Apple will be hosting an iPhone 4-related press conference later this morning. What do you think they’ll say?

Jeff Gamet - 16 July 2010 09:10 AM

Apple will be hosting an iPhone 4-related press conference later this morning. What do you think they’ll say?

I think they will give a gift certificate for a bumper/case as well as an extension to the time period that you can return the phone without questions asked.

Anything else that is announced will depend on the extent of whatever real issues exist with the iPhone.

I think the bumper/ certificate issue is at the top of the list since there have been reports of cases/bumpers fixing dropped call problems as well as CR saying that a bumper fixes the issue.

Neal

I don’t think it will just be a bumper case or gift card. They have to make sure all phones work properly. If there is an engineering change, all phones have to get it - wether that’s a firmware/software fix or a hardware change.  You can’t have any perceived differences between the current iPhones that are out in the wild.
Like Nealg, I also agree the return period will be extended.

Of course, they could call the CR guy up on the stage and reveal that the testing was all paid for by Google and Motorola.

Jeff do we have any number on how many iPhone 4 units have been returned? If it is not a significant number than we can assume that the problem is mostly a non problem.

If a software/firmware fix were possible, we would have it already, called 4.0.1. Since 4.0.1 doesn’t fix it, it’s not possible.

I’m expecting hard (ish) numbers re:  complaints/returns/swaps/refunds.  I’m also expecting to find out what the source of the trouble is (I don’t actually believe that the 4.0.1 fix was supposed to eliminate the gap-touch issue - more to provide better/more useful information to the user).

Personally, I think the missed-coating is the most likely culprit, and I expect to hear that he problem has been dealt with - if only because my phone was in the second wave to hit ATT stores, and I have been completely unable to re-create the signal-loss under any conditions.

mlvezie - 16 July 2010 10:03 AM

If a software/firmware fix were possible, we would have it already, called 4.0.1. Since 4.0.1 doesn’t fix it, it’s not possible.

You might be wrong about that, according to this…

According to The New York Times, the signal attenuation issue is the result of an interaction between communication software within the device’s operating system and the antenna, an issue that could presumably be addressed with a software update.

One person with direct knowledge of the phone’s design said Thursday that the iPhone 4 exposed a longstanding weakness in the basic communications software inside Apple’s phones and that the reception problems were not caused by an isolated hardware flaw.

http://www.macrumors.com/2010/07/15/iphone-4-signal-issue-can-be-fixed-with-a-software-update/

The article also says that Jobs did not know about the issue until after the phone was released.  So feasibly it could have taken this long to figure out the exact problem and come up with a fix, aside from the 4.0.1 problem.

One thing I know for certain

If Apple doesn’t recall all phones, not just the iPhone4, give away a couple billion dollars in gift cards to all buyers even if they only looked at an iPhone, fire everyone at Apple from department head on up even if they have no connection to phone design and production, and go into the Android phone business there are major parts of the yapping class that will declare this a FAIL and another example of Apple arrogance and not caring about the customer, why Apple products all suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck and why SJ should be tied to a Trebuchet and flung against the walls of Google Headquarters.

Which is why I go to TMO for my Mac news.