A simple Reliability analysis on the battery component would have let the engineers know of the expected life of the batteries with a certain confidence (usually around 95% confidence). This should have been followed by an accelerated life testing to determine the age. Seems like they didn't do this proper Reliability assessment properly or discovered it after he products were launched (through extended Reliability tests and/or warranty analysis) is that's pretty dumb.
Not everyone uses the battery the same, the issue is not the battery reliability at all ( except for the batch they replaced for the iPhone 6). At least try to read the actual issue.
One can make a fairly good predictive model on the analytical data to predict usage with a fair amount of certainty. Obviously, it isn't a 100% accurate model of the usage pattern, but from a pure reliability engineering standpoint, I'd accept a model that's even 80% accurate to aim for a reliability estimation of the usage.
Their reliability Engineering team needs to be fired for this fiasco. Guess they relied on the vendors assessment of Reliability estimation (and ask any experienced Reliability engineer and he will never accept a MTBF/MTTF number from a vendor and will perform their own analysis and testing). I know this from my current job in medical devices where we are required to predict battery life for lifesaving medical devices that we design.
Just finished reading the letter, and the linked info about Lithium-Ion batteries and how things work, and I think Apple handled that beautifully.
I also think 99% of consumers won't even bother finishing the letter, much less read the information about batteries, because consumers these days are mostly dumb, short-sighted, short-attention-spanned, bafoons who only know now about "Apple being bad and being sued" as fed to them by mainstream media.
And I can GUARANTEE that mainstream media won't even mention a whisper of this explanation or battery tech background, as it won't jive with their pitchfork narrative against Apple, which means the BS stupidity against Apple will continue unabated.
You mean like this trash headline? Pretty much every word is a lie or massive representation. And yes, you're absolutely right about most consumers being morons. But that doesn't stop them from posting hateful screeds on facebook and other social media, giving their passionate "opinion" without bothering to have even a basic understanding of anything.
I can't even think of how Apple could have made a better response, but that won't stop people from shitting on it just because. Apple tried to educate on the actual issue and their motivation for the software tweaks, apologized for not "communicating" better, slashed the price of battery replacement by more than 50%, and promised a software update with battery health info. I can't fathom what would constitute a better response, but I guess some won't accept anything other than Apple announcing it will be giving free iPhones for eternity, or maybe that it has decide to liquidate itself and dissolve the company.
They're only doing this after they got caught, and it still doesn't help users that already changed devices.
So? I love all these titty babies and astroturfers trying to make this a bigger issue. Take your broke asses to the Apple store and get a new battery or F off and buy a shit android device.
So I guess Dodge should give me a one time replacement of brakes, wipers, clutch plates, batteries, and everything else that's a wearable item on my car? Its a fucking wearable item! Why does Apple need to give anyone a onetime exception to replace a battery on an older phone with a lets say it together...wearable item?
Dodge won't put your car into limp mode when it detects any wear item is reaching end of life. If Dodge did what Apple did, and decided to limit your car to 35 MPH if it detects worn brakes, refuses to start if its dark and it detects a bad light, or won't let you put it in 4WD if you haven't changed your diff oil as recommended then you might have an argument.
A simple Reliability analysis on the battery component would have let the engineers know of the expected life of the batteries with a certain confidence (usually around 95% confidence). This should have been followed by an accelerated life testing to determine the age. Seems like they didn't do this proper Reliability assessment properly or discovered it after he products were launched (through extended Reliability tests and/or warranty analysis) is that's pretty dumb.
Not everyone uses the battery the same, the issue is not the battery reliability at all ( except for the batch they replaced for the iPhone 6). At least try to read the actual issue.
My views are based purely from an engineering analysis and product lifecycle management angle. The consumer angle , is different.
I just recycled/repurposed a working 2006 original intel iMac, a working 2009 MBP and an iPhone 5c (I put it on the roof of my car two weeks after I got it and drove off, ugh!).
I currently own an SE (Rose Gold), an ATV (non-4K), AirPods, a 2017 MacBook (Rose Gold), first gen. AppleWatch and a soon to be recycled/repurposed iPad 2.
