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Is the iPhone a substandard product?

benfilan

benfilan

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Dec 21, 2006
430
0
Ireland
When the iPhone was announced, I got really excited. like, pathetic, scarily obsessed fanboy excited. so much so that I couldn't wait for it to be released in the UK and I bought one from america, unlocked it, and enjoyed the novelty and jealous glances. when that iPhone died (from an unlocking illness) I bought a legitimate one, and I loved it. I still do kinda love it, my third one. Althought I am kinda sickened at how many faults its had. and from reading forums, and reports from friends, practically every iPhone I hear about has had some sort of fault, serious enough for it to be returned and replaced.

So my question: Is the iPhone a substandard product?

I feel it has been 'rushed' into production, to the detriment of build quality. If apple was hoping to win over non-mac fans to the apple cause, I feel the iPhone may have done more harm than good. (in addition, ALL of my non-iPhone loving friends have cited no MMS, bad camera and lack of bluetooth connectivity as main reasons not to get an iPhone)
 
No.

My iPhone is perfect.

What faults?

Information in forums are skewed because people generally come to forums to b*tch about stuff. Do you think every iPhone user writes about their iPhone in forums? Most iPhone owners are in the satisfied, quiet majority.
 
There used to be problems like the phone freezing up and not unlocking when I slid it, but now it is fine.

They sure did win me over because now I want an iMac or MB to accompany my iPhone just like when I has a zune I wanted vista to complete my 360/zune/vista bundle.
 
No, it's very well made. If you knew what you were buying then you should be happy with it, if you wanted a bigger feature set then it was never going to please you.

Simple really.
 
ok, i do love my iphone, but i've never had another phone thats has so many faults. I'm currently on my third. My friend Brian is on his fourth. Another friend who i persuaded to get an iPhone on the basis of how amazing it is had to get a replacement after his THIRD week. It really isn't good enough. This is supposed to be a premium device. If there's a few random hiccups, that fair enough, but this amount of eff ups is a bit ridiculous, non?
 
BongoBanger said:
No, it's very well made. If you knew what you were buying then you should be happy with it, if you wanted a bigger feature set then it was never going to please you.

Simple really.
Click to expand...

I didnt say I had any problems with it feature wise, I said that a LOT of my friends that are very anti-iPhone had raised those points as reasons to not get an iPhone. the same argument I come up against is "well the N95 is FREE and has X, X, X, X, X, that the iphone doesn't have"
 
If it's any consolation I own an N95 and haven't had any problems but a couple of friends did and one is on his fourth unit so it's not just Apple.
 
Surely said:
No.

My iPhone is perfect.

What faults?

Information in forums are skewed because people generally come to forums to b*tch about stuff. Do you think every iPhone user writes about their iPhone in forums? Most iPhone owners are in the satisfied, quiet majority.
Click to expand...

I read ALOT of forums, and yes, I know people come with problems, but I've seen a lot of complaints.

Issues? well, my first iPhone blanked out completely every five hours. no sound (Rings), no screen, although I could hear people speaking when they called.
my second iPhone OTB had issues with freezing - it froze during sync, when i tried to make a call, when i tried to take a photo.
my third iPhone, the one I'm using at the minute, no longer rings when people call, and the earpiece no longer works. I've only had this a month.
 
mines work fine..:)
did you try to restore it first and see if that worked out before you returned it?
 
Mine has had no issues.

Apart from the fact I keep dropping it, but then that's just me and mobile phones.

It's by far the best mobile phone I've ever owned (and I've had more than my fair share of them), and I firmly believe that the only phone I'll ever replace it with is the next iPhone. :)
 
benfilan said:
I read ALOT of forums, and yes, I know people come with problems, but I've seen a lot of complaints.

Issues? well, my first iPhone blanked out completely every five hours. no sound (Rings), no screen, although I could hear people speaking when they called.
my second iPhone OTB had issues with freezing - it froze during sync, when i tried to make a call, when i tried to take a photo.
my third iPhone, the one I'm using at the minute, no longer rings when people call, and the earpiece no longer works. I've only had this a month.
Click to expand...

I haven't seen a lot of complaints. I've seen the amount of complaints that you would expect in a forum that is partially dedicated to complaining about the iPhone. I know tons of people that are perfectly happy with the performance of their 4, 8, and 16 GB iPhones.

Well.... your first iPhone doesn't count since you stated that you unlocked it. That voids all complaints- unlock at your own risk.

Was the second one unlocked or jail-broken?

How about the one you are using now?

