My experience with iPhone 3GS [Updated]x3

Month and a half ago I bought white 32GB iPhone 3GS (fw 3.0.1) at t-mobile here in Croatia. Since day one there was a problem with battery life. It just drains too fast with all services and 3G turned off (and even faster when on of course).

For example: Fully charged in the midnight, by the 8AM the indicator still reads 100%. Then after two one minute phone calls and one sent e-mail it drops to 97%. Took couple of photos it is at 94% and one pixel column from the battery indicator is already missing. When you use safari over edge you can literally see that the battery percentage is dropping like 1% in two minutes of use.

This could probably considered normal to some users who don’t have other iphones to compare. Fortunately I have, and my iPhone 2G lasts at least 3x more and the battery indicator will stay full for a whole day with average use. My friend have iPhone 3G and their battery life is completely normal.

After couple of days using it normally I concluded that I need to charge it like 2 times a day which is completely unacceptable. Moreover I still maintain that with mine light usage I shouldn’t be forced to charge it daily.

Then I decided to test the phone against apple’s specifications. So browsing over wifi should last around 9 hours, and movie playback should last around 10 hours. So I’ve turned autolock to off, and navigated Safari to a page which reloads itself every minute. Left it that way for whole night and to my great surprise after 9 hours it still had like 25% charge left. Same with video playback. I’ve put Wrath of Khan and the battery life easily exceeded specifications. That was what puzzled me the most. Then I wanted to test it in real Safari use (just normal browsing) over wifi. 10% lasted barely more than half an hour. That means that the battery would last no more than 5 hours.

Then after couple more days of testing (and restoring as new, restarting, setting up on other computers etc) I returned to the t-com center and filed warranty claim. That was 2 weeks after purchase. A month(!) later they called me to pick up the phone. It was the same one accompanied with a letter that the battery was OK when tested and the software was updated to 3.1. I wasn’t hopeful at all and returned home and the problem was the same. Next day I called customer support and demanded to know what are my options of repair. The operator said to return it twice more (!) for warranty claim because after three times they will give you a new one. I of course refused because I didn’t want to be without iPhone for 3+ months (and I have to pay for it anyway) and demanded to know what other options there are. The only other option was to write a complaint to t-mobile. Which I did and sent it by e-mail and normal post office, but certified way. That was 4 days ago so I’m still waiting for the official reply. As advised on the Croatian consumer protection web page I demanded a brand new iPhone or servicing the defective one (I know that you get refurbished one) but on the condition that I get replacement 3G or 3GS (which I didn’t get when filing a warranty claim, only some htc/mda/WM crap which I refused). As the final option I requested an immediate termination of contract without paying early termination fee.

So what to conclude from this experience? This just affirms my suspicions that Apple doesn’t test iPhones after production or in other words their QA falls on the backs of users which is a huge problem for consumers in a country like Croatia where warranty claims are always a nightmare to go through.

Other resources:

Huge thread about the issue at Apple support forums (dunno why it is called “support” because Apple doesn’t read it).

Big thread at mackorisnik.com (in croatian language only) about almost non-existent, evasive, and blame-the-user servicing support at t-mobile croatia.

You can see my previous posts like this here, here, here and here. 

Update 24/10/2009:

Received a response to my complaint: t-mobile will sent my (short) claims of battery life to Apple to probably decide what to do. This doesn’t spell too good of a news, because Apple can simply say that the battery life is ok (and they are keen to say it judging from the apple support group linked above) and t-mobile will just shrug and basically tell me: “sue us”. Another problem is that the whole process is taking too long a time so I can press on with my demands regardless of the negative outcome. Anyways, we’ll see what will Apple respond.