Never would I think Apple is playing shenanigans trying to make me upgrade a device before its time. I've had so many years of usage out of all of my devices.
I don't want Apple to waste time and resources on legacy devices (like MS does)...I want them to put all the energy into future devices.
Am I wrong? Am I making sense? Comments?
Best.
P.S. 2018 will be an iPhone X (or and upgraded SE?), an iPad Pro (the big one), an LTE AppleWatch, PowerPad, new AirPods/case?, 4K ATV. I may even consider an Apple monitor for my MacBook...sadly, I think I'm done w/ iMacs (as much as I love them) and I think my MB is my last laptop. The future does, indeed seem to be IOS devices.
I said from day one when this first errupted this would be a huge PR problem for Apple. I wasn’t wrong. This is a good step though I agree with Ben Bajarin the $29 battery price should be permanent. Also I’m seeing quite a few posts from people saying their phone was fine with iOS 10 but when they upgraded to iOS 11 it really started to slow down. Seems there’s more issues than just the battery. Hopefully future point releases will fix these issues.
That huge PR problem exists in your wild imagination. No serious engineer talks without getting the results of the tests, benchmarks and other analysis. And Apple is managed by a serious engineer.
Ha, if it only exists in my imagination why did Apple release a statement? Why did they reduce the price of a battery replacement by $50? Why are they adding new features to iOS to give customers more visibility to the health of their battery? This was a huge PR issue that has affected Apple’s reputation and people’s trust in the company. You have have your head in the sand if you think otherwise.
Because it’s easier to spend money to change the narrative than trying to fix rampant misinformation and recall the distorted narrative that’s already out there.
Easier , to accept you did not communicate properly and that some people may feel hurt by this error, and fix the perception issue to what amount as buying the peace. Letting the narrative, no matter how false it is, escalate further, may have damaged the brand which is far more costly.
What’s the false narrative? That they were throttling phones without alerting the user?
Man, you are being obtuse, the fucking "conspiracy" and so called planned fucking obsolescence. You know the one that got a grandstanding shithead in France to wail and moan and half the Android tit suckers to jump and down and sing and repeat with glee the same message.
You do know that fracking throttling without alerting the user occurs ALL THE TIME IN FRACKING PHONES / PCs / LAPTOPS, WATCHES. Thermal throttling under load is hella similar to this huh except it happens right from the start instead of being progressive.
In fact, I kinda assumed throttling in response to battery degradation already was occuring cause that's what I would have done as an engineering decision (I am an engineer).
When it comes to Apple, there is always a clickbait narrative going even if nothing at all is actually wrong, remember "bendgate", "antennagate", whinegate, whatevegate...
I just love to say and repeat: Apple screwed up big time and I told you so! Now they did the right thing, software switch is coming.
I read your message and I see no such thing, its a PR move to preempt clickbait shit, a bit like "AntennaGate" Jobs statement and Apple issuing the bumpers. Perception of wrongness doesn't make them wrong, doesn't mean they've got nothing to fix though. What they're fixing is the perception, not the original decision which was perfectly sound.
The Theory of Obsolescence:
Late 2016:
Samsung’s Note 7 explodes, recalled & withdrawn
Apple plans to avoid such disasters by releasing iOS update that shuts down the iPhone( old iPhones with degraded batteries) in times of peak performance rather than overheating & exploding
Early 2017:
Apple users complain random shut down
Apple releases iOS update that prevents shut down by decreasing the performance of iPhone(with degraded batteries) during peak performance times
Late 2017:
Apple users complain performance differences testing with new batteries
Apple admits slowing down iPhones
Lawsuits against Apple
Today:
Apple apologises by reducing the cost of battery replacement
The whole world accuses Apple of conspiracies
MORAL: Apple punished for learning mistakes from Samsung & taking safety measure for their users
(Samsung officials in jail laughing taking a bite out of an Apple)
Everyone on here that said Apple did nothing wrong, should keep paying $80 for their battery replacements.
