iPhone 4 Screens Break 82% More Than 3GS 348
A surprising number of readers have submitted linkage to a story discussing a recently released study that
proclaims that iPhone 4 glass breaks way more often than the 3GS's. Although the chart that I found more surprising was the one that said almost 9% of iPhone 3GS screens crack after a year.
Causality? (Score:5, Funny)
Probably due to the fact that people slam the phone down 82% more of the time, because of the antenna reception issue.
Just saying..
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I sometimes have that effect.
9% after a year? (Score:5, Funny)
I think iPhone owners are one or more of the following: a. careless individuals who regularly drop their phones onto concrete, b. people who frequently beat on their phones out of frustration with Market policies and/or AT&T's network, or c. suckers that got sold an mechanically inferior product.
There are other pigeonholes, but that'll get you started.
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...suckers that got sold an mechanically inferior product.
Not to mention an grammatically dubious sentence ;)
Re:9% after a year? (Score:5, Interesting)
9% annual accident rate implies one accident requiring an insurance claim in 11 years. Doesn't sound particularly high for an item that is so easily dropped.
(Actually CmdrTaco can't read charts. That chart is nearly 8%, not nearly 9%. Which implies 13 years between claims.)
Re:9% after a year? (Score:4, Informative)
9% annual accident rate implies one accident requiring an insurance claim in 11 years.
(1 - 0.09)^11 = 0.35...I think it implies that after 11 years, about 65% require insurance claims.
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No, because when you claim on the insurance, you get another phone which can possibly break again. You're assuming once your phone breaks you don't get another one for the rest of the 11 years.
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Could it have something to do with the fact your nicad-powered monster only had a screen ~1 sq. inch, coupled with the fact that it was (probably) some kind of impact-resistant plastic?
iPhones - how I hate typing that - and newer phones have, big glass screens. Toughened or not it's a lot easier to crack a piece of glass than it is plastic that's 1/10th the size.
For my two-penneth I'd say it's because we're used to them now; the novelty has worn off and we just aren't taking as much care of them as we used
Something people forget about glass (Score:5, Insightful)
In particular the toughened stuff is that it is fairly brittle. So yes, it may well be stronger than plastic, but when it fails, it does so in a more catastrophic fashion.
You can see this with knives. Most knives are steel, of course. However with a little research you discover you can buy more advanced, harder knives. Ceramic knives that more or less never go dull. They are the real deal too, I own a couple. You can't believe their sharpness, the hold their edge forever, food washes right off them, etc. Brilliant things. So why then are they not used all over? I mean they are pricey, but not much more than a forged steel knife.
Reason is they are brittle. They are indeed much harder than steel, however they don't flex. So you apply pressure to them and they are unmoving until a certain point, when they shatter. A steel knife can bend and flex a bit, and be just fine. Mean that ultimately, a steel knife is much more resilient. They may lose their edge easier and so on, but they can do tough jobs ceramics can't (ceramic knives are for slicing, not for something lick carving meat on the bone).
Same sort of shit here. A good polycarbonate will scratch easier than a toughened glass, and is less strong, you can flex it just by pushing hard enough. However it has a lot of give. It can take some reasonably hard impacts and survive, whereas the glass will hold strong up to a given point, and then fail badly.
Max strength isn't always the most desirable characteristic. Surviving stresses can be as much about moving with them as resisting them.
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Totally right, except that toughened glass is of course more tough (the opposite of brittle) than ordinary glass, not less.
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There's the problem.
Apple insists on building it out of glass, in case you dont remember back to high school physics, tensile strength vs hardness. Materials that are more tensile resist impact better because they can warp and spread the force of the impact over a large area. Hardness on the other hand does not resist impact very well because the impact of the force remains more localised.
So plastic will bend because it is more tensile then glass, Glass will shatter because it's not
Re:9% after a year? (Score:4, Informative)
Also from TFA:
In SquareTrade's previous study comparing smart phone reliability from November 2008, we found iPhones to be far more reliable than Blackberrys and Palm Treos. We will be updating this report soon, and we'll have data on the latest Android phone models. It may yet be seen that even with the double glass, the iPhone has an overall failure rate that is still better than the competition.
