11 ms·

I bought my iPhone 2 years ago (iPhone 6, new) -- it's since been plagued by slowdowns that are incomprehensible to me as a software developer. How can somethin

I bought my iPhone 2 years ago (iPhone 6, new) -- it's since been plagued by slowdowns that are incomprehensible to me as a software developer. How can something go from completely responsive to absolutely useless in 2 years with virtually no major changes to the OS? Scaling the CPU down with battery capacity seems like a great way to hand-wave away planned obsolescence accusations. I was curious about the results my phone would receive, so I bought the Geekbench app mentioned in the reddit post. Indeed, my phone scores max out at half of what it claims the iPhone 6 should benchmark at. I'm pissed.

EduardoBautista 9y ago
On the other hand, people would complain about the horrible battery life. In any case, the solution is rather simple: just replace the battery.
- modeless 9y ago
  If the battery is so small that it can't last 2 years of normal wear without becoming "horrible", the design is bad. Papering over the bad design by making the phone run at less than 60% of rated speed, on purpose, is even worse. Battery wear is expected, but it is not reasonable to expect that the CPU will be affected too, and this has never been disclosed AFAIK. Also, replacing a non-user-replaceable battery is not a "simple" solution.
  - threeseed 9y ago
    (1) All batteries degrade. Really not sure why you think Apple would be any different. (2) Replacing the battery is simple. You take it to a phone shop or to Apple and in about an hour it is done. Most people aren't self servicing electronics or pretty much anything these days.
    - modeless 9y ago
      > not sure why you think Apple would be any different. I don't and my comment doesn't suggest that. What I suggest is that phones with non-user-replaceable batteries should be designed with capacity large enough so that life is still acceptable after two years of normal wear without throttling the CPU. As for how "simple" replacing the battery is, I don't consider a $79 repair that requires an appointment and driving to an Apple Store and wasting an hour of my day "simple".
      - muninn_ 9y ago
        Could be worse. You could wait a few days for Samsung to send you a box so you can mail your phone in.
      - coldtea 9y ago
        >I don't and my comment doesn't suggest that. What I suggest is that phones with non-user-replaceable batteries should be designed with capacity large enough so that life is still acceptable after two years of normal wear without throttling the CPU. Whether user serviceable or not is irrelevant, as long as they have a support program to replace your battery.
        pritambaral 9y ago
        As your parent points out: > As for how "simple" replacing the battery is, I don't consider a $79 repair that requires an appointment and driving to an Apple Store and wasting an hour of my day "simple". A support program is still far more trouble than user-replaceable batteries.
    - MereInterest 9y ago
      (1) All batteries degrade. This should be accounted for in the initial design, so that there is sufficient battery life at the end of product life, not just at the beginning. (2) Replacing the battery should be simple. Pop open the back cover, pull out the battery, and push the new one in. Heck, I used to carry a spare battery just in case, because it took 15 seconds to swap. Taking it to a phone shop and waiting an hour isn't what I would call simple.
      - drcross 9y ago
        >This should be accounted for in the initial design, so that there is sufficient battery life at the end of product life, not just at the beginning. If this was the case, the title of this post would be "iPhones don't use all available battery power" instead of what it is. You can't please all the people all the time.
        pbhjpbhj 9y ago
        People would be so upset that they didn't have to charge their phone so often and that the completely sealed in battery lasted longer before making their phone appear to become obsolete?
        sokoloff 9y ago
        They might be upset when their phone was 3/4 inch / 2 cm thick and weighed 3/4 of a pound / 1/3 kg.
        MereInterest 9y ago
        I'm really not sure how that follows at all. If the battery life of a new device is 3 days, and the battery life of a 2-year-old device is 1 day, at no point is there battery power that is unused.
      - Bud 9y ago
        1) It is accounted for. Just not in the way you'd like, with your priorities. 2) No. It should not be simple, and there should not be a crappy "back cover" which "pops" open. If you do that, you've made a fragile piece of crap with no water resistance and much less durability and you've wasted a lot of space. Space which is in very short supply.
    - mikeash 9y ago
