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Death Grip Tested On iPhone Competitors
adeelarshad82 writes "Given Steve Jobs' recent claims about 'Death Grip' being a common problem among smart phones, PCMag tested out six major iPhone competitors to see how they would react to the grip. The test included Motorola Droid X, T-Mobile myTouch 3G Slide, Droid Incredible by HTC, BlackBerry Bold 9650, and the Samsung Captivate. The signal strength was measured in dBm, which typically ranges between -50 to -110 dBm (numbers closer to zero show better signal). Interestingly, the test results video showed mixed results. T-Mobile myTouch 3G and Samsung Captivate showed drastic changes, dropping down to -89 and -97 dBm respectively. On the other hand, while the signal strength dropped for HTC Droid Incredible, Motorola Droid X and Blackberry Bold, it wasn't as severe. Results of testing showed that not all phones reacted the same way to the typical death grip and required variations of it to bring about results."
"On the other hand, while the signal strength dropped for HTC Droid Incredible, Motorola Droid X and Blackberry Bold, it wasn't as severe. "
Please forgive me if It was a typo and I seem like I'm being a smart-ass.
it's under construction
Why is the standard response for anything anyone is caught doing is to reply that someone else is doing (insert catch word lie: more|also|worse|longer) than we have.
I think that the Banana significantly outperformed the iPhone.
No, really, I mean it.
Have you heard about SoylentNews?
How many of them have bare metal antennas on the surface of the phone? No matter what weasel words Steve chooses, there is no excuse for this defect.
So what if other phones require a "death grip" to affect signal strength? After all, all phones are subject to the laws of physics; if you block the signal, there is nothing the phone can do about it.
How many more stories about this crap? The holy iPhone has a small defect. Guess what, it is not the biggest problem that the "form over function" philosophy has brought to the device. Those who value form will always buy the stupid device, its ability to complete calls (if you don't hold it the wrong way) is just an extra.
As for the "death grip". We were not talking about any death grips, that was never the issue and people don't usually hold their phone like that. The problem was with simply touching the device at the bottom corner and only the iPhone 4 has a problem (for "why" and "does it matter" see first paragraph of post).
And can we get on now? This is getting more annoying than dupes.
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
Steve Jobs hasn't ever admitted to the iPhone 4 losing all signal or dropping calls when held in the "death grip". He only admitted to a loss of signal strength, which he said all phones experience when held in a similar manner. This article just seems to confirm what he said. The real world difference is, that the iPhone 4 can actually drop calls and appear to lose all signal when held this way. Notice there is a difference between reality and what Apple (or any company that doesn't want to admit they have a flaw in their product) will admit to.
"[HTC Incredible] By using a death grip of both hands covering the phone we saw the results go from -57 to -64 dBm"
"[Droid X] can be difficult[...] We used two hands on this larger phone."
"[BlackBerry Bold] was a little more resistant [...] hold of it with two hands, we saw the signal strength go from -80 to -87 dBm."
Yeah, cause covering the entire phone with two hands is a perfectly normal way that people would ever use the phone. I bet if I shoved a smart phone up my a**, it would lose a lot of signal too...
One of the things I've wondered about is that Apple said the iPhone 4 does drop more calls than the 3GS. However, the iPhone 4 gets reception in locations the 3GS doesn't, so if iPhone 4 is dropping calls in situations where the 3GS wouldn't even have bars in the first place, it makes it look worse than it is.
Of course it can be degraded depending on its environment.
What is next, the 'discovery' that batteries run down differently depending on the temperature?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
They're seriously comparing phones that lose signal with a standard grip to phones where hold the phone with both hands deliberately trying to cover the antenna and pretend the result is somehow meaningful?
Wouldn't a sane signal comparison compare them using reasonably common grips? It's sorta stupid to say "When you deliberately cover both antennas with an awkward two hand grip it'll lose 10 dBm", everyone knows the antenna will lose signal if you cover it, the point is that the iPhone is so easy to cover by accident.
Attenuation happens. Film at 11...
No ever said that blocking the antenna doesn't affect signal strength. The problem with the iPhone is that the simple act of holding it normally can cause it to completely lose all signal. That is a problem. No other phones have this problem, that is why it has never come up before.
The iPhone has a serious design flaw, there is no denying this. I just hope Apple with fix this flaw before too much longer.
This is all very interesting, but any tech site that hasn't been using this method in their smartphone reviews since this started is behind the 8 ball. Consider Anantech's coverage of last week's update, with numbers before and after the software update and comparisons to the field. Heck, their Droid X review today treats the test as a standard benchmark.
