MacRumors Poll: iPhone 4 Signal Loss by Region

[DemNoir]

And another thing

Do any of you know how difficult it is to accurately measure RF field strength of a radio device at that frequency? Picking up the device when your god knows where in relation to the transmitter is not a scientific test not even close.

 

[nooaah]

with all due respect, you theory is not correct, i tried a 3GS and an iphone 4 at an at&t store 1 mile away from the tower, the bars were 5 on both phones, when i hold the iphone 4 in my hand the bars dropped to NONE .

Uh if you were 1 mile from the tower then your signal was probably decent.

 

[dashiel]

wednesday, no problems, no matter how hard i tried

thu-fri, took about 15 seconds but i could lose three bars, but downloads and voice saw no anecdotal impact

this morning wanted to investigate a bit more in depth with speedtest. can't recreate for the life of me now.

at&t is great here though. never get any dropped calls, data is typically 2500kbps on my ip4

 

[smarch]

Smarch is a 12 year old girl.


This problem only occurs in low signal areas. I've tested it myself. If I'm in a high signal area, I can't get my signal to drop one dB no matter how I hold the phone. If my signal naturally is worse than -90 then holding the phone will drop it down to -113.

This problem is NOT isolated to the iP4. My friends 3GS exhibits the same behavior.

HATER


everybody already knows it happens in low signal areas

 

[buckdutter]

This poll is completely flawed. It assumes an equal distribution of respondents across all region, which is unlikely to be the case, given that there are many time more iPhone users / mac rumour regulars in the states than in the UK (or other regions). Also the presentation is vague, suggesting, for example, that only 6% of UK users have problems (when what it actually means is that 6% of respondents who voted live in the UK). The poll needs 2 dimensions to be provide a basis for meaningful analysis :

1) do you have signal problems and
2) where do you live.

You could then chart percentage of respondents that have issues verus those that dont, broken down by region.

Pull this nonsense before somebody gets sued!

What he said. The only thing this survey proves is that the majority of your reader base is in the US. Hopefully Apple starts selling a clue so some of their fans actually start buying one (after camping out for weeks of course).

 

[jon macnrow]

I've tried holding it every way possible in multiple locations around the area in which I live - Still haven't even lost a single bar.

 

[ClearBox]

I get no service when I place my iPhone 4 in the microwave.

But seriously, I've done some testing this morning. Wifi signal is fine no matter how the phone is held.

I can bridge both antenna's and things still work. Only when I hold the phone tightly in my left hand - there are issues.

So, at this point the phone can be problematic for lefties, however, I'm not entirely sure yet if this is going to be a deal breaker for me. I usually do not hold my phone in the left hand. And, the test I was doing only measured data.

I will use the phone as much as possible over the next few weeks to see if there are problems in the daily use of the phone. Also, waiting to see what Apple comes up with.

This is a great phone otherwise!

If things don't work out - I can always return it.

 

[Dead Brad Pitt]

What we need is to put countries inside protective rubber cases. Anyway this is getting really boring, time to get some news about iPhone 5.

Back to the grave

 

[manu chao]

This poll is completely flawed. It assumes an equal distribution of respondents across all region, which is unlikely to be the case

No, it assumes that people
a) are smart enough to do the very simple math of comparing the yes and no numbers per country
b) are grateful for the information provided instead of declaring it as useless (completely flawed is very close to useless) just because the presentation of the results is not perfect

But, alas, both these assumptions are apparently not fulfilled.

 

[Kuro]

From all the polls I've seen it's a 50/50 split between those experiencing issues and those not. I'm adamant this is a design fault on the phone that affects every single unit that has shipped, the variable is whether you are a conductive human or not, if you are then no software will fix the fact that you're going to join the two bits of metal together with your hand, no matter how you hold it.

It's a huge design flaw, and there are going to be some red faces at Apple.

 

[smarch]

This is shtick right? I can only hope to god...

HATER

 

[nooaah]

HATER


everybody already knows it happens in low signal areas

Clearly they don't, Tiffany.

Anyway, I think I'm leaning towards it being a software issue now.

 

[nooaah]

From all the polls I've seen it's a 50/50 split between those experiencing issues and those not. I'm adamant this is a design fault on the phone that affects every single unit that has shipped, the variable is whether you are a conductive human or not, if you are then no software will fix the fact that you're going to join the two bits of metal together with your hand, no matter how you hold it.

It's a huge design flaw, and there are going to be some red faces at Apple.

My iP4 displays reception numerically in dB. I CANNOT reproduce this problem at all in high signal areas but I easily can on multiple iPhones, including a 3GS on 3.1.3, in low signal areas. I've used the same skin in each location.

 

[manu chao]

What he said. The only thing this survey proves is that the majority of your reader base is in the US.

For the mathematically challenged (or simply unwilling which I think for likely):
US: 56% yes, 44% no
UK: 56% yes, 44% no
France:37% yes, 63% no
Germany: 38% yes, 62% no
Japan: 38% yes, 62% no

 

[smarch]

you=ate up!

yup! wholly and completely. come on over, the weather is nice

 

[pilotError]

There is another issue that I'm afraid is being masked by placing your hand on the lower left hand corner.

I have two iPhones that I bought on Release day. One works fine, the other phone struggles to hold on to a 3g signal.

This isn't about holding the phone in the right place. I can place it on the table and one is fine, the other is on Edge.

If I reboot the phone, I can lock on 3g for a while, but eventually, it seems to stop trying. I'm not sure about call issues being affected, since I use my phone mainly for data, and the wife uses hers mainly for voice.

