back to article HTC handsets hit by grip of death

Reports of problems with HTC handsets continue to flood the web, with its flagship One X dogged by various Wi-Fi woes and the One S becoming disorientated when struggling for a data connection. HTC's quad-core powerhouse, the One X, is said to have been struck with its own grip-of-death problem. Users report experiencing …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hmm, Apple viral marketing at work?

    Mines fine...

    I'm guessing they failed in the courts, so it's time to take it to the forums...

    1. jai

      Re: Hmm, Apple viral marketing at work?

      funny that, cos my iPhone was fine last year too, but that didn't stop all the Antards declaring what a major fail it all was.

      what goes around comes around i guess...

    2. Blunderbuss
      Trollface

      Re: Hmm, Apple viral marketing at work?

      @AC Posted Tuesday 12th June 2012 11:33 GMT

      I smell a troll.....

      1. dotslash

        Re: Hmm, Apple viral marketing at work?

        whilst i like a dig at apple as much as the next man/woman/child/troll, I can see this being true. My desire S has the same issue, a wildly recognised issue at that with the wireless signal dropping if you 'hold it wrong' (copyright Steve Jobs)

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Hmm, Apple viral marketing at work?

      No because mine has gone back for this very reason, they said to me over the phone there is a flex issue with some early models. Should have bought the samsung

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

    That is all.....

  3. Anonymous Coward
    1. Code Monkey

      Re: Samsung too

      Oh piss. That's not good news at all. I'll stick with my HTC Desire for now.

      1. Dan 55 Silver badge

        Re: Samsung too

        I've seen similar diagrams in Nokia instruction books but I can't say I've noticed any effect remotely like Antennagate though.

      2. Crofty616

        Re: Samsung too

        Strange thing is, ive found my Desire HD randomly taking screenshots when i turn the screen off and on over the last few months, nice to know im not going crazy, since i dont actually know how to take a screenshot on it in the firstplace...

    2. LosD

      Re: Samsung too

      Wow, that's stupid. I have NEVER seen a phone manual that does not tell the user to stop blocking the antenna.

      This has nothing to do with the grip of death.

  4. Ben 50
    Meh

    How many millions (?) of units have they already shipped?

    Statistically significant?

    Very happy with my One X. Thanks.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    So there's a problem ...

    HTC response "Help us to fix it".

    Apple response "What problem? We see no problem."

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Problem is a lot worse though

      On the iPhone 4 you'd get a dropped call, not the "phone spins out attempting to connect, sending the One S vibrator haywire and disabling various buttons while acting as if others are being repeatedly pressed"

      Think you'll agree this is very hard to ignore...

    2. Snapper
      Thumb Down

      Re: So there's a problem ...

      I think you'll find Apple supplied quite a few free bumpers to sort the problem out.

      Just sayin'

  6. UncleMike987

    HTC - Ridiculous suggestion

    I was having huge problems with my HTC phone (the Desire) including it being unable to receive phonecalls. When I emailed HTC giving details and asking for help, they just replied back saying "as I understand you do not use our device any more. Please do not hesitate to contact us in future if needed."

    Nice.

    But then, a few days later, they rang me. And they suggested that they don't recommend using SIM cards that are more than 12 months old.

    I'm sorry... what ?!

    My SIM card was about 2 years old, but, come on... Are they making this stuff up ?

    Hands up anyone who has renewed their mobile phone contract, and the provider has sent out a new SIM card for exactly the same number ? It just doesn't happen.

    So, who knows, perhaps the HTC One problems are caused by the same ridiculous problem.

    1. Phil W

      Re: HTC - Ridiculous suggestion

      While the suggestion is perhaps a tad silly, it's not unwarranted. It is plausible for the SIM card to have compatibility issues due to it's type/age or simply from worn contacts or similar.

      But it falls into the same category as "have you tried turning it off and on again?" or "have you tried a different charger/battery?" really simple to tests/methods to try and eliminate a problem.

      AFAIK Most networks will usually provide a new SIM for the same number without too much fuss, the new one becoming active once you put it in your phone and the old one then automatically being deactivated. I've certainly done this once or twice before due to faults or problems.

