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I still think this was a decent engineering solution, although of course easily replaceable batteries would have been better. This should be a case study at PR

by mnd999 3y ago

I still think this was a decent engineering solution, although of course easily replaceable batteries would have been better. This should be a case study at PR school on how not to communicate with your customers though. Had they been open about what they were doing, why, and allowing customers to turn it off they wouldn’t be in this situation. The probably would have made a lot more cash on battery replacements too.

datadrivenangel 3y ago
Exactly. It's a good software solution to a hardware problem. But because they hid it they deserve this 100%.
- rhaway84773 3y ago
  They didn’t just hide it. They would vehemently deny it. And then when you tried to find help on Apple support and Apple forums about it you would be belittled when describing the behavior and made to believe you were imagining it all. It was gaslighting at corporate scale.
  - Analemma_ 3y ago
    Where did they vehemently deny it?
- londons_explore 3y ago
  Most other phone manufacturers do the same too. It is very common for the CPU frequency to be reduced below 50% battery, or the flashlight to be disabled under 15% battery, or the LTE modem to switch to single antenna mode (saving power) whenever the camera was on. All of those things are because as the battery ages, it's internal resistance increases, which means the terminal voltage drops a lot whenever it is under heavy load. When the battery voltage is low (ie. nearly empty), and then the terminal voltage drops more due to high load on an old battery, you can dip below the minimum voltage necessary for the voltage regulators and the phone will power off suddenly - even if there might be 20% charge left!. Users don't like their phone randomly turning off before the battery hits nil, so these little tricks are the lesser of two evils. Android even has a special file for the manufacturer to configure all these hacks in!
- nudgeee 3y ago
  +1 a total failure on the PR/comms side of the situation. Even some of my technical friends don’t understand the issue and solution which is worrying. I like to explain it like this: Imagine you a driving down the highway and step on the accelerator to give the car more gas, but there is an issue with the engine. The worst thing for the engine control unit to do is to cut off the engine while you’re driving at 60mph, this can be dangerous and cause a safety issue. Same with phones, you could be in a situation and need to make an emergency phone call, or need the last bit of juice from your device to check maps/GPS to get you out of the woods before dark. The worst thing here is for the phone to shut itself off when you need it. Car manufacturers will turn on a big red engine warning light, put your vehicle into failsafe/protection mode (but still let your drive it with reduced power) and tell you to get it serviced ASAP. This is what Apple failed to do correctly.

by mnd999 3y ago

datadrivenangel 3y ago

Exactly. It's a good software solution to a hardware problem. But because they hid it they deserve this 100%.

rhaway84773 3y ago
They didn’t just hide it. They would vehemently deny it. And then when you tried to find help on Apple support and Apple forums about it you would be belittled when describing the behavior and made to believe you were imagining it all. It was gaslighting at corporate scale.
- Analemma_ 3y ago
  Where did they vehemently deny it?
londons_explore 3y ago
Most other phone manufacturers do the same too. It is very common for the CPU frequency to be reduced below 50% battery, or the flashlight to be disabled under 15% battery, or the LTE modem to switch to single antenna mode (saving power) whenever the camera was on. All of those things are because as the battery ages, it's internal resistance increases, which means the terminal voltage drops a lot whenever it is under heavy load. When the battery voltage is low (ie. nearly empty), and then the terminal voltage drops more due to high load on an old battery, you can dip below the minimum voltage necessary for the voltage regulators and the phone will power off suddenly - even if there might be 20% charge left!. Users don't like their phone randomly turning off before the battery hits nil, so these little tricks are the lesser of two evils. Android even has a special file for the manufacturer to configure all these hacks in!
nudgeee 3y ago
+1 a total failure on the PR/comms side of the situation. Even some of my technical friends don’t understand the issue and solution which is worrying. I like to explain it like this: Imagine you a driving down the highway and step on the accelerator to give the car more gas, but there is an issue with the engine. The worst thing for the engine control unit to do is to cut off the engine while you’re driving at 60mph, this can be dangerous and cause a safety issue. Same with phones, you could be in a situation and need to make an emergency phone call, or need the last bit of juice from your device to check maps/GPS to get you out of the woods before dark. The worst thing here is for the phone to shut itself off when you need it. Car manufacturers will turn on a big red engine warning light, put your vehicle into failsafe/protection mode (but still let your drive it with reduced power) and tell you to get it serviced ASAP. This is what Apple failed to do correctly.