Issue with Proximity Sensor during calls - Continued v2

revmort wrote:
At that point, very frustrated and angry, I gave up and asked for a full refund, which another store employee gave me promptly.

So, I'll be spending the next few weeks, carefully researching other smartphones for the first time...thinking about the Sprint 4G (they have good coverage in Dallas). Suggestions anyone?

Congradulations. You saved yourself a world of **** and pain that some muppets here seem to just love putting themselves through. I would honestly stick with your 3GS. By all accounts the handset works fine on 3.1.2 and there (currently) is no reason to believe that 4.1 will resolve the speed issue the 3GS had with the multi-tasking platform. Eitherway, it's a solid handset, and if you can get yourself into the early part of next year, the odds seem high that either a new handset will be on coming out, or at the very least, the rumor mill will have had enough info to be able to predict when the next model will be out. You should also have the optiion of Windows7 Mobile by then, and it will have been through its early adoptor testing too.

I would avoid Android. If you don't know why, you need to do some serious research. It's reaching dead duck ststus and it can't adapt to the future. It also has major implementation flaws which run contrary to small handheld devices. If you've been used to the pawer and efficiency of the iOS, you will not find that in an Android phone. You will likely struggle for a year and then return to iPhone. Better to back W7M if you are so inclined. It currently has the potential to be a game changer.

Besides, if some fantasies do come true, and a software fix sorts out the issue, you can always buy back in when the forums confirm the issue is solved for sure. There seems to be very few other genuine faults of any great concern.

EBSkater wrote:

revmort wrote:
Thanks, elusivelattice. The challenge for me now is, with no iP4 software upgrade and solution in sight

Where do you get off saying that? Apple responded that this will be fixed. They have been made aware of it, and it should be fixed, within the next two updates (rumored that it will be dealt with in 4.1, but may not be till 4.1.x).

It amazes me how deluded this guy is.
Fisrt it was going to be fixed in the next update (Apple even said so), and 4.0.1 came and fixed FA. The you idiots kept spouting, 'oh, that was a quick fix and it'll be fixed in the next update', and 4.0.2 was released and it fixed FA. Then you said, 'oh, but the big new magifix is still to come and it'll be out before the end of September, and barring one pretender, it appears to fix FA. And now this idiot is saying, 'oh, but wait, it will deffinatelythen get fixed in 4.1.x'. Do you realise how ignorant and naive you realy are? It is sad, but this is the sort of desperation a lot of people here are feeling. You are perfect customers. Ones that will put up with any piece of cr@p so long as it has a logo on it.

Asa asa wrote:

mbassoc2003 wrote:
@Michael - No. Ive tested about 20 handsets. Two of my own, two owned by PC World employees, a few in my local Apple store, some in local shops run by carriers, and maybe a dozen owned by friends and colleagues.

I haven't been able to reproduce the PS sensor problem at all. I have been able to do the mirror test. I have been able to get my phone lighting up my face, but I cannot manage to get my cheek or my ear to activate the controls on the screen. Clearly the sensors are not operating in the manner you'd expect them to, but I cannot create a fault.

The way you perceive the proximity sensor issue is when the phone lights up there is no fault. However, one of the reasons why there is a proximity sensor installed in the phone is to prevent the screen from lighting up. Proximity sensor works in a way that it turns off the display when place it in your ear or cheek.
You can compare this issue to a dead pixel that is on a screen. Some people will let it go since it does not bother or disturb them but some people find this unacceptable and defective.

Absolutely spot on. I agree with you. That is a **** good comparison.

The PS issue is like a dead pixel on the screen. The purpose of the screen is to communicate information to the eye. A dead pixel does not impede that, and some people would let it go. I wouldn't because I hate dead pixels and I would percieve it as a fault.

If I bought a phone with dead pixels, I'd return it and get another one. If I get another one and it looked fine, but within a couple of days it got dead pixels, I'd take it back and rant and get another one. If I was on my fifth phone with dead pixels and everyone said they all have dead pixels, it's just that the resolution is so high that most people either don't notice them or don't care, then I'd be thinking the phone has a cr@p screen and no amount on software anti-aliasing is going to fix the dead pixel issue, and I'd be ditching my phone. I'd put it down to either the company not testing the new technology sufficiently, or the new technology not being developed enough, or them not going with the Amoled screens other phones have. But I wouldn't be believeing is a unicorn coming along with a new visual algorithhm that alters the screen between oposing images so fast the eye cannot see, and hey presto it blurs the pixels together creating a pure and crisp image.

elusivelattice wrote:
Why don't you wait until the software upgrade is released by Apple? You'll find out if the problems have been resolved and if they have, you can purchase the iPhone 4 again. If not, the sprint evo 4g seems like a pretty awesome phone

Because he's not an idiot?