Re:9% after a year? (Score:5, Informative)
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There seem to be a lot of people who are on their 3rd or 4th iPhone. Some return them for various defects, where the guy at the Genius Bar just gives them a new phone instead of trying to trouble-shoot the problem, or there was some hardware issue.
For a product that's only been out a few years, you wouldn't expect to see so many people go through 4 of them. On the other hand, my iPad Touch has been remarkably sturdy, though in its second year the battery cap
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My Samsung Moment Android phone also has one piece of glass. I recently dropped it on an asphalt parking lot while getting in my car, directly on the face at least 3-4 feet. It didn't break. It wasn't even scratched.
That may be, but I'm betting you went "oooohhhh ssshhhiiiittttt!!!!!!!!" in slooowwwww motion as the phone spun through the air and landed flat on its face. You were lucky there, I think: if it had hit on an angle you might have done more damage. But yeah, I don't consider Apple products to be particularly durable when compared to some, maybe even most, other smartphone makers. Don't know why: considering what they charge for the things you'd think they could use sturdier materials.
Re:9% after a year? (Score:5, Funny)
What the fuck do iPhone owners do with their phones? Crack open coconuts with them?
There's an app for that, yes.
Re:9% after a year? (Score:5, Funny)
What the fuck do iPhone owners do with their phones? Crack open coconuts with them?
Try REALLY hard to shove their iPhone into their incredibly tight hipster jeans? ;)
I actually own one, but I just couldn't resist.
Re:9% after a year? (Score:4, Funny)
What the fuck do iPhone owners do with their phones? Crack open coconuts with them?
Try REALLY hard to shove their iPhone into their incredibly tight hipster jeans? ;)
I actually own one, but I just couldn't resist.
Yes, and I appreciate that rarity of rarities ... an Apple owner with a sense of humor. Keep up the good work.
Mom, I had an accident (Score:2)
I don't even know what this "study" is trying to conclude.
Our data shows that iPhone 4 owners are reporting accidents 68% more frequently than iPhone 3gs owners. 4.7% of iPhone 4 owners reported an accident to SquareTrade in the first 4 months of ownership, almost 70% higher than iPhone 3gs owners, 2.8% of whom had an accident over the same time period.
OK, so what does that data mean? It looks like all the data shows is that, for whatever reason, there are a lot of "accidents" involving iPhone 4s. So, what does that mean? Does that mean people drop them more often? Would that be considered a "design flaw"? Are people dropping them just as often, but this model breaks more easily?
I don't see any conclusions that can be drawn about this device just given the percentage of people who manage to sc
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I don't even know what this "study" is trying to conclude.
Me neither.
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I had it in my front pocket when I was out paintballing and it took one to the screen, can't think of any way I could break it in normal use.
New screen cost me £35, cheaper than the insurance would have been if I'd taken it out
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I broke the screen on my HTC Tytn 2 I had it in my front pocket when I was out paintballing and it took one to the screen, can't think of any way I could break it in normal use. New screen cost me £35, cheaper than the insurance would have been if I'd taken it out
I'm waiting for the hero in some action movie to get shot and fall to the ground, only to pull out his smartphone to find the round stuck in it.
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My iphone screen is much harder than my other cell phone screen (samsung). The samsung is scratching - the iphone is still glossy.
So being harder, it may shatter when the phone is dropped the wrong way.
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My iphone screen is much harder than my other cell phone screen (samsung). The samsung is scratching - the iphone is still glossy.
So being harder, it may shatter when the phone is dropped the wrong way.
Engineering tradeoff. I'd rather have a slightly less brittle screen and put a protector over it, personally.
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OTOH, the tijme my iPhone's screen broke. it's because it slipped from my rain-soaked hand onto a tile floor. I maintain that if the thing had a grippy surface anywhere on it, it would never have fallen.
$100 parts and labour to repair.
100% more glass (Score:2)
86% more glass damage given 100% more glass.
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But according to the linked article:
Our data shows that iPhone 4 owners are reporting accidents 68% more frequently than iPhone 3gs owners.
iPhone 4 owners reported 82% more damaged screens in the first 4 months compared to iPhone 3gs owners.
The back is not a screen. There is 68% more accidents, probably attributable to that glass back.
But when just screen damage is compared, its much worse, 82%.
It almost appears if the front screen breaks more than the back glass.
