Apple's Iphone 3GS overheats
APPLE'S SHINY NEW Iphone 3GS can overheat and discolour its plastic casing.
Complaints about Apple's latest Iphone have started to appear on various blogs and forums. Some sites have run headlines saying the Iphone is "too hot", thus unwittingly providing the fruit themed retailer with a cool advertising slogan.
French site Nowhereelse.com started the stories with a video that shows off a discoloured white Iphone 3GS whose owner says the discolorations came from the device noticeably heating up during use of GPS and 3G wireless.
Heating problems with the Iphone have been around for a while. Most phones tend to warm up a bit during extended use. PC World hack Melissa Perenson seems to think it is nothing to worry about as her T-Mobile G1 also got a bit hot, so nothing to see here move along please. She said that the discolouration only seems to affect white phones and the black ones are much nicer anyway.
Apple fanboys have rushed to defend their favourite toy from even a hint that there might be something wrong with it. One fanboy said, in his "expert" opinion, that the phone's damage was consistent with being placed on something hot, not by an internal component heating up. He said that there is no internal component that forms a loop around the edge of the case.
"One would have to believe that Apple doesn't test their phones. They design them, build them, but never actually used one," the fanboy wrote. Of course Apple tests everything thoroughly and its devices could not possibly get too hot. He thought the whole thing was a hoax as we guess he thought it impossible that Jobs' Mob could have made such a design cock-up.
Our favourite comment from an Apple owner was posted by a guy who stuck his Ipod under his pillow while he slept and woke up in the middle of the night with a burnt ear.
To be fair to Apple, lots of people have been reporting that their smartphones seem to get too warm if you run GPS stuff on them. Although one would have thought that Apple's design genius, which the company is so proud of, would have worked out some way to build the Iphone 3GS so that it didn't run so hot. µ
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Let's see.
Scratching on the original Nano.
Cracking on the Mk1 iPhone.
Cracking on the Macbook.
Discolouration on the Mk3 iPhone.
They really need to get a plastics expert on the team going forward.
Even when left on charger for hours and extensive usage my iPhone 3GS is always cool. I haven't played any games yet so I don't know if this can cause a heat-up. I just think that looks like staining from having the iPhone in a sweaty jeans pocket and some dye has transferred on the back of the iPhone. He should have bought himself a protective case. Even in a case mine does not heat up when using 3G, GPS or WiFi for extended periods. Time will tell though as it always does with these kinds of faults. Apple always comes clean and offer free repairs when they've screwed up. Anyone denying that is a liar. They only time they don't offer a repair is when they have conclusive evidence that it's not a design flaw.
Well, I've got a mac pro 2009 here (a 2700 euro beast), that was stinking so much I had to have it repaired. It gave me headaches.
They said they didn't find anything and when it came back, it didn't stink anymore. Though I don't feel very well working with it because there is still a slight smell or something irritating my nose so I may send it back again.
So I can understand easily there may be problems with Iphone 3GS.
This site is totally against Apple and its products. I not a fan, I use a note with Volista and have a Ipod and a Iphone. I dont like Vista, but it works, I like Ipod/Iphone and it works very well without problems.
Well, I don't, and won't, own any fruity gear, as I'm an engineer and a REAL MAN, so I don't have an opinion on discolored fruity phones or any other fruity products.
I just like making rude comments about fruity fanbois. I also like poking anthills with sticks.
The INQ is not totally against fruity products, the people there just know a scam when they see it. After all, they've been scamming the public for years themselves, pretending to know the IT industry.... (smiles innocently).
Light colored plastics ARE more readily subject to thermal discoloration; also, there is a bias in normal visual acuity that presents as higher sensitivity to color shifts in lighter colors.
But getting back to my original topic, why would anyone NEED such a device? To play games? What, you people don't have real jobs, you're all public sector employees?
I am NOT an Apple fan boy, but I am a computer engineer. For the internal processor to generate heat to discolour the plastic is impossible as the processor would have burnt out before this would happen. What can cause the plastic to discolour is leaving it out in the hot sun too long OR leaving it in a hot car. Most people will set their screen down and leaving it out in the sun will cause this to happen.
I'm a computer engineer too (big deal), but looks like I missed the class when I was supposed to learn advanced plastic chemistry. Or something.
You could have a faulty battery in a few of 1,500,000 units, but the new iPhone doesn't have heat issues.
Only "one" report in 10 days, so sounds like a non-issue.
Why does this remind me so much of the Apple III fiasco?
@dorkbert
The Apple /// ? This isn't related at all.
The AP3 had connection issues between the primary logic and a daughter card, no heat was involved.
This isn't anything but a battery issue in "one" unit.
Hey, perhaps they should make the housing of aluminium and start to justify the high price tag on their toy. ;-)
I use my iPhone 3G, the only time it heats up in a notable way is in a low signal 3G call lasting more than 20 minutes. I've used GPS and 3G att he same time, and it didn't heat up.
I think either it's a single bad batch of iPhones, or some kind of market smearing.