So I hope all of these manufacturers do the right thing and recall their phones. If it possible to do something to a phone to get it drop in signal, then the only right answer is a recall. Originally I thought that the only right answer was a free case for everyone that bought them, but then Apple gave out free cases and I had to revise my opinion. I haven't yet figured out how to make the signal drops on phones from other manufacturers somehow Apple's fault, but if I can, then I will again revise my opinion to demand that Apple recalls the phones on behalf os the other manufacturers as well. There has to be a class action lawsuit somewhere here that I can peg on Apple...
Took the words out of my mouth! __ Sent from my mobile device
What's this "completely lose all signal"? I haven't seen any source for this. What I've seen is that there is a large drop in sensitivity if you hold the phone in a certain manner. If you have any reference to a complete loss of signal, please post it. If not, please stop claiming there is such a loss.
I can lose connection out here, because AT&T has low signal strength out here. I can't where I live. That suggests to me a significant but not total drop in sensitivity.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
The crushing the phone with two hands seems significantly different from touch the bottom left corner.
That's not surprising with any antennae. It'd be more convincing if the others had that drop when holding it normally to talk.
I'm just not seeing a drop from the table to just in my hand with my old phone, and well, I don't need to juice my phone to talk - I do usually touch it though.
I thought the iPhone4 would only lose all signal if you're already in a low signal area?
That is, for all these other phones that lost signal strength, if they were in a low signal area, they could very well lose all the signal as well?
Of course Jobs cherry-picked the phones that would most-illustrate a similar effect. I have an iPhone 4 and I love it -- never had any signal issues (but I use a Belkin Vue Grip case). I was a bit annoyed at the photos Apple showed, though -- if you look at the pictures, you can clearly see that they're squeezing the *SHIT* out of the phone to get the analogous effect (seriously, look at the guy's thumb who's squeezing the Blackberry -- he's pressing so hard, most of his thumb is WHITE). I'm a huge Apple fan, but I really don't appreciate attempts at manipulating results like that. NO ONE is going to squeeze their phone that hard. If they do, they deserve the signal loss. Oh, and that September 30th date? I bet they're actively working on an antenna redesign and that's when they'll be rolling it out in new iPhones delivered starting on that date -- it will be very interesting to dissect an iPhone made in October to see if this theory hold water.
Apple haters have no need to be sad.
Steve Jobs has demonstrated himself to be a weasel that tries to deflect responsibility for his own failures on others.
It really doesn't matter how bad the alternatives are.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Can I stop explaining to people why I intend to purchase this phone despite a minor defect that won't affect me now?
I think the Death Grip is referring to the relationship between Steve and the Fan-boys..
Perhaps only old fogeys recall rabbit ear TV antennas for analogue TVs ... touching can improve or degrade signal. Depends on where, what frequencies, etc.
No matter how clever the engineering, there's no cheating the law of physics.
I always use a bluetooth headset and seldom hold the phone during calls; and use a case. So it all seemed like a tempest in a teacup to me.
Really, that is not what the iphone users were complaining about. Yes you can cause cell phone signal strength to fall by covering it with both hands. I know the video was a parody, or meant as humor, but people will think that all cell phones are equal. They are not. And much depends on your provider and location also. It's easier to degrade a weak signal than a strong signal. So anyone saying Jobs was right by saying all phones have that problem is wrong. I have an HTC Incredible. I do not experience what iphone users are complaining about. The recent iphone release was just a bad design esp. for weak signal areas. People just need to move on. If the phone doesn't work for you, send it back.
I know seven people with iphone 4s. All seven of them have dropped calls, or lose signal completely if they hold the phone in their left hand. If they leave the phone on a table it works fine.
With seven people out of seven people have the exact problem I would say there is a problem. They can repeat the problem over and over again. It is a design flaw. Five out of the seven are lefties who normally hold the phone in their left hand. They are really annoyed.
I had no idea you could play World of Warcraft on a smartphone.
"I know together we'll make the possible totally impossible" - Homme
When you have to go to such inane and absurd attempts at doing damage control for a fundamentally defective design you might has well just give up trying to defend the piece of junk iPhone.
No wonder Android is destroying the iPhone in sales. 160,000 new phones a day/ 50 million or so a year. And that is just the rate as of a few months ago. Android has been doubling its marketshare every quarter since last year.
People adapt to their phones to optimize their signal. Just as you stand where the signal's strongest, you adjust your grip so the signal is strongest. It's just not that big a deal when you actually use the phone.
I can now make and receive calls from locations that I couldn't before I got the phone and the call is cleaner. In exchange, I had to learn to hold my phone slightly differently than I used to. I can live with that. If you can't, don't get an iPhone.
You may have joined the dark side and control an entire evil empire, Mr. Jobs, but you are not a Sith Lord ... yet.