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But they really only were saying that they couldn't tell if trapped dirt behind the slide case was to blame. (Reference is to previous stories about trapped dirt triggering back glass breakage).
When reference is made to 82%, its always specific to screens.
But lets go with your theory, and assume out that a "quarter" of all breakage is attributable to the back glass. Lets further assume that breakage was ONLY Front OR Back.
That still leaves 52% more breakage than the iPhone 3G. That in itself is rather sign
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the other thing I was wondering is does it have anything to do with the mounting of the glass? I haven't seen an iphone4 closeup yet, but the previous models all had the glass inside a metal rim. The 4 looks a lot like the new imacs, where the glass extends all the way to the edge of the machine. For the imacs, it means if something hits the edge of the machine it's hitting the glass, making the glass a lot more vulnerable to damage. Does the glass come to the edge on the 4?
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That's funny (Score:3, Insightful)
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Mod parent up. They're just trying to peddle warranties. Surprised nobody followed the money on this submission.
Taking Apple's side on this one... mostly (Score:5, Insightful)
Unless the glass is breaking all by itself, I'm going to go with "people who spent too much money on a phone don't know how to take proper care of them."
Fact is, I spent like $100 (and renewed my contract with tmobile) to get a samsung vibrant. The first thing I did was slap a protective case around it and put on a screen protector. Following that, a visit to eBay showed me some nicer things to protect the phone and I also got one of those belt holders for the phone. Why?
1. I spend what I consider to be a lot of money for a phone.
2. Things I spend money on, I try to take care of
3. Keeping a phone in your pocket will cause problems starting with dust and ending with who knows what else
4. In spite of all the care I want to give it, things fall, slide off, whatever.
If I had an iPhone (and people who know me know the LOOONG list of reasons why I will never own an iPhone) I would do the same thing to it -- protect the shit out of it. It's frikken expensive and needs to be protected.
People need to get over complaining about how durable something is or isn't and start simply being careful for a change.
Re:Taking Apple's side on this one... mostly (Score:5, Funny)
...and I also got one of those belt holders for the phone. Why?
Lemme guess, to look like a tool?
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No, because bad things happen to phones kept in pockets.
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Really, don't do this. Please.
I'm not saying this to be snarky or mean, and I'm not trolling. Just... don't wear your phone on a belt holder. That's about as bad as a fanny pack.
Don't walk with a bluetooth earpiece in, either, and especially don't walk around talking to someone on it, making yourself like a schizo.
Don't wear white socks pulled up to your knees while wearing shorts, either. Nor is the potential safety of a pocket protector worth the certain damage to your reputation. Wear contacts inste
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nope. parent was correct.
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Only if you keep them in the same pocket as keys and loose coins. Obviously. Keep your phone in the other pocket.
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The phone or the user?
Re:Taking Apple's side on this one... mostly (Score:5, Insightful)
But if it's wrapped in a protector how are you supposed to enjoy the beauty of the industrial design?
Of course, my feeling is that if you can't design an attractive product that is also durable then you're not a particularly good designer.
Been an unfortunate thing with Apple (Score:4, Insightful)
They've been very big on form over function for some time now. Doesn't mean their devices aren't functional, it just means that they worry about how they look more than anything else and they don't give much thought to if it interferes with working. For example if you look you discover time capsules have a bad habit of dying early, all around the same time. Further research shows this is because they overheat. They cannot take the heat of the integrated powersupply. Well external power would be perfectly doable, most devices have it. However Apple just had to have the sleek, all in one, unit. A fan was not acceptable either, of course. Thus form took precedence over good design and there were functional problems in the end.
Same shit on the iPhone 4. It isn't like they didn't put function in the device. It is a high end smart phone, no question. However they had to make it pretty, that was requirement #1, and some functionality suffered because of it.
I really dislike that way of doing things. I'm fine with good looking electronics, things shouldn't have to be ugly but function need to be primary. Make sure everything works first and if the design interferes with that, change it. Make shit work first, look good second.
Re:Taking Apple's side on this one... mostly (Score:5, Informative)
If it needs a case the design is flawed. My Droid goes naked. It has a raised metal edge that protects the screen.
