It's pretty obvious they didn't [improve] to almost everyone...
I respectfully disagree here. Most reviews put out before this "blew up" were rating reception better on the iPhone 4 than on previous iPhones and also several competitors. I have the same experience (much better reception). I think Apple showed some of their reception testing labs in the press conference. They put a lot of testing into this phone.
..it seems obvious to me that at these wavelengths touching one is not usually going to help it work
I agree. Don't touch the line. I get exceptional reception, and I don't touch the line. It's kind of a simple solution. I guess a case also helps, but I like my phone the way it is. There are places I don't touch on many of the RF devices I use. I don't put my hand on the antenna of my cordless phone either.
Yeah, Apple and cheapness are rarely used together, because if you're a customer, they aren't cheap at all. However, if you build things for them, they are as cheap as it gets. Many Apple products have been torn down to see what they really cost to make, and they seem to have about the highest hardware profit margin there is in the business, and on just about everything they "make". Or more accurately, have made for them in places where the labor is cheaper.
This has me completely baffled. The CPU, RAM, screen, cameras, and pretty much everything on the iPhone 4 are cutting edge. Apple bill of goods on production is low because they are a company known for cutting good deals on large scale parts purchases. That's a good thing for them, and for consumers. Yes, they build where the labor is cheap; as does every other phone manufacturer. None of this has anything to do with an antenna they spent a great deal of money designing, and seems to work really well for the vast majority of their customers.
...has a patent on an internal antenna design that works fairly well
I'm sure there are lots of internal antennas that work "fairly well", as internal antennas have been the norm. Apple was going for an improvement over that. Isn't it a good idea to try to innovate? The iPhone 4 has much better reception than previous iPhones.
Dumb patents plus Apple cheapness --
Apple cheapness? Now there's two words I haven't seen together often:-) I can see Apple not buying the alternate antenna due to "not made here" syndrome, but unlikely cheapness.
If by "Basics first." you mean reception should be first priority for a phone, I think Apple scores really well with the iPhone 4. It has great overall reception when compared to the competition.
If by "Basics first." you mean they should assume I'm not smart enough to avoid holding the phone in ways that would reduce RF reception; I guess I'd rather they give me maximum reception and assume I'm smart. That's kind of a geeky thing, I guess. But with a 300+dpi screen, 512MB RAM, and UNIX under the hood; this is a phone that has a pretty high geek factor.
I guess I'm just really pleased that the reception issues that plagued my iPhone 3G and 3Gs are gone now; and don't feel like it's a big price to pay to avoid the crack. Maybe Apple could have engineered an antenna that gives this great reception and is also hidden; but that seems like a big maybe. The R&D budget for the iPhone4 had to be astronomical; and I would be surprised if a big chunk didn't go into the structural/antenna design.
Since then, I've not really had a phone that ever had poor reception issues.
You haven't had a phone with reception problems in 7 years? That's great! What carrier do you use?
I guess I should have also mentioned that I live in a very challenging area for RF communication. Between the hills, dense population, and extremely high percentage of tech savvy individuals; SF is kind of a worst case scenario for RF of any kind.
I've been using cell phones heavily since the bricks of the early 90's. We used to have exposed antennas. Then retracted antennas that we could extend. Then the manufacturers decided phones would look cooler (and in some cases be cheaper) if the antennas were internal. I definitely noticed a decrease in signal quality when this move happened. As a heavy cell phone user, I also have always noticed that phones with internal antennas can have big changes in reception performance based on how you hold the phone. I've been re-learning the "optimal holding position" for every Nokia, Motorolla, and Samsung I've owned. It's just basic RF. Move your hands around your HDTV antenna and see how reception changes.
Apple did something really innovative by using a structural component of the case as an antenna. They went a step further by using that component for multiple antennas to allow for better reception and transmission of Wifi and GPS. So finally we have external antennas again, and ones that are much larger than other phone's internal antennas. The reception improvement in my experience is significant. I can walk around on a long call in areas where I would regularly get dropped calls due to AT&T's poor coverage; and not drop. Yes, I hold my iPhone 4 differently than my previous phone; but this is nothing new. When I talk to my friends and co-workers who also have an iPhone 4, they report the same. Every review I've seen has said the iPhone 4 has better reception than any iPhone before. My guess is that it has better reception than most other AT&T phones.
It's fun to have controversy to talk about, and I guess that's why everyone is spamming the internet with this issue. I'm certain the article on Consumers Reports is getting a lot of hits, and they are probably getting new subscribers. But why is this a huge deal? The whole thing just makes no sense to me. I think it's illogical to not buy a phone that takes such leaps forward in so many ways because of an issue that is a fact of life for every RF device ever made. The fact that so many of my fellow geeks are getting so revved up about this makes me wonder what they are thinking.