Update 8/12/2009:

The response I got was to go to the nearest t-mobile center and ask for my phone to be serviced once again if I want to get a new one. Translated that means just another servicing. To be quite honest, that wasn’t the answer I was expecting. So I went there expecting to cancel the contract and demand money-back because they certainly didn’t have replacement iphones. But I was wrong as you might suspect. When I got there it is always the usual stuff. Long tirade of what’s the problem with the phone, and it all ends with the “helpdesk” guys legendary sentence: “we can send your iphone for servicing”. Then I foolishly agreed, but only if they give me iphone as a temporary replacement. (This is the part where I made a mistake. I should have asked for contract termination right away, but no matter, lets continue with what happened next.) They declined of course saying, and I kid you not, that the only phone to get as a replacement is some MDA crap. That was totally expected because I heard the same story (and was foolishly completely convinced by it) two times before. But this time I made a right choice and said that in that case I want contract termination. Believe or not, all of the sudden they somehow did have an iphone as a temporary replacement. Then I made some quick thinking (which in my case never had a good record) and decided to take it and give my iphone to servicing. The guy made a report and even though I clearly described the problem, the only thing the guy wrote on the report was: “Battery is empty in less then 24h under minimal use.” In retrospective, I shouldn’t have signed it and the reason is simple. I bet that those morons at the service center don’t test mobile phones for more than 10 minutes. And in that time you won’t notice the huge battery drain I was experiencing. I should have added a note for those service morons to call me when they get to my iphone. Then I asked if they should attach my mail correspondence with the customer support I had, but no, the guy said that wasn’t needed because those service guys have all the necessary data. Of course they don’t have any of it and they don’t have any interest in those. Then I realized that I was duped so hard by that a$$#ole in customer support because the correspondence lasted more than a month and I got exactly nothing out of it. In any case, I grabbed the replacement iphone 3g and went about my business.

I was a bit anxious about the battery performance with the temporary replacement but that was quickly dispelled. Even though the phone was new, and the battery wasn’t fully formed the battery lasted like 4 times as much then on my iphone 3gs. For example, my 3gs would indicate around 50-60% battery charge left by 5 PM (10h standby – charged overnight). But with replacement 3G, and with around same usage, I would have full battery indicator in the evening (24h standby) and the next day in the morning I would have only 1 pixel row missing from the battery indicator, and by the end of the next day I would still have more than 60% of battery left. Then I would charge it or sometimes I even used it for the third day without problem. I have tested this extensively because I have the replacement for almost two weeks now. So I’m kinda glad that I got this 3G for a replacement because they have almost identical battery lifetime specs (3gs has slightly better though) and I was a little afraid that I would have the same problem as I had with 3gs.

So what to expect when I get a call to from t-mobile?

Case 1: 3GS replaced. Win situation.

Case 2: 3GS not replaced, there is “no problem with the phone”. I’ll print out comparative screenshots (I have those aplenty) and 3G vs 3GS battery specifications and layout them in front of them. If they don’t give me a new 3GS I’ll terminate the contract, and demand my money back. Win situation.

As always, I’ll keep you posted on any news.

Btw, I got myself employed, so I got an extra incentive to post more (no more exams hanging above my head). But the trouble is, when employed, I don’t travel at all, and don’t have much money to spend on new hardware (and consequentially to review) or something else.

http://bayimg.com/JagdGAaCL (I’ll link the same image from another source as soon as I figure out how to bypass bloggers too aggressive image compression)

Notice that the picture is showing phone usage with all services off and 3G off. There are two exceptions though, but those are turned on just before taking the screenshot. On some pictures you may notice some relatively high usage time, but that is due to music playback. That shouldn’t drain battery much so I included those screenshots too.

Update 2/2/2010

Ok, my iPhone 3GS was replaced by a refurbished one a little more than one month ago. For couple of weeks the battery life was the same or even a little worse than my original GS. But around 2 weeks ago things suddenly went better and better which is quite unexpected. Now the phone spends around 20% per day with some use. So I use it for full 3 days and on the evening of the third day I put it to recharge with around 40% battery remaining. I’m not sure what’s the cause because I haven’t changed anything but there is a slight possibility that keeping closed all safari tabs can reduce the battery drain. I haven’t tested with always opened tabs (after I noticed battery life improving), but I’ll try it in the coming days.

Same day update:

Apple released 3.1.3 patch addressing (after 3 moths, no less!) the problem with the “battery indicator” on 3GS models. I hope it will fix my problem (not as much pronounced anymore in the recent weeks anyway) too.

Apple headphones suck build quality wise - part 2, final conclusions

Note: This is a followup to my previous post about the low quality of the apple iphone and/or ipod headphones.

