Free bumpers might be another option. If they bought enough in bulk the price will be very good.

I certainly wouldn't mind being added to a queue to get a new iPhone.

I would be fairly close to the front of the list anyway as I would be straight down to my nearest shop as soon as I had heard about it.

Free bumpers won't fix the proximity sensor issue, although that could possibly be fixed in software.

If it were a recall and was to be done over time I would not be too upset with waiting if a bumper was offered as an interim. For me at the moment it is not an issue they still have not released any white ones.

Do we actually have numbers for the people that have suffered either or of these problems?

Mark

Nah, it's all anecdotal. However they do claim to have sold 2m of the things, so I think we can assume it's only affected some people rather than everyone, or they wouldn't have been able to bugger about for this long.

::Puts hand up::

Although I've not heard of this proximity sensor problem?! What's all that about?

A very vocal minority? I can't imagine the number being that small, otherwise this will've all blown over by now.

Mark

I know you've had the signal issues, but I was looking for actual overall numbers.
For all we know it could just be a couple of hundred or a thousand or two people experiencing the problem.
While those numbers are still significant, especially if you happen to be one of the affected, would it really be such a big thing for Apple to replace the handsets or provide a free 'bumper' case?
I think not, but the Apple way of handling this 'problem' has been somewhat detrimental to it's public image, and now it needs to call a press conference to address the issues.
This could have been handled so much better and in a much more discreet manner.

Mark

The iPhone (and I assume most other touchscreen phones) has a proximity sensor next the earpiece. When you hold the phone against your head (i.e. when you're using it as a phone) it shuts off the touchscreen so you don't randomly press 'buttons' with your ear while you're talking to someone. The iPhone 4 (or at least some of them) seem to have a problem in that it doesn't work properly and you can do things like launch different applications or even hang the call up with your ear because the prox sensor hasn't worked properly. I've never had the lost signal issue but I have had that on a particularly long call I made - after about 20 minutes I could see the screen come on out of the corner of my eye. Thankfully nothing untoward happened and it's never happened on quick calls. I did wonder if the issue was my arm was getting tired and I was holding the phone away from my head but it seems other people have had problems with it too.

The sensor switches the screen off when next to your ear, but if you move the phone away too far then in comes back on again. If you then bring it back to your ear sometimes the phone does not react fast enough in shutting the screen back down again. A software fix should solve this easily enough. In the meantime it means that iPhone 4 users need to be careful not to wave the phone about too much whilst talking on it.

SOME iPhone 4 owners, because others aren't experiencing any problems at all with their handset.

Mark

How can you stop it waving around when you're dangling it from a bit of string so your hands don't block the signal?

My phone also appears to work fine no matter what I do to it.

Ah you see, drilling the hole in it to fit the string though, that'd invalidate your warranty anyway....


What, including switch it off and take the battery out? To the patent office, forthwith!

I didn't think iPhones had batteries? There's certainly no obvious way to get to it, and it would be rather strange treating it as a non user serviceable item unless it was something rather different in there.