Can't get this.

I've now had the best prat of a month with my iPhone 4. I've heard all the 'antennagate' moans, but I just don't get it.... or rather I do when it comes to a signal.

As an example, last week I was on holiday in Santorini. It's a spectaculour place, but the landscape in Thira, the main town, makes for bad reception. Apparently, there was one cell tower for the island that resides next to the monastery on the highest point. My iPhone rarely failed me. In the hotel, I struggled to get a signal in the hotel room. One step outside and no problem despite no line of sight with that hill. The hotel owner was amazed that my phone worked at all (his didn't unless on the top floor). My friend's HTC something or other couldn't get a signal if he walked halfway up the hill. Indeed, even in line of sight it seemed to struggle. All of this on the same network.

At home, I never fail to have a signal outside of the usual 'on a train' type scenarios.

Anyone else had similar experiences?

I'm waiting for the white model but have been playing with a colleagues iPhone 4 at work. One thing I noticed straight away was the reception - way ahead of my 3G and it even gets a strong and stable connection to BT Openzone hotspots which my 3G doesn't see at all. I can't reproduce the death grip either, neither can he so I assume the signal must be strong enough for it to have no effect.

In reply to a post by Desmond:

I've now had the best prat of a month with my iPhone 4. I've heard all the 'antennagate' moans, but I just don't get it.... or rather I do when it comes to a signal.

As an example, last week I was on holiday in Santorini. It's a spectaculour place, but the landscape in Thira, the main town, makes for bad reception. Apparently, there was one cell tower for the island that resides next to the monastery on the highest point. My iPhone rarely failed me. In the hotel, I struggled to get a signal in the hotel room. One step outside and no problem despite no line of sight with that hill. The hotel owner was amazed that my phone worked at all (his didn't unless on the top floor). My friend's HTC something or other couldn't get a signal if he walked halfway up the hill. Indeed, even in line of sight it seemed to struggle. All of this on the same network.

At home, I never fail to have a signal outside of the usual 'on a train' type scenarios.

Anyone else had similar experiences?

I have had no problems either before or after buying the surround to protect the edges

I'm glad Apple have shown this story for what it is: Hysteria drummed up by some Apple hating web sites.
On it's way up Apple has unfortunately picked up quite a few enemies and these people have been chomping at the bit to have a go at Apple and they thought they had a good stick to beat them with.
Well they were wrong. If you look at the videos on Apples site of other phones behaving in exactly the same way you can see that this is a common problem with phones and this story has been way over hyped.
http://events.apple.com.edgesuite.net/100716iab73asc...
The vast majority of iphone 4 buyers are very happy indeed with their new phone.
The only fault I can find is that it took a bit too long for Apple to make a statement.

Interesting to hear some real life experiences for the 4 without the usual rabid dribbling. I know you use a lot of different products Des, so you're one of the few people on here that I would trust to be unbiased.

Was it patched to the new version that fixed the signal bar strength displaying incorrectly? When I did a 3GS here, the signal strength went from 4 bars to 1.

What concerned me is Jobs admitting that the 4 dropped one more call per hundred than the 3G/S, which in the area we operate in was a hell of a lot more in comparison to other phones.

What are others experiences with talking to you on the phone? The 3G/S are terrible for audio cutting out or call dropping in average-bad reception areas (again, in comparison to other smart phones), something that the person using the iPhone rarely notices but is fairly obvious to the other caller.

I guess I will have to get one at some point to try it, but the previous models were so bad with reception on the south coast that as a business that relies heavily on mobile technology, they got dumped pretty quickly. Once bitten twice shy and all that (well, more than once actually!!).

Des,
I've not heard of anyone outside US having problems. AT&T do see to get roundly abused for their level of network.

Neither have I had any loss of calls where I wouldn't expect on my other/ previous phones (BB and v old SLVR)


A

p.s. isn't Santorini FAB- would have been a bit hot last week- I went a few Septembers ago and it was pleasantly warm.