Just look at those awful headphones (why yes, I know that photo suck, but you can thank nokia for crappy ccds). These are iphone's and they are almost 1 year old. They completely disintegrated few days ago. Trouble started when the rubber rings around the the earpieces fell apart. Then around two months later, the rubber around male connector fell apart too because the iphone's female connector is a hair smaller than the headphone's male piece. At the same time the wire at the connector was chipped. I had to fix it with carefully applied electrical tape, but that worked only for a short while - right earbud stopped working. The wire snapped inside the microphone piece.

So with this day, I threw away two apple earphones, which were around 1 year old. The third pair lost the rubber around the earpieces months ago even though it was in the drawer all the time and never used! I have to stress that the headphones were always handled appropriately so the last one to blame about the quality of the earphones is me.

Am I Just Unlucky Or There Is No QA These Days? [Status update]

What is common to my Razer Tarantula keyboard, Citizen Aqualand Eco-Drive Titanium, Apple iPhone, Sony-Ericsson W910i, Lenovo L220x, and finally MSI Wind u100?

Firstly they are expensive and secondly and most importantly they all have manufacturing problems.

So what what's the problem with each and any of them?

1. Razer Tarantula: from day one some of the keys, some of the time, when pressed produce two characters. Eg. pressing M key once, you can get "mm". I didn't pay much attention first few days to that, I thought that as this was a pretty "special" keyboard, I had to "run in" the keys. Problem was, the problem was getting even worse with time. Then I made a mistake. I didn't return the keyboard straight away, but I just took out my previous keyboard and continued to type on it. Few months have passed until I returned the keyboard, and as I expected, trying to get something repaired/replaced under warranty in Croatia is extremely difficult and unpleasant experience. Ok so I returned it, guy there said that he never heard about that problem and that he is going to send it to their larger center to service it. At least two weeks passed and the same guy gave me a call to get my keyboard in the shop. He told me over the phone that the keyboard was found to be "working normally" and I had to pay for their working hours from my pocket. I almost exploded over the phone, but kept my calms. Returned to the shop, and some other guy told me to come back 4 hours later because their repair man hasn't come yet. Great, returned 4 hours later and told the guy that I cannot accept the keyboard back because I still claim that the keyboard is not functioning properly. You wouldn't believe how far those "repair" guys go to try to persuade you that it is your problem, and the keyboard is working fine. So lets see his line of argument and my responses.

Repairman: As the keyboard was tested by their professionals and deemed "working normally", I have to pay for their fees and take the keyboard back.
Me: The keyboard is still not working properly and I can prove it by plugging it to a nearest computer and testing it.
R: Very well, but I tested it this morning and it was "ok".
(the keyboard was installed in windows, guy runs a notepad and starts to mash buttons)
R: See, its ok.
Me: Not really, when I press for example M and Q lightly I get two chars like this.
R: I can't reproduce it. You have to press keys like this (guy pressed really hard every key), not lightly. When you type you have to press keys hard. It is a difference when typing. [and your typing style is wrong and keyboard is ok]
Me: I'm typing for the last 20 years, I typed on like 10 personal and hundreds of other keyboards and I never seen this problem. So it is not a matter of a "typing style".
R: Ah, but I now remembered you have to turn down the the keyboard delay in control panel. [guy turns repeat delay all the way down]. See, now you try!
Me: The problem is still the same. (this is even more pronounced now because on a normal keyboard this should be impossible)
R: [guy tries another you-are-doing-it-wrong-routine]
Me: It is not a "typing style" problem.
R: Ok, ok, I'll send it again to our tech guys.
Me: And what will happen if they don't find anything (as they didn't found it before)?
R: Ok ok. I'll order a new razer tarantula keyboard to the shop and we'll (him and me) compare the new one and the old one. If the new one doesn't have the mentioned problem you can keep it. I'll just give you a call when we get it in a few days.
Me: Fair enough. See you in a few days.

Aftermath: more than 2.5 weeks now passed, and I still didn't get a call. The dialog above was considerably more complicated and included many more "traps". It is an art how to avoid those pitfalls. I'll check the paper which I got first time I went there because after 45 days if they didn't manage to repair my item they have to give me new one. Update: they have less then 15 days not to repair the keyboard or give me the new one (by law). I'm afraid that they probably have some software which reminds them when warranty claims are due to close.