The issue with iPhone 4 isn't about *gripping it*, it's about simply touching this spot to affect the signal.
... *instant* loss of sound quality to the point I couldn't understand anything for several seconds.
Just yesterday I was on the phone and my pinky accidentally touched that spot
I will show you a death grip that nothing can survive.
WTF? Not a single article or video showing iphone dropping calls? NOT ONE? Jesus Christ - you fanbois are delusional.
Fuck my karma - here it comes - FUCK ALL APPLE FANBOIS, and FUCK STEVE JOBS. There, I said it. On /.
There are countless videos on YouTube submitted by users demonstrating the same effect with non-iPhones, and Apple has posted their own antenna page with videos of competing phones losing signal. It seems to be an issue in low-signal areas and is a fact of life for all smartphones.
"No other phones have this problem"?
Riiiight. Then why do ALL of their manuals tell you NOT to hold it certain ways which decrease signal strength?
http://dontholditwrong.tumblr.com/
If Apple put the 'death grip' in their manual, would everyone be ok with that?
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
See update 4. Completely losing your upload speed, and being unable to make a phone call, pretty much confirms a loss of all real-world signal.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
There must be huge variation from iPhone 4 to iPhone 4. I'm right handed and almost always hold my phone in my left hand. (I keep seeing stories that suggest that this problem affects lefties more, because they hold their phones with their left hands, but this seems backwards to me.)
I can't detect any problem with holding my phone in my left hand. I do see a substantial improvement in apparent coverage. Works reliably in my office, where my iPhone 3g was spotty at best. Voice works (but data sucks) in the basement of my office, where I had NO coverage before. I can only attribute this to the antenna redesign.
I think there must be some marginal phones out there, but it seems that there are a lot of iPhone 4s out there that are working well. And I think there's an aweful lot of hype around this problem. Maybe the lesson is that if you live by hype you can die by hype?
-Peter
Five out of the seven are lefties who normally hold the phone in their left hand.
Sheesh, that seems like a lot of lefties. I'm not sure I even know 5 Ned Flandersesses, let alone 5 that bought the new iPhone.
Why haven't they taken the device back for a refund? I know if I purchased a phone that didn't work properly I'd just take it back. This is the best way to teach Apple a lesson about quality control, if they are selling defective phones/phones which don't work with AT&T/phones you don't like/phones you can't hold normally - they should pay for it with a huge return rate. Take your pick of the list of purported reasons, whatever it is, if it's serious enough to lead to lots of dropped calls, why bother with the phone?
Luckily, I bought one of the magical iPhone 4s which isn't affected by any problem with dropped calls (0 over the last month), so I won't be returning mine.
All blenders I know of have caps which should be in place before you turn them on. I have even seen one that has a safety switch making it impossible to be turned on without the cap.
What happened to cellphones with protruding antenna? Other than having it jab me in the crotch when I put the phone in my pocket I never had an issue with such a phone.
http://mobihealthnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/0660208.gif
And as my failing memory serves, the signal was consistently better.
No sig for you. YOU GET NO SIG!
If only I could find a cable long enough. Watch this part:
NO SIGNAL LOSS - beat that!
StarTrekPhase2 - The Five Year Mission Continues!
Yeah but with AT&T, the entire US continent is a low signal area.
Bananas aren't Fruit, they're Herbs
You never catch me alive
Why haven't they taken the device back for a refund?
Because of all the apps they bought previously, and the itunes music and movies they bought, etc. Lock. In. Baby. Now that Apple has users by the pocketbook, they can afford to cut corners just like Microsoft.
Take it for what it's worth Apple has a page on Smartphone Antenna Performance where they document various popular phones and signal attenuation problems.
Is it propaganda... ahm I meant good public relations, probably to some extent.
Are the comparisons true, likely to some extent.
Do we care, not really. This whole thing is way out of proportion and only really matters to people who've got nothing better to do.
No ever said that blocking the antenna doesn't affect signal strength. The problem with the iPhone is that the simple act of holding it normally can cause it to completely lose all signal. That is a problem. No other phones have this problem, that is why it has never come up before.
The iPhone has a serious design flaw, there is no denying this. I just hope Apple with fix this flaw before too much longer.
Except that your argument is easily nullified. All cell phones have always dropped signal when touched, yes, even with a single finger. It's physics. You touch the phone, you mess with the antenna, signal drops. All cell phones, always. I have always noticed this with every cell phone I've had in the last 10 years. All of them. Always. You need to be more observant.
The Admin and the Engineer
Its a pretty simple issue. No other phones have actual bare metal antennas. All other phones cover their antennas with plastic so you can't conduct the signal away.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
WTF? Not a single article or video showing iphone dropping calls? NOT ONE? Jesus Christ - you fanbois are delusional.
