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iPhone SE (2016) iPhone SE 2020 - Bad Call Reception issue. Weak touch screen. Anyone else?

R

RobbyIdol

macrumors regular
Original poster
Mar 20, 2012
248
185
My wife and I have new 2020 SE's, and we both experience bad cell reception when making calls. We can hear people fine, but people we call say we're breaking up very often. It's pretty constant, with most calls being disrupted regularly.

We've also noticed that the touch screen is not responsive sometimes, particularly along the bottom and right edges (where most scrolling takes place). Even a simple volume adjustment slider on the Music app will take several taps to get the screen to register my finger swipe.

Anyone else experiencing these issues with the 2020 SE? What's the best course of action with Apple - return them for new devices, or call for tech support?
 
Both have the same touchscreen AND call reception issues, both arrived on the same day, and issues started same time. That's what has me suspicious and wondering if others have noticed the same.
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I actually just called my wife (from one SE to another SE) inside our own home, and we legit could hardly understand each other. Audio was garbled and super delayed.
 
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RobbyIdol said:
Both have the same touchscreen AND call reception issues, both arrived on the same day, and issues started same time. That's what has me suspicious and wondering if others have noticed the same.
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I actually just called my wife (from one SE to another SE) inside our own home, and we legit could hardly understand each other. Audio was garbled and super delayed.
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If you are using wifi calling, have you tried turning that off to rule out an issue with your wifi?
 
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Ouch! The garbled sounds issues all sound like the problems my husband and I had with iPhone 7 Pluses on AT&T. We never really found adequate solutions. He made calls using his Airpods. I resorted to using my Android phone. Another forum member told me at the time the problem was that the mics weren’t very good.
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VineRider said:
If you are using wifi calling, have you tried turning that off to rule out an issue with your wifi?
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This is a good suggestion. My unlocked Android phones that can’t do WiFi calling always give me better more clear connections than my Apple and Android phones that have carrier support for WiFi, calling even though we live out in the country with weak 4G.
 
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WiFi calling has been off by default. Good thought, though.

Ironically, we both got a carrier update this morning that seems to have resolved the issue on it's own. Calls seems clearer now, so maybe that was it (would make the most sense).
 
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This phone for me has WiFi issues. WiFi keeps on dropping in my bedroom (no other iPhone I ever had had this issue) and there is another bug when I connect to WiFi and turn aeroplane mode on, when the phone is connected to WiFi it shows the carrier name on the top of the screen despite aeroplane mode being on. That is not supposed to happen
 
Reviving this thread due to a similar experience I’m attempting to resolve.

Recently, as in less than a month, helped my elderly mother upgrade from an iPhone 5s — oddly, both the Home and power buttons became unresponsive — to an SE (2020).

*** Bear with me as getting details and completing other troubleshooting steps is akin to solving a Rubik’s cube ***

Because everything else apparently transferred fine from iCloud backup, I forgot about Wi-Fi. So, today, I think, I was able to talk the parents through the process. She’s on an AT&T prepaid plan and doesn’t have great cell reception indoors. The main purpose of the Wi-Fi connection was to allow her to call my brother via FT audio, which worked — maybe? My brother called my mother shortly after I informed him the Wi-Fi seemed to be connected and he said the call quality was “clear as a bell.” Great — or not. Prior to his call, I attempted a few test FT audio calls. The first two didn’t connect, or so I inferred from the description, and the third was very unreliable, both sides in and out, one hearing the other while the other couldn’t most of the time. This poor quality is also occurring on many non-FT calls. I tried to eliminate if it was just some unfortunate incompatibility between networks or networks and my iPhone on Mint (i.e. T-Mobile), though not certain if I succeeded.

The Internet and Wi-Fi speed should be sufficient. I’ve streamed videos and done online gaming when I’ve house and cat sat for them. Speed test a week ago resulted in 78 Mb/s down, 12 Mb/s up, and 19 ms latency.

Of course, I don’t keep a log of when and where she has problems and I can’t vividly recall instances — I have plenty of other stuff with much higher priority. In other words, the trouble might involve a home Internet/Wi-Fi issue, I just doubt it.

When I get a chance, I’ll check for iOS updates, although, it should be nearly up-to-date — unless it has been sitting on the shelf that long, I guess.

We might go back to the AT&T store for assistance. My worry is they say, “Everything looks fine to us” or they swap the iPhone and the replacement performs similarly. :: cue horror movie scream ::

What’s next? Any other simple, feasible ways to narrow this? is VoLTE applicable to AT&T’s network?
 
MacCheetah3 said:
According to iFixit, it’s an Intel modem.
www.ifixit.com

iPhone SE 2020 Teardown

Second Edition? Smallish Edition? Stimulus Edition? We’re not sure what “SE” stands for this time, but it wouldn’t be an iPhone teardown without a...
www.ifixit.com www.ifixit.com
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I thought that could of been the problem but he said there was a carrier update so I guess all is well now
 
Ram65 said:
I thought that could of been the problem but he said there was a carrier update so I guess all is well now
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Maybe focusing on the wrong transceiver. I’ve been thinking, the problem could still be Wi-Fi related.

I do know my mother successfully called my iPhone with her new SE this past week while they were visiting grandkids in FL. So...

Does anyone reading this have experience using an iPhone with an ARRIS modem and router combo unit, such as the SURFboard AC1600?
 
MacCheetah3 said:
Maybe focusing on the wrong transceiver. I’ve been thinking, the problem could still be Wi-Fi related.

I do know my mother successfully called my iPhone with her new SE this past week while they were visiting grandkids in FL. So...

Does anyone reading this have experience using an iPhone with an ARRIS modem and router combo unit, such as the SURFboard AC1600?
Click to expand...

Yes, when I was using my 11 pro max I had to disable private address to get it to stay connected more often and even then it was still a hit or miss.


Wi-Fi -> i by your wifi name -> private address.
 
QueenTyrone said:
Yes, when I was using my 11 pro max I had to disable private address to get it to stay connected more often and even then it was still a hit or miss.


Wi-Fi -> i by your wifi name -> private address.
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Good suggestion, thanks. I did forget about that feature as it hasn’t been a problem for me. However, my iPhone X and iPad seemingly works on their Wi-Fi network and I never disabled Private address. Still worth trying if/when I get the chance.

🤔
 
MacCheetah3 said:
Good suggestion, thanks. I did forget about that feature as it hasn’t been a problem for me. However, my iPhone X and iPad seemingly works on their Wi-Fi network and I never disabled Private address. Still worth trying if/when I get the chance.

Click to expand...

The XS and 11 series had intel modems, the x had Qualcomm I believe and iPads so that maybe why
 
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