New iPhone 4S unresponsive, requiring a hard reset on several occasions

Looks like a common problem. Normally a hard reset (holding both Sleep/Wake and Home button) for 30 sec will work but after a few weeks, it is totally unresponsive.

This is the 16 GB White iPhone 4S and the software is a restore from an older iPhone 3GS.

I will proceeed to call Apple Care for this issue.

The only thing that can be done is to replace the phone - it's a hardware problem.

My early 4s would do the same thing occasionally with the panic.plist note in the dianostics log. It's a hardware issue and nothing can be done but to replace the phone. Apparently, a few of the first phones had an issue with defective circuit boards (or so the store tech mentioned).

I did a backup last week, took it into the Apple Store (make an appt online first - the stores are nuts right now; or call Applecare and arrange for a replacement via post). The tech checked the log and said right away he was swapping to a new (not refurbished) phone. Got me on the road in about 10 minutes, went home and did a restore from backup. It did ask to update ios 5 to ios 5.0.1 which I accepted. Took about a half hour or so to reload all my stuff and had to reset some passwords (mail accts, phone lock, voice mail). All is good now. Battery seems to last longer too, although I felt the 5.1 upgrade on my original 4s alleviated most of that issue for me. In any case, no more panic crashes.

If you are getting the panic.plist notation in your 4s diagnostices log, get in now and get it replaced. No amount of hoping, wishing or futzing around with the phone apps or settings will solve a bad circuit board.

Apple customer service is a breeze. Got my replacement today. Hope this problem doesn't persist.

I'm on my 3rd iPhone 4s, all with different problems. The volume up button got stuck on the first one, camera didn't work(crazy blue screen) on the 2nd one, and this third one has the same low memory panic.plist going to sleep and only being able to be woken up by a hard reset. Does it about once a day. I took it to the store last night expecting to get a 4th phone, but instead the Genius told me that I need to close out all my apps that are running often because of the 4s's battery problems that apple is still working on to fix. I figured the apps don't need to be force closed in the dock and that they close automatically if the phone needs the memory, like on Lion. I'll see how it goes. Hasn't happened today yet.

I have had an iPhone 4S 16GB for 12 days. This is my very first Apple purchase.

In the first week, the battery was draining very quickly. That was fixed by following the recommendation in another thread here on the msg boards (reset, drain battery to 0%, recharge for 10-12 hours)

This morning, I took the phone off the charger at 7:00 a.m., put the phone in my purse and headed out the door.

At 11:00 a.m. I took the phone out of my purse to make a phone call and the screen was black and none of the buttons did anything. I connected it to the charger via a wall outlet, nothing happened.

I came here and found this thread. I just did the hard reset (thank you - I didn't know about that) and the phone is now back on, but the battery is at 27% !!!!

I am not happy. A brand new phone out of the box - no restores from anything - just a new Apple customer.

In 12 days, I have had a fast draining battery issue and now this. I am not happy.

The only thing that I have on my phone that I wouldn't want to lose is my contacts. I have no clue how to back those up. I guess I have to go to iTunes and figure it out. I'm not low tech, but I'm not high tech either, so hopefully it will be easy to do.

Have I mentioned that I'm not happy ????? I am beyond frustrated.......and don't know what to do. go to the so-called Genius Bar, call Apple? (I have Apple Care...no idea whether it is Apple Care or Apple Care+ - I didn't know there were 2 plans)

any help would be greatly appreciated by this grandma....

Do you use iCloud? That will sync your contacs for you. If you have the 4s, then you have applecare+, the iPhone 4s is the first apple product to have an applecare+ plan instead of just applecare. I would either go to an apple retail store or call apple. And good luck!

Thanks Kevin. I don't use iCloud. I haven't gotten that far in the User Guide yet :-)

I just connected my phone to the computer, opened iTunes and was able to back up my contacts to my Yahoo email account. So that's done....

now for the phone problem..

I'm not encouraged by others' stories of their varied success/failure at the Genius Bar......

Just happened on my 2 week old IPhone 4S 2 this morning. Phone is 16GB with AT&T. Did the hard restart and now working. One item for mine is I just set up parts of ICloud to sync with it. I have now turned all ICloud off and will see it problem returns.

I got mine from Best Buy and will have to deal with them soon if problem returns.

Update: After backing up my contacts yesterday afternoon, I called Apple Tech Support. The woman had me do a factory reset through iTunes and set it up as a new phone. She said to charge it overnight, try it for 24 hours and if I had further problems to call back.

I can't believe that that will "fix" anything. I had my phone set to very basic settings as a new time user and I had iCloud and Wifi turned off. Only a couple of weather apps ... so not much going on. Location Services is on, Siri is on, but Lift to Speak is off, mail is set to fetch every 30 minutes..... nothing fancy.

We shall see..... I charged it overnight and just took it off the charger at 7:00 a.m. east coast time. It is at 100% and working fine. But it was yesterday also, so that doesn't mean anything...

at least now I know about the hard reset procedure :-)

snagitseven wrote:

The only thing that can be done is to replace the phone - it's a hardware problem.

My early 4s would do the same thing occasionally with the panic.plist note in the dianostics log. It's a hardware issue and nothing can be done but to replace the phone. Apparently, a few of the first phones had an issue with defective circuit boards (or so the store tech mentioned).

I did a backup last week, took it into the Apple Store (make an appt online first - the stores are nuts right now; or call Applecare and arrange for a replacement via post). The tech checked the log and said right away he was swapping to a new (not refurbished) phone. Got me on the road in about 10 minutes, went home and did a restore from backup. It did ask to update ios 5 to ios 5.0.1 which I accepted. Took about a half hour or so to reload all my stuff and had to reset some passwords (mail accts, phone lock, voice mail). All is good now. Battery seems to last longer too, although I felt the 5.1 upgrade on my original 4s alleviated most of that issue for me. In any case, no more panic crashes.

If you are getting the panic.plist notation in your 4s diagnostices log, get in now and get it replaced. No amount of hoping, wishing or futzing around with the phone apps or settings will solve a bad circuit board.

How do I get to the diagnostics log to see if I have a panic.plist notation?

Detailed instructions please..... thank you.

Go to settings app > select general > select about >(scroll down to) diagnostics & usage > select diagnostics & usage data

Thanks Kevin !!!

I'll take a look.....

I have the panic.plist notation twice this morning. Phone seems to be working okay though.

but... I now have the fast draining battery issue again... sigh

What does the panic.plist notation mean? in simple terms.... lol

The name sure is not reassuring....

A full software re-install has fixed mine. I then set it up as a new phone, not from a back-up.

A pain for sure, but it hasn't had a problem in over a month now (down from 2 a day!)

My son and I both have 16gig phones and his locked up yesterday, and mine was frozen this morning.

The hard reboot worked and so far it has only happened once for each of us. He is blind and really depends on this phone and Siri.