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What I'm saying is that Consumer Reports seem to have put their money where their mouth is. Countless bloggers, Youtubers, and Twitter users have made their ane

What I'm saying is that Consumer Reports seem to have put their money where their mouth is. Countless bloggers, Youtubers, and Twitter users have made their anecdotal claims about having signal issues, and nearly every time they get published, a legion of Apple fanatics yells them down with "Doesn't happen on my phone/This is so overblown." There's already someone in the HN comments on this story who says it can't possibly be true because he's never had the problem with his iPhone. Seriously. Dinosaurs can't be millions of years old, because I read a book that said the earth is 4000 years old! Consumer Reports took the time and money to test three different iPhones in an RF isolation chamber, and presumably through scientific process, determined that indeed, the iPhone4 has signal attenuation issues that cause calls to be dropped. I think that if one believes they are fudging the numbers, either duplicate their effort, or contact Consumer Reports and ask for more details on how the experiment is run. I think it's good to question authority - and in fact that's what Consumer Reports often does, and is what they're doing here. The authority, Apple, is saying there's nothing wrong with one face, and with another face, they're hiring RF and antenna engineers. There are real people who paid at least $200 for this phone who are having real signal issues, but I shouldn't believe them because AT&T's coverage in Philadelphia is so widespread that I can use my iPhone underground in the subway? That's zealous, and I'm glad to see an organization with the means to test these things put some weight behind the bloggers and everyday users who are having real trouble with these phones.

leviathant 16y ago
Oh nice. See that paragraph where I said "do it yourself"? Looks like Engadget had the same idea, and they found that every iPhone4 they have suffers from signal attenuation issues. http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/12/consumer-reports-confirms-iphone-4-antenna-problems-and-so-do/ http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/12/consumer-reports-confirms... That's how you refute -- or reinforce -- a published study. Not with rhetoric that a high school student would be embarrassed to get behind, but with independent study, publishing your methods and findings.
tvon 16y ago
> (...) a legion of Apple fanatics yells them down with "Doesn't happen on my phone/This is so overblown." Anyone who doesn't have this problem or thinks it is overblown is an Apple fanatic, obviously, and of course they're all yelling all the time. > There's already someone in the HN comments on this story who says it can't possibly be true because he's never had the problem with his iPhone. Seriously. I can't seem to find that. Weird. > I think that if one believes they are fudging the numbers, either duplicate their effort, or contact Consumer Reports and ask for more details on how the experiment is run. Nobody said they were fudging numbers, nobody even implied it. > (...) and with another face, they're hiring RF and antenna engineers. Ah right, that whole conspiracy theory. > There are real people who paid at least $200 for this phone who are having real signal issues, but I shouldn't believe them because AT&T's coverage in Philadelphia is so widespread that I can use my iPhone underground in the subway? I haven't seen any comments recently (here or on reddit) which suggest that the problem does not exist, only that the problem does not affect them.
- rmc 16y ago
  >> There's already someone in the HN comments on this story who says it can't possibly be true because he's never had the problem with his iPhone. Seriously. > I can't seem to find that. Weird. Further down the page http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1508566 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1508566
  - tvon 16y ago
    First comment: > The iPhone 4 antenna attenuation issue will be remembered as one of the biggest avoidable but unforeseen design errors of all time, I think. The comment you're linking is a response to the above: > iPhone 4 owner as of day 1 and I haven't had an issue. I can't imagine that this is true. Seems obvious that the "I can't imagine that to be true" is a response to "remembered as one of the biggest avoidable but unforeseen design errors of all time"
ynniv 16y ago
presumably through scientific process Thats what bothers me - where is the data? And furthermore, is CR testing signal attenuation, or an actual loss of functionality? Not having a phone myself (but knowing someone who is quite happy with hers) I remain unconvinced that there is a fundamental issue until I see data correlating hand position to actual dropped calls or reduced data throughput. Anything else has the feel of weather prediction.
- leviathant 16y ago
  "Is CR testing signal attenuation, or an actual loss of functionality?" From the article: "When your finger or hand touches a spot on the phone's lower left side - an easy thing, especially for lefties - the signal can significantly degrade enough to cause you to lose your connection altogether if you're in an area with a weak signal" They are testing both signal attenuation and an actual loss of functionality. I agree, actual data would be nice. What gives me confidence in the report is that, to quote Wikipedia, "Consumer Reports does not print outside advertising, accept free product samples, or permit the commercial use of its reviews for selling products" and that they've been doing this since 1936. Bose and Sharper Image have in the past attempted to sue Consumer Reports for showing some kind of bias or for presumably using inaccurate methods in their reviews - both lost their lawsuits. There are good reasons why CR has the reputation it has, and that's why I'm willing to take what they have to say at close to face value, even without raw data being published in the same blog entry.

