Anyone else have an iPhone 6 with a defective wifi card?

Meestee wrote:

Has anyone else had this issue? I'm pretty shocked that apple is refusing to repair this issue that is on their end in the form of a defective device. I understand that it is out of warranty but this is a manufacturig issue. these phone cost us $300 plus our old phone. I am not in a position to drop $300+ on a new phone that I feel Apple should be responsible for. I have been searching online for similar issues and have yet to find anything.

Millions of that model have been sold. It's quite likely that someone else has had a problem with their WiFi card.

I think you don't quite understand what a warranty is. It covers any defects or component failures discovered during the warranty period. If the phone had a two year warranty (as it would have if you'd paid for AppleCare+) you'd still be covered. But, if the WiFi card failed after 26 months, it would not be covered. Given that you're now about six months outside of your warranty, I'm not sure why you would expect Apple to cover a problem you didn't even report to them until after the warranty was already over. Are you simply expecting Apple to cover component failure for as long as you own the phone?

Meg St._Clair wrote:

Millions of that model have been sold. It's quite likely that someone else has had a problem with their WiFi card.

I'm sure that no one has ever had a problem with the WiFi card in an iPhone, as there is no WiFi card in an iPhone. WiFi is provided by the same chip that provides BlueTooth, but it's not a card, it's just a radio chip on the main logic board. If BlueTooth works, and WiFi works when near the router, it isn't the chip either; most likely it's a broken antenna connection in the phone.

Lawrence Finch wrote:

Meg St._Clair wrote:

Millions of that model have been sold. It's quite likely that someone else has had a problem with their WiFi card.

I'm sure that no one has ever had a problem with the WiFi card in an iPhone, as there is no WiFi card in an iPhone. WiFi is provided by the same chip that provides BlueTooth, but it's not a card, it's just a radio chip on the main logic board. If BlueTooth works, and WiFi works when near the router, it isn't the chip either; most likely it's a broken antenna connection in the phone.

Excellent clarification, as always. 🙂

Meg St._Clair wrote:

Lawrence Finch wrote:

Meg St._Clair wrote:

Millions of that model have been sold. It's quite likely that someone else has had a problem with their WiFi card.

I'm sure that no one has ever had a problem with the WiFi card in an iPhone, as there is no WiFi card in an iPhone. WiFi is provided by the same chip that provides BlueTooth, but it's not a card, it's just a radio chip on the main logic board. If BlueTooth works, and WiFi works when near the router, it isn't the chip either; most likely it's a broken antenna connection in the phone.

Excellent clarification, as always. 🙂

Or pedantry.

Oh! That's one of my pet peeves! Along with people not understanding the difference between "regimen" and "regime".

Precison on a technical support forum is not, in my book, pedantry.

Great cartoon.

So opt for the out of warranty replacement at $299. It will be cheaper than buying a new phone.

Try a couple of simple tests:

• Try several different networks in different locations. If the problem happens on all of them the problem is the phone (the different locations is really important).
• If the phone works on some networks, but not others, most likely the problem is interference from overloaded WiFi bands. Switch to routers using the 5 GHz band, as it is more immune from interference.
• If the above doesn't resolve the issue, back up the phone, then restore iOS and set up the phone as a new phone. Do not reinstall any apps, do not enable iCloud, don't add any email addresses and test. If this does not resolve the issue it's almost certainly a hardware problem.

If it's hardware you have 3 options: Exchange the phone for $299 with Apple, attempt to repair it yourself (it's a fairly simple repair if it's the antenna) following instructions at http://ifixit.com, or find a reliable independent repairer. Not easy, but possible. The downside of the last 2 options is that you will probably give up the $299 option, as Apple usually will not exchange a phone that has been repaired by someone other than Apple.