Report: Software fix in the works for iPhone 3G

Apple is said to be planning a software fix for the iPhone 3G's reception problems.

(Credit: Apple)

The issues plaguing the iPhone 3G are indeed related to a chip inside the phone, according to a new report, but the solution could be easier than expected.

Business Week is reporting that, according to its sources, Infineon's chip inside the iPhone 3G is the root cause of the reception problems that numerous iPhone 3G owners have reported over the last month. Nomura Securities analyst Richard Windsor first suggested Infineon was to blame in a research note earlier this week.

The good news, however, is that apparently Apple believes it can fix the problems with a software upgrade, according to Business Week. A Swedish researcher who had discovered sensitivity issues in the iPhone 3G's chipset thought the problems would have to be solved through some sort of recall, but Apple and Infineon are said to be testing a software update that could be released perhaps as early as the end of this month.

[08Rabbit]

Awesome.
Good Job on following this issue Mr. Krazit!

[pking13]

Agreed, good to know something is going on with this. Also glad that a recall might possibly be avoided (as an AAPL shareholder).

[nesthakchen]

I hope they could make the fix asap. I also experience bad 3G reception and frequent dropped calls here in Japan.

[mozzor]

About time Apple stepped up and admitted there being a problem.

[lrf2005]

My guess is a nascent driver issue for the Infineon chipset. It would make sense if it's a newer chipset that the drivers for it are not fully stable yet, as in any system. If that's the case, it should be able to be provided to all 3G users via a firmware update that has little impact to the OS.

[Krupin2]

Does this mean Apple has officially commented on the issue or is this rumors?

[Tom Krazit]

Apple has not officially commented or acknowledged anything. Business Week tends to be pretty well-connected, though, so I think the information is a little more reliable than "rumors" generally are.

[ianim8]

will this be a world-wide update? Im not having issues with mine so I hope it doesnt affect me at firmupgrade

[msanto]

Here's my question: a software fix could either be a REAL fix, or it could be a workaround. Which will it be? Does this also mean early adopters will have worse performance than later buyers?

Krupin2: rumors. Apple has not commented, and probably won't until it has a fix, if even then.

[Tom Krazit]

Good question. I think they'd be playing with fire if they tried a simple workaround, I have a feeling an iPhone 2.1 release is around the corner that fixes this and other bugs that weren't addressed in the 2.0.1 update.

[sanjayb]

So will my Ipod Touch get 3G with this update?? :-P

[smilin:)]

Wait wait wait. How can there be a fix? According to Apple there isn't a problem.


I'm sure if there was a security issue they would disclose and fix it though. *snicker*

[Ferny821]

Lmao "will my ipod touch get 3G" that was priceless.

[dhaval001]

However arrogant you might be due to your success, everyone incl Mr Jobs should think there is the ultimate boundry and that is the world is made of only human beings which can never be 100% and somewhere someone can make mistake.

Apple joins long list of companies who don't accept the mistake up front and come up with stupid excuses and then are forced to admit it later on. Talk about Microsoft abusing the power of monopoly.

Dhaval

[Vegaman_Dan]

They may not be able to acknowledge the issue. The moment they do, they open themselves up to a lawsuit. Right now they can claim plausible deniability. They aren't aware of any problems. Everything you hear in the news is purely speculative. But if they acknowledge there may be a problem, then they have to take action immediately or face a class action lawsuit for the millions of units sold that are known to be defective (each and every single unit sold). That's a very very dangerous path to walk, so I can understand why they are being very quiet and careful about this until they can determine what the proper course of action will be.

[ejeon1989]

How's a software update going to fix the fact that a piece of hardware might be faulty? I'm just curious on that.

[Douglas W. Goodall]

It sounds lie what we have here is digital code that controls an analog section. They may have it set up so that if the signal isn't high enough, the phone doesn't use it. Adjusting the software to be more forgiving might keep it from dropping the call on purpose, but if the signal is marginal, the connection might drop a moment later anyway. If the problem is that the chip doesn't meet the spec in regards to our cell towers, that will be really bad. Apple might be able to compensate by upping the transmitter power, but that might use more power and the battery would run down faster. The phone is a balancing act of battery power, transmitter power, antenna efficiency and standards compliance. It is hard to test all real world conditions in a lab, but a good beta program should have exposed this trouble early. So would have expensive radio frequency analysers, if they used them. Some computer people build marginal hardware, and if it boots doc to the command prompt, they say it is ok and ship it. Some people use logic analysers and say the wave forms are exactly right for the specification, and use that to determine if things are working. Beta users may have said, "Gee I made a call and it worked!!".

[oneoclock]

I can't comment on the Infineon chip in particular, but in general, the bulk of code in device driver software is more often than not code to work around hardware glitches in the devices they drive. This is a phenomenon found across technologies and across operating systems.

[Seaspray0]

Same question as ejeon1989. But I guess it depends on where the fault is and if the hardware is updateable. If the problem is in the digital code and the chip is "flashable", then it could be fixed like a bios update to a motherboard. Or... is this some kind of "workaround" like what they did to the hubble telescope, i.e. enhance the reception via software but the hardware is still POS until they finally could replace the faulty components on a later repair mission.

[sachman1]

Lets hope it's indeed a software problem and not an issue with the hardware itself (i.e chipset)

http://tinyurl.com/5vog9y

[aristotle_dude]

Why is Richard Windsor being taken seriously when he was discredited already visa vie his previous claims that the touch screens on iPhones used a chemical that was wearing out?

http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/20070810/iphone-deadspot/

[a1016neo1]

Dude... Take a look at the date of the article! Aug. 10th, 2007!!!!!!!!!

[joetesta70]

GOOGLE "G1" PHONE DUE IN SEPTEMBER AND FOR $150

It's open, it's cool and it's all Google, baby! unlike the iPhone.

[oneoclock]

you are mistaken, android is not open, in fact many developers have left the project or are now sitting on the fence because google has all these restrictions and only a select few have been given access to the code.

[IowaNinersFan]

Of course it's not Apple's fault. It never is. Apple "just works" out of the box.

The problem lies with the chip manufacturer or the plastic maker.

A $200 brick that can't live up to its hype. Typical Apple crap. Like an "Apple", once it's rotten, there is no fix for it.

[CaptainJackHarkness]

It won't be a Google phone. Its a T-Mobile HTC running Google's Android OS.

[Vegaman_Dan]

Shouldn't the iPhone just work out of the box? Why does this equipment require multiple OS updates to make it meet the minimum requirements of a cell phone- ie to make and receive calls reliably? I'm really surprised that these problems showed up immediately once it was released but didn't show up in any testing before its release. Nobody knows what sort of testing they did, but I would hope they did more than just in Cupertino.

IPhone 1st gen: Success.

iPhone 2nd gen: Embarassing

Hopefully this will be the last update that will be required to get the units working reliably. Apple certainly wouldn't want to have a recall. If this turns out to be a chipset problem, then they won't really have a choice in the matter- you can't change out the chipset on a surface mount system board, so a recall would be necessary. That's millions of handsets that would have to be replaced and a publicicity nightmare of which I'm not sure the iPhone could recover from. It could be the Edsel of cell phones. I really hope the update will avoid this potential issue.

Apple can't really talk publically about the problem though. The moment they acknowledge publically there could be a problem, then they open themselves up to class action lawsuits with no defense and they simply do not want to open that door. I can fully understand why they have to keep quiet about the issue.