iPhone 3g Reception Problems

[cash7c3]

How's your reception?

While the iPhone has been a great success in sales during its first month with 3 million unit sold, the 3g phone has been hampered by problems from iTunes activation failing to cracks in the casing.

Add another issue to the list. Service. Many users are reporting issues with connectivity and their 3g iPhones. The an Francisco Chronicle reported the issues of one user. "I was driving down Folsom Street in San Francisco, and I got a dropped call 10 times. I get dropped calls just standing in one place," said Yarbrough, a 34-year-old accountant. "I'm extremely annoyed, but I'm hopeful a software update will fix it."

Mobile carriers of the iPhone 3g have conflicting comments concerning the situation. AT&T Spokesman Mike Siegel summed up AT&T's response that there is no real widespread evidence of an issue. "How a device performs in individual situations depends on circumstances like where you are in the 3G coverage, how close you are to a cell site. Things like terrain and buildings all come into play," Siegel said. "I'm not denying that people are having a less than satisfactory experience, but overall, the phone is doing great."

On the other hand T-Mobile Netherlands is putting blame for the connection issues directly upon the iPhone itself. "The 3G coverage of T-Mobile is as good as the competition, there can therefore not lie. We suspect that it is a hardware / software specific issue of the iPhone itself."

T-Mobiles statement appears to follow the theory speculated by Nomura analyst Richard Windsor in a note to his clients about the iPhone's 3g chipset. Windsor said that “We believe that these issues are typical of an immature chipset and radio protocol stack where we are almost certain Infineon is the 3G supplier"

If the problem does in fact stem from an immature chipset then the issue will most likely not be able to be fixed via a software. This would leave Apple in the awkward position of replacing over 3 million iPhones or not acknowledging any issues to the detriment of its users.

Do you have reception problems? Take our poll at the top of this thread.

[via cnet gigaom cnet cnet some more cnet and so forth]

Update: Fix May be coming

[461am]

Not just reception issues, plain old sim issues. I've been stuck a countless number of times with a 'no sim' sign. Once even inside an apple store, had to borrow a pin from them to take it out and put it back in, at which point it started working again. =/

I'm starting to lose faith, apple.

[jordbrett]

the reception on my phone and my gf's phone is less than sub par. We don't get service on certain floors of the apt building we live in. Yet my old iPhone had service just about everywhere. Even side by side comparisons show the old iPhone had better service.

[joshysquashy]

I live in the UK. I get 3G everywhere in my home town. Elsewhere, its Edge, or occasionally plain old GPRS.

Signal is normally full or one bar down. Sometimes it is low (1 bar), but I can still make and receive calls and have never had one dropped, yet.

I couldn't ask for signal to be better. Does this issue not affect the UK? Does this mean it is a problem with certain operators?

Whatever the issue, I am sure they will fix it, just glad it doesn't affect me!

[jvallesteros]

man, what is going on? hopefully there'll be updates to fix this issue. i'm still rolling with the 2g iphone and it's never seen problems like the 3g has.

[sikdaz]

that's why im sticking with my 2G..

[Ravenus]

Yea, honestly, the 3G is f@$king bogus!! It was a genius ploy to sell a crap load more phones and all they had to do is have a semi working network, so they could say, hey, we have towers, so it works. YEA, WELL YOU KNOW WHAT APPLE??? IT DOES NOT F@#KING WORK!!! I don't even bother turning it on because if I do my calls are guaranteed to drop 20 million times and seriously, how can they even say it's faster? It's a piece of crap. So fix it, or stop saying it's a faster network. I was happier with my first gen phone.

[mwr_allen]

I have a 3G iPhone on O2-UK contract and when I turn on the 3G in settings/general/network, my normal signal drops from 4-5 bars straight down to 1 and sometimes 0.

I took it into an O2 store last week and when I showed him the phone the woman next to him said "why does it say BT Genie as the carrier? this has been hacked" so it gave me great satisfaction to explain the history of O2 to an O2 employee and that O2 used to be called BT Genie up to about 6 years ago, She quickly shut up, ha ha, although my iPhone 3G had actually been pwnd previously

Anyway the guy told me to come back when they have more in stock but this would just be pointless because the issue would be the same.

Can anyone post their comments if they have both an iPhone 3G and also a 3G nokia phone or a blackberry and check what the signal is like in both phones in exactly the same place? that would be interesting.

[05VIII]

Yo! What's up..first post!! Felt like i should take part in this.I don't kno what choice to pick in the poll Cus I get horrible reception in most places when 3g is turned on, but when 3g is turned off I get full bars..no matter where I'm at. Let's start a poll bout lagging and crashing.. My safari has crashed 4 times n completely froze the phone 2 times as I was typing this...YEAAAA!!! Gotta love it!!

[LaZARuZ]

I love my 3G it's great. I have a very nice white screen no cracks and great reception. I know my area don't have full 3G it's has weak spots and I'm in one. I get no bars with 3G turn on and I still can make calls and surf the net np. I live in Fremont ca. I can tell you this apple made the wifi weaker. When I say weaker I mean it won't see lots of wifi signals. Exp. I know I have someone in my block with wifi and I can use it. My 2G iPhone can see it and conect easy but have to go outside but my 3G iPhone can't see it. It's a weak wifi signal but if my 2G can see it why can't my 3G? No big deal for me but something to think about it. Yeah still love my iPhone.

[nickh]

Very disappointed with 3G coverage in Australia, live in the so called 3G zone 1 bar, work in the CBD and 1 bar. 9 times out of 10 i have 3G turned off, just to make or receive a call, wish now i stayed with my first gen.

[tobypu]

I have issues with signal all the time. My wife has a 3G Blackjack on the AT&T network and her phone is constantly getting a better a signal than my 3G iPhone. I would venture to say that its a hardware/software issue and not a network issue.

I also get errors all the time saying that the phone cannot connect to the data network. I have to reboot every time and then it starts working. Annoying!

[sonex]

i live in nz.. have 0 problems with reception. Always on max bars except places where it normally goes down as it did on my old phone. I dont use 3g much but when i do i get 3+ bars which is all i need.

[sobeniceguy2]

I thought I would put my 2 cents worth in on the subject. I live in Miami Beach Fl and I can honestly say my reception is ok. Given that I am in a metropolitan area. It will go from 2-3 bars on 3g network and 3-5 on the edge network on the beach.Wifi is actually better that the 2g phone. The 2g phone reception was about the same with regard to the edge network.

Now when I go to work I get max signal on both networks. Geography and buildings often hinder reception on any phone so I try to keep that in mind.

I did do a side by side comparison edge network was the same at home and at work with both 2g and 3g iphones. So go figure. I have heard of a product called I-Tena that I just purchased online will see if that will improve signal strength. I am not promoting the product but if it works then I will lol. Regardless I guess I am ok with it.

[D.J.C.]

I had signal issues in the past. I took my phone to AT&T and asked for a new SIM and that corrected my problems. My wife has a BB Curve and gets worse reception than I do now. I still do get bad reception in my apartment, But I always have with any phone. As far as people fussing about other issues, I had a lot of problems with lagging and apps shutting down. Keep in mind you are using a hand-held computer, you need to reboot after installing programs. After I installed 2.0.1 my contacts now come up instantly and my keyboard doesn't lag.