Apple becomes SNL punchline over iPhone network coverage - Page 4

Your analogy is off. If I buy a washing machine guess what it is supposed too do........ Wash. If I buy a snow shovel guess what it is supposed to do.......Shovel snow. If I but an iPhone guess what it is supposed to do....... Make phone calls. Guess what it doesnt do.......Make phone calls. I said it before, the iPhone is great, the issue is AT$T but the problem is when you only have one carrier to use that phone on and that carrier SUCKS, guess what, the phone sucks too. I am sure it is great where you live but that does not do anybody in the USA any good and that is what this is about, AT$T and its crappy service in USA. If I move to the UK I will be sure to use your provider.

If I have a car that can only use one gas stations gas and that gas station never has gas my car is junk, rgardless of how awesome it is. AT$T is required in order to use the iPhone in the US, AT$T sucks so the phone sucks with it. I am sure it is great everywhere else, just not where I live and thousands more live.

If AT$T cared at all about its customers, crap like this would not be going on:

http://gizmodo.com/5428717/att-has-s...iphones-launch

They just want your money, have you locked in a contract and do not care. I normally take what I read on the internet with a grain of salt but when it coincides with the complaints of thousands there must be something too it.

Unrealistic? I switched from Verizon in summer 2008. My experience with AT&T has been horrible from day 1. I drop calls every day. EVERY DAY. I drop calls for no reason. I drop calls going from 3G to Edge. I drop calls with 5 bars. I drop calls 3 times in one conversation. Calls don't go through. I would say I have at least 10 drops a week, if not more. It's been like that despite software upgrades. The only thing I've seen in terms of improvement is that 3G speeds in the suburban Philly area seem to be better than they were a year ago. It is definitely the network, too. How do I know? I took a trip to Boston last year. No dropped calls and 3G speeds that seemed about double (subjective, but unmistakable). I even got a service credit for two weeks in August where I could barely make calls at all. As soon as the iPhone comes to Verizon, I'm gone.




You inferred that. No one claimed or implied as much. We are talking about our experiences. Most of us on the board happen to live in the US. Duh.


Three words: It's the network.


A week? I'd be happy with two days. Hell...one day of use would be nice.

Nope.

If you can't start the car, that implies that there is something wrong with the car itself. In terms of the phone/carrier comparison, the dirt track analogy is on the mark. The car isn't the problem. The phone isn't the problem. It's the service on which the phone must run, or the dirt track on which the car must run.

Mechanically, the iPhone is fine. Works fine up here in Canada. So is the same phone a piece of junk in the US but not in Canada? No. The mechanics are the same. The problem lies with your dirt roads vs. our paved racetracks.

The term "piece of junk" that has been used in above posts is used mainly in a pejorative sense as an expression of anger or frustration. There is however, no actual substance to it. AT&T is "a piece of junk", not your phone.



No. See above. Are you using the term "piece of junk" to imply actual mechanical fitness, or to imply that you can't use it as you'd like due to the carrier? Two completely different things. Even in the box, unused, unopened, sitting on the shelf in the store, you can't use the iPhone until you've purchased it. Until your purchase, is it a piece of junk because you can't use it?

The issue is with your definition and usage of the term, "piece of junk." You need to make clear what you mean here, becuase the term "piece of junk" implies exactly that: junk. Something fit for the scrapyard or the garbage bin, due to lack of mechanical fitness, unresolvable mchanical problems, or deterioration due to age, or due to something being wrong with the product itself in terms of quality.

so you're saying since the phone cant perform its primary function, you know call people, its still awesome? thats some messed up logic.

My analogy may be off but your rationale that the iPhone sucks is off too.

You buy the best washing machine in the world. It's fantastic at home. You install a second one in your second vacation house. The main water supply to your vacation house gets cut off that same day.
Now the same fantastic model you have at home now also sucks at the holiday house.

Do you now call up the washing machine manufacturer and tell them their machine sucks, or do you call the water company and tell them to fix the water supply pronto?