Paying $80 bucks after you recharged your battery 800 times is NORMAL unless you think Apple should pay for god damn tires if they sold a car hey logic boy.
So, go away troll, buy a Note 8 or S8 which dies quick and dirty and doesn't come back.
I said from day one when this first errupted this would be a huge PR problem for Apple. I wasn’t wrong. This is a good step though I agree with Ben Bajarin the $29 battery price should be permanent. Also I’m seeing quite a few posts from people saying their phone was fine with iOS 10 but when they upgraded to iOS 11 it really started to slow down. Seems there’s more issues than just the battery. Hopefully future point releases will fix these issues.
That huge PR problem exists in your wild imagination. No serious engineer talks without getting the results of the tests, benchmarks and other analysis. And Apple is managed by a serious engineer.
Ha, if it only exists in my imagination why did Apple release a statement? Why did they reduce the price of a battery replacement by $50? Why are they adding new features to iOS to give customers more visibility to the health of their battery? This was a huge PR issue that has affected Apple’s reputation and people’s trust in the company. You have have your head in the sand if you think otherwise.
Because it’s easier to spend money to change the narrative than trying to fix rampant misinformation and recall the distorted narrative that’s already out there.
Easier , to accept you did not communicate properly and that some people may feel hurt by this error, and fix the perception issue to what amount as buying the peace. Letting the narrative, no matter how false it is, escalate further, may have damaged the brand which is far more costly.
What’s the false narrative? That they were throttling phones without alerting the user?
Man, you are being obtuse, the fucking "conspiracy" and so called planned fucking obsolescence. You know the one that got a grandstanding shithead in France to wail and moan and half the Android tit suckers to jump and down and sing and repeat with glee the same message.
You do know that fracking throttling without alerting the user occurs ALL THE TIME IN FRACKING PHONES / PCs / LAPTOPS, WATCHES. Thermal throttling under load is hella similar to this huh except it happens right from the start instead of being progressive.
In fact, I kinda assumed throttling in response to battery degradation already was occuring cause that's what I would have done as an engineering decision (I am an engineer).
When it comes to Apple, there is always a clickbait narrative going even if nothing at all is actually wrong, remember "bendgate", "antennagate", whinegate, whatevegate...
'Obtuse' is a good word...I get a little nervous when I see "all caps," though.
So I guess Dodge should give me a one time replacement of brakes, wipers, clutch plates, batteries, and everything else that's a wearable item on my car? Its a fucking wearable item! Why does Apple need to give anyone a onetime exception to replace a battery on an older phone with a lets say it together...wearable item?
Dodge won't put your car into limp mode when it detects any wear item is reaching end of life. If Dodge did what Apple did, and decided to limit your car to 35 MPH if it detects worn brakes, refuses to start if its dark and it detects a bad light, or won't let you put it in 4WD if you haven't changed your diff oil as recommended then you might have an argument.
It doesn't react because cars are stuck in the 1800s were they often can't detect these things. Also, It wasn't in limp mode, only the top of the envelope were your phone spends maybe 5% of the time was slower. Running a benchmark is not a typical phone usage; it only reflects peak performance. Funny how you can't help yourself lying to make your "point". This is more like preventing you from going at 75mph, or pulling a big load if your tires are busted. Most people know to look for wear before doing some dumb crap like that, so why can't they do the same thing and go into setting to look for battery wear? They don't cause they expect miracles from Apple and mostly Apple obliges, keeping them away from having to take care of those things.
BTW, even with the peak blunted. its single thread score is still higher than Androids phone WHEN NEW, let alone when they're 2 years old themselves.
A simple Reliability analysis on the battery component would have let the engineers know of the expected life of the batteries with a certain confidence (usually around 95% confidence). This should have been followed by an accelerated life testing to determine the age. Seems like they didn't do this proper Reliability assessment properly or discovered it after he products were launched (through extended Reliability tests and/or warranty analysis) is that's pretty dumb.
Not everyone uses the battery the same, the issue is not the battery reliability at all ( except for the batch they replaced for the iPhone 6). At least try to read the actual issue.
