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GSMArena bought two iPhone 15 Pro Max from different retailers to test the overheating issue and they were unable to replicate it. > Lastly, we did read report

by fh9302 3y ago

GSMArena bought two iPhone 15 Pro Max from different retailers to test the overheating issue and they were unable to replicate it. > Lastly, we did read reports of overheating iPhones, some during fast charging. For this review, we used two iPhone 15 Pro Max units, obtained from different retailers, and neither of those became unbearably hot even after an hour of GPU stress testing. Warm, rather unpleasantly (but not concerningly) - sure, but hot - never. We know people have experienced and documented such issues, but we haven't been able to replicate those so far on our units. They think it's a bug in iOS 17 that causes some phones to overheat. > And since we ran the same tests on the iPhone 14 Pro Max, which last year we crowned as a phone with excellent stability, we were surprised to see that now, under iOS 17, its stability has gotten worse. That's why we think there is some software issue at play in addition to/or just contributing to the poor heat dissipation. https://www.gsmarena.com/apple_iphone_15_pro_max-review-2618p5.php https://www.gsmarena.com/apple_iphone_15_pro_max-review-2618...

dna_polymerase 3y ago
> Warm, rather unpleasantly (but not concerningly) - sure, but hot - never. If only we had a standardized scale to measure and express warm vs. cold…
- naravara 3y ago
  The problem is that the temperature you feel on your hand is not necessarily the temperature the chip is operating under. If your hand is warm that, ironically, means the heat is dissipating effectively. If it's not dissipating, then your hand will remain cool because all the heat is still on the chip. So unless Apple gives you a way to read the chip's own temperature sensor data, what you feel holding it isn't that useful. (From a performance standpoint at least. Having a handwarmer when you didn't want a handwarmer is a different kind of problem.)
  - delta_p_delta_x 3y ago
    To echo the parent commenter: If only things at a non-zero thermodynamic temperature gave off some sort of invisible wave that could be detected at a distance by some calibrated sensor that would give an absolute measure of the hotness of said things, without needing to worry about relative temperature differences...
  - bogantech 3y ago
    Normies care about the fact that it's uncomfortably warm to hold, not whether the CPU is hot or not.
    - jncfhnb 3y ago
      They do Until they don’t
    - capableweb 3y ago
      I do think "normies" care about the CPU is hot or not, but they do so indirectly, as the phone will start throttling the CPU when it reaches a certain temperature, so the phone will start feeling laggy. If you've ever tried to play a game on the iPhone/doing something else CPU/GPU heavy while outside in the sun on a hot day, you'll know what I mean, the performance is much worse.
      - lloeki 3y ago
        > while outside in the sun on a hot day, you'll know what I mean, the performance is much worse. Once I've had it outright shut down and show a black screen with a pretty thermometer, how's that for "performance is much worse"? ;) (to be fair it was a spectacularly hot and sunny day, definitely in the "out of spec" range)
      - FrankoDelMar 3y ago
        > If you've ever tried to play a game on the iPhone/doing something else CPU/GPU heavy while outside in the sun on a hot day good excuse to put down the phone and enjoy the sun :)
        capableweb 3y ago
        Some of us live in places where there is more sunny & hot days than not, and your advice feels geared towards people who don't live such places ;)
        cassianoleal 3y ago
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- Someone 3y ago
  For the issue at hand the temperature of the phone, even on the outside, is not very relevant. What matters are - whether it feels uncomfortable to humans - whether it is unsafe for humans I think both are mostly about the amount of heat the device transfers to human skin per unit of area per second. The temperature of the outside of the phone is _a_ factor in that, but not the only one. Thermal conductivity of the material (compared to metals, wood doesn’t feels hot in summer or cold in winter, for example) and grip strength needed to reliably hold an object play a role, too.
- steve1977 3y ago
  You’re not happy with our “warm - rather unpleasantly warm - hot” scale?
  - FireBeyond 3y ago
    ... but not concerningly!
- newaccount74 3y ago
  It's very hard to accurately measure temperature of metallic objects. Most people don't have suitable thermometers, and even if they did they would probably use them wrong. On the other hand, our skin is quite good at differentiating between warm and hot.
sangnoir 3y ago
> GSMArena bought two iPhone 15 Pro Max from different retailers to test the overheating issue and they were unable to replicate it. Did anyone manage to "replicate" the explosion of a Galaxy Note 7 under controlled usage? Assuming no one did, what conclusion wiuld we draw from s failure to replicate on n=2?
- nfriedly 3y ago
  Failure to replicate doesn't mean that it's not an issue. They even acknowledged that it has happened to other people. It's just another data point. IMO, it sounds like it's a real issue, but not one that affects the majority of users.
  - nailer 3y ago
    The way you handle inconsistent failures IRL is the same way you handle it in software: Run a hundred instances of the test. Measure the failure rate. Make the change. Re-measure. In bash it might be a for loop running the test a hundred times, in person it might getting a hundred phones.
- KolenCh 3y ago
  If you have an overheated phone as a rare event then you will at worst wasted a few hours of your life, if you have an exploding phone as a rare event then you will have your remaining of your life wasted.
elinear 3y ago
MKBHD in his review mentioned a very odd instance of overheating, seemingly random and unrelated to any stressful workload. Anecdotal evidence points to iOS bugs. https://youtu.be/cBpGq-vDr2Y?si=B0Tv1iRcd6Iran6B&t=669 https://youtu.be/cBpGq-vDr2Y?si=B0Tv1iRcd6Iran6B&t=669
instagib 3y ago
There’s a couple clarifications I’d like. Case or no case? A case keeps the heat in more. Max settings on games with no fps cap? Optimized charging off? Limit frame rate off? Brightness level max? Auto brightness off? Background processes on? Notifications on? Reduce motion off? Location services on / precise? Wi-Fi/bluetooth/air drop on? Standard set of social apps installed with games logged in, apps in the app switcher not closed, and email accounts set for push notifications? I have personally observed my [phone/ipad/old iPhone/old iPad] getting so hot that I got the cannot charge due to temperature message. Updates could have changed as I could not play some of these games for very long and others may have similar complaints. I blanched my iPad case white in some areas due to heating and charging while playing. Here’s my stress testing list: “20 minutes till dawn” minutes “Monster hunter now” “Disney mirrorverse” “Dragon raja” “Genshin impact” “Pathless”
ASalazarMX 3y ago
I can easily overheat an iPhone 14 Pro Max by taking pictures for half an hour. Even opening the camera app and leaving it unlocked the same time is enough to greatly overheat it. I don't know why the camera app is so power hungry, but I've replicated it with different two phones of the same model belonging to different people. It's very annoying if your use your iPhone to take pictures while traveling, because it will be drained by the afternoon, and it's something that didn't happen until the late iOS 16 versions. I haven't tried it in iOS 17 yet.
- ProfessorLayton 3y ago
  I'm not sure if this is common knowledge, but the phone is essentially taking pictures the entire time the camera app is open. Pressing the shutter button is merely selecting which photo to keep, and adding more post processing. This is done to minimize lag, which is important when trying to capture a moment, but uses a lot of power. My main gripe with this approach has been that this causes the camera app to be incredibly RAM hungry, and my Safari tabs/Apps will reload when switching back to them. My 15 Pro seems a little better thanks to the increased memory, but the issue is still there. Additionally, it's been relatively recently since iPhone captured at resolutions higher than 12MP, so that could explain why this phenomenon has gotten worse recently.
op00to 3y ago
When I sue full 20W charging, my iPhone 14 Pro gets warm, surprisngly so. That's a lot of power going into a small space. My wife's does the same.