    2. Gonebirdin

      Re: HTC - Ridiculous suggestion

      eerrm my provider does everytime

    3. Cam 2

      Re: HTC - Ridiculous suggestion

      "Hands up anyone who has renewed their mobile phone contract, and the provider has sent out a new SIM card for exactly the same number ? It just doesn't happen"

      In this case it's more than likely, because the One X uses a micro SIM. I upgraded and had a new SIM sent out as part of the deal. Otherwise I'd have had to take a SIM trimmer to my old SIM and there's a good chance I would have destroyed it :)

      Also I know of another One X user who had similar problems (wifi signal attenuated) but they admitted sitting on the phone and squashing it. I have noticed there is some movement when the phone is squashed like this (front to back) so I have been careful not to stress it!

    4. Sartori

      Re: HTC - Ridiculous suggestion

      "Hands up anyone who has renewed their mobile phone contract, and the provider has sent out a new SIM card for exactly the same number ? It just doesn't happen."

      Always happens for me, for example at work we use Orange as our provider and whenever a new phone / Blackberry / whatever is sent out to replace someones old one it comes with a new SIM and they always say to use the new one rather then the old one. The just deactivate the old SIM and activate the new one with the same number. If i get a handset upgrade on my personal mobile contract this has happened for at least the last two or three changes.

    5. earlyjester

      Re: HTC - Ridiculous suggestion

      My mother in law got herself a htc wildfire S,and got rid of an ld symbian nokia. same operator, same sim, signal was awful, someone suggested requesting a new sim which we did, put it in, brilliant signal.

      So ridiculous suggestion but it worked for us.

      1. Alan 6

        Re: HTC - Ridiculous suggestion

        Same with my GF, swapped from LG GT 540 to HTC Desire S, no 3G at all using old SIM, so O2 shipped out a new SIM and everything hunky dory...

    6. Rob

      Re: HTC - Ridiculous suggestion

      I must admit it's not common knowledge about possible SIM compatibility issues with phones but as a matter of course I always ask my network operator to send me a new SIM when I upgrade my phone and they are more than happy to do so. I only found out by having a phone that struggled to stay registered on the network, it wasn't until I got a couple of levels deep in technical support that I was speaking to a proper techie and she explained the nuts and bolts of SIM cards (she did sound quite hot on the phone, so she kept my attention through the whole 45mins I was on the phone, the only time I can talk to a strange woman on the phone without my wife getting suspicious).

    7. gareth 26
      Stop

      Re: HTC - Ridiculous suggestion

      Actually Orange always give a new SIM for EVERY new phone I have. I also work in IT and all our phones are with VF and they always send us new SIM's whenever there is an issue as they also say an older SIM can have negative effects on newer phones.

      I can't comment on the support side of things as I buy mine through a contract and IF I ever get an issue I just call Orange and have a replacement within 24 hours.

      As for the One X I have had no issues at all. People need to remember that there will always be issues in all hardware. Apple or HTC or Samsung. Nobody can produce perfect items 100% of the time. Stuff goes wrong people, That's what warranty's are for. Stop moaning about it and just send it back.

    8. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: HTC - Ridiculous suggestion

      Charger with my HTC Desire failed after 6 months. Amazon said contact HTC, which I did, six times and no reply. Amazon replaced phone. Thanks HTC for such good customer service.

  7. thefutureboy
    Headmaster

    Disorientated or disoriented?

    1. This post has been deleted by its author

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Kübler-Ross grief model

    1st step - Denial

    Funny to see so much of that here :-)

  9. Sartori

    Interesting

    I'm the first to criticize the One X when it comes to the horrendous build quality of early release stock. It took 4 swap outs from 3UK before I got one that was of a reasonable build. Issues included Gorilla Glass not fitted correctly, yellow spots visible on the screen where there was a glue issue, discoloured displays. Finally got a later revision and the only issue I noticed early on with all of them was that the signal strength did not seem as high as on my previous Desire. After a software update this problem went away.

    So far though I have had no issues with 'grip of death', wifi or laggy games. Happily in the situation where I now have no issues after some initial pain, the joys of the early adopter I guess!

  10. Syed
    Coat

    "...users reporting an improvement ... when the One X is squeezed in a particular way."

    Am I the only one that read that the dirty way?