JerryD71 wrote:
I had almost the exact same experience. Now on my 3rd iPhone 4, still the same problems.

Sorry to hear that. Unfortunately they are all the same. For the time being it's a 'can you live with it' issue. The jury is out on whether or not a fix will come. It appears to be a hardware issue and there are conflicting reports about whether a sofware fix will compensate. Some say it does. Some say it doesn't (the 'beta' testers fall into three catagories, those who have access because they work of apps developers, those who have access because they workd for competing manufacturers, and those who are downloading torrents and working on jailbroken handsets).

Either way the jury is out but the overwhelming consensus is that it is a hardware issue with a possible software recalibration or workaround to come. The only piece of honest and accurate advice I can offer is, if you have the issue and can't live with it like that forever, make sure you return your phone for a refund before your 30 days are up. Your 30 days rens from when you got your first phone, not when you got your last replacement. You can always buy back in and get another iP4 once the problems is fixed. Just don't get trapped by letting your 30 day period laps purely on the hope that the software is going to fix the problem.

Nothing idiotic about the suggestion to wait and see if there is a software fix.

The guy liked the phone - if it didn't have the problem. He returned it before the deadline, as he should.

He is now trying to decide what to do next. He has a 3G which works, but slow with the new OS. I don't know if his problem with speed is the same as mine, but while I would certainly like more speed, it works. The main speed issue being how long some apps take to load, but once in the app, I'm satisfied.

So, in my case - which matches the situation being dealt with - I find it far smarter to wait and see what happens for the following reasons:

1. I don't want to get stuck with some other phone for 18 months.

2. I don't want to lose the use of the many apps I bought (or, as an alternative, have to carry around both the 3G as an itouch plus a phone).

3. There is not just the question of a possible fix being worth waiting for on the iphone 4, but even if that isn't coming, there is also supposed to be a fix for the speed on the 3G. Okay, no guarantees, but certainly a reasonable option to wait for awhile and see rather than got locked into something else for 18 months!

For myself, I'm willing to use the 3G until next year if necessary. That might not be good enough for the other poster, but the simple point here is that there is nothing "idiotic" about waiting for a possible fix or even a whole new version of the phone.

In short, don't post crap inferring others are idiots.

dbk9999 wrote:
Nothing idiotic about the suggestion to wait and see if there is a software fix.

The guy liked the phone - if it didn't have the problem. He returned it before the deadline, as he should.

He is now trying to decide what to do next. He has a 3G which works, but slow with the new OS. I don't know if his problem with speed is the same as mine, but while I would certainly like more speed, it works. The main speed issue being how long some apps take to load, but once in the app, I'm satisfied.

So, in my case - which matches the situation being dealt with - I find it far smarter to wait and see what happens for the following reasons:

1. I don't want to get stuck with some other phone for 18 months.

2. I don't want to lose the use of the many apps I bought (or, as an alternative, have to carry around both the 3G as an itouch plus a phone).

3. There is not just the question of a possible fix being worth waiting for on the iphone 4, but even if that isn't coming, there is also supposed to be a fix for the speed on the 3G. Okay, no guarantees, but certainly a reasonable option to wait for awhile and see rather than got locked into something else for 18 months!

For myself, I'm willing to use the 3G until next year if necessary. That might not be good enough for the other poster, but the simple point here is that there is nothing "idiotic" about waiting for a possible fix or even a whole new version of the phone.

In short, don't post crap inferring others are idiots.

The question is why apple still selling the iphone 4? If the fix is going to take some time, they should stop selling, and fix it before they continue.

But that wasn't the question I was answering!

As for your question, they are selling it whether we think they should or not. So I pretty much don't get involved in that. I'll evaluate my opinion of Apple after this plays out further which, for me, probably means waiting until 4.1.

Meanwhile, yeah, it ticks me off, but for all I know they know they can fix it but there are lots of complications to deal with. I do wish they would actually say something, but we all know that just isn't what Apple does.

I got my first iPhone 4 (32GB) last week. Had no end of problems - proximity sensor issues galore, then phone kept dropping calls, kept getting garbled speech (before the call drop).... eventually "No service" at all. I tried the SIM in my old 3G and it worked fine.

Tried everything, reset all settings, reboot, restore... ended up with a message on the phone saying "phone cannot be restored" (with the "plug into iTunes" screen visible) or something similar.

I returned it for an exchange, and my new phone is absolutely fine. I've even updated to 4.0.2 without issue.

So, I reckon there's a batch of faulty phones out there! Keep returning until you get a good one.

John

Asa asa wrote:
The question is why apple still selling the iphone 4? If the fix is going to take some time, they should stop selling, and fix it before they continue.

