News - A quarter of iPhones fail within two years

[Rob_B]

Are you trying to say the iPhone is an expertly designed lightweight, extremely high performance, highly specific purpose, barely legal device wherein using a scratch-proof screen would throw the laws of physics out the window?

You know what I meant. It uses Gorilla glass, the (seemingly) toughest screen they could within reason, nothing is indestructable (as I understand you inferred) so how do you expect a phone's screen to be?
It is more scratch-RESISTANT than other screens. I suppose for the extra £200 it costs over other phones it should also have a battery that lasts 4months & uses thought recognition so you don't actually have to touch the screen?

Yes I know I'm being sarcastic but you know what I meant & you're expectations are wild especially considering you obviously don't even want to buy one of the things.
I'm not aware of any plastic (ie less likely to shatter) being more scratch resistant than gorilla glass but even if there was I have no idea of the cost implementations of it, it won't be the extra £200 but then again the screen isn't the only component and, of course, this is an Apple product

What do you mean by open? Actually, I did put a 'Invisible Shield' on my 2G iPhone, but I find the texture too thick. If I do end up getting the latest, I would do without, and expect it to be no worse than cheaper phones that I've had in terms of scratch resistance.

Open as in I've taken it apart I must get around to modding the spare back I bought & fitting it

I don't see anyone saying it's worse than any other phones, Apple set expectations too high when announcing the screen (ie 30 times stronger or something?) but it seems that was to do with compression/bending rather than scratch resistance which was pretty stupid of them

[Hicks12]

to be honest i dont think any screens are scratch proof yet and ive yet to get a mark on my HD2 when it had no screen protector on (for 3 months), the iphones screen is meant to be the best at the moment in terms of resistance but we shall never know!.

For the screen protectors, well imo you should certainly invest in it but that is just me as i like to sell on my devices or just look after them. I recommend bestskinsever because its well cheap! about $8 for a full body skin on the HD2 and many other devices, very scratch resistant and easy to apply so bargin!.

On another note, my LG renoir was more reliable than the iphone so does that make me special? Nah, all phones have their flaws so its just the luck of the draw and reliability for the iphone should be similar to most phones, unfortunately a lot of their users include careless chavs which dont treat it with a bit of sense so half of them break!.

[aidanjt]

You know what I meant. It uses Gorilla glass, the (seemingly) toughest screen they could within reason, nothing is indestructable (as I understand you inferred) so how do you expect a phone's screen to be?
It is more scratch-RESISTANT than other screens. I suppose for the extra £200 it costs over other phones it should also have a battery that lasts 4months & uses thought recognition so you don't actually have to touch the screen?

Yes I know I'm being sarcastic but you know what I meant & you're expectations are wild especially considering you obviously don't even want to buy one of the things.
I'm not aware of any plastic (ie less likely to shatter) being more scratch resistant than gorilla glass but even if there was I have no idea of the cost implementations of it, it won't be the extra £200 but then again the screen isn't the only component and, of course, this is an Apple product

Yup, hard as nails.

[joel_spencer]

I figure if you spend that much on a phone then you should be careful and buying a small leather case protects it, 10 quid spent on top of 700 is hardly significant. Just seems people expect to be able to treat their belongings like crap and still be covered, guess it's how you treat belongings, some with lots of money don't care.

[aidanjt]

I figure if you spend that much on a phone then you should be careful and buying a small leather case protects it, 10 quid spent on top of 700 is hardly significant. Just seems people expect to be able to treat their belongings like crap and still be covered, guess it's how you treat belongings, some with lots of money don't care.

There's a difference between treating your belongings like crap, and a product not being fit for purpose.

[12GaugeShotty]

But wait I thought iPhone's "just work" because they are made by Apple? Are you trying to tell me this isn't the case? *shock horror*

They actually have high failure numbers. All Apple products do. But if you keep lying to people and sell them on that Apple logo (as well as charge them an insane premium cost) then they will keep buying it.

[Unique]

I must have a vivid imagination then (imaginary friends) Cheap dig at iPhone users aside (course, I care about being 'trendy', just look at the labels I wear - oh, wait), my 2G bought on clearance over 2 years ago, still work fine within the limitations of the phone. I've had more problematic phones.

i thought someone else might have noticed and point it out, but i was being particularly twisted and ironic and sarcastic, suggesting that those who have to spend hundreds of quid and line for hours each year to get the latest model that's just a wee bit better than the perfectly fine one they already have are the sad ones

and i had my original 2g iphone since just after launch, and it was and still is perfectly fine, but i have now upgraded to the new one after lining up for a couple of hours (and tbh time passed quickly and pleasantly with good chat and free pastries and juices etc, and a nice sunny morning). i've also been promised £150 for my old one which i'm getting today, so only £60 to upgrade from a 3 year old model to the latest. pretty good deal as far as i'm concerned. i get 3g, a much better camera, gprs, flash of the non adobe variety, and twice as much flash memory for music and stuff. ok, most of that was available with the 3g and 3gs phones, but ironically it was cheaper to upgrade to the latest one than get one of the older models that would have been fine for me. i tend to keep my new phones hidden so people don't want to touch and play with them like i've jumped back in time to the victorian days with a mobile phone. seriously, that's how some people tend to act when you have the latest version straight away

oh, and back on topic. my new iphone failed on day one, but i was lucky to get a replacement on day two. i didn't have the same problems everyone else has mentioned, mine just got stuck in recovery mode and couldn't restore on 3 pcs and a mac. i had no problems with the first 2g one though

[Rob_B]

Yup, hard as nails.

