iPHONE 5S BATTERY: It may NOT just be you, it may be RUBBISH Apple is recalling some of its flagship iPhone 5s handsets after a flaw was found in the batteries that causes them to unexpectedly run out of juice. "We recently discovered a manufacturing issue affecting a very limited number of iPhone 5S devices that could cause the battery to take longer to charge or result in reduced …
After a year-and-a-half of of use, my battery life on my Samsung Android wasn't as wonderful as it had once been. So, two weeks ago I replaced it with a brand new one I bought on Amazon for $8.
That doesn't suck.
I've never bought a landfill phone without a replaceable battery, and I never will.
After a year-and-a-half of of use, my battery life on my Samsung Android wasn't as wonderful as it had once been. So, two weeks ago I replaced it with a brand new one I bought on Amazon for $8
$8 for a Samsung android phone, wow they're getting cheaper!!! no wonder they outsell i-Phones at that price
Dude, I have a SAMSUNG SIII and it's rubbish, like some oversize deal extreme toy and the OLED screen can hardly be seen outdoors and guzzles juice unless as much of it is kept black. Drop it and bits drop off it. I still have my old iPhone 4, just updated to iOS7 (can't even update the 6 month old SIII to later than 4.2.2 - yet). What is more, I replaced the battery in all my iPhones within 15 minutes for about £6. I wouldn't let glue stop me doing the next once the SIII has been jetisoned.
Your doing it wrong!
Though it is understandable as you say you have had the iPhone before the Samsung and probably don't realise that there is a lot of customization you can do to get the most out of your android, unlike iPhones.
And I am guessing that because you are an iUser, you think you are smarter then the average user and therefore you have done everything you can and it's still rubbish, therefore lets bash the droid and continue using my fruity phone.
Seriously. The phone is fine in even the brightest of outdoor scenorio's. And yes, if you do things like leaving the Wifi permanently on instead of switching it off when the phone sleeps, leave the brightness up on full, use the base applications that drain the battery etc.. etc.. then it probably will be rubbish. But if you are clever about it then the SIII is a great phone. Don't go mocking something because of your own ignorance!
I get a full days use out of my battery and thats with fairly heavy usage of it during the day (watching vids, internet, e-mail, vpn and RDP) . Some days it doesn't even get close to low battery.
So please. Go donate your Samsung to someone who deserves such a nice bit of kit and go back to playing with your crApple.
@AC 10:28 - >"$8 for a clone battery - not sure I would trust that in my pocket - left charging unattended etc."
No, it was a genuine Samsung battery. Same model number the phone originally came with:
http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-EB484659VA-1500mAh-Standard-Battery/dp/B005CRPU74
In fact - I was wrong. I'm looking at the page again and I see it was only $7. I must have paid some tax.
After two years of use, my battery on my Apple iPhone 4S was working very nicely. But I dropped the phone and cracked the screen. I took it to an Apple Store and they gave me a new phone. That doesn't suck, and it didn't cost me $8. Well, maybe the price of an underground ticket.
My old phone didn't go to landfill – it will be salvaged in one of Apple's huge repair facilities.
Meantime, I'm quite happy to have a phone that doesn't have creaky bits that snap apart for the dubious purpose of fitting a new battery, fluff-gathering expansion ports, flashing LED adornments etc. etc. etc.
So there.
@Mike Bell - "I took it to an Apple Store and they gave me a new phone. That doesn't suck, and it didn't cost me $8. Well, maybe the price of an underground ticket."
How much did you pay for AppleCare? I didn't have to pay Samsung a single penny for the right to buy an $8 brand new battery on Amazon.
Apple phones last longer - can be repaired - hold their value and Apple will properly recycle them at the end. Not really sure where the issue is. A friend is still using his iPhone 3GS every day - battery still fine and it's 4 years old. YMMV with batteries but quality cells are typically good for 750-1000+ full cycles and even that may still have 70-80% capacity - so I'd be surprised even if you fully discharged it every day if it did not last 2-3 years and then Apple will replace it with a new cell (to their spec) at a pretty fair cost. Remember you can't compare a 3rd party cell pack you fit yourself from eBay to a genuine cell you buy from the manufacturer and they fit for you.
