@ Yaman_NZ: I do agree. I think it has blown way out of proportion. As I said in our review of the iPhone 4, if it doesn't affect you then it is a non-issue. The fact the your iPhone now shows a couple of bars less than it did before is purely cosmetic. If you have a problem with it then sell your iPhone and don't get another. It really is just perception though, like you say if they removed the bars altogether then no one would be any the wiser.

(Daniel Burgess has made 613 comments)

Oh dear, enough ranting already… I wish they’d just remove the damn bars from the whole display as a fix to just shut people up… people who are not even experiencing loss of call quality or dropped calls as a result of this silly matter…
If the reception in your area sucks then move somewhere else or complain to your cellphone carrier… I’m quite sick of hearing of this crap, does anyone share the same sentiment????
Read my earlier post after I updated to 4.0.1 and check the youtube link.

(Yaman_NZ has made 184 comments)

hay guys i did the update well i started it and now it will only go about 1/3 of the way and it just stops. i left it for 30 mins and then still nothing so i disconnected the iphone 3g and then connected it again it was saying i had to do a restore and update did this and now the same thing keep happening it gets 1/3rd of the way and just stops this sucks!!

(startsome01 has made 1 comment)

Mak wrote:

My thoughts exactly Subject22, people need to realise that the update is in fact showing how many bars they should have had all along, rather than previous versions which have been a false representation.

Updating now, ~10 minutes to go. Will post back with feedback if any.

(Mak has made 127 comments)

I agree in part that the signal bars dropping off now is not a reflection of your signal strength actually dropping to the same degree but, I have an XT cell phone and my "XT" iphone next to each other and the cell phone has full strength displayed while the Iphone has 2 bars. If my "true" signal strength was poor (as Apple are trying to suggest) then surely my cell phone would also show this. Are they suggesting that ALL cell phone manufacturers from day one have calculated signal display wrong? To me (and its just an opinion) the recalculation of signal display is just masking the real issue of signal strength truly being affected by the antenna in the Iphone 4 (and even then i dont see it as a major issue as a case will fix it)

(camtab has made 464 comments)

Try making a call and notice the bars during the call… within one minute they’ll go up
@ commsdelta:

(Yaman_NZ has made 184 comments)

This is a very sad day for Apple customers. I live within 800 meters of a Telecom tower. Before the update I had 5 full bars everywhere I went in the house. After updating I go from 5 bars in the kitchen and walk 4 meters into the bedroom and it drops to 3 bars!!!!!!
What the hell!!!!!!

(commsdelta has made 82 comments)

Is there a link to watch it live?@ Paul:

(commsdelta has made 82 comments)

My thoughts exactly Subject22, people need to realise that the update is in fact showing how many bars they should have had all along, rather than previous versions which have been a false representation.

Updating now, ~10 minutes to go. Will post back with feedback if any.

(Mak has made 222 comments)

I have completely changed my mind, I WILL be getting up at 5am to watch the press conference tomorrow

(Paul has made 318 comments)

in all honesty, i never noticed a problem with my 4′s reception unless i gripped it super hard, but after this update, if you grip the bottom of the phone the reception stays as it is. so some progress i guess. even when on a call covering the so called area of reception loss, yes the bars would decrease but the call quality would remain fine. HMMMMM

(nzgeo has made 1 comment)

@ Yaman_NZ:
thanks for the vid
my aunt updated to IOS4.0.1
and she is not that happy with the number of bars.
she is 3GS, XT

and has found most of her work is a black zone,
funny given the fact she works for telecom.

she made note of the fact, that the chagne between different bar levels is very quick, rather then a slow change

(kiwiboi22 has made 57 comments)

Here’s the link to my video on Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWiUWaekOMo

Sorry I just realized that I provided the wrong youtube name of mine, it is actually Yamanito, not Yaman_NZ@ Yaman_NZ:

(Yaman_NZ has made 184 comments)

I'm getting a very Microsoft-like feeling about this now… ie: "Shall I wait and watch on this patch to see if the early adopters get blue-screens after installing it?"

(ALFA has made 25 comments)

@ camtab:

I was secretly hoping for a shock return of the XT logo and bundles with this also. Guess not

Thanks for confirming.

(Paul has made 318 comments)

gehenna wrote:

Here’s hoping this updates reverts the signing method so that custom carrier bundles can again be created and applied!

(gehenna has made 1 comment)

The Beta 4.1 doesn't allow the logo so unfortunately doubt 4.0.1 will either

(camtab has made 464 comments)

Here's hoping this updates reverts the signing method so that custom carrier bundles can again be created and applied!