Fuck my karma - here it comes - FUCK ALL APPLE FANBOIS, and FUCK STEVE JOBS. There, I said it. On /.
So the signal dropping is no longer the argument... it's dropped calls? They are the same thing. If touching an antenna drops the signal by -10dB and there is only -10dB of signal available, then you have a dropped call. It's not a different issue. A dropped call is PRECISELY the same issue as loosing signal strength from holding a cell phone.
The Admin and the Engineer
The music is not locked in.
The apps are specific to iOS, so they could go for a 3GS if they were finding the iPhone 4 to be useless, but didn't want to part with their apps. In the same way that if I move from Windows, my windows apps don't work on my Mac (without emulation/parallels etc).
They would likely find that the 3GS does not get a signal at all in the areas where the death grip affects the iPhone 4, so swings and roundabouts.
Let's do what the article should've done and quantify it. The worst signal loss they could get from the other phones by death-gripping them is about -14 dB. They didn't provide figures for the iPhone 4, probably because Apple makes this hard to find out, but IIRC it's been measured at -24 dB. That means that if you death-grip the iPhone 4 your signal is reduced to about 1/200th of what it was, and if you do the same to the worst of the normal smartphones it's instead reduced to 1/20th.
If you wrap your hands tightly around most of a phone, yes, you can produce a signal loss. You can also produce a signal loss by moving into a node or creating a standing wave pattern.
But the iPhone 4 doesn't require a "death grip", a touch of the gap separating the two antennas on the case suffices. No other phone behaves like that.
If I only had some mod points you'd be getting +Insightful
The iPhone 4 antenna design flaw results in a death *touch* which is activated simply by touching a specific place on the case. This is a far worse problem than using a specific grip to block antenna signals all around with a grip of your hand. Apple is basically trying to change the conversation to be about gripping phones in specific ways blocking some radio signals (which is an issue with every cell phone ever) and away from the design flaw which results in the iPhone 4's unique "death touch" problem.
Portable versions of Firefox, GIMP, LibreOffice, etc
Besides a) attenuation due to hand holding and b) change of the antenna characteristics due to bridging there's a third problem which really exacerbates the first two: the antenna of the iPhone 4G is highly directional. In other words, it matters a LOT which way you point the phone. Sometimes even small changes around it can make a big difference in terms of whether you get data or not.
You can test this out (assuming you've got access to an iPhone 4G) by running a speed test application (there are plenty in the App Store) while holding / pointing the phone in different ways. I can trigger signal loss even without holding the phone. No bumper whatsoever is going to fix that problem and this is plain and simple bad antenna design. I lose a lot more data when streaming radio on the 4G than what the 3G did even though the bandwidth is (potentially) much higher.
People, people, people. Its not about the death grip. Its not about general signal loss on all phones.
It is about the magnitude of signal loss. According to Anand's article, the iPhone 4 loses 20 dBm from holding it naturally with the antenna gap covered. That is 30% of the signal range. No other phone can acheive this signal loss, even with the death grip. Most phones 10 dBm or less, or better, even with a death grip. The magnitude of the iPhone 4's signal loss is 100% higher, or more, than all of its competitors when held naturally. This is abysmal, and makes it very hard for the user to predict whether his call is in danger or not. The bar change helps this a bit, but it doesn't take away the fact that a vanilla iPhone 4 has a signal handicap on all of its competitors due to shitty engineering.
Total received signal power is only part of the story with HSPA. The measurements should also take the QUALITY of the signal into account, ie the Ec/N0 figure. It's possible to have a strong signal and shitty bit error rate and vice versa. But you majority hardware n00bs here on /. wouldn't have a facking clue about that. It's all about bars, isn't it?
The HTC Droid Incredible (Verizon), Motorola Droid X (Verizon) and Blackberry Bold (Sprint), are on CDMA networks... The myTouch 3G (T-Mobile), Samsung Captivate (AT&T), iPhone (AT&T) are on UMTS/GSM networks... So this comparison is testing phones on different networks, using different technologies, with likely different radio chips...
How many of them have bare metal antennas on the surface of the phone?
I think we can forgive the other phones for lacking in this design area, as it has been fashionable of late to embed antennas.
The thing is, the larger surface area of the external metal antenna does mean the iPhone gets really much better reception - both voice and data.
This comes with the tradeoff that there is one specific location that, if you touch, can cause SOME interference (though if it really affects you depends on signal strength).
In real life, this one weak location is not really an issue compared to the benefits you derive from a better antenna. I can make calls reliably from my house now where with the 3Gs, the calls would often drop out or sound terrible.