      All batteries degrade. Not all batteries degrade into uselessness after a mere two years. My car is coming up on three years old and its battery capacity is still better than 99% of new.
      - hanbura 9y ago
        Your cars battery is cooled instead of being abused as a heat sink, is nearly never emptied, and uses a battery chemistry that doesn't degrade when fully charged. Smartphone battery degradation is indeed a consequence of design choices, but I think those choices are reasonable. I prefer battery power and processor power now over long term battery life, as long as the battery is replaceable.
        mikeash 9y ago
        If they’d just make it bigger they’d solve a lot of things for both of us.
        ghaff 9y ago
        Except people tend to vote with their wallets for thinner lighter phones. Probably I’d prefer a slightly thicker phone myself but I’m probably not typical.
        mikeash 9y ago
        Indeed. I really wish Apple would offer an option to have a phone that's twice as thick as their current offerings, with the extra space filled with extra battery. Keep the thin ones available for people who prefer those. But I'm not getting my hopes up for such a thing. (And to preempt the typical responses to this: I know battery cases exist, but they're a substantially inferior solution.)
        robterrell 9y ago
        It's not just us geeks. My wife and kids (at least, the daughters who are full-time snapchat users) would definitely select the larger phone with bigger battery. If you had both choices before you in the store, who wouldn't start to wonder if they'd regret the thinner/lower capacity choice?
  - coldtea 9y ago
    >If the battery is so small that it can't last 2 years of normal wear without becoming "horrible", the design is bad. And you say that as an expert on batteries, having done a comprehensive comparison study?
- clishem 9y ago
  I have an even simpler solution: don't buy any Apple products anymore.
- stordoff 9y ago
  If the battery life becomes "horrible" within two years, I'd question if it was sufficient in the first place. I've had non-Apple phones in use for significantly longer than that without meaningful battery loss (i.e. I don't have to charge more frequently). It also seems that you could throttle the CPU, but provide the user a way to override it. That'd be far more reasonable IMO.
  - meatbundragon 9y ago
    In terms of user experience, having the option to override might confuse those who aren't power users, and some users may unintentionally experience something that isn't the "ideal path" chosen by Apple if they do choose to opt out of the throttling experience. Of course, maybe iPhones could just tell the users to replace batteries if battery life starts to deteriorate below a certain threshold.
- pbhjpbhj 9y ago
  Yeah, just buy a new battery at a Walmart, pop open the battery compartment ... /s
- sytelus 9y ago
  I thought iPhone batteries are not replaceable. How do you go about replacing it? Is the replaced battery authentic OEM or some third party?
  - dannyw 9y ago
    They’re easy to replace, as long as you have careful hands and don’t try snapping off flex cables here and there. I can do one in 120 seconds, and I’ve only done it twice.
    - icebraining 9y ago
      Failing is painful, though. I replaced an iPhone's charging plug (which means replacing a small network of cables), got everything working and charging, then crushed the screen when closing it up :|
jpalomaki 9y ago
In the Reddit comments somebody claims this is actually a software fix for the 6s battery problem that was causing shutdowns when battery level fell below certain level. There's a free battery replacement program for the models affected [1]. My phone was one of the affected, but never got around to take it to repair shop because I thought the few random shutdowns were the only problem. [1] https://www.apple.com/support/iphone6s-unexpectedshutdown/ https://www.apple.com/support/iphone6s-unexpectedshutdown/
- Lunatic666 9y ago
  Thanks for posting the link, I don’t have the shutdown problem, but my serial number is on the list, so I’ll get my free new battery tomorrow!
  - dannyw 9y ago
    If you don’t have the shutdown problem, it’s probably because your SoC is throttled...
- emilsedgh 9y ago
  Thank you for this! I have this problem and I'm eligible.
- ksec 9y ago
  The problem is, there are other people in the thread claiming their iPhone 6 or iPhone 7 were also performing poorly according to Geekbench. Surely iPhone 7 isn't / shouldn't be affected by this batch? If this is true that apple throttle its performance due to battery Cycle, I will pissed too. Apple should have noted to me within iPhone that i should get a Battery replacement in the Apple Store, or I will be bringing my own Battery Pack when I am out.
  - ksec 9y ago