Re:Taking Apple's side on this one... mostly (Score:4, Insightful)
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Yet another reason I won't buy an Apple... in this case, a laptop. Dell offers "accidental damage" coverage. Normally, I skip all warranties as they are typically wasted money. Not so on laptops and they MUST have accidental damage because that is just about the only damage they get! And yes... my sympathy for the wine-spiller woman... within two weeks of getting my new Latitude D830, I spilled apple juice all over it. Broke my heart. Even a day of down time was too much, but I did it on a Friday!! A
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As a guy, I prefer to carry my phone in my pocket to be sure it doesn't get knocked out of a holster, and because seeing middle aged overweight balding men with Blackberries holstered to their side and a Bluetooth headset hanging out of their ear always seemed slightly toolish,
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Unless the glass is breaking all by itself, I'm going to go with "people who spent too much money on a phone don't know how to take proper care of them."
Fact is, I spent like $100 (and renewed my contract with tmobile) to get a samsung vibrant. The first thing I did was slap a protective case around it and put on a screen protector. Following that, a visit to eBay showed me some nicer things to protect the phone and I also got one of those belt holders for the phone. Why?
1. I spend what I consider to be a lot of money for a phone.
2. Things I spend money on, I try to take care of
3. Keeping a phone in your pocket will cause problems starting with dust and ending with who knows what else
4. In spite of all the care I want to give it, things fall, slide off, whatever.
If I had an iPhone (and people who know me know the LOOONG list of reasons why I will never own an iPhone) I would do the same thing to it -- protect the shit out of it. It's frikken expensive and needs to be protected.
People need to get over complaining about how durable something is or isn't and start simply being careful for a change.
I spent $600 on my nexus one in February, and have never had a case on it. I have dropped it once, getting out of the car, and it fell about 2 feet. It has one scratch from that, and no more.
I am a mechanical engineer who also runs our machine shop. I spend a lot of time running prototypes in the shop, and working with hammers, large pieces of steel, sharp cutting tools, and pulling chips of metal out of my hair/pockets/shoes.
My phone just hangs out in my pocket mostly, though I take it out all the time to
Water damage too (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Water damage too (Score:5, Funny)
Tears from frustration at all the dropped calls?
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Or that the iPhone 4 is slipperier, or any manner of other things.
9% actually 6% - Math is hard, let's go editing! (Score:2, Informative)
"Although to me the chart that I found more surprising was the one that said almost 9% of iPhone 3GS screens crack after a year."
Try ~6%.
First, the graph I believe this statement is citing is the "Reported iPhone Accident Rate" Which has an end data point of just under 8%. This is perhaps "almost 8%", but is not close to 9%.
Second, that graph is all accidents. The chart just down from that labeled "iPhone 3gs" (in a ring-style pie chart) shows the accident breakdown. 76% of the accidents are a cracked scree
Almost 6% of 3GS screens break, not 9% (Score:2)
The only information re: screen breakage on that page is that 76% of accidents are screen breakage, and that 7.8% of 3GS owners report accidents during their first year.
By my math, that means about 5.9% of screens are breaking on the 3GS.
Interesting properties of "Gorilla Glass" (Score:4, Interesting)
Glass is really remarkably strong when it comes out of the furnace. The tensile strength is amazing, it can bend enough to absorb some shocks. It's a great material before it gets to the real world.
But, once it does, it immediately develops microcracks in the surface, and each of these could be the beginning of a fracture that goes through the bulk of the glass. So, what to do?
I don't know if they've taken the hint from the semiconductor industry (look up 'strained silicon' [wikipedia.org]) but they did a similar thing with glass. By bombarding the surface of the glass with larger atoms, they create significant stress in the surface, so that any microcracks are immediately pushed shut. But, this is only true down to the level that these atoms diffuse into the surface...not far at all!
So, if you create a significant scratch (and this might just be 100 microns) you are through this surface, and have a potentially catastrophic failure waiting to happen.
A screen-protecting film of plastic would be a good investment.
Re:Interesting properties of "Gorilla Glass" (Score:5, Interesting)
Glass is really remarkably strong when it comes out of the furnace. The tensile strength is amazing, it can bend enough to absorb some shocks. It's a great material before it gets to the real world.
But, once it does, it immediately develops microcracks in the surface, and each of these could be the beginning of a fracture that goes through the bulk of the glass. So, what to do?
