Has Apple Misstepped Badly with the iPhone 4?

Great Debates
1

I decided to put this in Great Debates because the way people feel about this stuff, that’s what it will become.

The iPhone 4 was recently released to great fanfare, but is now plagued by a well publicized problem with reception.

In a fairly absurd PR blunder, Apple first announced - personally, from Steve Jobs himself - that the problem with reception was that people were holding it wrong. Not jamming it up their ass, mind you, but just holding it in such a way as your hand was touching the bottom right part of the phone.

Today, in a bizarre reversal, Apple has said that… umm, I’m not exactly sure. What they seem to be saying is that the problem is that the iPhone incorrectly displays signal strength in the first place, showing good reception when it doesn’t have good reception. It’s therefore somehow implied that holding the phone “the wrong way” magically fixes the problem with calculating signal strength. Or something.

On top of that, the 4 seems… well, underwhelming. I’m a happy iPhone 3G user, and being Canadian, we get multiple carrier choices and great signal more or less anywhere. When they announced the 4 I assumed I would want one, but… well, to be honest, I don’t think I’d pay money to upgrade. It has a camera on the front now. Wheeee. I would have been thrilled if they’d put a GOOD camera on the phone, that would have been awesome, but from what I’ve heard it’s still shitty. And you can multitask… I guess that’s nice. I never noticed a lack of it. It just doesn’t seem like a really BIG upgrade, you know? And now this antenna nonsense.

Question for debate: Has Apple lost ground in the smartphone market? Or will they overcome these errors?

2

To me, it is sensationalism by the tech media.

3

Agreed, particularly by Gizmodo. Here are a couple of more balanced alternatives - Consumer Reports and Anandtech. A common conclusion seems to be that even with whatever problem might exist, performance is better than previous models.

4

One thing I’ve never seen anyone mention: the iPhone 4 was field tested with a plastic cover that made it look like a previous generation iPhone. Gripping the plastic cover, nobody would have found out about the reception problems.

5

The issue is being completely overblown by people who seem to think that their personal worth is largely determined by the quality of the phone they’re carrying, and the number of other people carrying the same phone.

I got my iPhone 4 on launch day. If I hold it in my hand so that the corner touches my palm, I do notice a loss of cell signal. This is not new to the iPhone, all cell phones do it. They are essentially just two-way radios, after all. It seems likely that Apple’s external-antenna design makes the problem more pronounced, but in all other circumstances the new design results in improved 3G reception. It is true that, because of the external antenna, it is sometimes possible to cause the phone to completely lose service by smothering it with your hands. This is the tradeoff you get for improved reception when holding the phone normally.

Yesterday I was driving through the mountains, and stopped to take a picture of the sunset in an area I never got service with my 3GS. Lo and behold, my iPhone 4 got service. And sure enough, if I covered the antenna with my hand, it didn’t. If I were to make a phone call here (which wouldn’t be possible at all with my 3GS), I would probably have to be careful of where I touched the phone. I am not bothered by this in the slightest.

Apple’s announcement today was very straightforward. They said that the signal strength display is misleading, showing 5 bars for a very wide range of signal strengths, and then quickly dropping to 0 bars as the signal attenuates. They are going to change the display to more accurately reflect the received signal. This is not claimed to be a fix for the signal attenuation issue, merely an explanation for why the behavior seems somewhat erratic.

People vocally complaining about this issue seem to fall into two camps:

  1. People who don’t even own an iPhone, and take pleasure in trashing Apple because they don’t like Apple products, think anyone that does is a mindless brainwashed consumerized idiot, and are happy to see the company suffer from negative PR.

  2. People who are absolutely obsessed with Apple products and can’t believe that their precious iPhone 4 is not a magical, perfect device designed by angels, but instead an ordinary product involving engineering tradeoffs like any other.