    After 24 hours and putting lots of thoughts into it, I could not even argue for Apple. Out of the bulk load of Energy Usage, CPU is not even the primary area where energy are used. 40%+ is the Display 20%+ are the Network Connection, WiFi or LTE. 10%+ are RAM, NAND, etc. I am guessing around 20% is the CPU and GPU. So they lower this and try to save 10% more battery in response to lower battery cycle? And they have an Financial interest to slow your phone. This makes me sick. And I consider myself an Apple Fan.
jbverschoor 9y ago
Try running tinder in the background It will crash your phone and drain the battery in a few minutes to 20%
- lwansbrough 9y ago
  Yep I've had this issue too. Not sure who to blame for that though, Tinder is notoriously buggy.
logicallee 9y ago
What is better: for software writers to only be able to multiply two billion 64-bit numbers per second instead of four billion, or for you to have 5 hours instead of 10 hours of battery life? It is absolutely, 100% the right choice that a low-powered mode is used, and entered into, in software. I don't believe replacing a battery every 24 months is unrealistic if you want screaming-fast performance. There are a handful of exceptions I can think of: - There is no excuse not to give full power when plugged into a charger. - The OS should not be slow: its UI should be developed against the slower core. - The OS should allow a certain amount of high-power usage, if it is intermittant. In other words, apps should be able to request please, please be able to process something quickly, they promise not to use much power for a long time afterward. This may improve user experience in some cases. In general I would say Apple is making the right choice here.
- dmichulke 9y ago
  > In general I would say Apple is making the right choice here. IMO, they are making the wrong choice because they are making the choice (without letting you know). Isn't this a setting those nifty Boolean sliders were invented for?
  - coldtea 9y ago
    >IMO, they are making the wrong choice because they are making the choice (without letting you know) The whole appeal of Apple is that they are making those kind of choices, and correctly for the biggest number of users. Hobbyists can always run their own custom mobile OS version.
    - pritambaral 9y ago
      > Hobbyists can always run their own custom mobile OS version. Not on the iPhone.
    - gluestic 9y ago
      > Hobbyists can always run their own custom mobile OS version. HAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHA
coldtea 9y ago
>Scaling the CPU down with battery capacity seems like a great way to hand-wave away planned obsolescence accusations. It also seems like a great idea to save battery life.
b3b0p 9y ago
iPhone 6 Plus owner here. Bought it in straight cash a couple years ago. Was completely content and extremely happy... until now. It feels D.O.A. Random pauses for almost every action. Answering the phone even takes a good 2-3 seconds. Music crashes randomly. Podcasts pauses like it's meant to be intentional behavior. Battery drains noticeably faster now. I used to get at least 2-3 or more days. Now I can barely make 1. Similar problems started with my Apple Watch (2.0 bought in April). When the iPhone was first announced by Steve Jobs I seem to recall him exclaiming how everything was nearly instant, fast, responsive, and smooth. I feel like it must have been in a dream now.
- samstave 9y ago
  Exact same here. I’m on 11.1.2 iOS, and after that forced upgrade without my consent I went into apple and complained and got nowhere. The reason I complained is that after the upgrade the user experience was similar to that above where these problems persist; tapping on certain things don’t work, pauses in apps, crashing apps etc.. but also most notably for me is that my speaker volume is less than when it was new. Anyone experience lower speaker volume also?
  - stumblers 9y ago
    Ditto. Haven't complained or followed up with anyone yet, but seeing all of this info has me now thinking it's not just me. Every action is noticeably slower (~1s response for everything) and now, as of last week anyways, need to recharge my phone midday where I've never had to do that.
  - b3b0p 9y ago
    > Anyone experience lower speaker volume also? Now that you mention it, yes! Not just speaker though, headphones, earbuds, and especially noticeable using Bluetooth headphones/earbuds. I can't even use the phone to talk without a headphone/earbuds and a mic. I can't hear what anyone is saying anymore.
  - scarface74 9y ago
    How did they "force an upgrade"? To upgrade your phone, you have to confirm you wNt it and enter your PIN.
diogenescynic 9y ago
Same experience and my camera literally will not focus anymore. No drops or water damage. I simply cannot explain the loss in function or drop in battery life.