by fh9302 3y ago

dna_polymerase 3y ago

> Warm, rather unpleasantly (but not concerningly) - sure, but hot - never. If only we had a standardized scale to measure and express warm vs. cold…

naravara 3y ago
The problem is that the temperature you feel on your hand is not necessarily the temperature the chip is operating under. If your hand is warm that, ironically, means the heat is dissipating effectively. If it's not dissipating, then your hand will remain cool because all the heat is still on the chip. So unless Apple gives you a way to read the chip's own temperature sensor data, what you feel holding it isn't that useful. (From a performance standpoint at least. Having a handwarmer when you didn't want a handwarmer is a different kind of problem.)
- delta_p_delta_x 3y ago
  To echo the parent commenter: If only things at a non-zero thermodynamic temperature gave off some sort of invisible wave that could be detected at a distance by some calibrated sensor that would give an absolute measure of the hotness of said things, without needing to worry about relative temperature differences...
- bogantech 3y ago
  Normies care about the fact that it's uncomfortably warm to hold, not whether the CPU is hot or not.
  - jncfhnb 3y ago
    They do Until they don’t
  - capableweb 3y ago
    I do think "normies" care about the CPU is hot or not, but they do so indirectly, as the phone will start throttling the CPU when it reaches a certain temperature, so the phone will start feeling laggy. If you've ever tried to play a game on the iPhone/doing something else CPU/GPU heavy while outside in the sun on a hot day, you'll know what I mean, the performance is much worse.
    - lloeki 3y ago
      > while outside in the sun on a hot day, you'll know what I mean, the performance is much worse. Once I've had it outright shut down and show a black screen with a pretty thermometer, how's that for "performance is much worse"? ;) (to be fair it was a spectacularly hot and sunny day, definitely in the "out of spec" range)
    - FrankoDelMar 3y ago
      > If you've ever tried to play a game on the iPhone/doing something else CPU/GPU heavy while outside in the sun on a hot day good excuse to put down the phone and enjoy the sun :)
      - capableweb 3y ago
        Some of us live in places where there is more sunny & hot days than not, and your advice feels geared towards people who don't live such places ;)
        cassianoleal 3y ago
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
Someone 3y ago
For the issue at hand the temperature of the phone, even on the outside, is not very relevant. What matters are - whether it feels uncomfortable to humans - whether it is unsafe for humans I think both are mostly about the amount of heat the device transfers to human skin per unit of area per second. The temperature of the outside of the phone is _a_ factor in that, but not the only one. Thermal conductivity of the material (compared to metals, wood doesn’t feels hot in summer or cold in winter, for example) and grip strength needed to reliably hold an object play a role, too.
steve1977 3y ago
You’re not happy with our “warm - rather unpleasantly warm - hot” scale?
- FireBeyond 3y ago
  ... but not concerningly!
newaccount74 3y ago
It's very hard to accurately measure temperature of metallic objects. Most people don't have suitable thermometers, and even if they did they would probably use them wrong. On the other hand, our skin is quite good at differentiating between warm and hot.

