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Planetbeing tweet on antenna issue

N

nebo1ss

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Jun 2, 2010
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Interesting Tweet from Planetbeing about the antenna problems.

"Messing with the antenna and watching signal strength notifications directly from baseband. Instant 16-20 dB drop touching magic spot."

He reports seeing a 16-20 dB drop by touching magic spot, he is monitoring this directly in the baseband. For every 3dB dropped you lose half the power. It seems pretty conclusive there is something wrong.
 
nebo1ss said:
Interesting Tweet from Planetbeing about the antenna problems.

"Messing with the antenna and watching signal strength notifications directly from baseband. Instant 16-20 dB drop touching magic spot."

He reports seeing a 16-20 dB drop by touching magic spot, he is monitoring this directly in the baseband. For every 3dB dropped you lose half the power. It seems pretty conclusive there is something wrong.
Click to expand...

Yeah I saw that. He was also looking at what material/thickness between the spot and finger had an effect on it.
 
nebo1ss said:
Interesting Tweet from Planetbeing about the antenna problems.

"Messing with the antenna and watching signal strength notifications directly from baseband. Instant 16-20 dB drop touching magic spot."

He reports seeing a 16-20 dB drop by touching magic spot, he is monitoring this directly in the baseband. For every 3dB dropped you lose half the power. It seems pretty conclusive there is something wrong.
Click to expand...

I agree there is a problem - but viewing the drop in the baseband doesn't prove anything that isn't already stated. Im sure the 'bars' are just a reporting mechanism OF the baseband process that shows signal strength. It's just a numerical output rather than a graphical.
 
Arisian said:
I agree there is a problem - but viewing the drop in the baseband doesn't prove anything that isn't already stated. Im sure the 'bars' are just a reporting mechanism OF the baseband process that shows signal strength. It's just a numerical output rather than a graphical.
Click to expand...

Have to disagree with you there. The baseband will measure the absolute power level received. The phone firmware will interpret this into a graphical display of anything between zero and five bars.
 
nebo1ss said:
Have to disagree with you there. The baseband will measure the absolute power level received. The phone firmware will interpret this into a graphical display of anything between zero and five bars.
Click to expand...

lol - you just repeated exactly what I said.

the problem exists in both places, viewing it the baseband proves nothing that hasnt been stated
 
Applejuiced said:
I wonder if he did any tests with a case on and if he concluded if it does help or solve the issue.
I'd believe him over what press conference Apple puts out tommorow :)
Click to expand...


If you read his tweet he did test with a piece of cloth and also paper. he said the cloth worked and the paper did not.
 
Applejuiced said:
I wonder if he did any tests with a case on and if he concluded if it does help or solve the issue.
I'd believe him over what press conference Apple puts out tommorow :)
Click to expand...

He tried a "fabric" and an apple receipt last time I check twitter lol. The receipt did fare well..
 
TMar said:
He tried a "fabric" and an apple receipt last time I check twitter lol. The receipt did fare well..
Click to expand...

nebo1ss said:
If you read his tweet he did test with a piece of cloth and also paper. he said the cloth worked and the paper did not.
Click to expand...


Interesting. Thanks.
I noticed the same thing since I put my bumper on my i4 just more confirmation that it does make a difference.
 
Arisian said:
lol - you just repeated exactly what I said.

the problem exists in both places, viewing it the baseband proves nothing that hasnt been stated
Click to expand...


No I did not, when you measure absolute power in the baseband in dBm you are looking at a significant drop in received power level when touching the antenna. Apple has acknowledge they display it incorrectly graphically which means the calculations they use to display the bars in the firmware gives an incorrect display. When you drop 20 dB by touching the phone it means if you start off with a signal level of 100 Milliwatts you lose 97 of them by touching the phone and you end up with only 3 milliwatts for the receiver to work with.
 
Arisian said:
lol - you just repeated exactly what I said.

the problem exists in both places, viewing it the baseband proves nothing that hasnt been stated
Click to expand...

The difference is it shows a more real time representation of signal strength. Where the bars go down slowly it actually drops 16-20dB instantly. Knowing that compared to know 5 bars to zero is important because even a 20dB drop shouldn't be enough t drop a call a full strength.
 
nebo1ss said:
No I did not, when you measure absolute power in the baseband in dBm you are looking at a significant drop in received power level when touching the antenna. Apple has acknowledge they display it incorrectly graphically which means the calculations they use to display the bars in the firmware gives an incorrect display. When you drop 20 dB by touching the phone it means if you start off with a signal level of 100 Milliwatts you lose 97 of them by touching the phone and you end up with only 3 milliwatts for the receiver to work with.
Click to expand...

no - apple said the algorithm that calculates the bars, you don't know if that's in the baseband or if thats an issue from the baseband to the bars

The issue Apple mentions could be in the baseband - they never told us exactly where the calculation issue is.

Anyways, the issue shows up in both places - that's all Im saying. Multiple reports have already come out showing these exact numbers - not sure why we are all so shocked.
 
Arisian said:
no - apple said the algorithm that calculates the bars, you don't know if that's in the baseband or if thats an issue from the baseband to the bars

The issue Apple mentions could be in the baseband - they never told us exactly where the calculation issue is.

Anyways, the issue shows up in both places - that's all Im saying. Multiple reports have already come out showing these exact numbers - not sure why we are all so shocked.
Click to expand...