EduardoBautista 9y ago

On the other hand, people would complain about the horrible battery life. In any case, the solution is rather simple: just replace the battery.

modeless 9y ago
If the battery is so small that it can't last 2 years of normal wear without becoming "horrible", the design is bad. Papering over the bad design by making the phone run at less than 60% of rated speed, on purpose, is even worse. Battery wear is expected, but it is not reasonable to expect that the CPU will be affected too, and this has never been disclosed AFAIK. Also, replacing a non-user-replaceable battery is not a "simple" solution.
- threeseed 9y ago
  (1) All batteries degrade. Really not sure why you think Apple would be any different. (2) Replacing the battery is simple. You take it to a phone shop or to Apple and in about an hour it is done. Most people aren't self servicing electronics or pretty much anything these days.
  - modeless 9y ago
    > not sure why you think Apple would be any different. I don't and my comment doesn't suggest that. What I suggest is that phones with non-user-replaceable batteries should be designed with capacity large enough so that life is still acceptable after two years of normal wear without throttling the CPU. As for how "simple" replacing the battery is, I don't consider a $79 repair that requires an appointment and driving to an Apple Store and wasting an hour of my day "simple".
    - muninn_ 9y ago
      Could be worse. You could wait a few days for Samsung to send you a box so you can mail your phone in.
    - coldtea 9y ago
      >I don't and my comment doesn't suggest that. What I suggest is that phones with non-user-replaceable batteries should be designed with capacity large enough so that life is still acceptable after two years of normal wear without throttling the CPU. Whether user serviceable or not is irrelevant, as long as they have a support program to replace your battery.
      - pritambaral 9y ago
        As your parent points out: > As for how "simple" replacing the battery is, I don't consider a $79 repair that requires an appointment and driving to an Apple Store and wasting an hour of my day "simple". A support program is still far more trouble than user-replaceable batteries.
  - MereInterest 9y ago
    (1) All batteries degrade. This should be accounted for in the initial design, so that there is sufficient battery life at the end of product life, not just at the beginning. (2) Replacing the battery should be simple. Pop open the back cover, pull out the battery, and push the new one in. Heck, I used to carry a spare battery just in case, because it took 15 seconds to swap. Taking it to a phone shop and waiting an hour isn't what I would call simple.
    - drcross 9y ago
      >This should be accounted for in the initial design, so that there is sufficient battery life at the end of product life, not just at the beginning. If this was the case, the title of this post would be "iPhones don't use all available battery power" instead of what it is. You can't please all the people all the time.
      - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
        People would be so upset that they didn't have to charge their phone so often and that the completely sealed in battery lasted longer before making their phone appear to become obsolete?
        sokoloff 9y ago
        They might be upset when their phone was 3/4 inch / 2 cm thick and weighed 3/4 of a pound / 1/3 kg.
      - MereInterest 9y ago
        I'm really not sure how that follows at all. If the battery life of a new device is 3 days, and the battery life of a 2-year-old device is 1 day, at no point is there battery power that is unused.
    - Bud 9y ago
      1) It is accounted for. Just not in the way you'd like, with your priorities. 2) No. It should not be simple, and there should not be a crappy "back cover" which "pops" open. If you do that, you've made a fragile piece of crap with no water resistance and much less durability and you've wasted a lot of space. Space which is in very short supply.
  - mikeash 9y ago
    All batteries degrade. Not all batteries degrade into uselessness after a mere two years. My car is coming up on three years old and its battery capacity is still better than 99% of new.
    - hanbura 9y ago
      Your cars battery is cooled instead of being abused as a heat sink, is nearly never emptied, and uses a battery chemistry that doesn't degrade when fully charged. Smartphone battery degradation is indeed a consequence of design choices, but I think those choices are reasonable. I prefer battery power and processor power now over long term battery life, as long as the battery is replaceable.
      - mikeash 9y ago
        If they’d just make it bigger they’d solve a lot of things for both of us.
        ghaff 9y ago
        Except people tend to vote with their wallets for thinner lighter phones. Probably I’d prefer a slightly thicker phone myself but I’m probably not typical.
        mikeash 9y ago
        Indeed. I really wish Apple would offer an option to have a phone that's twice as thick as their current offerings, with the extra space filled with extra battery. Keep the thin ones available for people who prefer those. But I'm not getting my hopes up for such a thing. (And to preempt the typical responses to this: I know battery cases exist, but they're a substantially inferior solution.)
        robterrell 9y ago
        It's not just us geeks. My wife and kids (at least, the daughters who are full-time snapchat users) would definitely select the larger phone with bigger battery. If you had both choices before you in the store, who wouldn't start to wonder if they'd regret the thinner/lower capacity choice?
- coldtea 9y ago
  >If the battery is so small that it can't last 2 years of normal wear without becoming "horrible", the design is bad. And you say that as an expert on batteries, having done a comprehensive comparison study?
clishem 9y ago
I have an even simpler solution: don't buy any Apple products anymore.
stordoff 9y ago
If the battery life becomes "horrible" within two years, I'd question if it was sufficient in the first place. I've had non-Apple phones in use for significantly longer than that without meaningful battery loss (i.e. I don't have to charge more frequently). It also seems that you could throttle the CPU, but provide the user a way to override it. That'd be far more reasonable IMO.
- meatbundragon 9y ago
  In terms of user experience, having the option to override might confuse those who aren't power users, and some users may unintentionally experience something that isn't the "ideal path" chosen by Apple if they do choose to opt out of the throttling experience. Of course, maybe iPhones could just tell the users to replace batteries if battery life starts to deteriorate below a certain threshold.
pbhjpbhj 9y ago
Yeah, just buy a new battery at a Walmart, pop open the battery compartment ... /s
sytelus 9y ago
I thought iPhone batteries are not replaceable. How do you go about replacing it? Is the replaced battery authentic OEM or some third party?
- dannyw 9y ago
  They’re easy to replace, as long as you have careful hands and don’t try snapping off flex cables here and there. I can do one in 120 seconds, and I’ve only done it twice.
  - icebraining 9y ago
    Failing is painful, though. I replaced an iPhone's charging plug (which means replacing a small network of cables), got everything working and charging, then crushed the screen when closing it up :|