Shouldn't we all be concerned with the antenna making a better phone or not? Because for many, many people (as witnessed by the return rate) - the iPhone does a better job of that. If the antenna produces better calls then it's not a flaw, it's just the tradeoffs leading to a better antenna are different than tradeoffs made before - but it's still progress.
For all the whining about this look for competitors to start introducing external antenna soon.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
If you have -10 dB of signal then you are standing next to the transmitter. That's a really good signal.
No other phones have a problem whereby holding it in a NORMAL way can reduce the signal to a useless level.
Those manuals talk about increased power consumption not complete loss of useable radio
Steve, get off my Slashdot and fix your damn phone!
I guess the other guy always "accidentally" hangs up on you.
I'm highly sceptical of anyone who says they dont have an issue. Normally it's just the ego covering up for a decision that you desperately want to be right. Regardless of whether it is or isn't a good decision your ego will not let you judge it rationally.
The really sad thing is that all Apple need to do, was cover the damn aerial is a few mm of plastic or rubber and the signal loss would have been lessened to real world numbers (5-7 dBm). But Apple would not permit this, there have literally been dozens of studies on bare metal aerials and they have all concluded bare metal aerials are not suitable for phones due to interference cause by being touched.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
This isn't what they found. More over a few of the other phones showed similar performance drops when held in a why that seems quite "normal". On the flip side, they didn't find such huge drops on all phones, and on some the grip on the phone was anything but normal.
In summary, this isn't unique to the iPhone 4 but it isn't universal to all phones either.
I think I am now just as tired of hearing about the iPhone 4 antenna issues as I am hearing about SCO.
Let me summarize so we can PLEASE move on:
iPhone has an antenna problem.
Get a bumper case or a friggin piece of scotch tape or take it back if you're not happy with it. If you don't own one and are just bitching because the rest of the world is, please get a life or at least find something else to gripe about.
Kk thx.
Err, no. You are forming a capacitor with the phone's antenna as one side and your squidgy mitt as the other side - direct contact isn't the problem. That's why a little bit of sticky tape over "the line" doesn't cure the problem. If you think about it you'd not be able to touch the phone's antenna at all (as one side is the WiFi antenna and the other side is the Cellular Antenna). It's the fact you're a big bag of mostly water that's the problem.
I find on my Nokia phone holding the phone with my palm in contact (or very nearly in contact) with the back of the phone makes it lose some signal strength (and in areas of low signal this can cause a dropped call). The antenna assembly isn't in direct contact with my skin, the effect is as described above.
I hold the phone with fingers outstretched so the body of the phone isn't in contact with my palm. I've have the phone so long (and I've seen the same thing on so many phones) this seems natural - but it really isn't.
This isn't logical. It really does matter how a product performs relative to other products of the same type. Forget Apple and the iPhone 4 this argument doesn't make any sense at all. If I created a widget that performed twice as well as it's nearest competitor then I'd have the best widget in the world. You can't claim just because it doesn't have infinite performance my widget is a failure and I'm a weasel for suggesting otherwise. Can you?
Maybe so, but signal attenuation isn't the only factor - probably more important is the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR).
probably more important is the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR).
Hey look, it's a straw man argument. Or possibly a red herring. Maybe even both. In a discussion about tests on phones losing signal strength, you're going to bring up SNR? Get the fuck out, and come back when you're on topic.
Why is this modded insightful? Yeah, the phones *could* lose signal, but the point is the iPhone 4 is MORE likely to lose signal, because it experiences a greater drop. In fact, apparently a significantly greater drop, thus proving the Steve Jobs was misrepresenting the situation when he said that all phones suffer from this issue.
Unfortunately, as an AT&T/iPhone 3gs user, I have to agree.
Actually, it's not quite that bad. I get horrible reception in my house, but it's much better in bigger cities in my experience.
Nobody has ever questioned that physical objects can block, attenuate, or otherwise distort electromagnetic radiation. That is a pretty basic fact that nobody will deny.
So, a good phone is not one that overcomes the laws of physics preventing physical objects from interfering with its signal. No. A good phone is one that is designed in a way that allows you to grab the phone in any of the usual ways that are suitable to hold a conversation or browse the web and still get a signal. They usually achieve this through properly insulated, numerous, cleverly positioned antennas. A good phone is one that grabbed in any normal way suitable for browsing/texting/talking doesn't loose too much signal. Most cellpones pass this test ok. Check the video. The ONLY phone that lost signal while being grabbed normally was the iphone 4. All the others had to be covered almost all round the phone, with a firm, very hard grip, both hands, to make them loose some signal, and even then, they performed better than the iphone4.
This is not Apple hating. It's just reality. All iphones have crappy signal. Apple designed the phone to look nice, and forgot about functionality. The iphone 4 is even worse, but all previous generations have on average worse reception thanother phones.