leviathant 16y ago

Oh nice. See that paragraph where I said "do it yourself"? Looks like Engadget had the same idea, and they found that every iPhone4 they have suffers from signal attenuation issues. http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/12/consumer-reports-confirms-iphone-4-antenna-problems-and-so-do/ http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/12/consumer-reports-confirms... That's how you refute -- or reinforce -- a published study. Not with rhetoric that a high school student would be embarrassed to get behind, but with independent study, publishing your methods and findings.

tvon 16y ago

> (...) a legion of Apple fanatics yells them down with "Doesn't happen on my phone/This is so overblown." Anyone who doesn't have this problem or thinks it is overblown is an Apple fanatic, obviously, and of course they're all yelling all the time. > There's already someone in the HN comments on this story who says it can't possibly be true because he's never had the problem with his iPhone. Seriously. I can't seem to find that. Weird. > I think that if one believes they are fudging the numbers, either duplicate their effort, or contact Consumer Reports and ask for more details on how the experiment is run. Nobody said they were fudging numbers, nobody even implied it. > (...) and with another face, they're hiring RF and antenna engineers. Ah right, that whole conspiracy theory. > There are real people who paid at least $200 for this phone who are having real signal issues, but I shouldn't believe them because AT&T's coverage in Philadelphia is so widespread that I can use my iPhone underground in the subway? I haven't seen any comments recently (here or on reddit) which suggest that the problem does not exist, only that the problem does not affect them.

rmc 16y ago
>> There's already someone in the HN comments on this story who says it can't possibly be true because he's never had the problem with his iPhone. Seriously. > I can't seem to find that. Weird. Further down the page http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1508566 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1508566
- tvon 16y ago
  First comment: > The iPhone 4 antenna attenuation issue will be remembered as one of the biggest avoidable but unforeseen design errors of all time, I think. The comment you're linking is a response to the above: > iPhone 4 owner as of day 1 and I haven't had an issue. I can't imagine that this is true. Seems obvious that the "I can't imagine that to be true" is a response to "remembered as one of the biggest avoidable but unforeseen design errors of all time"

ynniv 16y ago

presumably through scientific process Thats what bothers me - where is the data? And furthermore, is CR testing signal attenuation, or an actual loss of functionality? Not having a phone myself (but knowing someone who is quite happy with hers) I remain unconvinced that there is a fundamental issue until I see data correlating hand position to actual dropped calls or reduced data throughput. Anything else has the feel of weather prediction.

leviathant 16y ago
"Is CR testing signal attenuation, or an actual loss of functionality?" From the article: "When your finger or hand touches a spot on the phone's lower left side - an easy thing, especially for lefties - the signal can significantly degrade enough to cause you to lose your connection altogether if you're in an area with a weak signal" They are testing both signal attenuation and an actual loss of functionality. I agree, actual data would be nice. What gives me confidence in the report is that, to quote Wikipedia, "Consumer Reports does not print outside advertising, accept free product samples, or permit the commercial use of its reviews for selling products" and that they've been doing this since 1936. Bose and Sharper Image have in the past attempted to sue Consumer Reports for showing some kind of bias or for presumably using inaccurate methods in their reviews - both lost their lawsuits. There are good reasons why CR has the reputation it has, and that's why I'm willing to take what they have to say at close to face value, even without raw data being published in the same blog entry.