iPhone news / rants

[Trips]

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Bloated and weepy?

[ThatHaole]

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Brain dead and drunk

[strommsarnac]

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Think about that. Those Ads are made of of KB of data. To get on your iPhone and also to be updated, the iAd software uses your DATA connection. YOUR connection.

Since no iPhone provider has an unlimited data plan, this means that YOU pay for Apple to push ads to your phone. Yet Apple reaps the rewards by receiving money for you being forced to watch those ads which you are also forced to pay to get on your phone.

[MrGoutHimself]

What's more annoying than spending hours lining up for a shiny new gadget? Learning that your precious phone can't actually connect to the network. Well, depending on how you hold it -- word has it that the iPhone 4's bottom-left corner isn't playing nice with your skin. If you recall from the keynote, that's where the Bluetooth / WiFi / GPS antenna meets its GSM / UMTS counterpart. So we decided to test on two brand new iPhone 4 handsets purchased today in the UK.

One iPhone 4 demonstrated the issue everytime it was held in our left hand (as a right-handed person is apt to do) so that our palm was essentially bridging the two antennas. You can see that in the video after the break. Bridging the two with a finger tip, however, didn't cause any issues with the reported reception. If we had to guess, we'd say that our conductive skin was acting to detune the antenna -- in fact, we've already managed to slowly kill two calls that way so it's not just an issue with the software erroneously reporting an incorrect signal strength. That said, we had no issues when Apple's $29 rubber bumper accessory (given to us free for standing in line) was attached, creating a buffer between our palm and the antennas. See the video evidence after the break including Insanely Great Mac's version which got us to worrying in the first place.

P.S. Don't forget to take our poll and let us know if you're seeing both the yellow spots / stripes and reception issues. Unfortunately, we're suffering from both flaws which is not a good sign for quality control on this first batch of Apple handsets.

P.P.S. Since some of you are asking, our review unit showed none of these issues.

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I agree with you.... bigger things to worry about at the corporate level and also the world level.

There are different issues like medical insurance companies and Health Care that, to me, are a much bigger problems for Americans (95% of DSFers live in the U.S. which is why it's relevant). The fact that America scored dead last in healthcare studies (again) and the fact that Med Insurance companies are literally letting people die rather than pay for procedures that should be covered are things that i would love to explore further and start threads about. Problem is that those issues are closely tied to politics which never ends well here.

So I keep it relatively light. Bash Apple, BP, and Facebook Those are things that we can all agree on or at least have a lively discussion about without it ending too badly.

[strommsarnac]

Here's my biggest problem with this "FORCED ads" crap.

Ads are data. Data is not unlimited for the iPad and iPhone. This means that the subscriber is paying for Apple to force shit on them which they don't want.

Thank god I'm on Sprint and still have my WinMo6.1 phone. Nothing is forced on me and I have unlimited data. Not to mention neither Sprint nor Microsoft is watching where I'm at and what I have on my phone.

[MrGoutHimself]

i dont have a cell phone. problem solved.

Apple responds to iPhone 4 reception issues: you're holding the phone the wrong way
Jun 24th 2010 8:07PM

iPhone drops calls when left corner is touched

So, we just spoke with Apple and got the straight dirt on the reception issues that have been plaguing users today... and it's a little surprising. In essence, Apple cops to the fact there are reception issues with the new iPhone -- namely, that if you cover the bottom-left corner of the phone and bridge the gap between the notch there with your naked flesh, you could see some signal degradation. Yes, you read that right: it's not a software or production issue, simply a matter of the physical location of your hand in regards to the phone's antenna. The company's suggested fix? Move your hand position, or get a case which covers that part of the phone, thus breaking contact. As you can see in the email above which just arrived in our tip box, this is a sentiment which runs pretty high at the company. Here's the official statement:

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We know what you're thinking, and we're thinking it too: this sounds crazy. Essentially, Apple is saying that the problem is how you hold your phone, and that the solution is to change that habit, or buy one of their cases. Admittedly, this isn't a problem that exists only for the iPhone 4 -- we've seen reports of the same behavior on previous generations (the 3G and 3GS), and there is a running thread about this problem with the Nexus One. While it is definitely true that interference is an unavoidable problem, we can't help feeling like this is really a bit of bad design. If the only answer is to move your hand, why didn't Apple just move the antenna position? What we can say without question is that in our testing of the phone, we had improved reception and fewer dropped calls than we experienced with the last generation, and we never noticed this issue. Additionally, when using a bumper we can't recreate the signal loss. So, now we have an answer... all we're wondering is whether or not the company will start handing out bumpers pro-bono to those who are experiencing problems. It certainly seems like the right thing to do.

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[ThatHaole]

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Wow, it's almost like I read this four posts ago. Crazy.