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Apple Agrees to Pay $113M to Settle 'Batterygate' Case over iPhone Slowdowns

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Re: Apple Agrees to Pay $113M to Settle 'Batterygate' Case over iPhone Slowdowns

#171

Post by meowster »

darksaints wrote: post #37
Karunamon wrote: post #6

Worth mentioning here is that this wasn't just about the "sneaky" fix for battery degradation, it was about doing this without notice , and having internal tooling that would deny a replacement (even at full retail price) if the battery was above an arbitrary health threshold (but still low enough to cause throttling). Before Apple changed their tune, if you read about this, and went into an Apple store for a replace…

This was exactly what happened to me. My phone slowed down drastically after an update, and so I took it in. They confirmed to me that it was this update that throttled everything if the battery health was degraded "in order to prevent further battery degradation". But when I pointed out to them that my phone was less than a year old and still under warranty, they tested it again and told me my battery didn't meet th…

I'm not a lawyer, but it sounds like you would have had a slam-dunk case in small claims court.

Re: Apple Agrees to Pay $113M to Settle 'Batterygate' Case over iPhone Slowdowns

#172

Post by thirdsun »

iabacu wrote: post #114

I think it's clear Apple intentionally* degrades software quality on older iphone/mac models in order to drive purchase of newer hardware. I've been considering switching away from Apple hardware, not because of hardware quality, but because of software. * By pushing software updates optimized to new hardware with obvious regressions on older models.

> I think it's clear Apple intentionally* degrades software quality on older iphone/mac models in order to drive purchase of newer hardware.

I don't think that's clear at all.

> * By pushing software updates optimized to new hardware with obvious regressions on older models.

New software can come with increased hardware requirements, yet customers want to benefit from new software. It's a compromise. You could simply not update if you're worried about that.

> I've been considering switching away from Apple hardware, not because of hardware quality, but because of software.

I'm sure software updates long after your device's release won't be a concern with the competition. You probably simply won't receive any.

Re: Apple Agrees to Pay $113M to Settle 'Batterygate' Case over iPhone Slowdowns

#173

Post by arcticbull »

rat9988 wrote: post #167
arcticbull wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would I want the phone to turn off sooner?

It's still better than being slow while being on.

How is a black screen better than a device that's slower, but on?

Re: Apple Agrees to Pay $113M to Settle 'Batterygate' Case over iPhone Slowdowns

#174

Post by webmobdev »

arcticbull wrote: post #145
greggman3 wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's imagine it's a electric car. The car goes 70mph when you buy it. Suddenly it only runs at 45mph. You want to buy a new battery to fix it but the car company refuses even though you're willing to pay. Why should you have to put up with a car that only goes 45mph when it went 70mph when you bought it? What part of this is hard to understand. I don't want a phone that runs slow.

It's different in that the electric car is marketed as capable of achieving 70mph, Apple does not market iOS devices in terms of performance. No promises were made in that regard - at all, IIRC.

> Apple does not market iOS devices in terms of performance.

Come on dude, stop bullshitting. Every Apple device promotion shows how it is faster or better than the previous device or its competitors. Even the new Apple ARM processor touts how it is equal or better than other processors.

Re: Apple Agrees to Pay $113M to Settle 'Batterygate' Case over iPhone Slowdowns

#175

Post by onion2k »

sthnblllII wrote: post #48
cheeze wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree about the confusion, btu the issue AFAICT is more about the fact that they didn't offer consumers any way to rectify the issue

Have the plaintiffs requested some kind of battery notification? Their angle has always been accusing Apple of planned obsolescence, which seems laughable compared to how little long-term support Android phones get.

Their angle has always been accusing Apple of planned obsolescence, which seems laughable compared to how little long-term support Android phones get.

Apple making phones that last a little longer than Google doesn't mean Apple make products that last. That just means that both Google and Apple are designing products that fail unreasonably quickly.

Re: Apple Agrees to Pay $113M to Settle 'Batterygate' Case over iPhone Slowdowns

#176

Post by yoz-y »

unishark wrote: post #162
Karunamon wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, it's not that Apple didn't violate the laws of physics on their "magical" device, it's that they: 1. Applied the throttling fix silently 2. Denied warranty replacements 3. Wouldn't even replace the battery with cash in hand until after the suit was filed 4. ..leaving people with no good way to have a working device.