On the other hand, I don't like smartphones. I carry a small, shitty, Nokia 1208 cellphone. It's light, small, tough, and has a huge battery life. The battery is very easily replaced, and I carry with me a spare fully loaded battery. Many people that I work with have iphones. Most of the time, when I go down to just 1-2 bars, iphones are already completely out of signal. Example, at the elevator, every iphone user drops the call immediately, but I still keep enough signal to continue talking. That's what a cellphone is supposed to be. I don't feel the urge to carry with me a camera, a digital recorder, an audio/video player, a web browser, etc. with me at all times, but if I did, I would carry a separate device that would do all of those things, while still carrying my small, simple phone that always works.
WTF am I doing replying to an AC at 5 A.M on a Friday night?
All this time, I thought that little line was a capacitative, physical End Call button!
It is possible that clear nail polish will do very little to mitigate the problem.
Anadtech showed that 1-mil Kaplan tape applied did reduce the effect somewhat.
The case will always be better but even bare as it is it works well enough. I don't plan to put a case on mine.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Consider an old radio. Tune to your favorite station. Then turn the tuning knob to the left or right. You'll find that your favorite station is gone, and you're now listening to something in Spanish!/i
Consider the iPhone 4 though. In real life if you have a strong signal, there's pretty much no effect from the "detuning". Even if you have a weak signal it may not be enough of a drop to drop a call...
So it doesn't really seem like a full detuning is what is going on, generally speaking (though that's part of it).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Nokia managed to convince the industry internal antennas works just as well.
About time we brought the antenna back out and the signal reception back up.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Has anyone else noticed the people frothing at the mouth in comments on Apple stories are almost all high user IDs?
I'm just saying...
No other phone can acheive this signal loss (20db)
From the video link:
Last up came the newly released Samsung Captivate. The Captivate went from -81 to-97 dBm after we applied the standard left-handed grip
Pretty close to 20.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
It's not just smart phones. I had aNoxia 97xx that would drop calls if held a certain way. It always seemed obvious to me that it was attenuation.
Having said that,I thought Apple was nuts to expose the metal, and had presumed originally that it was covered in clear polymer. Every school kid radio fan knows what happens to the signal if you grab the antenna, right? So why would you make a phone with a naked antenna?
On the other hand I've played with a few 4s and the issue is IMO not nearly as severe as the tempest would imply, and while most people I know can reproduce the problem several indicate that the phone works in places where previous models didn't. If I were in the market I would still buy one. I would use a case as a matter of course anyway (put one on the 3gs immediately, have you seen what these things cost?). Not Apple's case, I swear Apple has no idea how to make a good case.
jim frost
jimf@frostbytes.com
He's lied about being sterile to try and get out of paternity and he ripped the Woz off a few grand back by lying even before they started Apple. So he is most definitely a liar and a douche, but the question is, is he lying this time?
Ranking has gone up in the past 24 hours 469 days in the top 100.
http://astore.amazon.com/canon.eos.rebel.t1i.15.1.mp.on.sale-20
If you're going to use terms like "all" to describe fact, then perhaps a little less extremism, a little more research. I have an N900, manual number 9216999, issue 1.0 - not a single reference anywhere on how or how not to hold the device. I have had dozens of phones over the years, few of those had guidelines on physical handling. None in particular had guidelines on handling in regard to reception or transmission. The usual FCC boilerplate on interference, or a few lines on needing a good signal for clear transmissions, but that's it. I can appreciate that some manuals and models do, but all? I think not good sir.
I can grip this bad boy in both hands tightly, run a script to poll the signal strength every few moments, make a hole big enough just to read the display, and it barely drops a couple of dB. This is only part of the story though. I am in the Philippines, we send 140 billion text messages a year, we get cell base stations for free in our breakfast cereal boxes, they are everywhere. :-) I don't remember having a dropped call for a few years now.
I remember the days of analogue in Australia, then GSM, coverage outside of major towns was spotty at best, but more usually non-existent. I get the impression that this is about where America is right now with GSM. It'll take time to improve things I guess.
Folks... dBm is a ratio, expressed in dB, compared to 1 milliwatt, so dBm is refers to an absolute power level. When signals differ, that ratio is expressed in dB, not dBm.
Here's an analogy. Let's say a dog weighs 100 rats = 20dBrats. An elephant weighs 10000 rats = 40dBrats. So clearly an elephant weights 100 times a dog, ie. 20dB more than a dog. Rats, or any other reference weight, factors out of the comparison.
You know what I don't understand - Apple's videos of the Eris show them knocking the signal completely out just by holding it differently.
Try this with a real Eris - you won't be able to reproduce this effect no matter how hard you try (and I've spent a fair amount of time trying too).