No. They are a business and they are in the business of selling phones. You do not stop your business becaus a few people have an issue with the PS sensor. You have a responsibility to the owners of the company to keep on program. Apple has gone from a standing start to grab a hige chunk of the phone market wuith a single product, not a suite of products like it's competitors. It must always be ahead of the game in yterms of both technology and implementation because if loses the lead and becomes just another phone manufacturer, the fact that they only have one product will kill them.

PC World magazine 8/23:

Toward the end of the "antennagate" press conference, Steve Jobs quickly glossed over a reported issue with the proximity sensor and mentioned in passing that Apple was looking into it for a future software update. Well, the proximity sensor is actually a more serious problem for the iPhone 4 than the antenna issue and many iPhone 4 users have been anxiously waiting for that update.

The proximity sensor is supposed to determine when the iPhone 4 is in a call and close to your face, and disable the display so that you don't press the touchscreen with your cheek while you talk. However, the iPhone 4 proximity sensor is flaky and fickle--resulting in random beeps as numbers are pressed, muting calls, putting calls on speakerphone, initiating Facetime video chats, or dropping calls and starting new calls to some other contact stored in the iPhone 4.

Talking on an iPhone 4 with the proximity sensor issue is like playing Russian roulette with your call--you never really know what will happen. The reason this is a bigger issue for business professionals than the antenna issue is because the antenna issue has mitigations available to minimize or eliminate the problem. It is possible to hold the phone differently, or to use some sort of case to reduce the effect of the attenuation, but there is no magic bumper or new way to hold the phone that solves the proximity sensor issue--unless you just do all of your calls on speakerphone so the iPhone 4 doesn't touch your face.

Apple has already released iOS 4.0.1 which addressed some mythical problem with the way signal bars are calculated, uncovered by Apple while investigating "antennagate". Then there was iOS 4.0.2 which patched a serious security flaw in iOS used to jailbreak Apple devices by simply visiting a Web site.

However, neither of those updates addressed the fundamental issues that plague many iPhone 4 users. Apple has not officially stated that iOS 4.1 will fix the proximity sensor issue--but Apple has a problem admitting that its devices have a problem at all, so officially fixing it is out of the question. AppleInsider reports, though, that "time spent with the latest beta build shows a marked improvement" in the proximity sensor functionality.

Keep your fingers crossed that the third time's a charm. If the rumor is true, two months, three updates, and a rubber bumper later the iPhone 4 will finally be able to live up to its potential as a cutting-edge smartphone.

Thanks for posting. Well, that's a good sign in that a mainstream magazine has run an article concentrating on the issue (instead of adding a tagline in passing) and identifying the fact that this is potentially a far greater 'issue' than any bluetooth or antenna issue.

The gist of it (implied) seems to be that it is an issue that affects some phones. I wonder if they have tested the issue or just assembled the article off of data collected from online posts. It would be good to see a real expose on this issue with tested corroberated data. That would be a real scoop.

mbassoc2003 wrote:
Thanks for posting. Well, that's a good sign in that a mainstream magazine has run an article concentrating on the issue (instead of adding a tagline in passing) and identifying the fact that this is potentially a far greater 'issue' than any bluetooth or antenna issue.

The gist of it (implied) seems to be that it is an issue that affects some phones. I wonder if they have tested the issue or just assembled the article off of data collected from online posts. It would be good to see a real expose on this issue with tested corroberated data. That would be a real scoop.

...patience young jedi, the story is still unfolding

Apple is going to find it nigh impossible to avoid making a statement about a fix, or or some other sop for those affected, prior to the mid september(?) conference showcasing new product.

Wall street still has that $175m 'bumper set aside' provision lending weight to investor concerns. There'll be more than a little disquiet in the market if aapl has to accede to an indefinite continuation of the bumper giveaway.

Now mix in a little pressure from the flurry of tablet offerings from other manufacturers, the upcoming announcements of hot new android product and the outstanding growth in market share of the android platform. and, as bystanders we can expect to see all the makings of a seriously good bun fight in September.

All the cream in the west country won't make rotten fruit taste good 😉

I've read the same report about four times in an hour. Seems to be on the back of something AppleInsider posted with most news outlets and websites rehashing the saem thing second hand.

You gotta feel sorry for all the third party retailers who bought boxloads of Apple bumpers and other cases and now find that their stock is next to worthless on the back of the free case program. Bumpers are going for about $5 on eBay in black and I imagine everyone and their mother has signed up for their freebie of one case or other. So the third party buyers who bought in a boxes of run of the mill cases at launch have made really big blunders.

If you all loved the Droid so much you would not spend so many hours in this forum crying about a phone that is without a doubt the best phone in the market. If it were so flawed you would have moved on. But no, instead you want the Ip4 with all its imperfections and demand that Apple provides you with updates on how it is "fixing" an issue that most of us have yet to experience....