I don't know if they've taken the hint from the semiconductor industry (look up 'strained silicon' [wikipedia.org]) but they did a similar thing with glass. By bombarding the surface of the glass with larger atoms, they create significant stress in the surface, so that any microcracks are immediately pushed shut. But, this is only true down to the level that these atoms diffuse into the surface...not far at all!
So, if you create a significant scratch (and this might just be 100 microns) you are through this surface, and have a potentially catastrophic failure waiting to happen.
A screen-protecting film of plastic would be a good investment.
I worked at a glass shop for a summer installing windows and doors in peoples houses when I was younger. If it wasn't a brand new house, we'd have to take out the old windows. Often those windows had tempered glass. We took all the old windows back to our shop and threw them in a big trailer for the dump (sadly, window glass isn't as high quality as bottle glass, so it wasn't worth recycling. or thats what they told me).
Anyway, we loved to break the tempered glass. Normal glass breaks in big sheets, but tempered glass is made for safety, so it is both stronger, and won't break into sheets - it shatters into 1000's of tiny pieces when it breaks, so you can't get stabbed.
The fun comes with how it breaks. You can hit a 1/4" thick tempered glass window head on with a sledge hammer and it won't break. BUT, tempered glass gets its strength from really high surface tension, which is unbalanced on the edge of the glass. So, after we hit the thing with the sledgehammer and it didn't break, we'd take a regular hammer and lightly tap an exposed edge of the glass, and BOOM, it instantly shattered!
I don't know how gorilla glass compares to regular tempered glass, but it seems like a bit of a bad design to have the edges exposed like that.
But then, we knew it was a bad design...
-Taylor
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BUT, tempered glass gets its strength from really high surface tension
You mean surface compression... The middle of the glass is in tension, and it is protected by the outside surfaces which are in compression (and hence scratch-proof). I never thought about the edges though, that is cool.
How to not break your screen (Score:2, Funny)
Q. How do I keep my iPhone screen from breaking?
A. Stop throwing your phone at your cat.
Q. What if I don't have a cat?
A. Then stop throwing it at your bf/gf.
Q. What if I don't have a boyfriend or a girlfriend?
A. Get an iPhone 4.
Because there are two planes of glass (Score:2)
Of course the iPhone has two pieces of glass to break instead of one, so, for the careless consumer who has insurance because they want to break the phone and get a new one
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What is all this apologetics?
Are you telling me that it's Squaretrade's fault that iPhone 4 has twice as much glass and is twice as likely to break?
I don't see you arguing that the numbers they provided are wrong, so how are they being deceptive? They simply reported that in the 4 months since iPhone 4 came out, almost twice as many suffer breakages as 3GS, which is numbers from their own customers. I totally fail to see how this is deceptive.
Do you mean they should have reported a lower (and false) n
This Gorilla Glass stuff... (Score:2)
... Is this the same Gorilla Glass that's in my Cowon S9? Because I *sat* on it once (oops) and it broke the AMOLED screen (cry) but not the gorilla glass on top. I've seen the videos of someone attacking it with forks and coins and stuff too. That shit is seriously tough. So did Apple buy the generic brand of it or what? How the hell are people cracking it without destroying the rest of the damn phone?
The bottom line with all this? (Score:2, Informative)
You mean... (Score:2)
They really were holding it wrong?
Abuse (Score:2)
Cell phones get abused, simple as that. You have people who would not normally use anything more advanced than a TV remote that have high end smartphones these days. And such people, and not a shot at them just saying, often don't have the mindset of treating high end portable electronics with a bit more care. To them something that you can throw in your purse or pocket should be able to take massive amounts of abuse.
And by in large I would say that modern cell phones do! Phones get dropped, dropped in
Waiting for .... Apple Special Event (Score:4, Insightful)
I am awaiting the announcement of an Apple Special Event on this problem soon.
At the event Mr. Jobs will bash with a hammer the screens of competing cell phones from RIM, Motorola, Sony, Nokia, etc. The results of this vigorous laboratory testing will be presented with a pie-chart to show that the iPhone screen is more resistant to hammer blows as long as you hold the hammer carefully with a finger or two and not grip it with your whole hand.
Design decisions (Score:2)
Shocking news (Score:2, Troll)
Shocking news ... metal covered glass breaks easier than the one surrounded with thick plastic.