Of course, Apple is partly to blame for the exclusivity deal with AT&T, but not the device itself.
I reiterate, the sooner iPhone is available on other carriers in the USA or AT&T improves its network, the better.
What will settle the issue is whether other AT&T subscribers with different 3G handsets experience the same level of dropped calls.

An awesome device on a bad network. Completely logical. It's awesome on Rogers, Telus, Bell, etc. So again, the problem is with the carrier, not the phone.

My rationale is for the average consumer. I know the iPhone is good but the average consumer may not. When you are shoe horned into only one carrier, the two go hand in hand. If Joe Blow is having constant dropped calls with his new shiny iPhone on AT$T but did not on his Razr on AT$T, he will blame the phone, period. The consumer has no recourse since AT$T is the only carrier so the perception is that the iPhone sucks. The average consumer makes up a large percentage of iPhone users, not the tech guys.

We are not talking about those carriers. We are talking about a device that requires a certain carrier. If that carrier is crap, the device is crap. The consumer has no choice to go anywhere else so you cannot ignore that fact. The iPhone and the service go hand in hand in the USA (which is what we are talking about not any other country). The average consumer (which makes up a large majority of iPhone users) will not differentiate between the carrier and the phone. They have crappy service and will blame the full package. Even when the iPhone jumps to other carriers, the techies will jump ship but I will lay money that many will not opt for another iPhone, they just do not realize the difference which leads us back to the topic. The average consumer will see the SNL and say "yes my iPhone sucks and drops calls" They wont say "AT$T is the culprit".

Nope. Again, great device on a bad carrier. The fact that there are no other carriers that have the device is incidental. The device is, obejectively and on its own merits, great. The carrier is the problem.

You're confusing public perception with material fact. The possibility that the average consumer will not/cannot differentiate between phone and carrier means that the consumer is simply unable to differentiate; it's their misreading of the situation. It's perception, not fact. Now in terms of publicity and conusmer opinion, their perceptions (that are not baced on facts) will lead them to dismiss the phone as "crap." It's an inaccurate assessment made by the consumer, but the fact remains that that assessment is what actually matters in terms of sales and market uptake, regardless of how inaccurate it is.

A phone that is mechanically fit cannot be "crap" in one place and not "crap" in another.

But I thought the phone makes the carrier.

Well that is one of his quotes on here.

Im not confusing anything, public perception buys phones, material fact does not. Economics 101. Regardless of the truth, what is perceived will be the driving force of sales, period. Verizon knows it, SNL knows it and AT$T knows it. There is no doubt Apple is selling tons of phones but they see the writing on the wall, AT$T is a sinking ship.

What I find odd is that Ma Bell of Canada has no problems whereas Ma Bell of the US [the older parent] does have problems.

There's a simple reason for that. Number of users. With the first million sales of the original 3G, 600,00 were in the US, where Canada had about 16,000. I'm sure that percentage difference didn't change much with the 3Gs. That's also with three other carriers that carry the iPhone too. The largest data plan for iPhone with Bell in Canada is 3GB a month (most users will be on the 500MB/1GB plans), and it's a LOT more expensive than the US. When you're on a limited plan, you don't use the data network as much because you don't want to get raped by overages.

Do a pure Apples to Apples comparison... oh wait, you can't. The US sold more iPhones than the rest of the world combined (the US have currently about 58% of the iPhone/iPod Touch market). Since iPhones users use more bandwidth (and I'm sure that's in every country), I doubt that many networks in the world could handle that. If you believe that Verizon's network could/can handle it, dream on.

BTW... it seems that AT&T data network is faster after all. People seem to relate technology to speed. Its how the technology is deployed and used, nothing to do with the actual technology.

http://gizmodo.com/5428343/our-2009-...yline=true&s=x

Which is why AT&T has gotten as much play as they have so far. The iPhone put carriers on the map, including AT&T. Lousy carreir or not, consumers have flocked to AT&T to get their hands on an iPhone.

The phone makes the carrier . . . popular and more profitable. Not actually better. Which is why so many carriers are falling all over themselves to get the iPhone.