I give up, you obviously do not understand what the baseband is.
 
Arisian said:
no - apple said the algorithm that calculates the bars, you don't know if that's in the baseband or if thats an issue from the baseband to the bars

The issue Apple mentions could be in the baseband - they never told us exactly where the calculation issue is.

Anyways, the issue shows up in both places - that's all Im saying. Multiple reports have already come out showing these exact numbers - not sure why we are all so shocked.
Click to expand...

Actually they said "formula for calculating how many bars of signal strength". It's is reporting it signal strength correctly but not displaying the bar correctly.
 
TMar said:
Actually they said "formula for calculating how many bars of signal strength". It's is reporting it signal strength correctly but not displaying the bar correctly.
Click to expand...

Sure - all I'm saying is that I'm underwhelmed by the news. Also, Apple wouldnt come out and say "We have an issue calculated the baseband power that will be fixed in the next release" - people would be confused. In my opinion, I just feel like it's not entirely that clear - but I'm willing to be wrong.

Either way, I'm not really invested in whichever it is - All I was trying to state was that this is old news and that bars are the numerical output of a baseband issue - issue meaning dropped strength, not 'problem'. We already know this stuff, right

My last comment on this because it's not something I care to be right or wrong about. lol
 
Arisian said:
Sure - all I'm saying is that I'm underwhelmed by the news. Also, Apple wouldnt come out and say "We have an issue calculated the baseband power that will be fixed in the next release" - people would be confused. In my opinion, I just feel like it's not entirely that clear - but I'm willing to be wrong.

Either way, I'm not really invested in whichever it is - All I was trying to state was that this is old news and that bars are the numerical output of a baseband issue - issue meaning dropped strength, not 'problem'. We already know this stuff, right

My last comment on this because it's not something I care to be right or wrong about. lol
Click to expand...

"Upon investigation, we were stunned to find that the formula we use to calculate how many bars of signal strength to display is totally wrong. Our formula, in many instances, mistakenly displays 2 more bars than it should for a given signal strength. For example, we sometimes display 4 bars when we should be displaying as few as 2 bars. Users observing a drop of several bars when they grip their iPhone in a certain way are most likely in an area with very weak signal strength, but they don’t know it because we are erroneously displaying 4 or 5 bars. Their big drop in bars is because their high bars were never real in the first place.

To fix this, we are adopting AT&T’s recently recommended formula for calculating how many bars to display for a given signal strength. The real signal strength remains the same, but the iPhone’s bars will report it far more accurately, providing users a much better indication of the reception they will get in a given area. We are also making bars 1, 2 and 3 a bit taller so they will be easier to see."


I don't see how it get any clearer. Signal strength is reported correctly, bars are not. People are interested in it for the same reason most all phones (including the iphone prior to iOS4) had a field test mode.

If you didn't have any interest I don't see why you would post in the first place. Your disinterest in this doesn't interest us.
 
TMar said:
"Upon investigation, we were stunned to find that the formula we use to calculate how many bars of signal strength to display is totally wrong. Our formula, in many instances, mistakenly displays 2 more bars than it should for a given signal strength. For example, we sometimes display 4 bars when we should be displaying as few as 2 bars. Users observing a drop of several bars when they grip their iPhone in a certain way are most likely in an area with very weak signal strength, but they don’t know it because we are erroneously displaying 4 or 5 bars. Their big drop in bars is because their high bars were never real in the first place.

To fix this, we are adopting AT&T’s recently recommended formula for calculating how many bars to display for a given signal strength. The real signal strength remains the same, but the iPhone’s bars will report it far more accurately, providing users a much better indication of the reception they will get in a given area. We are also making bars 1, 2 and 3 a bit taller so they will be easier to see."


I don't see how it get any clearer. Signal strength is reported correctly, bars are not. People are interested in it for the same reason most all phones (including the iphone prior to iOS4) had a field test mode.

If you didn't have any interest I don't see why you would post in the first place. Your disinterest in this doesn't interest us.
Click to expand...

im obviously wrong.
 
TMar said:
"Upon investigation, we were stunned to find that the formula we use to calculate how many bars of signal strength to display is totally wrong. Our formula, in many instances, mistakenly displays 2 more bars than it should for a given signal strength. For example, we sometimes display 4 bars when we should be displaying as few as 2 bars. Users observing a drop of several bars when they grip their iPhone in a certain way are most likely in an area with very weak signal strength, but they don’t know it because we are erroneously displaying 4 or 5 bars. Their big drop in bars is because their high bars were never real in the first place.

To fix this, we are adopting AT&T’s recently recommended formula for calculating how many bars to display for a given signal strength. The real signal strength remains the same, but the iPhone’s bars will report it far more accurately, providing users a much better indication of the reception they will get in a given area. We are also making bars 1, 2 and 3 a bit taller so they will be easier to see."


I don't see how it get any clearer. Signal strength is reported correctly, bars are not. People are interested in it for the same reason most all phones (including the iphone prior to iOS4) had a field test mode.

If you didn't have any interest I don't see why you would post in the first place. Your disinterest in this doesn't interest us.
Click to expand...

+ 1. Arisian clearly has absolutely no idea what he's talking about.

PS - in case you didn't get it Arisian, you lost this one. Twice.
 
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