Apparently Apple doesn't agree that this is covered under warranty since they have denied wrongdoing (at least last I saw as of the $500M settlement, can't access the latest one).

Isn’t battery a consumable and thus not covered by warranty by default? (Unless it has a manufacturing defect)

Re: Apple Agrees to Pay $113M to Settle 'Batterygate' Case over iPhone Slowdowns

#177

Post by yyyk »

thirdsun wrote: post #168
yyyk wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is that Apple knew about the bad batteries* , denied it and discouraged battery replacement, thus leading to increased iPhone sales if users wanted a decent experience - defrauding its own customers. That's not good faith at all. That apologists keep talking about batteries but ignore the real problem smacks of a PR campaign. * We actually don't know if the slowdown was only for bad batteries - that's Apple…

It's not a bad battery. The degrading performance over time applies to every battery ever sold. Apple decided that keeping your device functional by slightly reducing the performance once the battery is degraded is preferable to randomly shutting your device down. I agree with them.

The battery isn't good for the entire warranty term. Sure it's bad. Apple decided to lie to users about this, and that just happened to encourage expensive iPhone sales, rather than a cheap battery replacement.

I sure hope Apple isn't taking your approach to HW reliability across the board. After all, memory and disk eventually go bad too.

Re: Apple Agrees to Pay $113M to Settle 'Batterygate' Case over iPhone Slowdowns

#178

Post by eecc »

aetherspawn wrote: post #43
Karunamon wrote: post #6

Worth mentioning here is that this wasn't just about the "sneaky" fix for battery degradation, it was about doing this without notice , and having internal tooling that would deny a replacement (even at full retail price) if the battery was above an arbitrary health threshold (but still low enough to cause throttling). Before Apple changed their tune, if you read about this, and went into an Apple store for a replace…

Hi, Battery engineer here at an electric vehicle company. The crux of it is this: when you draw high current from a small battery, the voltage will sag (1). The manufacturer has an on-board battery management system that MUST turn off the battery if it goes below a certain voltage threshold. As the battery ages, the sag effect increases significantly, up to 2-3x. Thus, when your phone clearly indicates say 20% batter…

I’m a software developer contractor. By the nature of my work I often have to suffer the “corporate fog”, a sort of induced stupor caused by multiple layers of middle management, generic performance objectives, knowledge loss due to churn and ineffective information management.

This drama sounds like a typical corporate misunderstanding: engineers follow technical specs, no written requirements, management doesn’t understand the subtleties - nor do their care for them and they’re busily enough already with all the other tugs.

Eventually shit hits home, PR digests and translates into requirements, management gropes along in the fog.

There’s no malice, it’s just a large org, and there’s no SJ that agonizes over the details (and even then, he also let big fuckups slip past, remember the iPhone antenna issue)

Re: Apple Agrees to Pay $113M to Settle 'Batterygate' Case over iPhone Slowdowns

#180

Post by mlindner »

reducesuffering wrote: post #17
CapriciousCptl wrote: post #10

So, I'm somehow developing a pro-Apple bias these days. This whole batterygate to me is kind of based on conjecture-- that Apple slowed old phones with the intention to sell more new ones. If there's any supporting evidence, or anything that's come up in discovery that Apple acted in bad faith, I'd possibly change my (admittedly biased) mind. But really, slowing the phones down to extend battery life is a reasonable…

I think this is the crux of the issue. Apple had to make a call for their customers: ensure the low battery is as long-lasting and predictable as possible around 1-5%, or keep high performance as the phone battery degrades quicker and shuts off. I think many people thoroughly understand how crucial it can be to have that last 1-2% and going into a situation where you think you have 5%, but then the phone dies, is a p…

You're not understanding the issue here. This had nothing to do with how fast the battery degrades. This was only ever about how the phone acts with an already degraded battery. The two choices are 1. Shut off the phone suddenly if any high performance tasks are attempted 2. Throttle the phone performance to keep it from shutting off.

Apple chose #2, which is best for customers, and got forced to pay $113M from it. It's ridiculous.

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