Apple admits iPhone's signal bars are BS. Worse than BP?

[gturner]

Is the end near for Apple?

The company reported being "stunned" to learn that the formula used to determine the number of signal strength bars to display had turned out to be "totally wrong."

"Our formula, in many instances, mistakenly displays 2 more bars than it should for a given signal strength. For example, we sometimes display 4 bars when we should be displaying as few as 2 bars. Users observing a drop of several bars when they grip their iPhone in a certain way are most likely in an area with very weak signal strength, but they don't know it because we are erroneously displaying 4 or 5 bars. Their big drop in bars is because their high bars were never real in the first place."

CBS News link

A cell phone is just user interface functionality added to a two-way radio, and Apple just admitted that their signal strength indicator, one of the single most important measures of a radio, is a hoax. Since there is no known "formula" for erroneous bars and the software didn't write itself, should iPhone customers start a class action lawsuit to fight such blatant, corporate, greed-driven fraud?

Or will iPhone customers hurl their millions of toy phones with crappy antennas into the ocean and create a toxic waste dump potentially worse than the BP oil spill?

Even worse is Apple's response:

n other words, this was a relatively easy-to-remedy algorithm issue, not a more significant structural design weakness with the antenna. If that isn't enough to satisfy customers, Apple will offer full refunds for users returning undamaged units within 30 days of purchase.

How many Apple customers (or should we call them "suckers"?) have been standing in the middle of the desert for the past couple of years trying to talk to their grandmother in the one spot that seems to work, despite purchasing phones that showed way more signal bars than competing models? Too bad for them, because it took them more than 30 days to realize they've been scammed by a greedy mega-corporation.

Yes, I'm declaring an Apple bashing thread!

Maybe we should talk about the Apple iPad's lack of a USB port. These days even toasters have USB ports.

 

[RoJoHen]

Apple is all about forward-thinking. They build things in anticipation of a time when technology will be different. We won't need USB ports in the future. We won't need CD-ROM drives. Bars? Who needs bars? In the future, you will have a full signal wherever you go!

 

[Rett Mikhal]

Yeah, and they invent things that don't work because in the future people will realize Apple products are awful and only made for aesthetics.

 

[gturner]

Apple is all about forward-thinking. They build things in anticipation of a time when technology will be different.

I know, and somewhere deep in the bowels of Apple's top-secret product research division, the engineers are watching Idiocracy for the twenty-seventh straight time.

 

[trekkiedane]

If it runs some kind of Linux I'd definitely want the iPhoney5:

 

[hamudm]

Got an iPad the other day and it's been a dream to use for surfing/multimedia. Lack of flash, usb and other seemingly necessary features hasn't bothered me one bit yet!

Now if I were to use it as a media center for my home theater or to create and manipulate lots of spreadsheets, I'd be pissed. But it's a great portable unit to have around the house and to take on the road for vacations, etc... A lot less cumbersome than my laptop.

 

[gturner]

So far I've only found one must-have app on my friend's iPad. Last week he came over and we decided to get something to eat at a campus dive at 2:00 AM. After we'd finished eating we went outside to smoke, where we were engaged in conversation by a very hot, really drunk, 23-year old blonde. She asked my friend if he ever smoked "the green". A short while later she was sitting in the back of his VW Passat getting stoned out of her mind, and I asked him to pull up the iPad pond app and pass it back to her. She must've played with the pond for an hour!

 

[JonathonWally]

So Apple would rather admit to lying in their software to cover up for AT&T's terrible service coverage than admit to being stupid and designing their phones to work for use in your left hand?

So now their cover story is that contact with the antenna isn't really killing your signal, it's just fixing their inflated signal bar algorithm? People will believe anything apparently.

"You see, it's not really killing your signal, it's just reflecting what the signal actually is."

Meanwhile, here's what probably went down. Late in the development cycle, they realized, one it was too late, that due to the materials and placement of the radio antenna that they had fucked up. Jobs comes in and says "fuck it, we'll make them buy a $30 case from us to fix our fuck up, it's win/win for us. We have obsessed fans who their whole idea of social status is dependent on owning an iPhone on day 1, let's milk those fuckers."

 

[Owain Taggart]

Not really sure how you can compare Apple to BP. Sure, the new iPhone has its faults, but that's about it. It will only affect those with iPhones. BP on the other has has compromised the environment, which is far more serious of a problem.

 

[trekkiedane]

Not really sure how you can compare Apple to BP. Sure, the new iPhone has its faults, but that's about it. It will only affect those with iPhones. BP on the other has has compromised the environment, which is far more serious of a problem.

And producing devices that are useless after a year or two and end up in a big pile of electronic waste isn't a problem? - not trying to be a big jerk, merely pointing out that electronic devices aren't environmentally 'clean' to begin with.

 

[Guartho]

Yeah, and they invent things that don't work because in the future people will realize Apple products are awful and only made for aesthetics.

Also, don't forget that all Star Trek fans have bad acne, BO, no friends, are virgins, and live in their parents' basements.

 

[David cgc]

"You see, it's not really killing your signal, it's just reflecting what the signal actually is."