(gehenna has made 1 comment)

Ok guys guys guys… guess what I just noticed!!…
Yes, I am getting less bars than usual on my iPhone 3Gs, I’m getting as little as 1 bar in places I used to get 5 bars, but GUESS WHAT?? That is totally not the case when I make a call!…
Here’s how it goes: My phone is displaying 1 bar, or 2 at best here at my work place, where it used to display at least 4 bars. I made a free call just to test the quality of the sound, and it was just fine, but that’s not all!… I also looked at the bars and guess what happened? They went ALL the way up to 5 bars!… I thought ok maybe this is just a coincidence, but no! It happened every single time i tried it, and I even recorded that on video which I will be uploading to youtube once I go home as I can’t upload large files using my work internet… just being careful, but the video should be on Youtube by tomorrow morning (before the conference) and I will add the link on here as soon as I post it… or you could check my youtube channel anyway, not much there just personal videos lol… my username is Yaman_NZ.

Keen to hear what the new OS did for actual iPhone 4′s!

(Yaman_NZ has made 184 comments)

Update applied to my iPhone 3G and now it only shows one bar of 3G in my house when it used to say three bars. This seems more realistic as if not stood on my sofa at a certain height the call just didn’t work!

(Andy has made 11 comments)

@ Paul: @ Subject22: Great insight team. Cant wait for 5am Saturday Morn and then the harder wait for the eventual Iphone 4 release

(camtab has made 464 comments)

camtab wrote:

To me (and its just an opinion) the recalculation of signal display is just masking the real issue of signal strength truly being affected by the antenna in the Iphone 4 (and even then i dont see it as a major issue as a case will fix it)

Judging by what I’ve read, we can safely say the iPhone 4′s antenna is FAR better than previous versions. The best description I heard of it was a “three steps forward, one step back” design. Sure, holding it “incorrectly” causes a signal drop, but (if we can believe Apple) not one as dramatic as is currently apparent.

camtab wrote:

Dont get me wrong, I will be getting an Iphone 4 ASAP as I dont see the antenna issue as being a deal breaker, just saying that the “oh look we calculated it all wrong for 3 years and only just realized now” stance doesn’t fly with me. Admit the antenna does have an issue if bridged, offer consumers the right of return and move on (hopefully what they will do tomorrow..along with announcing NZ release date)

Nor with me. These guy’s are smart, and one look at the attention to detail that goes into Apple’s products makes it seem highly unlikely that they missed this. In fact, Walt Mossberg, along with a select few reviewers, got an iPhone 4 early to have a look at. In his review, which was published a LONG time before anyone started complaining about the “death grip”, he mentions something being up (or down ) with the reception of the device. If I recall correctly, he asked Apple about it, and had a reply back saying that there was a known bug with how signal strength was calculated that would soon be patched, but he never bothered to pursue it any further. I emphasise the point that this was well in advance of the public getting a hold of the iPhone 4.

In this light, it is clear that Apple was aware of the problem, and it is likely that they knew, or at least had decided to tell that public that, the reception “problems” were due to a faulty formula. So why would Apple let this get so far out of control (well, out of control by Apple’s standards)? The only explanation I’ve heard for this comes again from Macbreak weekly, and is that somewhere along the line there was a breakdown in communication between different parts of the company. Again, this seems somewhat unsatisfactory.

As for admitting that the antenna was badly designed, we’ll have to wait for the press conference, but I would be very surprised. I think it would have to be so bad that Apple decided that they could not smudge things enough in their favour to let it pass. After all, they have a reputation for getting this sort of stuff right first time, every time, and an admission like you are suggesting would tarnish that more than a stalwart refutation of there being a hardware glitch.

(Subject22 has made 10 comments)

@ camtab:
2 iPhone 4′s in my house now and no way in hell I can replicate the “death grip issue” Believe me I have tried!
4 Friends in the UK with the iPhone 4 who can also not replicate the issue.

Just been blown way out proportion to me. Press conference will be interesting for sure.

(Paul has made 318 comments)

commsdelta wrote:

Is there a link to watch it live?@ Paul:
(commsdelta has made 11 comments)

Yup, right here on iPhonewzealand http://www.iphonewzealand.co.nz/2010/all/iphone-4-press-conference-this-saturday/2/

(Paul has made 318 comments)

@ camtab:
It’s not exactly a case of ‘Wrong’ but a case of calculating signal strength ‘differently’.