It sounds like (if #2 and #3 aren't unlocked or jail-broken) you've had some bad luck. I'm not going to sit here and defend Apple like some ridiculous fanboy, but not every single individual product that a company makes can work perfectly, especially when that company is producing millions of that product. There are apt to be dysfunctional products- pobody's nerfect. I'd suggest trading iPhone #3 in for a new one (since it has only been a month) and hope that the 4th time's a charm.
 
benfilan said:
ok, i do love my iphone, but i've never had another phone thats has so many faults. I'm currently on my third. My friend Brian is on his fourth. Another friend who i persuaded to get an iPhone on the basis of how amazing it is had to get a replacement after his THIRD week. It really isn't good enough. This is supposed to be a premium device. If there's a few random hiccups, that fair enough, but this amount of eff ups is a bit ridiculous, non?
Click to expand...

I've never had any problems with my iPhone. I got one replaced because I thought the speaker wasn't loud enough, but no real problems. My dad has had his since launch with no problems. One of my friends has had his since launch with no problems. Another got his in October, and it still works fine.

So based on my anecdotal evidence, there's not a single problem with the iPhone.
 
Surely said:
I haven't seen a lot of complaints. I've seen the amount of complaints that you would expect in a forum that is partially dedicated to complaining about the iPhone. I know tons of people that are perfectly happy with the performance of their 4, 8, and 16 GB iPhones.

Well.... your first iPhone doesn't count since you stated that you unlocked it. That voids all complaints- unlock at your own risk.

Was the second one unlocked or jail-broken?

How about the one you are using now?

It sounds like (if #2 and #3 aren't unlocked or jail-broken) you've had some bad luck. I'm not going to sit here and defend Apple like some ridiculous fanboy, but not every single individual product that a company makes can work perfectly, especially when that company is producing millions of that product. There are apt to be dysfunctional products- pobody's nerfect. I'd suggest trading iPhone #3 in for a new one (since it has only been a month) and hope that the 4th time's a charm.
Click to expand...

Agreed. The huge majority of iPhone problem posts I've read come from folks who admit to unlocking their iPhone. Like you said, unlock at your own risk. Add my iphone to the list of those that have no problems.
 
Had mine since day 2 (sadly wasn't ready to buy day one, oh well). Love it. Have had absolutely no problems with it. Works better than it did day 1 (2 technicaly:p) and i cant wait to see what they bring out next.
 
"practically every iPhone I hear about has had some sort of fault"

huh? you need to get out more
 
No, but people will issues are more likely to talk about them, hence why you see more problem iPhone threads, then flawless ones

Think about it

"Hey, my iPhone doesn't work, I need to go get it fixed"
"Thats too bad, whats wrong, how did it happen etc?"
is more interesting then

"Hey, my phone does what I bought it for!"
"I'd hope so!"
 
benfilan said:
my third iPhone, the one I'm using at the minute, no longer rings when people call, and the earpiece no longer works. I've only had this a month.
Click to expand...

This sounds like the same headphone jack issue that others are having. If you try adjust the volume on the side, does it say "headphones"? If so, try inserting and removing the headphones repeatedly. It worked for me.

Sometimes it thinks headphones are connected when they are not.
 
benfilan said:
I feel it has been 'rushed' into production, to the detriment of build quality. If apple was hoping to win over non-mac fans to the apple cause, I feel the iPhone may have done more harm than good. (in addition, ALL of my non-iPhone loving friends have cited no MMS, bad camera and lack of bluetooth connectivity as main reasons not to get an iPhone)
Click to expand...

Your life is a substandard product.

Just kidding, iPhones have great build quality, and they feel incredibly sturdy.

*re-reading post* You have to be kidding, all of your non-iPhone loving friends point out the minor flaws that it has, REALLY?

MMS is something that should be there, but as my bad excuse, it can and probably will be added with 2.0. The camera isn't bad, unless your a professional photographer, but there really aren't that many phones on the US market with much better cameras. Absence of bluetooth can be a pain, but is it really that necessary (also can be added through firmware, I think)?

However, if you do choose to stick by its faults, it has soooo many more pluses than minuses. It is a truly revolutionary and great product.

IMO ~Austin~ All the best and replies will be replied to.
 
The only issue I have had in a month (with a refurb) has been the occasional crash when using Safari. That's not completely unexpected, although it was kind of lame when it crashed on the Apple Web Apps page.

I also think it's got a bit of a bad rep. Some people expect the iPhone to cure cancer AND AIDS. It won't. Look at it as an 8GB or 16GB widescreen iPod with all the Internet connectivity things, a phone inside, and a PDA. When I see people complain about it and say how this and that phone has something else (3G, video camera, whatever), I love to return and ask them "OK. Does your phone have a video iPod in it?"
 
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