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Firm Tests iPhone 3G Antenna, Says It's OK

Monday August 25, 2008 11:15 am PDT by longofest
Swedish website Gtesborgs-Posten is reporting that tests of the iPhone's antenna are "completely normal," which may go to counteract suspicions that ongoing connectivity issues are due to the iPhone's antenna.

The test was conducted by Bluetest, a small company that sells test chambers for wireless devices with small antennas, and the results were compared to a Sony Ericsson P1 and a Nokia N73. The bottom line of the tests were that the iPhone was on-par with the other phones.

Testing was only done with one iPhone so it does not eliminate the possibility of a manufacturing defect, however the author notes that before the test the iPhone had been registering lower 3G bars than the Nokia model and would be more apt to switch to the EDGE network; symptoms common amongst users with the connectivity issue.

BusinessWeek (and later a memo from Steve Jobs) has previously reported that the issue was to be fixed via a software update. Since then, iPhone Software 2.0.2 has been released claiming to fix the problem, though users have still reported the issue.
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MacTheSpoon
Posted: 45 months ago
This is very good news. Sounds like there is no hardware design flaw. A bad batch of iPhones or a software bug is much less painful to deal with.

I was getting a little leery about pulling the trigger on a 3G iPhone but I feel reassured now.
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Hodapp
Posted: 45 months ago
It's going to be hard to argue against independent testing like this.
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wizard
Posted: 45 months ago
My impression is that overall behaviour of my iphone got worst after the update to 2.0.2. The phone might actually be better but Safari and networking actually seem worst. Further I thought the random crashes in Mail where gone but that is still a mystery.

In anyevent back to the heart of this thread. I have to wonder how they tested the antenna or for that matter why people think it is a problem. Much of the behavioural problems I see have software written all over them.

Dave
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bigmc6000
Posted: 45 months ago
I think what we need to focus on isn't that some people are still having problems but that some people no longer have problems. There's this addiction to negative media that's propogated since, well, before I was born (82) and we continue to do it. I'm not saying people should be happy Apple is trying but they should realize that with each revision the number of people affected by this bug gets smaller. In the world of mass production you're never going to be bug free - it's the correction of those bugs that separate one company from the next and 2.0.2 was a step in the right direction.

Personally I have problems here and there with Safari crashing but putting it in the context of a computer I find just as stable as my XP Pro box here at work (running only company approved software so the fact that it still crashes is kinda messed up in my opinion...)
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naroola
Posted: 45 months ago
I believe that 2.0.2 was released only to add support for the 20 or so countries where the iPhone launched this past friday. I don't think it did addressed any bugs or did anything else for that matter.
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aristotle
Posted: 45 months ago
I hate to say "I told you so" but I told you so Vandozza. :D
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bradl
Posted: 45 months ago
Just to play devil's advocate here, it would have been more feasible to perform this test with a number of phones made from various week's batches (say, one or two from weeks 27 through 34) to get better idea of if the antenna is the problem.

Yes, it could still be a chipset issue, but at least this could put the hardware outside of the chipset in the clear. Also, when was the 3G iPhone released in Sweden?

BL.
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Small White Car
Posted: 45 months ago

Just to play devil's advocate here, it would have been more feasible to perform this test with a number of phones made from various week's batches (say, one or two from weeks 27 through 34) to get better idea of if the antenna is the problem.


That would be nice, yes, but the main news here is that there's not a design flaw with the phone.

There may be bad batches. There may be bad software. There may lots of bad things that require an update or a partial-recall. But a message from Apple saying "oops, they're all bad! We did it wrong!" is looking less likely because of this news.
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longofest
Posted: 45 months ago

I believe that 2.0.2 was released only to add support for the 20 or so countries where the iPhone launched this past friday. I don't think it did addressed any bugs or did anything else for that matter.


Apple said 2.0.2 "improves communication with 3G networks".

http://www.macrumors.com/2008/08/22/iphone-3g-issues-persist-despite-latest-firmware/
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Ori
Posted: 45 months ago
So we still stand with it could be software, but it could also be the chipset. All we have eliminated is the Antenna. Don't get me wrong, thats a start! ;-)
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