Dials: left is phone on table, 804 kbps down/709 kbps up/449 ms ping
Center is phone held, 263 down/0 up/17769 ping
Left is in leather case, 594 down/42 up/448 ping
Seems someone forgot to test antenna gain when held. It can be fixed with a redesign of the PCB, the case, and the antenna layout, but that will require a new round of FCC (and all the overseas equivalent) tests, so expect a minimum of 3 months to redesign to fix this problem.
FYI...
some serious flaws in iphone 4 so far
- poor reception when iphone is held by hand
- yellow spots on screen
- glass breaks easily when you drop it
He’s just not holding his mouth right and PLEASE remove all outer tinfoil before using!
Apparently, there are several antennas built into the band separated by small gaps.
It may be possible to bridge the gaps with a wet finger creating inefficient antennas. The interesting number in the center is the 17 second ping time. I’d like to see some repeated experiments to see if there the results are consistent and what affects the antennas.
OTOH, the bars on the power graph tend to be useless. I spent the evening with five bars indicated on my iPhone 3G and no 3G connectivity. AT+T is annoyingly bad.
Another thing to remember is that this comes from Gizmodo, which is to tech journalism what the UK Sun is to newspapers. Gizmodo is the sleazy organization that paid $5k for a stolen iPhone prototype.
When you touch an antenna conductor, it “de-tunes” the radiating element, usually lower in resonant frequency. The effect becomes more pronounced the higher in frequency you go.
You’re not really “shorting” anything out in the sense that something is going to blow a fuse - you’re effectively hanging a big, lossy lump of wet noodle off the end of the radiating element.
I’m rather surprised not only that this wasn’t found in testing, but that it made it through design. Most all of my RF work and studies were at HF to VHF frequencies, and having the user’s sweaty palm or fingers in contact with the radiating element would have been a no-no even at 150MHz - never mind up around 1.9 Ghz.
One thing that would be interesting is to see the difference between 850/1900 Mhz regions and 1900-only regions with this test.
Simple fix..
STOP TOUCHING THE ANTENNA!!
Apple has a touch screen keyboard on the Ipad that does not have up or down cursor keys. What does one expect? Certainly they have designed this product so that it is held in the “Steve Jobs hand position” and if you just hold it that way it will work fine.
Seems to this poster, that was a major flaw with the “real world” testing apparently done by way of using the new phone inside a clamshell camoflaged as a prior gen iPhone.
(the one which was allegedly lost in the bar, which caused all the controversy)
So it’s tested with the external antenna shielded from contact with the user, by the clamshell disguise?
Now the production version is out - the external antenna is no longer shielded by the disguise, and holding the phone interferes with the effectiveness of the antenna?
Seems like a sophomoric mistake, if that’s what happened.
No macbots yet? I need to know what the story is on this before I can know how to spin this when someone tries to attack Apple products.
Does anyone have the PR points from Apple yet?
I wonder if they’ll have a recall? Man I’d be pissed if I paid for a new iPhone and a 2 year contract to get this crappy quality.
I wonder if that’s a “feature” and the phone is actually extending battery life by lowering power. Hey that may be the macbot spin. everyone knows you only need one bar to get a call while it’s in your leather case. And no one really wants to talk while holding it they will typically lay it on the table and use speakerphone or handsfree bluetooth. This is really a great feature that makes us do this because it’s safer when driving to not be touching the phone while you talk. And who on earth would drive with the phone in the leather case? You’d want that on your dashboard so everyone can see your pretty iPhone. It will only make your car look better anyway.
Is he logged in?
it had to be asked ...
Most people use plastic/silicon cases over their iphones...wouldn’t that alleviate the problem?
Guy goes to the doctor, raises his left arm over his head, and say “It hurts when I do this.” Dr. replies “Don’t do that.”