[status update]: Actually, the last sentence didn't came true. In fact more than 45 days passed from the day I returned the keyboard. So according to the Croatian law, I had to be issued a replacement. Let me just get a quick sidenote here. The very same day I went to replace the keyboard and a seagate hard disk (but at a different vendor) which died after 3.5 years of use (god bless 5y warranties). So after 45 days nobody contacted me nor fixed/replaced the hard disk so I went there to get the new one. The guy there just looked at paper I got when I deposited the disk, and without a word started to search for new equivalent disk. As he couldn't find one guy told me that he'll order another one and contact me in 2-3 days. Fair enough, I was done in 5 minutes. And this is hg-spot, probably the worst IT vendor by reputation, so I was really surprized. Then I went to the other shop where which was responsible with servicing my razer tarantula. But as I said 45 days was up and I went there demanding a replacement. Guy there called their servicing department in another city asking about the keyboard. I didn't hear the conversation but he told me that I have to call their servicing department myself. I was starting to get pissed but I called them immediately from the shop.

Let's see how the conversation went:
Guy: Your keyboard is at the razer importer company and I should call that company to see what's with it.
Me: Its not my problem where the keyboard is right now, I bought the keyboard from them, not the importer. I would ask you to issue me a new keyboard according to the 45 day clause (which is even written on the receipt)
Guy: But there is a problem because 45 days are still not up because you gave the keyboard for servicing 2 weeks later again (after the keyboard was deemed "ok" the first time).
Me: 45 days passed because when they tried to return the keyboard to me I didn't accept it because I claimed it was still defective (the problem wasn't corrected).
Guy: This is most unusual, I'll call you back when I get some additional info (as in soon-ish).

Guy didn't call for a whole day and the next day I called back. Then he caved in and told me that I'll get a new one. This was all I wanted to hear. I officially "won" then. Then the guy told me that he'll order a new keyboard from the importer and call back when he get any news. Day and a half passed and still no call but I got them now though. So I wasted so much energy with a warranty service claim which I hope I wouldn't need to repeat it in the near future. And finally would you believe this company was famous for their service support.


2. Citizen Aqualand Titanium EcoDrive diver's watch [UPDATED]: Bought it last winter. It seemed all ok, but on this summer it displayed its true colours. When your hand gets moist from sweat (as it happens all the time in the summer), the watch would go into the diving mode, register around 2.5m, return to 0.0m, sound the alarm (for ascending too fast) and do this all the time. Truth be told, the problem was a bit more complicated but I won't bore you with it. Returned it to the citizen dealer in Italy, guy there sent it to Milano for repair.

Update: The watch was returned from the milano factory to the trieste watch dealer. They concluded that watch is working normally (which as we know is load of rubbish). I'm waiting for a friend to pick it up in trieste and bring it back. I'm going to write a letter to Citizen about this problem and demand they repair it. This is completely unacceptable behavior. Having a watch which doesn't work 1/4 of the year is unacceptable. Screwing with a diver who co-owns a diving center is never a good reference because divers like to spread information by word of mouth. And telling all those divers that citizen sucks because they didn't repair a clearly defective watch can get some people turned away from buying another citizen watch.

Another update: I left the watch to the salesman (friend of a friend) in the shop where we bought it to try it out himself (this is the second time) and he promised that he will test it now more thoroughly. Couple of weeks later, guy called and said that the watch was repaired at the factory. Everything inside the watch was being replaced. I got the watch back two days ago (9/12/2008). I'm not sure how shipping+repair+shipping again "less than" giving a new watch though.

3. Apple iPhone: all of this was said in my older blog posts. Just to recap: managed to get two brand new 1st gen 1.1.4 fw iphones, one was ok, the other one had a dead wifi. Apple in *USA* didn't want to service it because it wasn't activated with at&t(wtf?). (I'm especially bitter about this one because I had to involve two people I didn't even know to return the phone to apple in US).

4. Sony Ericsson W910i: Actually this isn't my phone, but my dad's. After a few months of heavy use (phone and sms) the phone developed a problem. When you slide open the phone a bit faster than really slow it turns off. The phone is going to be returned this week.

