iPhone 4 grip of death
My initial enthousiasm for the iPhone 4 has faded within a week. Yes, once again Apple has lived up to it’s reputation of delivering bad crappy 1.0 products.
No kidding: as long as I have been following Apple (basically since 2002) they have been delivering their new products with some sort of problem. So it’s no surprise that the beautiful iPhone 4 has problems as well.
For starters the special glass casing (advertised as “…20 times stiffer and 30 times harder than plastic, the glass is ultradurable…”) seems to not nearly as scratch resistant as Steve Jobs wants us to believe. If you look on YouTube you will find many videos of users that scratched up their brand new iPhone within a day. And, more problematic: the glass breaks easy as well: a 1 foot drop (33 centimeters) is enough to do the trick.
Folks: that’s just not acceptable. I have dropped all the phones I have owned so far at least once from 3 feet (standing up) on various surfaces (carpet, wooden floor, tiled floor) and none of them ever expired on me from that.
Epic fail
Then there is the “yellow stain” problem: people report yellow spots or stains on/in the screen. It seems to be some glue or epoxy that has not dried up sufficiently. Apple’s response: “it just needs to dry”.
But the clincher is “the Grip of Death”. iPhone 4 owners started to notice how they lost reception when you hold it by the antenna band. It has been well documented by now and even confirmed by Apple. But what is even more annoying, is their response to the problem.
Steve Jobs himself replied back to a user’s email about the problems, by saying that he should ‘avoid holding the phone in that way’. So what is Apple’s official fix to the problem?
”If you ever experience this on your iPhone 4, avoid gripping it in the lower left corner in a way that covers both sides of the black strip in the metal band, or simply use one of many available cases.”
Are you kidding me? Apple is trying to tell us how we should hold a phone? Excuse me but that is a 100% FAIL for *any* phone. I damn well decide myself how I should hold my phone! I have never *ever* had any mobile phone manufacturer tell me “how to hold my phone”. It’s unheard of. Shame on you Apple!
I bet you anything that the 1.1 version of the iPhone will have a solution for this problem, but too me that’s way too late. Apple should find a fix and do a product recall. Making calls is a primary function of – well – a phone! Come on!
I tell you: the chances of me buying an iPhone 4.0 just dropped by 60%. I think that instead I might buy a Samsung Galaxy S GT-I9000 or HTC Evo 4.
Anyway: are you annoyed with your spanking new iPhone 4 because you suffer from the “grip of death” as well? Here’s a solution for you: just blend you’re iPhone 4 and get it over with!
Update (27-06-2010, 11:50am): Engadget has a funny photo up illustrating the problems 
You can't touch this iPhone 4!
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Before you buy a Samsung Galaxy S you might want to read this one (Dutch website) http://tweakers.net/nieuws/68280/samsung-gebruikt-traag-opslaggeheugen-in-galaxy-s.html
Funny! Your comment came in just when I was reading that article. And that sounds pretty darn annoying as well! Like having a Ferrari but having to drive it with the handbrake on! The truth is off course that every (smart)phone released on todays market has bugs. In fact I think I read somewhere that every phone released in todays market, has an average of about 100 bugs that are not solved when they are launched. Most bugs will not creep up with average users and can be fixed later, but I would not be surprised if that number is getting bigger.
Go figure: the time to market a phone is getting shorter every year. New models are released almost on a weekly basis. The time left to develop a decent OS – and matching hardware – is getting shorter.
Now, off course there are bugs and bugs!
I would rate the speed issue for the Samsung as “annoying” (it will definitely “bug you” when using navigation software and anything that needs caching). But as long as software is loaded in the memory, you will still benefit from the 1ghz processor.
Now, as specifics are trickling in for the iPhone “Grip of death issue”, it seems that this is easily fixable as well: just buy one of the “bumpers” or use a case so you don’t touch the antenna.
But I find it very stupid that Apple did not opt for some coating (as suggested by Anandtech and others).
Also: I find the iPhone 4 aesthetically most pleasing without that bumper! Why waste that with some ugly, colorful, plastic ring?
Long story short: what counts in the end is if the iPhone 4 will drop calls because of the design or not.
And from reading the Anandtech article there seems to be a discrepancy between what the iPhone 4 shows you what your reception is, and what that means. I.e.: it might show no or little bars, but still be able to maintain a signal/call.
Anyway: since the iPhone 4 isn’t available yet in Holland, I’m sure that by the time it is, I’ll have enough information to make up my mind for real.