I'm not sure about lasting longer. I've still got my HTC Desire which is just shy of four years old now, a few months younger than the 3Gs. The battery still holds very good charge as a phone (about a day) and I can easily replace it myself if I wish. They still go for about £70 on fleabay (granted I'm sure this is less than a similar age iPhone). As for recycling, I did it myself. I removed the SIM rooted it and removed all of the phone software, reskinned the OS and made it into an MP3 player. If I turn off wifi and bluetooth I can get a couple of days battery life minimum out of it which makes it a pretty decent MP3 (as well as any other digital file format you can think of) player for taking on long journeys. And it has a micro SD card slot so I upgraded the storage. I'm not disputing that the iPhones are pretty well built pieces of kit, but they're by no means the only one.
"I've never bought a landfill phone without a replaceable battery"
Are there any phones available without replaceable batteries? I feel you're trying to make a point about Apple, but since everyone with an IQ over 4 (ie most Apple users according to Reg commentard fandroids like yourself) knows that iPhone batteries are easily replaceable your point seems to be that your IQ is less than this :/
So I can swap the battery in the iphone in less than 10 seconds without voiding the warranty?
I can with my non-glued together phone......
If I don't 'play' with my phone I can get 3+ days charge out of it... if I use it, i.e. movies, reading books etc, I get a days charge out of it..
And really a day is not enough when you travel...
Oh I didn't realise we define easy as 10 seconds now. Not sure how you get a battery delivered in 10 seconds though, I'd imagine in reality the whole process is probably similar in time to the Apple process, and a quality battery from the phone vendor is probably similar money too. The difference being that Apple devices look nice and pack more into the case because they don't have a door and a big plastic battery to accommodate.
Apple will replace the battery in your iPhone - think it may be about £50/$50 - but at least it's a genuine cell to the manufacturer specifications rather that a 3rd party / knock off. Considering these batteries typically last 1000+ full cycles - paying that for another 3 years use seems pretty fair.
You just did, I bet a lot more people with Android devices are chucking batteries into the landfill, who cares about the phone compared to the damage the batteries are doing. My entire family have had iphones and ipods over the years and have NEVER had to replace the device or battery. Not to say others haven't but nothing compared to non apple devices.
"Apple declined to say precisely how many iPhones are affected by the botched battery design, but indicated it was in the thousands."
Deliberate ignorance? Clearly it's not going to be the design, but a bad chemical mix in a subset of batteries as Apple will not have had a different design just for a subset of phones. But hey this is The Register, anything to make it look like Apple have been incompetent rather than that there were supplied with a bad batch that failed to meet requirements.
@AC 19:49
How is your comment any different - or do you think jumping in to defend a phone brand is somehow not a pathetic life?
Me, I have a phone, it's an HTC. Other members of my family have iPhones. It's called personal preference and choice, but then as a veteran/survivor of the home computer wars, maybe I'm just jaded.
"iPhone batteries are replaceable
You can get a replacement battery for your iPhone 4 or newer at the Apple Store.
The battery is not designed to be replaced by the end user though."
Genius: Give me your money and I'll give you a battery,
Mug: OK, have a load of it.
Genius: Here's your battery. Now I'm going to watch and laugh as you try to put it in. Huh! I'm not called Genius for nothing.
Mug: Oh, Genius, thank you. You are so cool and work for such a cool company. If your logo had lips I'd kiss it every day.
Genius: Don't you do that already?
Mug: Oh yes. You're right. I forgot. I'm not called Mug for nothing.
Shrug. I've replaced iPhone3GS and iPhone4 batteries. The 4 takes about a minute, the 3GS maybe six minutes. Both replacement batteries were about £7, and neither job needed a special screwdriver.
The 3GS was later replaced by Apple for free (well out of warranty, admittedly) due to an unrelated issue where it wouldn't update to iOS5. The 4 is still going.
BS yourself.
Two outer screws out, slide back cover, lift off.
