bunch of apologists, itt.

"oh, yeah, just don't hold it this way or that way."
"i know someone will come out with something thinner that won't interfere with the antennae."

Whatever happened to working like it's supposed to?

6/24/2010 12:36:20 PM

I am baffled at the long lines. It's just a piece of technology, folks. I mean, I understand geeks getting excited about new and cool tech, but normal joes forming lines 1,000 people long??

6/24/2010 12:39:35 PM

People acting like they're in third-world countries getting food rations.

6/24/2010 12:40:44 PM

Yeah almost anyway i hold it reduces the signal to shit and half the time when i'm holding it to surf the web it drops to "searching" and doesn't work at all. No reception/data. This is a major design flaw. How could this possibly get into the wild? I guess Apple is going to be replacing A LOT of iphones.

6/24/2010 12:43:02 PM

I have read literally dozens of reports from users just like that ^ where the person says they held the phone every way imaginable without any issue. It's not a fucking design flaw, it's a manufacturing issue. Is it a fuck up? Hell yes, and it looks like Apple (or Foxconn) will have to pay for it.

6/24/2010 12:55:34 PM

Yeah I read about it before i got my phone in line so after i got my phone i walked around the iphone store and did it to about 6 of the display iphone 4's and every single one displayed the exact same behavior.

6/24/2010 1:00:16 PM

I haven't had display or reception issues.

I guess I'm just better.

6/24/2010 1:01:41 PM

Very pleased with mine so far. The display is amazing, reception/call quality in general seems better, but HUGE improvement in speed to synch, full synch with about 12 gigs of stuff took under 10 mins here as well.

Oh, and the camera is pretty killer too. I hope it'll let me record at 60fps soon so I can use it as my track camera!

6/24/2010 1:02:12 PM

Quote :

"It's not a fucking design flaw, it's a manufacturing issue."

Explain how it's a manufacturing issue.

[Edited on June 24, 2010 at 1:03 PM. Reason : .]

6/24/2010 1:02:13 PM

Either way, it's an issue.

An expensive issue. That looks bad on Apple. But it won't stop the hoards of people from lining up for it.

6/24/2010 1:04:32 PM

If you have the antenna issue please call Apple and bitch. I did and was basically told that the only way it'll get taken seriously is if they get enough calls about it.

6/24/2010 1:10:46 PM

I did want to say a few more positive things. This thing is blazing fast. I came from a 3G to this and it's so much faster doing everything it is almost unbelievable. Super smooth.

Regarding the antenna issue... I notice it less when I am outside and the reception is really good. Being indoors is where I notice the drop off if I hold it a certain way.

6/24/2010 1:12:51 PM

^^^^What do you want me to explain? You've got a brand new antenna design on a brand new phone. You've got unprecedented demand and they were obviously rushed just to make enough of these things to fulfill pre-orders. That's a combo platter of imminent fail right there, especially when you outsource all your manufacturing to a Chinese 3rd party.

But whatever, believe what you want. Believe that Apple designed, tested, and knowingly released a phone that DOESN'T WORK WHEN YOU HOLD IT IN YOUR HAND

6/24/2010 1:14:24 PM

It's nuts at Crabtree. The line covers literally half of the upper level of the mall.

6/24/2010 1:17:44 PM

yeah, apparently the first phones that went out early to reviewers didn't have this issue...probably just the ones that were mass produced.

6/24/2010 1:23:17 PM

Quote :

"Explain how it's a manufacturing issue."

Because not a single one of the review phones they gave out to columnists et al. had that particular problem as far as I'm aware.

[Edited on June 24, 2010 at 1:24 PM. Reason : ^]

6/24/2010 1:24:00 PM

Well, you need to remember that many of the reviewers are 1) not that tech saavy (by this, I mean educated engineers and designers) and 2) apple fanboys. They arent geared to properly test somethng like some of the hardcore users out there.

Bottom line: none of you can really state what is happening, so lets just cool the jets and wait for apple to decide what to do...

[Edited on June 24, 2010 at 1:29 PM. Reason : ,]

6/24/2010 1:28:39 PM

We can't say for sure, no, but all the evidence (early phones not having the problem, phones from this batch having it) along with common sense (apple probably tested holding the phone, at some point) indicates a manufacturing issue.

If I had to guess, I'd say there is supposed to be some coating or material on the antennas to prevent exactly this.

6/24/2010 1:32:23 PM

Quote :

"If I had to guess, I'd say there is supposed to be some coating or material on the antennas to prevent exactly this."

There is. It's called a bumper and Apple conveniently sells them for $29.

6/24/2010 1:33:52 PM

^^one would think so.

Pretty funny:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nK-e5e6i0Q

6/24/2010 1:35:23 PM

Quote :

"Bottom line: none of you can really state what is happening, so lets just cool the jets and wait for apple to decide what to do..."

You're right, no one knows exactly what the cause is, or how/when it's going to be fixed. However, as I keep saying, it's patently ridiculous to assume that this is working as intended. It could definitely prove to be a fuck up on a massive (monetary) scale though for Apple.

[Edited on June 24, 2010 at 1:36 PM. Reason : :]

6/24/2010 1:35:30 PM

I think they've finally realized they can release shit in a box with their logo on it and people will eat it up

6/24/2010 1:38:57 PM

Ok so i've been playing with it and it's not just when you cover up the black bar. If you touch part of your hand to the metal strip then another part of your hand to the bottom metal near the port it also does this. If you connect those two pieces at all it drops the signal. Lame. The typical way i hold it (pinky under port and against hand) does it. Grr.