The main benefit is having a quieter box, with better video chip (hardware accellerated H.264, etc), and high quality video Component/HDMI video output out of the box. It also has optical audio out. It's just a really nice HTPC. I'm the guy in the video, and my plan is to use this as a MythFrontend; among other things. It's a very cool little box.
I'm working on getting MythFrontend running. That was actually the main driver behind me getting this working, as I'm a big MythTV user. My main backend has 500GB and 2 HDTV tuners. I'd love to get this box running in my bedroom with the 24" HD LCD I have on the wall (Dell). I'll post back when I have MythFrontend running....just need to configure my backend for remote frontend access and install the OS X MythFrontend which has already been compiled for Intel OS X. Oh yeah, I'm the guy in the video.
It works very smoothly. It's just a standard install of 10.4.8 on a 2.5" hard drive. All you have to change: swap out the kernel with semthex's kernel, copy over the boot.efi file from the original AppleTV drive, run the "bless command" for that efi, remove all the NV* kernel extensions (NVidia video drivers interfere with the new chipset), and boot up the drive in the AppleTV. It's also pretty snappy for a 256MB RAM machine. The Pentium M is a great little low-power processor.
With OS X Tiger, all 5 of the Evoluent mouse buttons can be configured right from "System Preferences" >> "Dashboard & Exposé". The main OSX gadgets are available without any driver software, including:
Exposé : All windows
Exposé : Application windows
Exposé : Desktop
Dashboard
Start Screensaver
Stop Screensaver
I love my Evoluent mice, and use them on my Mac and PC. If I have to use a different mouse for a while, I start to "feel the pain" within an hour or two. The Evoluent Vertical Mouse is a lifesaver for a developer like me that spends a lot of hours mousing around GUI's.
Don't you have to at least buy a copy of Mech Warrior or some game to hack it? Can you provide a link to the fully free (nothing additional needed) method?
If you have a dedicated box for your pcHDTV setup (recommended!), the best thing to get going quickly is to just download KnoppMyth from a mirror, their main site is http://mysettopbox.tv
It makes setting up a HDTV PVR using the pcHDTV card MUCH easier.
I spent a couple weeks at the pcHDTV site trying to get it working, and after many compiles I downloaded KnoppMyth. I was watching and recording an hour later.
Don't give up on the pcHDTV folks just because they didn't do a very good job patching their web site.
It's true, they don't post much. But the hardware is good, and other folks are very helpful on those boards, as well as the MythTV and KnoppMyth communities.
It was really cool of them to try to build a business around a HDTV card designed for Linux users, and it sure gives you a lot more flexibility than "Microsoft TV".
I have two of the pcHDTV 2000 cards and record a lot of TV each week in gorgeous HDTV quality on my KnoppMyth boxes. It's a geeky experience getting it all working, but well worth it.
What's up with all the fleece? Am I the only geek that is concerned about static electricity zapping all the components I'm always working on? A fleece jacket to put my expensive gadgets into just seems like a very bad idea.
"similar media seem enormous and clunky by comparison"
It depends on what you're calling "similar media". My 1gig Compact Flash card is probably less volume than a 1cm square cube already, and you can write AND read to it. Already a CF card is available at 4gigs in the same space.
It may be better form-factor than CD or DVD, but that's because these formats are quite old "standards". The CD format was developed about 20 years ago, right? DVD is looking pretty dated as well. I'm sure with newer technology (blue laser?) you could get up to 40gigs or more today.
I think this would be more impressive if it were a Terrabyte in the same space. The next big standard needs to make a big leap forward to get people to toss out the old technology. Of course, whoever is designing this standard will probably get a lot of heat from the big media lawyers to never sell it to end users (wouldn't want poor owner to backup all his DVD's to a single cube);-)
Of course the above CF cards are quite pricy, so it's not a great analogy, but the density argument is still valid.
I have an 800Mhz C3 running RH8 as well as a 500Mhz G3 running OS X. My impression of the C3 is that it is dog slow. As someone else mentioned, it seems approximatly equivelent to a 400Mhz PIII in overall performance (that includes GUI). For launching apps, browsing, and general use, my 500Mhz G3 feels at least TWICE as fast as the 800Mhz C3. Luckily I purchased the C3 for use as a mini-server, so I won't be running the GUI for long.
When comparing these processors: the C3 is one of the poorest performers on the market from a Mhz vs. real speed perspective. The PowerPC, on the other hand, is one of the highest performers per Mhz.
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It's pretty obvious they didn't [improve] to almost everyone...
I respectfully disagree here. Most reviews put out before this "blew up" were rating reception better on the iPhone 4 than on previous iPhones and also several competitors. I have the same experience (much better reception). I think Apple showed some of their reception testing labs in the press conference. They put a lot of testing into this phone.