sangnoir 3y ago

> GSMArena bought two iPhone 15 Pro Max from different retailers to test the overheating issue and they were unable to replicate it. Did anyone manage to "replicate" the explosion of a Galaxy Note 7 under controlled usage? Assuming no one did, what conclusion wiuld we draw from s failure to replicate on n=2?

nfriedly 3y ago
Failure to replicate doesn't mean that it's not an issue. They even acknowledged that it has happened to other people. It's just another data point. IMO, it sounds like it's a real issue, but not one that affects the majority of users.
- nailer 3y ago
  The way you handle inconsistent failures IRL is the same way you handle it in software: Run a hundred instances of the test. Measure the failure rate. Make the change. Re-measure. In bash it might be a for loop running the test a hundred times, in person it might getting a hundred phones.
KolenCh 3y ago
If you have an overheated phone as a rare event then you will at worst wasted a few hours of your life, if you have an exploding phone as a rare event then you will have your remaining of your life wasted.

elinear 3y ago

MKBHD in his review mentioned a very odd instance of overheating, seemingly random and unrelated to any stressful workload. Anecdotal evidence points to iOS bugs. https://youtu.be/cBpGq-vDr2Y?si=B0Tv1iRcd6Iran6B&t=669 https://youtu.be/cBpGq-vDr2Y?si=B0Tv1iRcd6Iran6B&t=669

instagib 3y ago

There’s a couple clarifications I’d like. Case or no case? A case keeps the heat in more. Max settings on games with no fps cap? Optimized charging off? Limit frame rate off? Brightness level max? Auto brightness off? Background processes on? Notifications on? Reduce motion off? Location services on / precise? Wi-Fi/bluetooth/air drop on? Standard set of social apps installed with games logged in, apps in the app switcher not closed, and email accounts set for push notifications? I have personally observed my [phone/ipad/old iPhone/old iPad] getting so hot that I got the cannot charge due to temperature message. Updates could have changed as I could not play some of these games for very long and others may have similar complaints. I blanched my iPad case white in some areas due to heating and charging while playing. Here’s my stress testing list: “20 minutes till dawn” minutes “Monster hunter now” “Disney mirrorverse” “Dragon raja” “Genshin impact” “Pathless”

ASalazarMX 3y ago

I can easily overheat an iPhone 14 Pro Max by taking pictures for half an hour. Even opening the camera app and leaving it unlocked the same time is enough to greatly overheat it. I don't know why the camera app is so power hungry, but I've replicated it with different two phones of the same model belonging to different people. It's very annoying if your use your iPhone to take pictures while traveling, because it will be drained by the afternoon, and it's something that didn't happen until the late iOS 16 versions. I haven't tried it in iOS 17 yet.

ProfessorLayton 3y ago
I'm not sure if this is common knowledge, but the phone is essentially taking pictures the entire time the camera app is open. Pressing the shutter button is merely selecting which photo to keep, and adding more post processing. This is done to minimize lag, which is important when trying to capture a moment, but uses a lot of power. My main gripe with this approach has been that this causes the camera app to be incredibly RAM hungry, and my Safari tabs/Apps will reload when switching back to them. My 15 Pro seems a little better thanks to the increased memory, but the issue is still there. Additionally, it's been relatively recently since iPhone captured at resolutions higher than 12MP, so that could explain why this phenomenon has gotten worse recently.

op00to 3y ago

When I sue full 20W charging, my iPhone 14 Pro gets warm, surprisngly so. That's a lot of power going into a small space. My wife's does the same.