Posted on 07/16/2010 7:36:37 AM PDT by RachelFaith
As Apple prepared to address the mounting controversy surrounding the antenna of the iPhone 4, one thing appeared clear: the company does not plan to recall the popular device.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Dropping signal when you touch the antenna is 100% hardware related. That’s scientific fact. I’m sorry if you can’t understand that.
No, it doesn't.
And it validates the assumption that their “Super Awesome intelligent switching” was really a scam to just show more bars.
Unless it's touched in just the right way, the reports show the iPhone 4 getting far better reception than the 3G, regardless of bars. It can easily be a software problem if the "super awesome intelligent switching" software gets confused by the effect of touching the antennas in just the right way. The more complicated it is, the easier it is to get screwed up by unanticipated input, like altered feedback from the antennas due to touching. Unanticipated input is about the biggest cause of software bugs and security holes.
I think Apple just really pushed the state of smart phone technology with the iPhone 4, and it's showing with some bugs in a couple of places.
That has been my opinion since a Freeper commented that from his house his iPhone occasionally grabbed the weaker signal from the two nearest towers. When you are comparing signal strength from a number of competing sources, especially when you are on the move, and then choosing when to lock in to which, change to another while dropping the first, while all the variables are constantly changing, seems like a pretty tricky proposition with lots of opportunities for dropping a signal. If my description is even close to accurate, I don't see how it works at all.
With all due respect, I don't think giving away free cases is a mistake, because it's only part of what they're doing. The cases are a workaround for the existing hardware problem relating to having a bare-metal external antenna. They will address that hardware problem in the future (my own guess is they'll coat it with something non-conductive). They're working on the software issues (no surprise that there are software issues involved too).
If the cases were the ONLY thing they were doing, it would be a mistake, I agree.
And I think you are right to be cautious -- I would be too. I don't have an iPhone, and won't until and unless they pair up with Verizon. And even then, I never buy the initial release of a complex product. This debacle is a good reason why patience is rewarded.
It is entirely possible that it is 100% hardware and can only be fixed by a 100% hardware fix. Except modern antennas tend to be controlled by software. We've gone far beyond the basic tuning coil, capacitor and crystal.
Remember back when modems were 100% hardware, all the signal modulation, compression, error correction, etc., built into the hardware? Then out came soft modems, with most of the hardware of the modem replaced by software. Fixing a buggy driver, which soft modems were famous for, could vastly improve the performance of your modem.
Once again the issue here is of pure science. Software can MASK issues, but there is no way it’s going to fix a hardware issue. If it were possible then Apple would have it fixed via software.
The only software fix is to make the signal look weaker when there is only one tower in the area which is means holding the phone will likely drop the call.
So I misunderstood what I thought came out of apple today at the conference. They are giving rubberbands to stop the hardware issue.
While you can believe it's software related all you want those who understand antenna's know you are wrong. Like the senior engineer at apple that warned Steve Jobs that this would happen when they selected this design and before the software was written. He knows the physical laws of science and if you physically short something software can't fix that.
That's like saying I can take the shielding off my cable for my TV and the cable company can fix it via software.
Antennas and modems are two completely different things.
One is just modulating a signal and the other is sending and receiving the signal.
To use the modem analogy would be like turning my old 56K modem into a wifi adapter via software only. If you can do that then I’ll agree the antenna issue could be a software issue.
??? I didn't know my old modem only received. I thought it sent and received signals.
You know exactly what I am saying. When you can turn my modem into a wifi adapter via software then you may have a point about software being able to take the physical properties of antennas and reshape the antenna as needed for signal strength.
*BZZZT* Play again.
Do some research on the software in cell phones, before you make a silly statement like that.
Modern cellphone software is extremely advanced, and the bars are only a user indication -- what matters is how the software deals with the signal from the cell tower as received by the antenna. Your comment is extremely superficial and uninformed.
Not that there's anything wrong with that. ;-)
I suggest with regard to your apparent argument, that you quit digging, the hole is quite deep enough now.
Cell phone software doesn't reshape the physical antenna, of course. It manipulates the sending/receiving characteristics of the antenna. Look it up, I'm not going to give you a lesson in antennas and digital signal processing theory in a forum post. Besides, it's gotten a lot more advanced since I studied it years ago.
BZZZTT. You can try again. Why not provide some details instead of talking out of your arse?
Everyone agrees Apple changed their software a while back to show more bars. Now they are saying they screwed up and really need to show less bars.
Anyone that understands what’s going on realizes the following:
1) iPhone 4 has a physical antenna issue when you touch it
2) This issue is exposed more often when ther are fewer towers available to the phone
3) Apple plans to re-do what it shows as a strong signal so they can blame ATT
4) If you have many towers the touching issue is less apparent
5) Apple wants to re-do what it shows as a strong signal so they can blame ATT
6) If they change the software...what will they change? Obviously the situation where there are fewer towers which will expose the hardware defect. So a logical change will say if only one tower in the area show 1 bar (no matter how strong the signal). If 5 towers show true signal strenth.
7) result ATT gets the blame because as Apple said all phones have issues when holding a phone.
But I guess the real answer will be when apple releases the software fix (which I thought they did with 4.0.1 today). So someone can easily test this. Get an HTC phone and hold it and talk in an area with only one tower. Then do the same with the iPHone. If the iPhone doesn’t drop the signal or the call then I guess they fixed it via software.
And that fixes the hardware issue how? Fact: Touch an antenna and you change the properties of that antenna.
Tell it to apple’s senior antenna egineer. He warned them this would happen.
BTW: you may be referring to the fact that they use software in regards to shaping the signal because cell phones have multiple frequencies so they want to optimize that. However, that has nothing to do with the physical properties that change when the antenna is touched.
If the software is responsible for dynamically tuning the antenna, and assumes the antenna will be tuned at X under normal physical conditions, but the antenna is suddenly detuned to Y due to touching, then reception will drop or die. If the software knows to watch out for the detuning due to the changing physical environment, and retune it in response, then you have FIXED the hardware problem with software.
This is like how Toyota FIXED the rollover problems in its Lexus SUVs through software. The software controls the hardware, so the software can fix the hardware.
I am not saying this is the absolute case. I am just refuting your claim that an antenna problem cannot be fixed through software.
I mean, it's not like Apple included an HDMI port then admittedly architected the hardware in a way that the CPU can't handle that and output over 30fps, so while movies over HDMI look good, the screen looks like crap since it's limited to the 30fps of HDMI. Oh wait, that's the EVO 4G.
But no, despite HTC's claims, that too can be fixed by software. Only you need to root it to an unsupported configuration and install a third-party workaround, and it only works on some EVOs so far.
If Steve Jobs agrees with me will you admit you were mistaken on this topic?
Of course. That's simple physics.
What the software does (among many other things) is compensate for the ever-changing characteristics of the antenna, due to orientation, proximity effects, capacitance effects, shielding, ghosts/echoes, you name it.
Without that software, no cell phone made in the past few years would operate worth a damn anywhere but < 1 mile from a tower.
Look, stop hyperventilating about how the iPhone4 sucks, and just accept that:
Just accept that they didn't die over this problem, they're still doing fine.
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