jpalomaki 9y ago

In the Reddit comments somebody claims this is actually a software fix for the 6s battery problem that was causing shutdowns when battery level fell below certain level. There's a free battery replacement program for the models affected [1]. My phone was one of the affected, but never got around to take it to repair shop because I thought the few random shutdowns were the only problem. [1] https://www.apple.com/support/iphone6s-unexpectedshutdown/ https://www.apple.com/support/iphone6s-unexpectedshutdown/

Lunatic666 9y ago
Thanks for posting the link, I don’t have the shutdown problem, but my serial number is on the list, so I’ll get my free new battery tomorrow!
- dannyw 9y ago
  If you don’t have the shutdown problem, it’s probably because your SoC is throttled...
emilsedgh 9y ago
Thank you for this! I have this problem and I'm eligible.
ksec 9y ago
The problem is, there are other people in the thread claiming their iPhone 6 or iPhone 7 were also performing poorly according to Geekbench. Surely iPhone 7 isn't / shouldn't be affected by this batch? If this is true that apple throttle its performance due to battery Cycle, I will pissed too. Apple should have noted to me within iPhone that i should get a Battery replacement in the Apple Store, or I will be bringing my own Battery Pack when I am out.
- ksec 9y ago
  After 24 hours and putting lots of thoughts into it, I could not even argue for Apple. Out of the bulk load of Energy Usage, CPU is not even the primary area where energy are used. 40%+ is the Display 20%+ are the Network Connection, WiFi or LTE. 10%+ are RAM, NAND, etc. I am guessing around 20% is the CPU and GPU. So they lower this and try to save 10% more battery in response to lower battery cycle? And they have an Financial interest to slow your phone. This makes me sick. And I consider myself an Apple Fan.