I do think at this point the whole iPhone 4 issue has been blown out of proportion, but I think those demos are faked.
I dunno...used a friend's 4G. Covered the antenna part. He lost a bar. Uncovered it, bar came back. Just, umm, slide your fingers an 8th of an inch apart when you hold the phone if you're concerned.
As with all dBs, this is logarithmic. A 20dBm loss is a 100x loss, 10dBm is a 10x loss. Each 10dB of attenuation is much worse than the last.
As an example if I gave you earplugs with 10dB of attenuation, it would take a conversational voice down to a quiet level. 20dB would take it down to a whisper. 30dB would put it below the background level of most rooms.
With dBs, you are talking orders of magnitude.
Yeah but with AT&T, the entire US continent is a low signal area.
Let me guess, your geography teacher was G.W.B.? :)
When I say no dropped calls, I mean no calls have ended unexpectedly, everything worked as you'd expect over around 50 calls. The only criticism I have is that one call that I remember had mediocre voice quality (not breaking up, but fuzzy), but that's something I've experienced with many phones, on many networks, and could be caused by lots of things. So for me, coming from an iPhone 3G, this phone is a big step up in speed, reception, and aesthetics (I didn't particularly like the styling on the 3G).
If you've seen that video of the guy lightly touching the edge of his phone and data cutting off, you have to accept there is definitely a problem with some iPhone 4s in some conditions (which Steve adroitly misdirected as a 'death grip' problem, when in fact it was about a light touch). However that doesn't mean that all iPhone 4s exhibit this - I've tested extensively and can't reproduce it. YMMV.
Apparently you have this problem with your internet posts, as you refuse to accept evidence to the contrary once you have decided that all iPhones must be flawed. As you don't even have an iPhone I wonder why you are driven to such lengths to demonstrate its clear inferiority - why do you even care?
That's not been my experience here. Sorry to disappoint you.
I am not sure if you are trying to be sarcastic or not but SNR is actually very important. If you want to talk about a single figure you should possibly use discuss the overall sensitivity the receiver. You could also talk about the ability of the demodulator to discriminate the signal from the noise. The fixation on signal attenuation is a bit like the mega pixel crap on mobile phone - the pixel count is not the whole picture. ;)
Having said that certain the iPhone do suffer from user induced reception loss (death grip). It also appears that other phones also suffer from this effect to some extent.
Really.
I'm not the one purporting to have an experience opposite to what most people are reporting.
I'm highly sceptical because your reports do not fit the profile of other reports. This is not cognitive dissonance. Cognitive dissonance is pretending a problem does not exist because I want it not to exist. Projection is claiming post who call you out as cognitive dissonance.
Umm...
You didn't provide any evidence, what you provided was an anecdote which is contrary to the position of actual evidence. The plural of anecdote is not data.
Also I have enough knowledge to understand that the problem is caused by an unshielded aerial is a design problem and yes, this affects all Iphones (hence the comment of mine that "is not your experience").
Because I am old enough to remember the rise of Microsoft into prominence and how against all warnings I hailed Windows.
This is a mistake I have learned from and do not wish to repeat again.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
It's not just smart phones. I had aNoxia 97xx that would drop calls if held a certain way. It always seemed obvious to me that it was attenuation.
Chinese knock-off brand, like Nokja?
I realize that practical engineering should have nothing to do with this argument, but I'll try it anyway. I don't own a cellphone, but if I did, I'd prefer to have one with a spring-loaded telescoping antenna that pops or flips (like a switchblade) up (or down) when I want to talk. Then, unless I touch the antenna, it'd have a nice freespace location to radiate and receive in. Then, when I was done, I push on the top of the antenna and it would collapse into the body. In the case of the switchblade, I could also use it for personal protection or to scale fish.
ALL THIS JAZZ YOU'RE ARGUING IS UNNECESSARY. It's about fashion, NOT good engineering. The physics is elementary. The debate is childish. Thank you for your time, I return control of your screen now.
"You must try to forget all you have learned. You must begin to dream." -- Sherwood Anderson
Apple has done a slight of hand here. Do not get sucked in.
iPhone4 issue comes from *** ONE FINGER TOUCHING THE PHONE ***, not "an entire hand cupped around the phone".
It's a bit like saying "yes, our -cars- aren't as crash proof as they could be, but look at Suzuki -motorbikes-, they're not safe either".
Also, it's a PATHETIC attempt by Apple to blame everyone else. This is disgraceful behaviour from Apple and it makes me sick. As a parent, I would not accept my child behaving this way (and he's 5). So why would I accept it from a grown man (SJ) and a "supposed" professional company?
AC
... but the car in front of me was also speeding. Also, didn't you notice that the car I passed back there had a broken tail light.
