasting with applause for this product.....this place is 99% complaints because someone took shortcuts
 
philly's finest said:
i know you dont want to believe it, but when other users in different countries are experiencing the same problem, how do you pin point that on at&t soley.....dont get me wrong, i love apple products, but dont you think this website should be boasting with applause for this product.....this place is 99% complaints because someone took shortcuts
Click to expand...

Pinning it on ATT is silly. It's not ATTs network when:

Other 3G Phones are fine
The phone sits stationary and signal meter goes from 1 bar to 5 then back to 1.

It may be possible to flash the low level software by wrapping it into a firmware update thus avoiding a massive recall...time will tell.
 
philly's finest said:
i know you dont want to believe it, but when other users in different countries are experiencing the same problem, how do you pin point that on at&t soley.....dont get me wrong, i love apple products, but dont you think this website should be boasting with applause for this product.....this place is 99% complaints because someone took shortcuts
Click to expand...

No, the forum is 99% complaints because that's the nature of online forums - people are far more likely to post when they've got a problem than when they haven't!
Dropped calls are normally caused by bad handoff from 3G to non-3G when going out of coverage and are the Network's reponsibility.
I'm not saying every iPhone is perfect, but if it was a design flaw then every phone would be experiencing the problem.
The fact that they aren't suggests either some bad phones or problems with the service providers
It's not that I "don't want to believe it", but rather I refuse to run around like Chicken Little every time a market analyst makes some unsubstantiated claims.
 
Phil A. said:
hmm, This is just conjecture and supposition by a market analyst who may or may not have a vested interest in knocking down Apple's stock price.
Click to expand...

But there is a valid reason for the chipset argument, Apple has picked the really small chipset manufacturers for the iphone.

http://www.eetimes.com/news/latest/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=209100058

If you pick a small chipset manufacturer with a single digit market share --- there is a great chance that you are going to get inferior products.

Barrons has a more detailed article on his comments --- i.e. other chipset manufacturers (from industry leaders TI and Qualcomm) would have "failed" more gracefully with a weak AT&T signal.

http://blogs.barrons.com/techtrader...-iphone-sales-grow-so-do-3g-reception-issues/

This is like the old saying of "nobody ever got fired for buying IBM" --- things don't get wrong if you buy chipsets from Qualcomm and TI.
 
Phil A. said:
No, the forum is 99% complaints because that's the nature of online forums - people are far more likely to post when they've got a problem than when they haven't!
Dropped calls are normally caused by bad handoff from 3G to non-3G when going out of coverage and are the Network's reponsibility.
I'm not saying every iPhone is perfect, but if it was a design flaw then every phone would be experiencing the problem.
The fact that they aren't suggests either some bad phones or problems with the service providers
It's not that I "don't want to believe it", but rather I refuse to run around like Chicken Little every time a market analyst makes some unsubstantiated claims.
Click to expand...


im just saying look at all the articles coming out today, more post appearing here on macrumors.....go to the apple support discussion site....there is only so long that they can ignore and not make responses....and only so long people can deny that apple messed up.....i guess we will find out how many more complaints there are when this phone is release to the other 70+ countries.....and if they are all complaining i hope your not gonna say its every network and not the iphone.....
 
Again good reception here, 4 to 5 bar all day everyday. No dropped calls no problems at all. Knock on wood, say a prayer to Steve, and all that. :)
 
I'm actually a little confused as to why I'm sitting in work unable to connect via 3G, just EDGE. I looked up my work address on OfCom's Sitefinder service and the closest O2 mast is *literally* 500 feet away. I'm inside a building, but I'm close to the edge of the building near the windows, so I shouldn't be getting a non-existant 3G signal.

Station Type: Macrocell
Height of Antenna: 13.7 Metres
Frequency Range: 2100MHz
Transmitter Power: 27.3 dBW
Maximum Licensed Power: 32 dBW
Type of Transmission: UMTS (ie, 3G!)

When I go out for lunch I can actually see the tower right next to my work and I get 5 bars of 3G signal, but somehow that all disappears as soon as I go back into work... I can't imagine this place is lead-lined :p

Edit: I've just noticed that I have a 3G mast across the road from my house (less than 100 metres away) and I only get 1 bar when sitting upstairs in my bedroom. How odd...
 
My friend's Samsung 3G phone gets 4 bars at my house, while my iPhone gets between 1-2 bars. At my beach house, which is located on a fringe 3G area, his Samsung gets 2 bars of 3G, while I don't even get it at all. I am on EDGE. So it does sound like the chipset, which makes me pretty mad cause Apple will improve it in the next iPhone and I will have to upgrade if I want decent signal. I highly doubt we see any kind of recall. Imagine a 3 million phone recall and what a mess that will entail.
 
Could any of this be tied to the build week? Mine is week 24 and I haven't had any 3G reception issues (well, there are locations where there is spotty 3G coverage, but that's AT&T, though I haven't tested it with another 3G phone on AT&T's network).

But in locations where my 3G coverage is good, it's consistent.
 
I have iPhone 3G reception problems.

I switched over from a Treo 750 with Windows Mobile 6 and 3G/HSDPA. I always had 5 bars of 3G coverage anywhere I went in the city (NYC), and far superior data transmission speeds. In fact, I was always pleasantly surprised at the availability of 3G signals when traveling as well.

It was reliable and always there. With iPhone, it's just, well, not.
 
I have a feeling that the quality control is not all that great on the 3G, considering the ridiculously high manufacturing volume. Hence, some people have been getting poor antennae, etc... This problem is likely compounded by the "weak" low-power chipset that Apple reportedly used.
 
I live in Dallas, where I am supposed to have full coverage. My iPhone always says "No Service." My mom's Samsung has full bars of 3G in my house, but I have nothing. Occasionally I will get a bar.

When I don't get 3G, it's supposed to default to Edge, right? How long do I have to wait for it to do that? I always have to manually turn 3G off to get to Edge.
 
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