[Edited on June 24, 2010 at 1:40 PM. Reason : s]

6/24/2010 1:39:21 PM

Who's to say the review phones didn't have this problem and just weren't in use by enough people for them to connect the dots, walt mossberg reported that his test unit had poor signal compared to his 3G. Without reports online I don't know that I would've ever associated the loss of signal with how I was holding the phone. Those sorts of discoveries only come when you have a lot of people using something and collectively sharing their experiences, something the reviewers didn't have.

6/24/2010 1:46:49 PM

From Mossberg: best phone in it's class.... except if you want to make phone calls....

Quote :

"And even Mossberg — while suggesting that, if call quality is important to you, you may want to carry a second phone on a different network — offered the ultimate praise, calling the iPhone 4 still “the best device in its class.”"

6/24/2010 1:50:44 PM

ha, it's just a glorified ipod touch if you can't make calls

6/24/2010 1:57:31 PM

^yea no doubt it's the most amazing phone I've ever used apart from the fact that it turns in to a paperweight when you pick it up, which is basically what he's saying

6/24/2010 2:00:39 PM

wonder what apple will do about the antenna issue? I can duplicate it just by placing my thumb over the bottom left juncture. 5 bars to none and back again as soon as I remove my thumb. That is no good. Either they are going to be replacing some phones or giving away some bumpers.

6/24/2010 2:09:47 PM

lol i'd love to be a fly on the wall when jobs hears about this

6/24/2010 2:14:24 PM

I'm surprised there isn't a new Downfall parody on youtube yet

6/24/2010 2:16:08 PM

Quote :

"It's nuts at Crabtree. The line covers literally half of the upper level of the mall."

Yeah, after hearing a few reports like this I decided to cancel my reservation. I can wait 3 weeks.

6/24/2010 2:16:17 PM

^^^^i don't have any plans to put an ugly ass bumper or case on my phone even if it's free, I want a phone that works like it's supposed to. I understand the limitations of AT&T's network and will tolerate it to use a phone as good as the iPhone but I can't tolerate a design flaw that doesn't even let me use AT&T's limited network to its full potential.

[Edited on June 24, 2010 at 2:18 PM. Reason : ]

6/24/2010 2:16:28 PM

Agreed. I waited this long, i can wait longer.

6/24/2010 2:19:50 PM

Jobs just pee'd his pants.

6/24/2010 2:20:12 PM

that's just from drinking too much smug

6/24/2010 2:23:30 PM

I hope the apple store will be ready for my wrath should they give me grief about it.

6/24/2010 2:25:00 PM

http://gizmodo.com/5571171/iphone-4-loses-reception-when-you-hold-it-by-the-antenna-band?skyline=true&s=i

6/24/2010 2:35:24 PM

THIS JUST IN

6/24/2010 2:39:08 PM

Its a large collection of user submitted cases. Slightly more useful than your post.

6/24/2010 2:43:23 PM

has anyone successfully made a facetime call yet?

6/24/2010 2:45:18 PM

watch for a release from AT&T that they significantly upgraded their service, but its that darn iphone's antenna that's the problem.

6/24/2010 2:52:45 PM

the antenna issue is why i never jump on the first version of a major redesign of anything (phones, mp3 players, cars, etc). that, and with apple most of the time in 6 months they'll drop the price considerably and increase the battery life or something.

plus, i can't get one til next june anyway

6/24/2010 2:53:45 PM

Scotch Tape Fix:

6/24/2010 3:05:16 PM

so i just updated my 3G to iOS 4 and it lost all my files. i tried doing a restore, but iTunes couldn't find the restore i did before the update, so i was like great i'm screwed now. mostly b/c of all the photos (of my daughter) that i would be missing now.

so i poked around the file system and found \Users\kwarner\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup\putlongguidhere

that folder contained a ton of .mddata files and i figured the backup stored as a bunch of compressed files. but then i noticed a lot of the files were 600-800K, about the size of an iphone photo. so i batch renamed everything to *.jpg and sure enough now i got all my photos back

6/24/2010 3:05:51 PM

wish i could have done that after i jailbroke and lost all my pics

6/24/2010 3:31:58 PM

^^http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2472256

[Edited on June 24, 2010 at 3:33 PM. Reason : ,]

6/24/2010 3:33:44 PM

^^check that backup folder. i didn't expect my backup to be there since iTunes didn't find a backup for that date/time, but sure enough there were several backup folders in there and one of them had my precious files in it

^ i saw some talk on twitter about the windows Previous Version feature coming to the rescue, but my win7 install is like a week old and didn't have any previous versions to restore

[Edited on June 24, 2010 at 3:37 PM. Reason : .]

6/24/2010 3:35:48 PM

For some reason my mom's phone doesn't seem to have facetime activated. My dad and I can facetime talk just fine but it's not an option on hers. I don't get why. Google suggested a reboot but that didn't fix it.

[Edited on June 24, 2010 at 3:43 PM. Reason : hmm..it says waiting for activation in teh facetime settings.]

6/24/2010 3:40:43 PM

go to settings > phone > facetime and make sure it is set to "on"

6/24/2010 3:41:57 PM

Yeah, it's on, but I just noticed it says waiting for activation. Google says it has something to do with people that ported their numbers from another carrier, but her and my dad were on the same account. anyway, it says waiting will fix it so hopefully it's no big deal.

6/24/2010 3:46:21 PM