The Wide, Wide World of Apple

[BuddhaRhubarb]

The ipad may very well be the new "Newton"

[citizen k]

Apple's Fault, Not AT&T, for iPhone Ills

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Apple's (AAPL) iPhone is a signaling pig.
As the great iPhone/AT&T (T) debate goes round and round, an equipment supplier has pointed the finger at Apple -- not AT&T -- for causing the problems with the iPhone's wireless connections.

Hoping to clear the air -- or perhaps sell more gear -- Nokia Siemens Networks, a joint networking gear venture of Nokia (NOK) and Siemens (SI), says mobile signaling traffic exploded when Apple released the iPhone OS 3.0 on June 18, 2009, according to a note from JPMorgan analyst Rod Hall Wednesday.
iPhone 3GS

Apparently, in an effort to lower power consumption, Apple designed the iPhone to stay in touch with the network through heavy bursts of signaling traffic rather than keep a radio channel open constantly (keeping the channel open drains the battery). The iPhone effectively caused signaling congestion problems like dropped calls and poor connection quality.

Think of it like a railway system and the arrival of fancy new trains. A troubling feature of the new trains is that their radios jam the railroad's signaling system. The tracks aren't congested, but the lights are all glowing red.

If true, the assumption would make Apple's iPhone the culprit in what has been a vexing issue for AT&T, Apple and millions of cranky customers.

This could be a big vindication for AT&T, which has been widely criticized for its network's quality issues. If Nokia Siemens' diagnosis is accurate, it would mean that AT&T's data network isn't in need of great repair and that only a modest signaling upgrade would be needed if Apple decides to stick with its signaling preference.

AT&T declined to comment. Apple wasn't immediately available for comment.

The picture started to come into focus last week. Nokia Siemens CEO Rajeev Suri hinted during a presentation at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona that an unspecified smartphone had a particularly troubling network profile.

Suri told attendees that a certain idle smartphone created as much signaling traffic as 1,000 phone calls a day, according to a story reported by Mobile Europe.

Until now, few industry players had been willing to blame Apple for the problem. And Apple has never explained its role in the signaling flap. In fact, last month, Apple told analysts on its earnings call that AT&T would take the fall and make the fixes.

"AT&T has acknowledged that they are having some issues in a few cities and they have very detailed plans to address these," Apple COO Tim Cook said, according to a transcript on SeekingAlpha. "We have personally reviewed these plans and we have very high confidence that they will make significant progress towards fixing them."

Stepping up so Apple could save face and keep its reputation unblemished may have paid off for AT&T. Ma Bell won an exclusive deal to sell the iPad next month and its exclusive pact with the iPhone may have been extended for its loyalty.

-- Written by Scott Moritz in New Yor

[garbon]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100315/ap_on_hi_te/us_tec_apple_ipad_batteries

Apple says it will replace iPads with dying batteries for about $100.

Apple Inc.'s iPhone and iPad both have sealed-in batteries that owners can't replace themselves. As it does with the iPhone, Apple says it will give people whose iPads have a "diminished ability to hold an electrical charge" an entire new unit. The service will cost $99 plus $6.95 in shipping charges.

[garbon]

Apple's Fault, Not AT&T, for iPhone Ills

Hadn't this already been suggested?

[derspiess]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100315/ap_on_hi_te/us_tec_apple_ipad_batteries

Apple says it will replace iPads with dying batteries for about $100.

Apple Inc.'s iPhone and iPad both have sealed-in batteries that owners can't replace themselves. As it does with the iPhone, Apple says it will give people whose iPads have a "diminished ability to hold an electrical charge" an entire new unit. The service will cost $99 plus $6.95 in shipping charges.

Apple's hatred of user-removable batteries is puzzling.  You better not have any sensitive information on your iPad at any time, lest the battery go dead & you have to send it into Apple without being able to sanitize it.

[MadImmortalMan]

One of the main foci for my fun-investing has been with companies that build/lease cell tower infrastructure.

[Barrister]

Apple's hatred of user-removable batteries is puzzling.  You better not have any sensitive information on your iPad at any time, lest the battery go dead & you have to send it into Apple without being able to sanitize it.

Not so puzzling.  A replacable unit makes it much bulkier.

And even if your battery goes dead you can still plug it in, do what you want to do to wipe it, then send it in.

[garbon]

Also, sounds lame that you can only have one application open at once.

[BuddhaRhubarb]

Thinking about getting a Mini instead of the Imac, as my finances are not as robust as I'd hoped. It'll do what I need, it's just not quite as flashy.

[Barrister]

Also, sounds lame that you can only have one application open at once.

Not exactly.  You can have more than one Apple application going at once.  You can listen to your music from iTunes while you surf the web on Safari, for example.

Many rumors that iPhone OS 4.0 will have more multitasking.  People who have 'jailbroken' their iPhones have created multitasking apps, so there's nothing that physically prevents it.  It's more a design / battery life decision that Apple made.

[garbon]

Not exactly.  You can have more than one Apple application going at once.  You can listen to your music from iTunes while you surf the web on Safari, for example.

http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/01/28/wired.missing.from.ipad/

Multitasking

From the demonstrations at the Jobsnote, it appears that, like the iPhone, we can't run applications in the background. This will annoy many, but it will not matter at all to the target user, who will be using the iPad to browse and consume media. In fact, this user will benefit, as the lack of CPU-cycle-sucking background processes is likely a large part of that ten-hour battery life.

If you are authoring content, like this post, then multiple browser windows, a text editor, a mail client and a photo editor all make sense. If you're reading an ebook, not so much.

What's the point of the iPad if it is just a large format iPhone?

[Barrister]

What's the point of the iPad if it is just a large format iPhone?

Well the size of it opens several new (or different) ways you'd interact with the device.  I wouldn't want to watch a movie on an iPhone, but it becomes possible on an iPad.  Web browsing becomes much simpler, as you don't have to pinch/zoom in order to see anything.  Reading ebooks becomes much more likely.

Of course the large size makes other tasks unlikely.  You can't really stick it in your pocket, so a lot of the ultra-mobile or GPS type applications wouldn't make as much sense.

[garbon]

I realize I'm not the target audience, but $400 for that seems a bit steep.

[derspiess]

Re: watching movies, Apple screwed the pooch by not making the screen 16:9.  You're going to have a lot of wasted space watching movies on a 4:3 screen.

[Barrister]

I realize I'm not the target audience, but $400 for that seems a bit steep.

Can you get something with that size screen and 10 hours batterly life for anywhere near the same price?

It's the typical Apple pricing debate.  You may not think an iPad is worth it to you.  But based on the specs I can't see how it isn't a fair price for what you get.