One screw out for the power connector, shield off, spudge out the battery.
New battery in the hole, click connecter in, shield on, screw down, back cover, two screws.
Easily done in a minute while chatting to someone. 1m30s tops if you're being tentative or drop a screw.
I've not yet needed to get into anything more recent than an iPhone4, which now I think about it says something about battery longevity...
You *can* physically replace the battery in an iPhone, but you void the warranty, so for example if you want to get the screen fixed after breaking it, or anything else, then they will just tell you to sod off.
I’m not having a go at apple, my phone doesn’t have a removable battery, but then again that’s just one of the things I don’t like about my phone.
You can get a replacement battery for your iPhone 4 or newer at the Apple Store.
No you can't. You can get a replacement device, reconditioned, free in warranty or at cost outside of it - which can be significant depending on the model - see here:
http://support.apple.com/kb/index?page=servicefaq&geo=United_Kingdom&product=ipod
(yes, I know the link says iPod, but procedure is the same for iPhone/iPad - just higher cost).
The battery is not designed to be replaced by the end user though.
According to Apples own guidelines, it's not designed for their own engineers to remove/replace within the context of an Apple Service Centre (of any kind - official Apple store, or auhorised service centre).
You won't find any authorised repair centre that wants to keep it's operating license/partner status doing in store battery replacements, period. Apple like to mystery shop their service centres, and going outside of their very clear, fixed guidelines is a Big No to them, to the best of my knowledge.
There is a slight difference between click Amazon link, receive battery, remove back, insert new battery in phone (total job time under 15 minutes including ordering) and the time taken for the round trip from the sticks to London, plus the Apple Store visit.
I might only need to do it every 2 years, but it would still be a massive pain.
Nice for you that you live within lunchtime visit of an Apple Store, but most of us don't.
Most people live pretty near to an Apple Store or you can post it in. I had an iPhone for about 3 years and was upgrading - the battery was still pretty good but perhaps down to about 80% original but was passing it on to a family member so got Apple to replace the battery. You can do it in store or post it off.
>> Nice for you that you live within lunchtime visit of an Apple Store, but most of us don't.
In my experience no-one does. Even if the shop is 5 minutes away, I found that although there are usually roughly the same number of staff and customers in the store, the average waiting time is an eon and a half due to aforementionned staff being busy telling each other's week-end adventures while walking across the store and back in a busy-looking manner while doing absolutely fuck all. Twice have I just walked away without what I came to get, because my lunch break was nearing its end.
Published headline:- iPhone 5s recall shocker: Crap batteries leave fanbois fuming
Story: Apple is recalling some of its flagship iPhone 5s handsets after a flaw was found in the batteries that causes them to unexpectedly run out of juice.
Appropriate headline: Manufacturing fault at subcontractor: Vendor announces replacement programme
One presumes your journalistic/ethics training manual was bought at a fire sale at the demise of the late unlamented News of the World...
Whilst I don't doubt that the title was pure clickbait, the smugness that Apple, its employees and fans spout about the superior quality of its products it is very difficult not to feel a little bit of glee when they have issues. Furthermore it makes a change for Apple to admit to such faults, normally they blame it on their loyal flock using the product incorrectly.
I've almost never seen iFans being smug about their iPhones on these forums. They just get on with their lives. I've also been to many Apple Stores around the world and the last word I'd use to describe the employees is 'smug'. Helpful, charming, young and (mostly) attractive, yes; smug, not so much.
Fandroids however will take any opportunity no matter how small to throw stones at Apple.
[*] Apple as a company on the other hand, is smugger than the smuggest kid at the National Smugness Olympics. Who just won first place in the Mens' 100m Smugrace. For the 10th year running, making his DecaSmug debut before an audience of 80,000 smugfans. That Jony Ive video on the website makes me want to physically hurl chunks. Gah.
There was a repeat spelling mistake in your 'quote'. I have fixed it for you
[*] Apple as a company on the other hand, is smeggier than the smeggiest kid at the National Smeginess Olympics. Who just won first place in the Mens' 100m Smegrace. For the 10th year running, making his DecaSmeg debut before an audience of 80,000 smegfans.