As an iPhone 3G user of several months i put little credibility into this story & it will be fictional to me till apple says something.
- A
And I bet that Nick is typing all of his news on Fruity MAC and hearing music on his Fruity pod... And Fruity products ARE not inferior, Just SUPER OVERPRICE and made for girls (because of the way they look). Ohh god I hope I don’t go to hell for saying that! Ohh please forgive me for my sins Steve God! The Inq made say it lol!
is what we find in most responses to senior farrels scribblings, as indeed we do in the writings themselves
i just don't have the energy to give a shit anymore
I just got my first piece of Apple equipment, a 3GS, to replace my Razor. After letting my daughter play "Cooking Mama Lite" on the thing last night I was surprised at how hot it was.
Currently I have it in a rubber shock-resistant sleeve, and I was wondering if I should take it off to allow more air to circulate around the unit. It seems odd that this should be an issue. I'll be closely following any updates to this.
Like mycelo, I also don't recall learning anything about plastics chemistry in school. I leave that sort of thing to the professional mechanical engineers I work with.
But I do know my geek sites, like this tear-down photo of the iphone 3GS:
http://www.isuppli.com/Asset/Apple%20iPhone%203%20GS%20Exploded%20View.jpg
So let's just apply some simply deductive reasoning. The discoloration reported has a consistent shape, it's next to the battery, and its outline corresponds to the outline of the battery.
If being left out in the sun was the problem, you'd see generic discoloration, shadow effects, issues all over the phone - not a consistent pattern.
I'm not a lithium-ion polymer battery expert, but a little research confirms what we all know - they are prone to high temperatures when charging and design/manufacturing defects can exacerbate those issues.
That being said, to conclude that there is an endemic discoloration problem requires broad, systemic evidence, and it's troubling that most of the stories I see on this issue are using the exact same picture.
Well I'm an engineer and a Mac fanatic. I can't possibly believe that Apple would ever have produced any design flaws in any of their product. Apple after all makes perfect products that function perfectly and Steve Jobs is the messiah in human form. It's just a conspiracy perpetrated by Microsoft to make Apple look bad. What else could it be?
Well I'm an engineer and I once carried a flaming Mac out of an office building downstairs to the trash bin hoping to save my co-workers from an exploding battery. As for your fruity messiah's over priced fruity junk being perfect, you need to get a life mate!! Design flaws happen. Someone else listed several of them across several product lines. Best for the Fruits to admit it and move on to fixing the prob than waiting around to blame the fat guy with the glasses in the Mac commercials for your Messiah not taking care of his fruity customers. WOT??
If the battery were the source of the heat, then it would stand to reason that the discoloration would spread from the battery as seen, but that the plastic over the battery (the heat source) would be equally (or more discolored).
Looks to me like the battery was actually a heat sink, keeping the part of the plastic that it contacts cooler than the surrounding parts, and resulting in the nice outline you see.
Whether the heat was generated internally or applied externally is indeterminate.
Gotta love the blind faith of the faithful.
Just because your iPhone doesn't attempt meltdown, it doesn't mean none of them will! Just because your dog doesn't bite you, would you come and play with mine with the same confidence? (hint: He's hungry, and weighs more than I do!)
The faithful are missing a major point... Apple do not make the iPhone. Apple haven't actually made any of there physical products since the days of the Apple II.
Apple outsource everything. The components are sourced from dozens of companies who quote the best price, and put together by other companies who also quoted the best price.
Given the huge initial production run, half of China's battery manufacturing companies probably made batteries for them. Now let's just say in one company was a guy, we'll call him Ooh Fuk... Well Ooh Fuk wasn't paying attention in class and isn't very good at batteries. They're okay. They work for a bit, but his chemical mixing could be better.
Battery problems are not new. They're not even new to Apple. Before that was the capacitor scandal, that haunted us for years, all because someone stole a dodgy electrolyte formulae!
Any fanboy who is still insisting this could never happen is so firmly entombed in the St Jobs reality distortion field he might as well be left to burn/melt.
Any rational Apple fan will admit there is a problem with the new Iphone 3GS.
The iPhone 3GS does have two problems. No question or a significant number of Apple fans are halucinating.....err....I know, I know that is one possible explanation.
I have a new 3GS it does overheat badly on high load applications such as GPS. After 20 mins its too hot to handle. Battery drain is relatively rapid at same time. Its a battery and/or power management problem.
The screen is yellower and gets yellower during use!!
Apple has a history of screwing up on the battery side of things.....looks like they have done it again.
What really sucks is that they must have known this ....again....and went ahead anyway. Thats taking the piss again. But what if they were not aware of it (it looks that way) then Apple shareholders should run for the hills.
In UK there are enough disgruntled customers that O2 management are meeting to discuss how to respond. You can expect long cues at O2/Carphone Warehouse on Friday looking for refunds (in UK we have 14 day cooling off period on iphone contracts and it launched June 19th).
I am an Apple fan…..just. But I sold my Apple stock this morning. I'll buy back in in say about a month :)