If you want a phone that will be guaranteed to survive being dropped then buy Sonim's model (which still isn't indestructable anyway )

No phone on the general market today, regardless of price, is indestructable/scratch proof.

[aidanjt]

If you want a phone that will be guaranteed to survive being dropped then buy Sonim's model (which still isn't indestructable anyway )

No phone on the general market today, regardless of price, is indestructable/scratch proof.

It doesn't need to be 100% indestructible or impossible to scratch. It just needs to not explode, burst into flames, get scratched up to hell just by sticking it in your pocket, have the signal attenuate and die when you hold it to your ear, utterly destroyed when dropped from 3 feet, die within 5 years of purchase, have a user serviceable battery, and so forth... You can get all those things from a £100 phone, is that really too much to ask from £700 one?

[Rob_B]

I don't understand why you're directing those claims specifically at Apple though?
Would any current smartphone with probably a large, fragile screen survive? Considering the enormous user base & the high visibility of it the iPhone is always going to be picked out when some idiot drops it then complains that it broke, phones break when you drop them, survival should be the exception not the rule when dropping a fragile electircla device from 3 foot onto god knows what material.

Phones exploding, if I recall correctly it was never widespread & fizzled out when the news couldn't find any more cases of it?...unlike laptop charges/other electrical bursting into flames, Nokia batteries were exploding a few years ago remember?

ALL models of phone break if you drop them sometimes, ALL die sooner or later & I've not seen any evidence of iPhones dying quicker than others, ALL get scratched - the gorilla glass makes it harder but there is no perfect material out there (within reason) to use in place of it just yet.

The signal issue is a major cockup & is shocking, Apple will hopefully pay big time for that, you seem to have made your mind up long ago though?..

25.6% of iPhone owners experienced a failure in the first two years of use. 18.1% reported a failure from accidental damage, while the remaining 7.5% reported a hardware malfunction,

So it's not a quarter of phones failing, it's 7.5% within 2 years. What are the figures for other phones? Without that data you can't say the iPhone is better/worse can you? Don't forget the iPhone also has a significantly larger user base than any other model.

[TooNice]

i've also been promised £150 for my old one which i'm getting today

Wow, who did you sell it to?
That's not even £20 barely less than what I paid mine 2 years ago!

[Unique]

Wow, who did you sell it to?
That's not even £20 barely less than what I paid mine 2 years ago!

i sold it today to a local store like cash convertors. old 2g model, it had a fair few surface scuffs on the back, nothing deep, but i had the box and everything else in mint/excellent condition, and i officially unlocked it and wiped/reset everything on it. i said CEX offered £145 on the website but i wanted £150 and as they had no iphones in the store they gave me it. no hassle at all. i got the cash in my hand today, £150, no fees or postage or hassle, no ebay fees, no comebacks. the new phone was £209 so i've only had to fork out £60 to upgrade, so you can imagine how chuffed i am

i think CEX dropped the prices offered in the last week, but i didn't recheck and neither did the place i sold it to, i think i got lucky selling it now, before prices drop, and whilst iphone mania is high and people are interested in them

[aidanjt]

I don't understand why you're directing those claims specifically at Apple though?

I'm implying no such thing, neither directly nor indirectly, the topic is about the iPhone's absurd failure rates. Why are you knee-jerk leaping to Apple's defence when their shoddy broken 'engineering' is indefensible?

[TooNice]

^ How do you draw that conclusion based on that article? 'Absurd' would be draw make any conclusion without comparison to similar product on the market. I'd have no problem questioning Apple's engineering if the report states that 24% of iPhone fail from accidental damage, 13% from normal use within two years, whereas a HTC/Blackberry/Xperia fail 15%/5% (accident/normal use) in that period of time. However, the report does not provide the smallest hint of that, so all we have now is your word (and other people who had their iPhone dead/killed) versus those who have a functioning device in two years. Hardly meaningful. Ironically, here is conclusion of the report:

As we have seen before, Apple has created one of the most reliable smart phones on the market, especially considering how the typical cell phone sees more use and abuse than any other consumer electronic item. While the 3GS model shows evidence of fewer touchscreen problems than the previous iPhone generation, we will keep a close eye on failure rates to see if the new construction of the iPhone 4 results in a higher rate of accidental damage.

Again, the report fails to provide the comparative data required to support their own conclusion (or the opposite), but if we are sticking to what it says, then there is nothing absurd about the iPhone's failure rate. Or if it is for you, then perhaps the majority of smartphones have an absurd reliability, and it would be best to avoid them all.

[Rob_B]

I'm implying no such thing, neither directly nor indirectly, the topic is about the iPhone's absurd failure rates. Why are you knee-jerk leaping to Apple's defence when their shoddy broken 'engineering' is indefensible?

Fair point, but there aren't many other £700 phones on the market & how come an extra £200 suddenly means it has to be scratch proof/etc hence my comments

Oh & as I said & TooNice just said, we don't know if the failure rate is high or not, if anything the actual report states it is one of the most reliable.