..it seems obvious to me that at these wavelengths touching one is not usually going to help it work
I agree. Don't touch the line. I get exceptional reception, and I don't touch the line. It's kind of a simple solution. I guess a case also helps, but I like my phone the way it is. There are places I don't touch on many of the RF devices I use. I don't put my hand on the antenna of my cordless phone either.
Yeah, Apple and cheapness are rarely used together, because if you're a customer, they aren't cheap at all. However, if you build things for them, they are as cheap as it gets.
Many Apple products have been torn down to see what they really cost to make, and they seem to have about the highest hardware profit margin there is in the business, and on just about everything they "make". Or more accurately, have made for them in places where the labor is cheaper.
This has me completely baffled. The CPU, RAM, screen, cameras, and pretty much everything on the iPhone 4 are cutting edge. Apple bill of goods on production is low because they are a company known for cutting good deals on large scale parts purchases. That's a good thing for them, and for consumers. Yes, they build where the labor is cheap; as does every other phone manufacturer. None of this has anything to do with an antenna they spent a great deal of money designing, and seems to work really well for the vast majority of their customers.
...has a patent on an internal antenna design that works fairly well
I'm sure there are lots of internal antennas that work "fairly well", as internal antennas have been the norm. Apple was going for an improvement over that. Isn't it a good idea to try to innovate? The iPhone 4 has much better reception than previous iPhones.
Dumb patents plus Apple cheapness --
Apple cheapness? Now there's two words I haven't seen together often :-) I can see Apple not buying the alternate antenna due to "not made here" syndrome, but unlikely cheapness.
Basics first.
If by "Basics first." you mean reception should be first priority for a phone, I think Apple scores really well with the iPhone 4. It has great overall reception when compared to the competition.
If by "Basics first." you mean they should assume I'm not smart enough to avoid holding the phone in ways that would reduce RF reception; I guess I'd rather they give me maximum reception and assume I'm smart. That's kind of a geeky thing, I guess. But with a 300+dpi screen, 512MB RAM, and UNIX under the hood; this is a phone that has a pretty high geek factor.
I guess I'm just really pleased that the reception issues that plagued my iPhone 3G and 3Gs are gone now; and don't feel like it's a big price to pay to avoid the crack. Maybe Apple could have engineered an antenna that gives this great reception and is also hidden; but that seems like a big maybe. The R&D budget for the iPhone4 had to be astronomical; and I would be surprised if a big chunk didn't go into the structural/antenna design.
Since then, I've not really had a phone that ever had poor reception issues.
You haven't had a phone with reception problems in 7 years? That's great! What carrier do you use?
I guess I should have also mentioned that I live in a very challenging area for RF communication. Between the hills, dense population, and extremely high percentage of tech savvy individuals; SF is kind of a worst case scenario for RF of any kind.
I've been using cell phones heavily since the bricks of the early 90's. We used to have exposed antennas. Then retracted antennas that we could extend. Then the manufacturers decided phones would look cooler (and in some cases be cheaper) if the antennas were internal. I definitely noticed a decrease in signal quality when this move happened. As a heavy cell phone user, I also have always noticed that phones with internal antennas can have big changes in reception performance based on how you hold the phone. I've been re-learning the "optimal holding position" for every Nokia, Motorolla, and Samsung I've owned. It's just basic RF. Move your hands around your HDTV antenna and see how reception changes.
Apple did something really innovative by using a structural component of the case as an antenna. They went a step further by using that component for multiple antennas to allow for better reception and transmission of Wifi and GPS. So finally we have external antennas again, and ones that are much larger than other phone's internal antennas. The reception improvement in my experience is significant. I can walk around on a long call in areas where I would regularly get dropped calls due to AT&T's poor coverage; and not drop. Yes, I hold my iPhone 4 differently than my previous phone; but this is nothing new. When I talk to my friends and co-workers who also have an iPhone 4, they report the same. Every review I've seen has said the iPhone 4 has better reception than any iPhone before. My guess is that it has better reception than most other AT&T phones.
It's fun to have controversy to talk about, and I guess that's why everyone is spamming the internet with this issue. I'm certain the article on Consumers Reports is getting a lot of hits, and they are probably getting new subscribers. But why is this a huge deal? The whole thing just makes no sense to me. I think it's illogical to not buy a phone that takes such leaps forward in so many ways because of an issue that is a fact of life for every RF device ever made. The fact that so many of my fellow geeks are getting so revved up about this makes me wonder what they are thinking.