One can make a fairly good predictive model on the analytical data to predict usage with a fair amount of certainty. Obviously, it isn't a 100% accurate model of the usage pattern, but from a pure reliability engineering standpoint, I'd accept a model that's even 80% accurate to aim for a reliability estimation of the usage.
Their reliability Engineering team needs to be fired for this fiasco. Guess they relied on the vendors assessment of Reliability estimation (and ask any experienced Reliability engineer and he will never accept a MTBF/MTTF number from a vendor and will perform their own analysis and testing). I know this from my current job in medical devices where we are required to predict battery life for lifesaving medical devices that we design.
The iPhone is not a medical device. It's..a..PHONE. That means that while Apple certainly has the highest standards for components in the industry, the iPhone is not a pacemaker or other device that lives depend on. And a pacemaker or diabetes pump wearer is required to get a new device well before the battery is subject to failure. (Full disclosure...I work for a very large software company where I deal with pharma, clinical trials and medical devices customers, and my first post-collegiate job in the 80s was working for Apple).
Apple has had three decades of working with battery technology going all the way back to the original lead-acid powered Mac Portable. Few other companies have their experience and expertise. And I'm sure that from the Apple retail stores, they have seen plenty of data through the years from customers who come in complaining that their older iPhone would just drop suddenly when it said it had some battery life left. I've seen it too where my phone would drop under 20% power but then well before it got to 5% the iPhone will abruptly shut down. The only solution at the time was to either get a new phone or replace the battery. Considering that the cost of battery replacement from Apple was close to $100, phone replacement usually was the choice for many. And the natural upgrade cycle helped since there was always a new product to entice the buyer.
But someone in engineering had an idea...what if you tweaked the speed of the CPU to prevent some of the power spikes usually handled with fresh batteries but less so with older, weaker cells? You could make a more reliable battery performance for the user and keep customer out of the Apple stores with questions like this since their phones would be less likely to abruptly shut down. Seemed like a good idea at the time.
But Apple is also a company with a disproportionate number of eyes on even the most minute details of their products and operations. Stuff that no one cares about with their competitors ends up on the national news for Apple (antenna-gate, anyone?). And I'm sure few if any people are actually speed testing a 4 year old Android phone. And yes, the change to speed was noticed. I had a iPhone 6 Plus during this time before my upgrade to the X. And yes, it was certainly slower. But it was a lot more slower due to the increased demands of iOS 11 combined with limited RAM memory (1 GB) then it was by the CPU tweak. And it took until iOS 11.2 for Apple to really get memory management down for tolerable levels in this phone...and this was still with the intentionally slowed CPU. This isn't a new thing...it happens every year with a new version of iOS and people usually complain about the speed of the oldest supported phones...in this case, the 5s and the 6.
Of course, left to their own devices, people come up with all kinds of silly conspiracy theories for why Apple would do this. The easiest (and laziest) is that Apple is trying to herd people into buying new iPhones. Please. Apple already controls the upgrade process with the choices of what iPhones get the iOS upgrade come September. This has become more complicated in recent years since Apple no longer discontinues the previous year's iPhone with the introduction of the new product. Nowadays, the current models (8, X) plus last model years' phone (7) and the year before that (6s) are all being sold side-by-side at different price points. And since Apple usually likes even their discount iPhones to have 2 years of active iOS supported software, that means that phones as old as the 5s are still supported by iOS 11. But the oldest 5s batteries out there in users' hands are 4+ years old. And even the best lithium-ion phone batteries usually are showing significant degradation at the end of year 2.
There are countless things Apple does to their hardware and software that aren't announced. Revisions here, a tweak or bug fix there...it's standard operating procedure. But this one was noticed and not only is there a tech press who jumps on things like this, but also law firms just looking to feast on a small part of Apple's considerable war chest. And what began as just another day in Apple-land has now mushroomed into more PR trouble and legal trouble than the whole thing was worth. And the amount of money Apple gets from battery upgrades right now are probably a rounding error in the revenue calculations. So it made more sense just to offer the people who wanted a new battery to get one inexpensively rather than contribute to Apple's usual expected margins. And it'll make it a lot easier to have these silly lawsuits dismissed and not have money going to lawyers with little if any benefit going to customers.