[...]
I'm not the one purporting to have an experience opposite to what most people are reporting.
[...]
You didn't provide any evidence, what you provided was an anecdote which is contrary to the position of actual evidence. The plural of anecdote is not data.
Wow - are you aware that you wrote both of those sentences in the same post? Really? And just how long did it take you to read the reports of over 1,500,000 iPhone 4 users?
To be perfectly honest, I don't care what phone you use. In fact, I don't even care much what the (phone) antenna performance on my own iPhone is, since I rarely even use it as a phone, and the wi-fi works just fine. What I do care about is science, and evidence-based conclusions. And frankly people on both sides of the argument have been kicking the crap out of the science, in favour of whatever conclusion they'd prefer to reach. Rarely, though, will you see someone so self-unaware as to preach the importance of evidence while simultaneously paying it no regard, as you managed with this post.
I mean we've even seen Techcrunch run a story from a so-called expert gave a financial justification for predicting that Apple would announce a thin non-conducting coating fix at their press conference! As though the physics of whether or not it would help was unimportant!
This is Slashdot people— we're supposed to be science-geeks; let's start acting like it!
(OK - last sentence was slightly tongue in cheek, but I meant the rest of it)
where i'm from, we _had_ to grab the antennae.
otherwise you wouldn't get the one channel our town received.
there was a rotary knob for uhf
and one for vhf
and each knob had two rotating pieces, an inner and outer disc. One spun smoothly for fine tuning, the other for large jumps.
i'd make my brother hold the antennae while i watched saturday morning cartoons.
Hold it any way you want.
Holding the phone with your left or right hand while talking without a headset/earpiece has a lot more to do with left or right brain bias than handedness.
- Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
What's even more confusing is that they are problably not even on the same carrier, which effectively means that signal coverage on the same place (of test) is different for every phone.
My numbers are even better. I never lost any calls on an iPhone, whether the first, the second, third or the last generation.
If you want to know how I did it, all you have to do is provide me with two simple payments of 99.99 and I will explain this fact to you in great detail and depth.
--
[nokia6303c user]
You can't handle the truth.
What? A magazine I often turn to for my PC info actually had to test this "theory" out. Did they run out of things to test that weren't common sense? I guess I'm the only one thinking that covering an antenna with another "antenna" is a dumb ass thing to do. The human body being a conductor is not news. Cell phone antennas, internal or external, being affected by the human body is not news. Slashdot has been getting really laxed on what it considers news.
Interesting point. The fact that my hearing loss is more pronounced in my right ear (due to an unfortunate incident involving a gas mask and an M-16) my play a role as well.
-Peter
I wish I could [Death Grip] my phone from across the room when it rings and I'm busy pvping.
I am waiting for a joker Apple fanboy to say
"My iPhone lets me know low signal areas at the touch of a hand. Other phones don't do this. How did people live before this?"
But almost nobody actually has the problem. Only 0.55% of users report any problem.
They've successfully converted this from, "Is there an issue with touching a part of the iPhone that we should have caught during development," to "Is the iPhone better or worse than other smart phones when held in a death grip?"
When Steve Jobs gets to define the question, the answer will never be seriously negative for Apple.
You may have dry hands, while others have moist hands that more easily can short with the antenna? With my hands, I'm sure not to have this problem; they are dry enough not to work on many capacitive fingerprint readers (although, somehow, my Hero does fine - great touch screen that).
and Apple has posted their own antenna page with videos of competing phones losing signal.
Wow, I've been of the opinion that this whole thing was somewhat overblown, and that Apple's response of the cases/refunds was good, but I'm really disappointed in this "Look at them! Look at them!" attitude. I just want to say to them, "You're APPLE. Your marketing mantra for years has been 'it just works' and you've grown because of problem free customer experiences. If the best you can say is 'See? We're just like our competitors!' then you have lost. Your customers expect more, because you've told them to expect more!" Personally, I think they'd be better off stating that while there does seem to be some effect, their testing and surveys of customers have indicated that in practice it does not have a pronounced effect on calls *, and that user experience is so important to them that they will give a free bumper case or a refund to any customer who requests one within the first 30 days of ownership - then leave it at that. No pointing fingers at competitors' products - let crazy fanbois do that for you. It's hard to sling mud without getting any on yourself. Stay above it, focus on the features, play up the positive experiences. Don't mention your competitors' products at all. People don't stand in line to buy iPhones because their signal quality issues are the same as HTC or Samsung phones. People stand in line to buy iPhones because they perceive iPhones to be better. Equating the iPhone with its competitors seems like a bad strategy.
* Note: Whether the experience is common or not, I find it hard to believe they can't produce results that say this, by proper selection of survey questions.