The main benefit is having a quieter box, with better video chip (hardware accellerated H.264, etc), and high quality video Component/HDMI video output out of the box. It also has optical audio out. It's just a really nice HTPC. I'm the guy in the video, and my plan is to use this as a MythFrontend; among other things. It's a very cool little box.
I'm working on getting MythFrontend running. That was actually the main driver behind me getting this working, as I'm a big MythTV user. My main backend has 500GB and 2 HDTV tuners. I'd love to get this box running in my bedroom with the 24" HD LCD I have on the wall (Dell). I'll post back when I have MythFrontend running....just need to configure my backend for remote frontend access and install the OS X MythFrontend which has already been compiled for Intel OS X. Oh yeah, I'm the guy in the video.
It works very smoothly. It's just a standard install of 10.4.8 on a 2.5" hard drive. All you have to change: swap out the kernel with semthex's kernel, copy over the boot.efi file from the original AppleTV drive, run the "bless command" for that efi, remove all the NV* kernel extensions (NVidia video drivers interfere with the new chipset), and boot up the drive in the AppleTV. It's also pretty snappy for a 256MB RAM machine. The Pentium M is a great little low-power processor.
Evoluent makes a left-handed version. It's a bit more expensive because they don't sell as many, but is otherwise identical.
I've been using my Evoluent Vertical Mice for over a year now, and they are really great.
With OS X Tiger, all 5 of the Evoluent mouse buttons can be configured right from "System Preferences" >> "Dashboard & Exposé". The main OSX gadgets are available without any driver software, including: Exposé : All windows Exposé : Application windows Exposé : Desktop Dashboard Start Screensaver Stop Screensaver I love my Evoluent mice, and use them on my Mac and PC. If I have to use a different mouse for a while, I start to "feel the pain" within an hour or two. The Evoluent Vertical Mouse is a lifesaver for a developer like me that spends a lot of hours mousing around GUI's.
Don't you have to at least buy a copy of Mech Warrior or some game to hack it? Can you provide a link to the fully free (nothing additional needed) method?
You are a bit mixed up. The hack you link to is for the WMA11B, but the original poster has a WMLS11B, which is quite different.
If anyone finds a replacement firmware for a WMLS11B, that would be great, as it seems very buggy with the default firmware.
If you have a dedicated box for your pcHDTV setup (recommended!), the best thing to get going quickly is to just download KnoppMyth from a mirror, their main site is http://mysettopbox.tv
It makes setting up a HDTV PVR using the pcHDTV card MUCH easier.
I spent a couple weeks at the pcHDTV site trying to get it working, and after many compiles I downloaded KnoppMyth. I was watching and recording an hour later.
Don't give up on the pcHDTV folks just because they didn't do a very good job patching their web site. It's true, they don't post much. But the hardware is good, and other folks are very helpful on those boards, as well as the MythTV and KnoppMyth communities.
It was really cool of them to try to build a business around a HDTV card designed for Linux users, and it sure gives you a lot more flexibility than "Microsoft TV".
I have two of the pcHDTV 2000 cards and record a lot of TV each week in gorgeous HDTV quality on my KnoppMyth boxes. It's a geeky experience getting it all working, but well worth it.
What's up with all the fleece? Am I the only geek that is concerned about static electricity zapping all the components I'm always working on? A fleece jacket to put my expensive gadgets into just seems like a very bad idea.
"similar media seem enormous and clunky by comparison"
;-)
It depends on what you're calling "similar media". My 1gig Compact Flash card is probably less volume than a 1cm square cube already, and you can write AND read to it. Already a CF card is available at 4gigs in the same space.
It may be better form-factor than CD or DVD, but that's because these formats are quite old "standards". The CD format was developed about 20 years ago, right? DVD is looking pretty dated as well. I'm sure with newer technology (blue laser?) you could get up to 40gigs or more today.
I think this would be more impressive if it were a Terrabyte in the same space. The next big standard needs to make a big leap forward to get people to toss out the old technology. Of course, whoever is designing this standard will probably get a lot of heat from the big media lawyers to never sell it to end users (wouldn't want poor owner to backup all his DVD's to a single cube)
Of course the above CF cards are quite pricy, so it's not a great analogy, but the density argument is still valid.
I have an 800Mhz C3 running RH8 as well as a 500Mhz G3 running OS X. My impression of the C3 is that it is dog slow. As someone else mentioned, it seems approximatly equivelent to a 400Mhz PIII in overall performance (that includes GUI). For launching apps, browsing, and general use, my 500Mhz G3 feels at least TWICE as fast as the 800Mhz C3. Luckily I purchased the C3 for use as a mini-server, so I won't be running the GUI for long. When comparing these processors: the C3 is one of the poorest performers on the market from a Mhz vs. real speed perspective. The PowerPC, on the other hand, is one of the highest performers per Mhz.