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Live iPhone 4 press event coverage

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Re: Live iPhone 4 press event coverage

#31

Post by ergo98 »

ugh wrote: post #22
tvon wrote: post #16

In Q&A they seem to be glossing over or ignoring the whole "if you bridge the gap the signal drops" issue (demonstrated here with a paperclip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgouzUMlQpY but as I understand it your finger will do the same thing). At least when asked somewhat directly, one engineer gave a complete non-answer.

What you see there is a drop of between 6 and 22dB (from four bars to one [+]). Gripping the iPhone will reduce the signal by at most 24dB. I don’t know whether they don’t acknowledge that. They showed a “X marks the spot” slide. That, to me, seems to be a pretty clear acknowledgement that merely touching that spot weakens the signal. [+] http://www.anandtech.com/show/3821/iphone-4-redux-analyzing-...

In reference to the "x marks the spot" they claimed that it "showed you where to cover the antenna", trying to draw a parallel with covering the internal antenna on any other phone.

That is ridiculous. You aren't "covering the antenna" when you cover that spot. The antenna is the big strip of metal above that spot. Instead you're upsetting the profile of the antenna, which is entirely different.

The presentation was incredibly deceptive and flawed.

Re: Live iPhone 4 press event coverage

#32

Post by wvenable »

ajg1977 wrote: post #12
mbreese wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

single finger on one small spot I'd like to see you hold a phone with a single finger...

I hold my phone lightly, not in a death grip. If part of my skin touches the wrong area on the iPhone 4, signal vanishes. Capeche?

Perhaps then this phone, with it's innovative antenna design, is simply not for you. I'm not sure why Apple owes you a differently designed phone. It is what it is.

Re: Live iPhone 4 press event coverage

#33

Post by Shabaz »

sigzero wrote: post #24
Shabaz wrote: post #19

One of the things that most bothered me in the initial responses from Apple (the Jobs emails and the open letter) is that none of them acknowledge that there is a fundamental difference between antennas from other smartphones losing signal and the iPhone 4, where the antenna is exposed and can be shorted, even with one finger. I'm kind of disappointed they apparently still don't acknowledge that (maybe the live trans…

> caused by something completely different Um, from what I saw it was caused by the same thing. You hold a phone a certain way you lose signal strength. > that seems like a fundamental engineering flaw, and I would've liked them to acknowledge that. I watched the whole thing and several times it was acknowledged as such. Maybe you wanted them to say it was only an iPhone4 issue and not a general smartphone problem?

I have only read the gdgt transcript, so if you watched it somehow I'm going to defer to you about anything not in the transcript.

But as far as the 'completely different' thing goes, as far as I know the lower signal can be caused by signal being absorbed by your hand. But what seems to happen with the iPhone 4 is that there is also this shorting issue because of an exposed antenna. But when directly asked about the shorting issue they say it's about your body being a "pretty effective signal absorber".

Re: Live iPhone 4 press event coverage

#34

Post by zppx »

rauljara wrote: post #21

Q: Are you willing to make an apology to investors? Steve: You know we hear from customers who love this phone and have a great experience with it, and we're doing a lot to help them with any issues they're seeing. To investors, you know, you invest in the company we are, so if the stock goes down $5... I don't think I owe them an apology. Whether or not Jobs is bs-ing about loving his customers so much, I wish more…

I think this is the correct attitude when you're an entertainment company, or a company that does have a direct relationship with costumers, but might not work for other types, such as services for enterprises.

Re: Live iPhone 4 press event coverage

#36

Post by tvon »

bond wrote: post #17
AlexMuir wrote: post #11

A lot of people ask how Apple didn't pick this up in field testing. I think the answer is that they wrapped the iPhone 4 in plastic to camouflage it as an iPhone 3GS (as we know from the Gizmodo phone). Hence all their field testing was effectively done with bumpers on.

They knew... Steve Jobs: "The iPhone 4 went through all of these tests. We KNEW that if you held it in a certain way, the bars would go down."

That means they knew something, but not necessarily about the "bridging the gap" problem.

Re: Live iPhone 4 press event coverage

#37

Post by wvenable »

In the Wall Street Journals live blog of the event, Jobs indicates they have a Verizon testing site:

http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2010/07/16/live-blogging-apples-...

"We have both an AT&T and Verizon cell site set up on our campus" for testing, says Jobs.

Did Jobs go out of his way to say Verizon there?

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