Everyone on here that said Apple did nothing wrong, should keep paying $80 for their battery replacements.
Paying $80 bucks after you recharged your battery 800 times is NORMAL unless you think Apple should pay for god damn tires if they sold a car hey logic boy.
So, go away troll, buy a Note 8 or S8 which dies quick and dirty and doesn't come back.
Exactly my point, people like you should keep paying $80.
Everyone on here that said Apple did nothing wrong, should keep paying $80 for their battery replacements.
That would certainly be Karma. They can get their new battery after wiping the egg off their face. They can yell at us as much as they want but when you pay $700 or more for a phone you expect a correspondent quality, service, and support. Which is why I found this unacceptable. It’s also why android phones like the Pixel 2 are extremely unacceptable with its long list of problems.
Comments
Their reliability Engineering team needs to be fired for this fiasco. Guess they relied on the vendors assessment of Reliability estimation (and ask any experienced Reliability engineer and he will never accept a MTBF/MTTF number from a vendor and will perform their own analysis and testing). I know this from my current job in medical devices where we are required to predict battery life for lifesaving medical devices that we design.
You mean like this trash headline? Pretty much every word is a lie or massive representation. And yes, you're absolutely right about most consumers being morons. But that doesn't stop them from posting hateful screeds on facebook and other social media, giving their passionate "opinion" without bothering to have even a basic understanding of anything.
I can't even think of how Apple could have made a better response, but that won't stop people from shitting on it just because. Apple tried to educate on the actual issue and their motivation for the software tweaks, apologized for not "communicating" better, slashed the price of battery replacement by more than 50%, and promised a software update with battery health info. I can't fathom what would constitute a better response, but I guess some won't accept anything other than Apple announcing it will be giving free iPhones for eternity, or maybe that it has decide to liquidate itself and dissolve the company.
I just recycled/repurposed a working 2006 original intel iMac, a working 2009 MBP and an iPhone 5c (I put it on the roof of my car two weeks after I got it and drove off, ugh!).
I currently own an SE (Rose Gold), an ATV (non-4K), AirPods, a 2017 MacBook (Rose Gold), first gen. AppleWatch and a soon to be recycled/repurposed iPad 2.
Never would I think Apple is playing shenanigans trying to make me upgrade a device before its time. I've had so many years of usage out of all of my devices.
I don't want Apple to waste time and resources on legacy devices (like MS does)...I want them to put all the energy into future devices.
Am I wrong? Am I making sense? Comments?
Best.
P.S. 2018 will be an iPhone X (or and upgraded SE?), an iPad Pro (the big one), an LTE AppleWatch, PowerPad, new AirPods/case?, 4K ATV. I may even consider an Apple monitor for my MacBook...sadly, I think I'm done w/ iMacs (as much as I love them) and I think my MB is my last laptop. The future does, indeed seem to be IOS devices.
You do know that fracking throttling without alerting the user occurs ALL THE TIME IN FRACKING PHONES / PCs / LAPTOPS, WATCHES.
Thermal throttling under load is hella similar to this huh except it happens right from the start instead of being progressive.
In fact, I kinda assumed throttling in response to battery degradation already was occuring cause that's what I would have done as an engineering decision (I am an engineer).
When it comes to Apple, there is always a clickbait narrative going even if nothing at all is actually wrong, remember "bendgate", "antennagate", whinegate, whatevegate...
Perception of wrongness doesn't make them wrong, doesn't mean they've got nothing to fix though.
What they're fixing is the perception, not the original decision which was perfectly sound.
So, go away troll, buy a Note 8 or S8 which dies quick and dirty and doesn't come back.
Also, It wasn't in limp mode, only the top of the envelope were your phone spends maybe 5% of the time was slower.
Running a benchmark is not a typical phone usage; it only reflects peak performance.
Funny how you can't help yourself lying to make your "point".