Update: phone was repaired in a matter of 2 weeks. Quite speedy for Croatia. Working fine.

5. Lenovo L220x lcd display: 22'' 1920x1200px, great reproduction of colours. What more do you need? Sharp characters. All characters and objects are blurry on the bordering pixel with white. Looked on the web in panic, but alas people report that this is "normal". I was thinking of returning it but what would I gain? Nothing really, all panels have this problem. But what did get me angry was that people who tested the first batch of monitors all said that the text was sharp etc. As I bough this monitor around month ago, this surely isn't from the first batch. Then I realized the truth. First batch was good, and then they started to put lower quality parts on later batches. I can't remember what is the name for such a nasty practice unfortunately. There are many reports of other manufacturers doing the same which doesn't surprise me even a bit. They should make this illegal really. I'll review this monitor one boring day and take a macro photo of the pixels to demonstrate the problem.

Sidenote: Previously I had 17'' LG lcd which died 3 months after a 3 year warranty period (talk about planned obsolescence). Then I had (still have) samsung 731BF. Ok monitor, not really good colours though. Then I had samsung 226bw (was borrowed for like a year). Ok monitor, not really good colours unfortunately. But all this monitors (and couple of laptops I had) had extremely clear characters.

Update: I'm not certain that there was a problem with this monitor at all. I turned off ClearType and forced myself to use the monitor for couple of days. After that, probably my brain accustomed to the text I was reading so now characters don't appear blurry or anything else. I'm quite baffled by this though. At first my eyes were literally full of tears when I was looking at this monitor without Cleartype (I prefer it that way).

6. MSI Wind u100: As you may guess from this blog post I updated it to include this subnotebook (not a netbook you twats, every (sub)notebook works "offline" too). So whats the problem? After a few days of use ventilator started to get very noisy. I could clearly hear those winglets rubbing against other plastic (which is very noisy and iritating). So I searched the web for the resolution of the problem and I found that the screws on the back panel aren't screwed good enough so the fan inside is a bit lower than it should be so it starts to scratch (because it is hanging upside down). So the simple method is just to tighten the screws. This is the simplest solution I have ever heard to solve some hardware problem, but it probably was the most potentially expensive one. One of the two screws which are directly responsible for the fan is covered by the "warranty void if removed sticker". I mean great. So I had to make a choice between this options:

1. Tighten the screws voiding the warranty.
2. Send the computer to the dealer (only one in croatia!) and wait for a month to get it back.

Naturally, I did 1. And seconds later the whirring and irritating sound was gone. I was thinking though, as the sticker is very low quality (not a fancy one as you can see on some other general computer components) I might be able to duplicate it if I ever would need a warranty service. I would need to do that if the MSI would have done their part of the bargain in the first place!

Update: It wasn't the problem with the screws. I still haven't discovered what the real problem is (it sounds like those winglets brushing the ventilator case, but upon direct eye observation that doesn't happen) but I did discover how to aleviate the problem. Few small drops of machine oil in the center shaft of the ventilator seems to do the trick. First time I've put only one drop and a week and a half later the sound came back. A month ago at least I've put a few drops more and now it seems like it is working normally. But I'm afraid that it will require some additional oiling in the future.

Update (30/1/2009). The second oiling I did fixed the problem. The ventilator doesn’t scream as it used to, and it is as quiet (but again, not nearly as quiet as a macbook) as the day I bought it.

So what to conclude from all this. I know, plural of anecdote isn't data and maybe I was just "unlucky". But I call BS on this. All things considered, all this items I mentioned before are bought in the last year. So almost everything (computer related) I bought in the last year was defective. Luckely, MSI Wind on which I'm typing this is ok for now (review coming soon). I'm just sick of it all. Manufacturers in the past actually tested the equipment before they shipped it to dealers. Now to cut costs (and maximize the profits) they skipped this step. You and I are testers/consumers. Why would manufacturer waste their resources on testing when they have morons^Hconsumers to do that for them for free? Now that apple's of 0-15 day return policy actually makes sense. Your iphone's wifi isn't working? Here is a new one. And off they send the DOA one to the factory. Screw them all.

update: sony-ericsson mobile changed to 910 from 890. It was a typing mistake.