iPhone 4/iOS 4 bluetooth muffled on other end

Hi - I have this exact same problem. My GF calls me, ******* at me that she can't hear me, then I call her back and all is fine. I can also reproduce this problem sometimes by calling my own voicemail with bluetooth, switching it to speaker phone, then switching it back to bluetooth and it will be muffled. I have a Discovery 925 that worked fine with the 3.x OS's on my old iPhone 3G. This is a deal breaker! Should I just return it and try another one?

I HAVE SAME PROBLEM WITH IPHONE 4 AND PLANTRONICS DISCOVERY 975 . IT WAS GOOD WITH 3GS BUT I PHONE4 IS SO BAD THAT WHEN I CALL , OTHER PARTY DOESNT EVEN HEAR ME AT ALL SOME TIMES VERY LOW AND THEY SAID MY VOICE IS BROKEN ... I HATE THIS NOW , IM RUNNING OUT OF TIME ... I JUST CANT HOLD MY PHONE ANYMORE ... THEY MUST FIX THIS SOME HOW ... AND QUICKLY ....

I have the same problem. I ended by buying a Jawbone Icon. The same issue occurs. This is really annoying and no one is addressing it publicly. This should recieve the same coverage as the antenna problem. I now have a Motorola H15, Voyager Pro, and Jawbone ICON. The only that works pretty consistently is the H15. When is Apple going to respond to this???

Stephane Touya

You guys do realize that the problem ONLY occurs on incoming calls?? That's the exact problem I have... ONLY on incoming calls do I hear complaints from the other end shouting for not being able to hear my voice at all... I have read here some people say that... but we all need to try this to isolate the problem. This may give Apple a better idea as to what might be causing this... Try this please...

Update: I thought the phone got better after that single reboot I did with it, but now the problem is back. Callers continue to complain of muffled voice. It seems to be sporadic though. I tried it twice in the span of 5 minutes and the first time they couldn't hear me and the second time they heard me perfectly. I have a suspicion (also based on what I have read from other's experiences) that there is a bug in the code which causes this issue when the call is transferred from the phone to the handsfree. It happens during both incoming and outgoing calls.
Going to test some more today and I have an appointment at the store tomorrow (wonder why they call it Genius!!) and if nothing gets resolved I have decided to return the phone. I'd rather have an old Sony Ericsson phone that works perfectly than have a phone with lots of whistles and bells but unable to do its most basic function. Hope Apple is listening (most likely not).

There is no way to know for sure at this point if this very real problem will be rooted in HW or SW or possibly an interaction between both. Considering returning your iP4? Be assured that should the ultimate "fix" require Apple to give you another phone, and you have gone past 30 days, *you WILL be given a refurbished one...* People going into the stores and expecting to exchange phones are already receiving refurbed for NEW. Smells kinda funny for a company whose CEO exclaims "we care about our customers".

I attempted to return my new iP4 with this problem to my local store. They said no problem, went in back and came out with another phone packed in a little black box. This phone had physical "dings" in the metal antenna band and was clearly a refurbed unit. I politely refused the phone and requested a refund. I was then told that since I purchased my phone from the Apple website and not a store, I could only get a refund on an Apple gift card. When asked if I could "cash-in" the gift card they said no. When I politely questioned the policy, the "Genius" went away to seek management guidance. Upon his return I was advised that in fact, the store could not issue a refund of any kind to me.

My only recourse was to call Applecare and get a prepaid label to send it back to them. I have since sent the phone back, received my credit, and had my ATT "upgrade eligibility flag" reset (should happen automatically upon return). Don't get me wrong, the iP4 is the best smart phone out there in essence. I will buy another iP4 as soon as Apple comes clean and establishes a fix for the Bluetooth issue. I am praying that this does not turn out to be another iPod BATTERY debacle. Apple was taken to court on a Class Action suit and finally agreed to provide what amounted to a $50 Apple credit or a $25 check to those affected. This resolution took YEARS to materialize...

Ok so if they are still saying they don't know they have a problem they are lying or just stupid... I just up graded to the iPhone 4 from the original iPhone and was very excited because my old phone was slowing down and didn't have enough space. But since getting my new phone I've had to replace it once do to top ear speaker not working. Now with my second phone I'm having trouble with the bluetooth and my jawbone, people on the other end couldn't hear me very well and I kept loosing connection with the phone. Thinking it was my older model jawbone I gave it to my girl friend and bought the newest model. My old jawbone works perfectly with her Blackberry. Still major problems, if the phone is sitting on the counter things are ok, but put it in my pocket and things go down the tubes. Just putting the phone in my front pocket the phone lost connection with the head set, out walking the dog I had to carry the phone in my hand each time I put the phone in any of my pockets my girlfriend said she couldn't hear me over the noise (some sort of electronic audio interference) or the phone would loose contact with the headset completely. I'm afraid this isn't going to be a software fix, I'm afraid it's faulty antennas, I have the bumper and it's not helping with this issue...

As it looks right now Apple saying that there is no problem:

This is the first paragraph of the email I got today from Apple Support:

" As far as from Engineering, I'm not expecting to hear anything back from them in regards to troubleshooting as the case appears to be closed on their end. I apologize if I did not explain that clearly in my previous email. "

The Case is CLOSED, NO SOLUTION, JUST CLOSED.

The Engineering so great that they closing cases in minutes.

Have we thought about maybe bombarding SJobs' inbox? Since he is great at replying one-liner, maybe eventually it will reach the point where he will respond with something meaningful. If not, we will see him on Gizmodo news. Now, that's what I called publicity.

I sent in a tip to Engadget... maybe if other do (took me about a minute of my time) they will reach out to Apple and get some action on it.

I returned my iPhone 4 on Monday and I've been using my iPhone 3GS for a few days now with absolutely no issues on incoming or outgoing calls.

@Rainmat

What's the OS version on your 3GS?

This is so disappointing. I'm about as big an Apple fan as there is, and a stockholder as well. iPhone 4 is such a let down, and is in fact the first Apple product that I have ever been sorry I bought. First the antenna issue and the dropped calls, then the proximity sensor, and now the bluetooth problem. I'm experiencing them all. It's so bad that I've even been looking at BlackBerry. I've always been an early adopter of Apple products, so I understand the risks inherent to that. iPhone 4 has just been a huge disappointment.

@ Jim Kohn

Well, why didn't you pay some 550£ and get the iPhone 4 unlocked from UK, as I did, and only then try figuring out how much comes from the operator and how much from apple? I had not even one drop call over Orange, Europe. But the BT problem gets me crazy...

Message was edited by: Onutz

Message was edited by: Onutz

This is not an iPhone 4 issue. It is a iOS 4 issue. As soon as I updated my 3GS iPhone to iOS4, this problem appeared with my Voyager bluetooth which had been working perfectly for over a year. This problem also appears intermittently on my iPhone 4. It is a software issue with iOS4 and iOS 4.01 not a hardware issue. I find it hard to believe this problem hasn't been given attention on any of the Apple-centric websites.