This is more like preventing you from going at 75mph, or pulling a big load if your tires are busted.
Most people know to look for wear before doing some dumb crap like that, so why can't they do the same thing and go into setting to look for battery wear?
They don't cause they expect miracles from Apple and mostly Apple obliges, keeping them away from having to take care of those things.
BTW, even with the peak blunted. its single thread score is still higher than Androids phone WHEN NEW, let alone when they're 2 years old themselves.
The iPhone is not a medical device. It's..a..PHONE. That means that while Apple certainly has the highest standards for components in the industry, the iPhone is not a pacemaker or other device that lives depend on. And a pacemaker or diabetes pump wearer is required to get a new device well before the battery is subject to failure. (Full disclosure...I work for a very large software company where I deal with pharma, clinical trials and medical devices customers, and my first post-collegiate job in the 80s was working for Apple).
Apple has had three decades of working with battery technology going all the way back to the original lead-acid powered Mac Portable. Few other companies have their experience and expertise. And I'm sure that from the Apple retail stores, they have seen plenty of data through the years from customers who come in complaining that their older iPhone would just drop suddenly when it said it had some battery life left. I've seen it too where my phone would drop under 20% power but then well before it got to 5% the iPhone will abruptly shut down. The only solution at the time was to either get a new phone or replace the battery. Considering that the cost of battery replacement from Apple was close to $100, phone replacement usually was the choice for many. And the natural upgrade cycle helped since there was always a new product to entice the buyer.
But someone in engineering had an idea...what if you tweaked the speed of the CPU to prevent some of the power spikes usually handled with fresh batteries but less so with older, weaker cells? You could make a more reliable battery performance for the user and keep customer out of the Apple stores with questions like this since their phones would be less likely to abruptly shut down. Seemed like a good idea at the time.
But Apple is also a company with a disproportionate number of eyes on even the most minute details of their products and operations. Stuff that no one cares about with their competitors ends up on the national news for Apple (antenna-gate, anyone?). And I'm sure few if any people are actually speed testing a 4 year old Android phone. And yes, the change to speed was noticed. I had a iPhone 6 Plus during this time before my upgrade to the X. And yes, it was certainly slower. But it was a lot more slower due to the increased demands of iOS 11 combined with limited RAM memory (1 GB) then it was by the CPU tweak. And it took until iOS 11.2 for Apple to really get memory management down for tolerable levels in this phone...and this was still with the intentionally slowed CPU. This isn't a new thing...it happens every year with a new version of iOS and people usually complain about the speed of the oldest supported phones...in this case, the 5s and the 6.
Of course, left to their own devices, people come up with all kinds of silly conspiracy theories for why Apple would do this. The easiest (and laziest) is that Apple is trying to herd people into buying new iPhones. Please. Apple already controls the upgrade process with the choices of what iPhones get the iOS upgrade come September. This has become more complicated in recent years since Apple no longer discontinues the previous year's iPhone with the introduction of the new product. Nowadays, the current models (8, X) plus last model years' phone (7) and the year before that (6s) are all being sold side-by-side at different price points. And since Apple usually likes even their discount iPhones to have 2 years of active iOS supported software, that means that phones as old as the 5s are still supported by iOS 11. But the oldest 5s batteries out there in users' hands are 4+ years old. And even the best lithium-ion phone batteries usually are showing significant degradation at the end of year 2.
There are countless things Apple does to their hardware and software that aren't announced. Revisions here, a tweak or bug fix there...it's standard operating procedure. But this one was noticed and not only is there a tech press who jumps on things like this, but also law firms just looking to feast on a small part of Apple's considerable war chest. And what began as just another day in Apple-land has now mushroomed into more PR trouble and legal trouble than the whole thing was worth. And the amount of money Apple gets from battery upgrades right now are probably a rounding error in the revenue calculations. So it made more sense just to offer the people who wanted a new battery to get one inexpensively rather than contribute to Apple's usual expected margins. And it'll make it a lot easier to have these silly lawsuits dismissed and not have money going to lawyers with little if any benefit going to customers.
Live and learn (again).