(there is also category 3, consisting of people who bought a stolen Apple prototype, posted pictures of it all over the web, and are pissed they’re being held accountable for the damage this did to Apple, but I’m ignoring them)

In all other respects, the iPhone 4 is fantastic. It is very pretty in person and feels great in your hand - very dense, solid, and precise. The back-facing camera is the best I’ve ever used in a cell phone - it’s almost as good as a dedicated compact point-and-shoot, so good that I’ve scrapped my plans to buy a new small camera. Not sure what you’ve heard online - perhaps people are talking about the front-facing camera? That’s not intended to be used for taking photos, just video chat.

The multitasking is quite nice and well-implemented, but that is available on the 3GS as well. If you haven’t been bothered by the lack of this in the past, you likely won’t care.

The best new feature is the screen, which you really have to see in person to appreciate. Text looks as good on this screen as it does coming out of a laser printer, and the color saturation and contrast are amazing. It makes all mobile other screens (including the 3GS and iPad) look like crap.

The ability to shoot HD movies on the phone is very cool as well.

6

There is no way Apple didn’t know about this since they first came up with the idea of putting the antennas on the outside. No way whatsoever. A first-year electrical engineering student could tell you this was going to happen the instant he saw the design. It is just as obvious as the fact that making the back out of glass makes it more likely to break when dropped.

They definitely made a deliberate decision to optimize the best-case behavior of the antenna, and accept a corresponding deterioration in the worst-case behavior. In this regard, the iPhone 4 is definitely less idiot-proof than it could be. This is atypical behavior for Apple (though much welcomed, in my opinion), but it was definitely as carefully thought-out as every other detail of the phone.

7

Don’t forget the nation’s duct tape manufacturers, who will shortly be publishing a fix which involves wrapping a 1/2" strip of nonconductive grey tape completely around the edge of the phone.

8

Interesting news from Apple …
It’s not that there’s a reception problem, it’s that the phone is erroneous reporting a stronger signal than it really has.

I’m very happy with mine.

9

Seriously? Because I’ve seen that mentioned many times including a few hours after the attenuation issue was first reported.

I’ve only ever owned two Apple products, an iPhone 3G and an iPhone 4. The 4 is significantly better than the 3G in just about every way. It loads web pages 50% more quickly, the screen and camera are amazing, longer battery life, hugely faster in loading apps… I can replicate the death grip thing but I can’t say that I’ve lost a call over it.

Did they misstep? They’ve sold nearly two million of the things. There are still lines at the stores every morning. They can’t make the things fast enough. When the white ones become available in two weeks or so there will be another gigantic surge. I’d say that they did just fine.

10

The engineer’s mantra: “It ain’t broke, it just doesn’t have enough duct tape on it yet”.

11

The answer to the OP is no. Apple engineer are human, and screwed up. No big deal except for the Jobs worshipers. The reason it gets so much press is that it is easy for the public to understand, like the Intel FDIV bug. I’m dubious that the bar bug, which has been there from the beginning, explains all the problems. But very few people who are willing to pay a premium because it is new and shiny are going to care.

12

heh heh heh heh…you must live in one of the urban areas.

13

Things are always so polarized with Apple. A 24 dBm drop is signal strength is pretty bad. That’d drop the signal here in the community outside of Perth, Ontario. It wouldn’t be a big deal in my old place in Ottawa with a tower on the building across the street (where my Bold reported -60 dBm signals.) Steve Jobs made some ridiculously douchey comments, but Steve Jobs always does that. It certainly isn’t going to do AT&T any favors by revealing gaps in its coverage. I don’t think it’s going to hurt Apple’s reputation much if they can come out with a fix quickly. Not this software fix that no one is falling for, but a real fix like adding insulation. Apple’s reputation is already that the first generation of a new product blows and you’re supposed to wait for the revision. This just adds more to that.

If I were an economist analyzing Apple, I’d watch the return rate now that they’ve dropped the restocking fee and people have had some time to determine whether the issues with the phone affect them. The iPhone userbase doesn’t seem to be growing that quickly given how many sales are upgrades over new accounts. No matter how quickly Apple revises hardware, there is a limit on what its fans can afford to spend. If they lose their new customers, it’s going to be even harder to pick them back up now that every hardware manufacturer is making an Android smartphone.