jbverschoor 9y ago

Try running tinder in the background It will crash your phone and drain the battery in a few minutes to 20%

lwansbrough 9y ago
Yep I've had this issue too. Not sure who to blame for that though, Tinder is notoriously buggy.

logicallee 9y ago

What is better: for software writers to only be able to multiply two billion 64-bit numbers per second instead of four billion, or for you to have 5 hours instead of 10 hours of battery life? It is absolutely, 100% the right choice that a low-powered mode is used, and entered into, in software. I don't believe replacing a battery every 24 months is unrealistic if you want screaming-fast performance. There are a handful of exceptions I can think of: - There is no excuse not to give full power when plugged into a charger. - The OS should not be slow: its UI should be developed against the slower core. - The OS should allow a certain amount of high-power usage, if it is intermittant. In other words, apps should be able to request please, please be able to process something quickly, they promise not to use much power for a long time afterward. This may improve user experience in some cases. In general I would say Apple is making the right choice here.

dmichulke 9y ago
> In general I would say Apple is making the right choice here. IMO, they are making the wrong choice because they are making the choice (without letting you know). Isn't this a setting those nifty Boolean sliders were invented for?
- coldtea 9y ago
  >IMO, they are making the wrong choice because they are making the choice (without letting you know) The whole appeal of Apple is that they are making those kind of choices, and correctly for the biggest number of users. Hobbyists can always run their own custom mobile OS version.
  - pritambaral 9y ago
    > Hobbyists can always run their own custom mobile OS version. Not on the iPhone.
  - gluestic 9y ago
    > Hobbyists can always run their own custom mobile OS version. HAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHA

coldtea 9y ago

>Scaling the CPU down with battery capacity seems like a great way to hand-wave away planned obsolescence accusations. It also seems like a great idea to save battery life.

b3b0p 9y ago

iPhone 6 Plus owner here. Bought it in straight cash a couple years ago. Was completely content and extremely happy... until now. It feels D.O.A. Random pauses for almost every action. Answering the phone even takes a good 2-3 seconds. Music crashes randomly. Podcasts pauses like it's meant to be intentional behavior. Battery drains noticeably faster now. I used to get at least 2-3 or more days. Now I can barely make 1. Similar problems started with my Apple Watch (2.0 bought in April). When the iPhone was first announced by Steve Jobs I seem to recall him exclaiming how everything was nearly instant, fast, responsive, and smooth. I feel like it must have been in a dream now.

samstave 9y ago
Exact same here. I’m on 11.1.2 iOS, and after that forced upgrade without my consent I went into apple and complained and got nowhere. The reason I complained is that after the upgrade the user experience was similar to that above where these problems persist; tapping on certain things don’t work, pauses in apps, crashing apps etc.. but also most notably for me is that my speaker volume is less than when it was new. Anyone experience lower speaker volume also?
- stumblers 9y ago
  Ditto. Haven't complained or followed up with anyone yet, but seeing all of this info has me now thinking it's not just me. Every action is noticeably slower (~1s response for everything) and now, as of last week anyways, need to recharge my phone midday where I've never had to do that.
- b3b0p 9y ago
  > Anyone experience lower speaker volume also? Now that you mention it, yes! Not just speaker though, headphones, earbuds, and especially noticeable using Bluetooth headphones/earbuds. I can't even use the phone to talk without a headphone/earbuds and a mic. I can't hear what anyone is saying anymore.
- scarface74 9y ago
  How did they "force an upgrade"? To upgrade your phone, you have to confirm you wNt it and enter your PIN.

diogenescynic 9y ago

Same experience and my camera literally will not focus anymore. No drops or water damage. I simply cannot explain the loss in function or drop in battery life.