No, it's not "killing" your signal at all. Bridging the antennas subtracts about thirty-eight percent of signal strength. Now, in a just and sane would, that would translate to a drop of one or two bars, if each bar represented one fifth of the range of possible signals. Unfortunately, Apple decided to exaggerate their scale, so rather than represent eight to a hundred precent signal, five bars on an iPhone can be anything from thirty five percent up.

So, if you have a hundred percent signal, and five bars, and you do the death grip, you'll lose thirty-eight percent, and go down to sixty-two percent strength, which is still five bars.

On the other hand, if you have a 35% signal and five bars, if you bridge the antennas, you'll lose 38%, leaving you with... oh, dear, -3% signal, or no bars.

So, what they're saying is, it's not killing your signal as much as it might appear. See, people walking around with 35% and five bars try the death grip, and think the phone is a fragile piece of garbage, while people walking around with 100% and five bars think the phone works fine, and the issue is being cooked up by a bunch of old-guard Apple haters who still think it's 1996 and they might get assigned one of Doctor Gil's six-color nightmares at work that they'll never figure out because their training on using a GUI is limited to "keep clicking the right mouse button on everything until the little menu has something you want to do on it."

Now, all the people who have been having an effective death grip will only get two bars (assuming they go for a direct mapping this time), and will complain that Apple's software update broke their phone's reception, even though it was apparently pretty crappy if they could kill it just by holding it, which I certainly can't do on mine, since I live in a working cell.

(Math based on this)

 

[What's his face]

I'm quite happy with my iPhone 3GS, but I'm not about to drink the Apple Kool-Aid.
The Apple/anti-Apple tribalism that exists is bizarre.

 

[Arrqh]

Bridging the antennas subtracts about thirty-eight percent of signal strength. Now, in a just and sane would, that would translate to a drop of one or two bars, if each bar represented one fifth of the range of possible signals. Unfortunately, Apple decided to exaggerate their scale, so rather than represent eight to a hundred precent signal, five bars on an iPhone can be anything from thirty five percent up.

None of which would be a problem at all if the antennas were just coated with a non-conductive material. Or inside the phone away from people's conductive hands. Or if it came with a free rubber case. A 24dBm drop, which you get from bridging the antennas, is also the largest drop you get with any phone on the market no matter how you hold it. This is a very real issue, and even when their bar display is a little more reliable the core problem... a faulty antenna design... will remain.

There's also no such thing as "direct mapping" and talking about signal strengths in terms of percent doesn't make sense (100% signal would be 0dBm, which you could only get if you've climbed a cell tower). Signal strength is measured in dBm, or decibels to the milliwatt, and is logarithmic. Further, Apple intentionally adjusted their bar display two years ago to the state that it is now; for them to act surprised at this "discovery" is... odd. The article you yourself linked to says this:

The drop in signal from holding the phone with your left hand arguably remains a problem. Changing the bars visualization may indeed help mask it, and to be fair the phone works fine all the way down to -113 dBm, but it will persist - software updates can change physics as much as they can change hardware design. At the end of the day, Apple should add an insulative coating to the stainless steel band, or subsidize bumper cases. It's that simple.

Also, there's a good write up on bars and actual signal strength here.

 

[Owain Taggart]

Not really sure how you can compare Apple to BP. Sure, the new iPhone has its faults, but that's about it. It will only affect those with iPhones. BP on the other has has compromised the environment, which is far more serious of a problem.

And producing devices that are useless after a year or two and end up in a big pile of electronic waste isn't a problem? - not trying to be a big jerk, merely pointing out that electronic devices aren't environmentally 'clean' to begin with.

Well, that's a good point. Still though, I'm not seeing it on the same scale, as the BP problem is a more immediate danger, whereas Apple still has time to make a difference.

 

[JonathonWally]

The Apple/anti-Apple tribalism that exists is bizarre.

Apple takes pride in being polarizing. They do it on purpose to use to their advantage.

As someone who used to work for Apple, I will be very happy when my gag-contract expires.

 

[Hermiod]

One problem is a massive engineering failure, costing billions of dollars and causing widespread protests and condemnation, one the company responsible has no idea how to fix.

The other is a mobile phone.

 

[Owain Taggart]

One problem is a massive engineering failure, costing billions of dollars and causing widespread protests and condemnation, one the company responsible has no idea how to fix.

The other is a mobile phone.

Yeah, that's the point I was trying to make in my original post. I just don't find it compares at all.

 

[Hermiod]

And producing devices that are useless after a year or two and end up in a big pile of electronic waste isn't a problem? - not trying to be a big jerk, merely pointing out that electronic devices aren't environmentally 'clean' to begin with.

Don't know what it's like in Denmark, but in the UK there are companies springing up all over the place who will take your old mobile phone, refurbish or recycle it and pay you for the privilege.

 

[Arrqh]

One problem is a massive engineering failure, costing billions of dollars and causing widespread protests and condemnation, one the company responsible has no idea how to fix.

The other is a mobile phone.

Yeah, that's the point I was trying to make in my original post. I just don't find it compares at all.

Obviously the two don't compare, one can assume that this thread is an attempt at humor by the OP.

That being said, no reason we can't have a reasonable discussion on the engineering failures at hand!