Garrett Murray the maker of the popular Ego iOS app went on a rant today about his issues with his iPhone 4.
I’ve never been so completely disappointed in Apple. I genuinely believe Apple knew from the beginning their antenna design was flawed and would cause issues. I believe that’s why they used bullshit math to show an incorrectly positive number of bars, and I believe that’s why they designed the Bumper.
This idea that Apple knew about the antenna issue and did nothing about it or made the Bumper to hide it is something I have been hearing mumbled about recently. This is definitely a problem for Apple.
Apple is known for making innovative products that just work. This iPhone however seems to have many reported issues, starting with the antenna, the proximity sensor and most recently bluetooth issues. All of these experienced by Garrett.
Apple released a statement two weeks ago saying the fix was coming in a software update to use a new formula in calculating signal strength. This fix was implemented today, but doesn’t seem to have fixed the actual problem. The NY Times is however reporting that there is another possible software fix to the problem
The glitch could presumably be fixed with a software update, and it appears to be unrelated to one that affected the display of the phone’s signal strength.
Another aspect of this however is AT&T. This problem seems to be severe when in areas of poor service. Already Apple has said that using the wrong formula was the problem, and now they have fixed this problem, people will no longer see the “fake” 5 bars they used to see, but now see possibly one or two bars in its place. I think Apple is afraid of this and have hidden it as long as they can using the above mentioned “fake” bars.
Apple used the signal formula to buy time to dig deeper into the issue. With this type of public outcry, Apple will do the right thing tomorrow and apologize and announce a permanent hardware or software fix.
The one more thing (if there is one) however will be the announcement of the iPhone 4 coming to Verizon.
This will cause people looking to buy the phone to hold off for that Verizon iPhone 4, and buy Apple sometime to eliminate this bad PR by changing the topic toward something the public has been asking for, for years.
Only time will tell.