  11. William Boyle

    I've had similar problems with my N1 in that after some time of operation (minutes to hours), the touch screen registration becomes bogus, in that touching some part of the screen well above the bottom soft keys will still activate them. This was supposed to be fixed a long time ago, but it has been a continuous problem for a couple of years now. The only solution (temporary at best) is to reboot the phone (giving it the 3-finger salute). If that was not happening, I would be 100% satisfied with this Gingerbread OS system.

  12. Xenobyte
    Happy

    Really?

    I've had my One X since it came on the market and aside from 3-4 crashes (reboot, followed by an offer to send crash info to HTC) it has worked flawlessly. No Wifi-issues, no GSM/UMTS issues, no battery issues. Oh, and silent means silent - no shutter sound from the camera in silent mode - as it should be.

    Quite possibly the best phone I've ever owned!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Really?

      "I've had my One X since it came on the market and aside from 3-4 crashes .... Quite possibly the best phone I've ever owned!"

      Sheesh, is this the standard of performance that Android users expect? That's the best you've ever owned? My Lumia, running WP7 of course, has never crashed. Never. Not once. My HTC before it was the same. This is over about 18 months of WP7 devices.

      1. Benjamin 4

        Re: Really?

        "Sheesh, is this the standard of performance that Android users expect?"

        Well that's normal for just about any phone. Even very basic Nokia feature phones crash once in a while. Android phones crash once in a while (though my Desire HD has been much more stable since I upgraded to CyanogenMod without HTC Sense), iPhones crash once in a while. Maybe your windows phone is the one in a million that doesn't, but just about any computer device crashes once in a while, it's their nature.

        1. Rob

          Re: Really?

          I agree, being deadly serious when I say my microwave crashed about a month ago, left it unplugged for 10mins and earthed the case, worked fine again after that. It's the nature of electronics, all it takes is for something daft like to many ions in the air proceeding a storm or maybe you put the wrong leg in your trousers first in the morning, who knows.

      2. Darryl

        Re: Really?

        My old Nexus S has been chugging along flawlessly since the day I received it. It crashed once, forcing a battery pull after I installed a flaky VPN app. Other than that, I think it's only even been turned off once or twice and rebooted once after the ICS upgrade.

        I still think that most of the problems you hear about (or experience) with smartphones, whether Android, iPhone, WinPhone, Blackberry, etc. are actually caused by apps.

  13. Anonymous Coward 101

    Welcome to HTC Customer Service!

    If you have a knackered device, HTC cannot or will not fix the phone competently. Kiss goodbye to £30 or so every month until the middle of 2014. Did you work hard to earn that money? Yes? Well, tough shit.

    Your money is gone.

  14. bigphil9009

    Sounds like the same thing that happened with the Galaxy Nexus

    The "spinning out" issue sounds suspiciously like the issue that occured on the Galaxy Nexus (ICS) when it was first released - it hadn't been fully tested on the 2G 900MHz GSM networks and when switching from a 3G band to the 2G one, it went crazy, vibrating and becoming totally unresponsive so that the only thing that fixed it was a battery-pull. The problem was patched pretty quickly though...

  15. BigG
    Gimp

    Don't Apple have a patent on crap antennas?

    Cupertino's lawyers are gonna sue, boy!

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Copying?

    Now this is taking copying Apples iphone a bit to far.

  17. amanfromearth

    Ah so

    You holding it wong..

  18. jestersbro
    Happy

    Mine's fine

    That is all :-)

    Actually, no it's not. The only problem I'm having is that I can't put the bloody thing down! It's all fast and woosh and cool! No problems here.

  19. OneX
    Thumb Up

    Had it!

    I had a problem with wifi and bluetooth, whenever I placed my phone in my pocket, bluetooth headset was becoming unusable. I've send my phone back to HTC and after 4 days received it back - fixed.

    Didn't have any more problems since!

  20. tonyoung
    Thumb Up

    It's OK!

    I've had a One X for a couple of weeks and it's been fine.

    No probs at all - until my missus knocked it out of my hand yesterday and now the Gorilla glass looks like someone's mosaic patio!

    Now to test the HTC repair centre ....

  21. Razzadazza
    WTF?

    No issues with HTC customer service

    I've had a HTC handset for about 8 months. Last month, it developed a fault with the front facing sensor, called HTC customer services at 10am on Thursday. It was collected 5pm that day by UPS. I received it back at 10am on Monday. Best customer service I have ever received, especially as I'd purchased through a third party.

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