Since getting the phones, she's only had one dropped call.

 

[rhanley]

This is definitely an issue for me.

I live in Eugene, Or and I've never had good reception at my house with my iphone 3G and sometimes I have to go outside to get a good connection, but I've noticed far worse reception and dropped calls with the Iphone 4.

I can also say that I hold my phone in a way that causes the signal to drop, and I've been holding my iphones (1st gen and the 3G) for 3 years that way, and now I'm supposed to just switch how I hold the phone.

During a call yesterday, I constantly found the connection getting choppy and even had a dropped call, and had to constantly remember to change my hand position.

I have purchased the over-priced apple case for it to hopefully resolve the problem, but it's still pretty lame that Apple is acting like this only happens when you cradle the phone in a way you would never do in a normal situation, and I'm supposed to change the hand position I've been using for years...

I just wish that there would be a little more compassion out of Apple. Sure, other phones may degrade in reception when you hold it, but should this really be worse than my 2 year old iphone 3G?

Luckily I'm moving back to Orlando, FL soon and hopefully this won't be an issue and I can remove the case.

 

[smarch]

Clearly they don't, Tiffany.

Anyway, I think I'm leaning towards it being a software issue now.

hold me back macrumors

 

[Surreal]

No, it assumes that people
a) are smart enough to do the very simple math of comparing the yes and no numbers per country
b) are grateful for the information provided instead of declaring it as useless (completely flawed is very close to useless) just because the presentation of the results is not perfect

But, alas, both these assumptions are apparently not fulfilled.

Why visualize the data poorly? Grateful for what, the effort? Thanks for trying, but this is flawed. Which is not to say none of this happens, but that this IS close to useless.

 

[TardigradeNYC]

"Non-Issue" or "Effectively Irrelevant"?

I'm not a professional RF engineer but I do know more than a little bit about the subject and it's always fascinated me how manufacturers make decisions about location of the phone antenna and how many times people are complaining about RF reception when they're really having problems with antenna interference. You certainly can ground out cell phone antennas and this clearly is and should be happening with other slab-type phones.

These tests should be re-run on phones with cases, including Apple's "bumper bar" strips or by people using Bluetooth with the phone stashed somewhere.

Academically it's not a "non-issue" but most people place their phone in a case or cover that may well eliminate the problem and others have the phone stashed and use a Bluetooth headset that minimizes handling. It would be interesting to understand how Apple thought through the "pros" and "cons" of this antenna design but that's different than affecting folks' day-to-day use of the phone. AT&T is still mostly responsible for that problem.

The internet's desire to turn everything into hot gossip meant this controversy was inevitable.

Personally, I thought the first iPhone 4 launch issue was going to be the 10,000 couples claiming to be first to use Face Time for phone sex.

 

[Plutonius]

I'm much more interested in if the bumper or a case fixes the problem.

 

[Kuro]

My iP4 displays reception numerically in dB. I CANNOT reproduce this problem at all in high signal areas but I easily can on multiple iPhones, including a 3GS on 3.1.3, in low signal areas. I've used the same skin in each location.

I'm sure this is nothing to do with the mast, or any other environmental variables. I have a femtocell 10 feet away from my desk and it still happens to me.

I've been able to reproduce the issue on other phones that other people are not having issues with and they've not been able to reproduce on mine which I am having issues with. The issue is caused by the person holding it. If you're not having issues, try a coin on the left hand side of the phone near the rubber gasket. If the issue does not reproduce, then it is a random hardware defect, if it does, on a phone you thought was working well, then it is a design flaw caused varying levels of human conductivity.

 

[franswa za]

This might be the most unscientific poll I've ever seen. You need a poll for each region.

+1

add to it other non iphones as well ....... for comparison

maybe this "poll" is sanctioned for/by apple?

or JUST LET IT SLIDE

hehehe

 

[datboitom]

I just got my iPhone the other day and I can replicate this issue (not that its an issue for me, the only times I actually hold the phone like that to lose reception if when I'm not making a call).

However, I have tried to replicate the issue on 2 other iPhones that my co-workers got and I've been unable to do so.

 

[inhrntlyunstabl]

Technically Fascinating

I work in high-end IT with many large corporations and I can't tell you the number of times everyone gets engrossed in a "technically fascinating" issue, but if you go and ask the people that should care, that should be affected, they couldn't care less - sometimes not even aware there is any issue. Yet all this time and money is wasted investigating and caring about a technical fascinating issue which in the end has little to no bearing on the end-user's actual use case.

So I ask, if it were not for all this press and communication, how many of us would really know or care about this issue. Probably a very, very small number.

Bottom-line, does the phone work as expected? And are your expectations realistic? All cell phones have issues from time to time or location to location. And if you're old enough to remember, there was a day when they had long antennae and if you didn't raise them or blocked them somehow, you didn't get a signal. So Apple touted their external antennae and now we've discovered a way to defeat it. Big deal. Get a case! I can't imagine why everyone doesn't have a case already. With my 3GS, the rubber case has been a Godsend - it prevents it from sliding on the car dash or anywhere else. And I dropped it yesterday and it prevented any scratches or dents too.

So either hold it different, get a case, or stop worrying about it. Apple isn't going to give you a free iPhone 5 because you are whining (the most they will ever do is give away the free bumper case - they are cheap enough already, go buy one if it's that critical to you). The more time you discuss this possibility the more time of yours you are wasting.