Still, I’d rather have AAPL in my portfolio than RIMM.

14

Does not compute.

15

Here is an article by a independent engineer who is an expert on antenna designs. He says that the whole thing is way overblown.

16

I got the original iphone when it first came out, switched over to AT&T with great reluctance, hated it and have recently had Verizon modify my iphone to work on their network. I skipped the 3g, skipped the 4 and unless the iphone 4G is available on verizon, I will never be buying an iphone again.

My next phone will be a 4G phone and it will be the best of whatever Verizon has to offer.

17

Good for you. I got rid of Verizon and never looked back after the horrible experience I had with Palm, the Palm Treo and the absolutely abysmal customer [lack of] support from Verizon.

I love my iPhone.

18

I’m sorry for the hijack, but I want to hear a little more about this. AT&T and Verizon use completely incompatible technology, GSM/UMTS and CDMA respectively. Unless by ‘modify’ you mean ‘disassemble, replace the chips and antenna, and re-write the software’, I don’t see how this is possible.

ETA: my iPhone 4 has much better reception than my 3GS did on its best day. I work in one of those buildings that must have been built out of lead. Cellphone reception is abysmal for all carriers, but the 4 can place and receive calls in my office most of the time, while the 3GS almost never could.

19

I’ll repost some of what I said in the mpsimm thread -

  1. The physical problem is genuine. The Anandtech article was linked up thread, but it’s worth linking again, for those who missed it.

Here’s their conclusion:

  1. Apple is now claiming that they are shocked (shocked!!) to find out that their method of displaying bars is inaccurate. Apple is claiming that once they push a patch to recalibrate the bar display, the dropped call problem will go away.

This is sort of true, and as per Ars Technica, glosses over the fact that Apple deliberately pushed a patch back in iPhone OS2 announcing that they were going to change the display to show more bars no matter what the signal. They changed it at the time to counter the notion that the iPhone was getting crappy signals. So in so far as it’s a factor, it’s a factor they themselves introduced.

Here’s the thing - When you look at your bars, you’d think 5 bars = 20% each. So three or four bars means you’re above 60-80% strength, right? Well Apple’s algorithm doesn’t work like that. Apple’s phones are set to show 5 bars anytime you have more than about 45% or better strength. The next range, 4 bars, means you’re operating at about 45-35% strength and so on. (Anandtech’s article has a graph of this.)

So a person who might be talking at 3 bars and thinking they’re getting 50% signal strength is really at a pretty marginal 25% signal strength. If that person suddenly shifts their phone in their hands just the right way, suddenly that 20dB drop in their signal strength causes their reception to crater and the call drops.

Apple’s saying that once they more accurately display the signal strength, people will see when they have marginal service and not be surprised when their call drops.

  1. Which might be true, actually. But it doesn’t change the fact that there’s an easily reproducible way of manually causing the disconnect which would be pure suicide to allow in front of a jury. I suspect that, unless the judge tosses the newly-filed class action suit, Apple will settle and give everyone free bumper cases (rubber cases which cover the antenna). Teh Steve has an ego, but he’s not an idiot.

I also suspect future iPhones will include the insulation coating, or some such, like Anandtech suggests.

  1. As for the Apple Magic, well, they’ve never been magic, really, to anyone paying attention. The bigger their marketshare gets - the more attention will be payed. I think they’ll be fine as long as they have Steve. After he retires though they’re going to have a tough time of it.
20

It’s not that Apple is Magic, it’s that the competition has been so abysmally horrible. Dell was putting out inherently defective machines and didn’t own up. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/29/technology/29dell.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=dell&st=cse Now they are toast.

HP has turned into a producer of garbage with horrible customer service. Their printers absolutely suck. Good luck on getting support with your PC which wiil need it.

Compaq. Thanks, Carly, for the destruction. You are such a business maven. Almost as impressive as GWB.

Gateway. Who are they?

Palm. High flier that is now just totally lame.

After awhile you get to the point where you accept the flaws just to know that it is mostly right. What Apple does wrong can be infuriating but it’s still a lot better than the other crap that is out there.