It wasn't unpleasantly hot at all (high 20's/Low 30's with a nice breeze). It's a definite go back to place.... if I can find out when there are fewest Americans and Australians

If you remember from my previous posts, I upgraded from the 2G iphone.
I work in an area with bad reception and used to either get no signal or dropped calls. Now I find I can get a signal and so far haven't had any dropped calls.
My only beef is battery life. In order to keep charge over a few days, I've turned off data roaming, 3G and location services. I'm also very on the ball about killing applications in the background. It's a shame there isn't a quick way of doing this rather than having to shut each application down indvidually.
In every other respect I love it though.

I'd also like a way of easily killing background apps. Personally, I don't usually need any of them other than mail doing its thing and (occasionally) TuneIn Radio.

My wished for features for the next iteration of the OS would be being able to totally disable background apps or (better) enable or disable them on a case by case basis and some connectivity being clever enough to only turn itself on if a running app demands it. Otherwise, it stays off. This includes the option of turning 3G off unless I actually launch mail. Another would be a profile or other feature that means I can select what things work in a manner similar to switching users on a Mac or PC. As an example, I'd like to be able to kill my work email between 6pam and 6am on weekdays and 6pm Friday to 6am Monday and totally on a whim. I'm really not interested in being notified of some sad individuals' work related emails arriving at silly hours.

In reply to a post by SamsonUK:

Interesting to hear some real life experiences for the 4 without the usual rabid dribbling. I know you use a lot of different products Des, so you're one of the few people on here that I would trust to be unbiased.

Was it patched to the new version that fixed the signal bar strength displaying incorrectly? When I did a 3GS here, the signal strength went from 4 bars to 1.

What concerned me is Jobs admitting that the 4 dropped one more call per hundred than the 3G/S, which in the area we operate in was a hell of a lot more in comparison to other phones.

What are others experiences with talking to you on the phone? The 3G/S are terrible for audio cutting out or call dropping in average-bad reception areas (again, in comparison to other smart phones), something that the person using the iPhone rarely notices but is fairly obvious to the other caller.

I guess I will have to get one at some point to try it, but the previous models were so bad with reception on the south coast that as a business that relies heavily on mobile technology, they got dumped pretty quickly. Once bitten twice shy and all that (well, more than once actually!!).

I used a Blackberry for about 9 years prior to my iPhone4 but for signals and calls I find the iPhone better and have not had any dropped calls at all. The battery life however is another story - it has to be topped up daily whereas the Blackberry would/could last a week or more sometimes. However I wouldn't want to go back.

Also I have received an email today from Apple advising that they have refunded the cost of my bumper purchased at one of their stores a few weeks back. No request or intervention on my part required at all. Now that is what I call customer service.

If you touch the spot with your hand it does lose signal. It's worse when you're hands are a bit clammy and you're on GPRS with WIFI enabled.

But most of the time when I'm holding the phone my hand doesn't even touch that area.

If you use push email then only RIMs implementation is battery efficient, they have patents on it. Everyone else has to do it differently in a more intensive way.

There's a lot of people who want to see Apple fail. If every iPod owner decides their next phone is an iPhone then there would be a lot of people in trouble.

I am still waiting for my iPhone 4 to get shipped. It'll do so eventually. Lol.

Got an e-mail regarding the Bumper program. Nice one, but, probably get a case that will protect it better, especially the screen.

The 'Invisible-Shield' for my 3Gs has kept it like brand new. Superb case and well worth the money.

In reply to a post by gilesjuk:

There's a lot of people who want to see Apple fail. If every iPod owner decides their next phone is an iPhone then there would be a lot of people in trouble.

Not sure I quite follow. In what way would they be in trouble?

The media hype over the problems with the iPhone4 is as often the case with the media over exagerated.

I thought gilesjuk meant that non-Apple phone makers would be in trouble.

In reply to a post by john2007:

I thought gilesjuk meant that non-Apple phone makers would be in trouble.

ahh I see..........

Although, as Apple are unable to keep up with current demand, perhaps he did mean Apple.