I see iPhone uses being smug about their iPhones on here all the time, they just never appear on a story like this.
In fact here is one I remember recently
Posted Tuesday 22nd October 2013 14:53 GMT
Philippe
Please point me in the direction of that Android phone with a 64 bits processor and a Biometric scanner.
Hang on. I already have that on my iPhone
One presumes your journalistic/ethics training manual was bought at a fire sale at the demise of the late unlamented News of the World...
El Reg was publishing inaccurate and inflammatory headlines long before the demise of the News of the World.
Perhaps you thought you were on one of the many boring tech news sites out there?
They're British. Despite everything we still have a sense of humour, and far fewer lawyers per head of population than the US.
As someone who has worked for both British and US companies, I never cease to be astounded by the mealy-mouthedness of the freedom lovers. It's almost as if speaking out of turn or raising your head above the parapet could get you sacked or demoted. (I know there are US companies that are not like this, I can only speak from experience).
Apple could never have succeeded as a British company because Jobs would have had to devote all his energies to trying to find out who was spreading all the Steve Jobs jokes. The answer would have been, almost everybody.
They built millions of the things... and like almost every other business they try to do this building as cheap as possible to keep the costs down. Quality is always going to be a problem eventually even for systems that are almost entirely machine assembled - iPhones being what they are have a lot of manual assembly and this involved people who will make mistakes sometimes.
Rigorous testing probably catches most of the assembly problems, but for devices that (for whatever reason) don't charge or hold their charge as well as they should over a relatively long period, this type of problem won't be picked up. Hopefully the exact problem will have been fathomed out by now and the Apple engineers will have something in place to change their designs to make it less likely to happen in the future. Apple probably can't say how many are affected or may be affected due to the nature of the problem so arguing numbers probably won't work and given the lawyer-friendly nature of the US would open them to class action suits at the drop of a hat if the exact numbers or percentages are predicted or known.
To be fair, as a side-line we do a rather worrying amount of mobile phone repairs. It IS possible to source genuine iPhone parts and a battery is <£20 (Obviously the eBay copies are available for £4.. but we stay away from them).
iPhone 3G/S's take around 5 minutes to swap the battery.
iPhone 4/4S's take around 5 minutes to swap the battery.
iPhone 5's take around 5 minutes to swap the battery. (Annoying pentalobe screws aside, but that can warrant a whole discussion all on its own..) - No iPhone 5C/S's in for repair yet luckily!
Galaxy S4/S3's take a few minutes (Removable back). I appreciate most Android phones have replaceable batteries and some do not (e.g the HTC One which I've just purchased myself - and also seems hermetically sealed....!)
Conclusion:
They're all as bad as one another!
I've had -- Ericsson, Sony, Blackberry, Samsung, some unknown chinese binfiller - phones.
The Ericsson ate three batteries, proprietary, and annoying, (but oddly cheap) in one year. 30 seconds to replace.
The blackberry(ies) I easily trashed a battery a year -- but tended to have two on hand since I spent so much time on conference calls --- not cheap but easy to swap, and the the wall charger for the battery was cheaper than the battery itself.
The chinese binfiller phone managed for 6 months under the stress, then overheated itself one night and melted most of its internal solder. -- no idea about the battery on that one other than the fact that it stank to high heaven when it died.
The Sony -- 8 or 9 years on the battery still works and takes a charge, my youngest is using the phone as an music player. (no sim), but I did buy the replacement. Its still in the sealed plastic bag in a drawer somewhere - that was horribly expensive.
Sammy -- at almost a year -- I clear the battery out in a day easily - -but again -- lots of time on the phone, and now fairly heavy data usage -- but the charge takes about 2 1/2 hours and seems to be holding steady. Prices seem to be reasonable and it takes about 30 seconds to swap one.
what we really really really need is for these damn phone manufacturers to do away with these stupid battery things. Give us permanent nuclear energy in our damn phones right now.
/oops/ did I type that out loud? /oops/
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