(visionarymedia has made 66 comments)

Dont get me wrong, I will be getting an Iphone 4 ASAP as I dont see the antenna issue as being a deal breaker, just saying that the “oh look we calculated it all wrong for 3 years and only just realized now” stance doesn’t fly with me. Admit the antenna does have an issue if bridged, offer consumers the right of return and move on (hopefully what they will do tomorrow..along with announcing NZ release date)

(camtab has made 464 comments)

@ camtab:
All manufacturers. And all handsets display signal strength differently. You CANNOT compare one device with another. Unless they are identical and on the same firmware.

(visionarymedia has made 66 comments)

camtab wrote:

I saw an official update and assumed it was just the beta one they released yesterday..but nooo. Beta 4.1 vs Official 4.0.1. What was the point of the beta at this time?

They only put out betas when the next firmware release adds new features and makes changes that mean that devs need to learn new code or recode existing apps to make the most of the new features of new release. So with 4.1, Apple are going about things business-as-usual – same as they always have with a new SDK for the devs to have a look at.

4.0.1 is minor release, the only thing it does is update the signal strength formula – it has no bearing on devs, existing apps and introduces no new features so there is no harm in Apple releasing this while they continue along the beta-path for 4.1. Apple obviously felt the updated signal strength formula was too important to wait for 4.1 which could be still be in beta for several weeks yet.

(Steve Lawrence has made 645 comments)

This patch will not change your reception, for better or worse. It changes how many bars your iPhone will display. There’s nothing to worry about, this is purely a cosmetic update. Officially at least.

(Subject22 has made 10 comments)

There’re a few theories going round about the “improved formula”. One is that from day one of the original iPhone launch, Apple has been using a formula that makes the iPhone look like it gets better reception than it normally does, but now that the external antenna of the iPhone 4 makes it possible to attenuate the signal more than was previously possible (ie: by gripping the phone), that decision has backfired. In other words, Apple made it look like the iPhone had really good reception, and previously that was covered up by stable signal strength (ie: no sudden drops due to attenuation were occurring). So: When your signal was really strong, it showed really strong; When it was really weak, it showed really weak; But when it was moderate; it showed strong.

If anyone gets the Macbreak Weekly podcast they would have heard the suggestion that it’s highly unlikely that Apple deliberately misled anyone (because of the consequences that would have), but that they more-likely had the option of using one of several possible formulae (all accurate, and entirely honest in their own, technical way) for determining signal strength, and they naturally chose the one that made the iPhone look best.

(Subject22 has made 10 comments)

First impressions are… I like the look of the new logarithmic-looking bars.

I’ll update everyone as to how I find my reception representation.

(visionarymedia has made 66 comments)

For me, the signal bars on my 3G previously were pretty much at 5 bars all of the time (North Shore)… after the update, it tends to go between 3-4 bars. An interesting observation, while on phone in my kitchen yesterday, I had a few dropped calls. The phone was displaying 5 bars during this time. This morning in the kitchen the phone only displays one bar, so maybe the formula is more accurate?

(oobidub has made 33 comments)

Paul wrote:

A BETA 4.1 yesterday, followed by a press conference announcement followed by an official 4.0.1 update today ……. something fishy going on at Apple.

Will update tonight.

(Paul has made 63 comments)

Yeah I am with you Paul…I saw an official update and assumed it was just the beta one they released yesterday..but nooo. Beta 4.1 vs Official 4.0.1. What was the point of the beta at this time? I am thinking that part of (not all of) the announcement tomorrow is going to be iOS4 for Ipad but then that is thrown by the random iPad update today..arghh…guess its Apple playing Apples games and we just wont know until they announce it

(camtab has made 464 comments)

Used to have 5 bars pretty much everywhere I went in Auckland on my 3GS. So far this morning I am getting between 3&5 but usually 4 bars

(747 has made 3 comments)

I think this update is stupid I used to have 3 bars in my bedroom and now after the update I have none

(lakeview01 has made 198 comments)

A BETA 4.1 yesterday, followed by a press conference announcement followed by an official 4.0.1 update today ……. something fishy going on at Apple.

Will update tonight.

(Paul has made 318 comments)

Also available is iOS 3.2.1 for iPad. Which is supposed to fix some Wi-Fi issues. I had an iPad for a day, and the Wi-Fi and bluetooth were unavailable, I will ask the person I got it off if it has been fixed.

(Allan has made 42 comments)