Look at the 3G/3GS, and compare it to the first iPhone (on which I saw some broken screens) and the iPhone 4....
I think the new design looks spectacular, still I would 100x prefer my 3GS with the 4's features than the actual 4.
I actually think, that a iPhone 4 with the plastic bumper is still more vulnerable to side impacts than a 3G/GS without a protector.
Just my 2c ...
An other factor : if you have big hands, y
Re:Gimme a break! (Score:5, Insightful)
This is good unbiased, peer reviewed, wholesome and all-American goodness coming from a company that sells warrantees.
Good times
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And who else would have any statistics that you would trust better? The manufacturer?
Re:Gimme a break! (Score:4, Insightful)
Preferably someone who isn't standing to make a buck from the claim, which rules out the insurance company AND the manufacturer. Maybe someone like Consumer Reports?
Re:Gimme a break! (Score:5, Informative)
And they get their information from?
Is there a place to report breakage on their site?
Square Trade loses money for every screen break.
Nobody has better stats than Square Trade, because Apple takes one look at it and says user abuse, and does not bother counting it. Same for the carriers.
Nobody is keeping statistics EXCEPT the third party insurance providers. This is largely true in medicine as well. Unless there is a contagious factor, the only nationwide stats you will find on injuries (broken arms) is from insurance carriers. Why you choose to denigrate that fact when Apple is involved but not for heart attacks is sort of, well, suspicious.
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Right, which gives them all the incentive in the world to get money from as many of the other 91% as they can.
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What part of "Unless there is a contagious factor" don't you understand?
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Are you really trying to link an event that happened 150 years ago to modern epidemiology? Doctors in the 1850's still practiced trepanation to cure a variety of ills...I think a lot has changed since then, including the role of doctors in collecting medical statistics.
Like the grandparent poster said, a lot of today's injury statistics come from the insurance companies.
Re:Gimme a break! (Score:4, Interesting)
I am quite sure Apple keep very precise statistics of all breakages reported to them, whether they agree to fix them or not, though of course they won't share them. As to consumer reports (for example), they could easily do a survey of iPhone owners, and I'd trust them a hell of a lot more than someone whose interest is in inflating figures like this to sell insurance.
As to medicine, the fact that insurance providers hold all the power in the US is an anomaly. In most other first world countries, insurers don't run the health system, and proper statistics on all types of injuries are compiled by a central body and doctors themselves, not by a party with a monetary interest. Just because it is done that way in the US doesn't mean it is normal or efficient. Here's an example:
http://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/overall/hssh0405.pdf [hse.gov.uk]
The only source less likely to provide reliable statistics on breakages is Apple, and I wouldn't trust these statistics from anyone with a monetary interest in the results - it's too easy to lie by tweaking the figures you choose to present.
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Disclaimer: I'm a happy iPhone owner without insurance.
"Square Trade loses money for every screen break."
I'm sure this is not how they look at it. As an insurance company (in other words a bookmaker) they make or lose money based on whether they have set the right or wrong odds on screen breaks and other problems. They would certainly not count single screen breaks and go "damn, we lost money on this one".
Instead they would simply raise their premiums if screen breaks occurred more regularly than they had i
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There have been reports that when a grain of sand gets trapped under a case (sliding case), that it can scratch the back glass, and be compressed enough to cause a tiny crack to form which spreads, and the whole back shatters.
Of course who knows if these reports are true.
http://www.iphonehacks.com/2010/10/apple-investigating-potential-issue-with-slide-on-cases-and-iphone-4-causing-cracked-glass-back-panel.html [iphonehacks.com]
Re:Gimme a break! (Score:4, Informative)
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Proof of that claim? If you're talking about the Suzuki Samurai case then no, that isn't proof.
Response from Steve Jobs (Score:5, Funny)
See, you're not holding it right.
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Note the complete statistical fail: the iPhone 4 has *two* glass screens - that means that all the fucktards that used to just scuff the hell out of the metal back are now dropping and breaking their back glass.
How is that a "statistical" fail?
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The iPhone 4 only has one screen. The glass back is not a screen. The article is quite specific about this.
As to you other point, that may be true, because I've noticed over the years that only people who eventually die buy life insurance. &_&
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"While our data doesn't identify which broken screens resulted from dirt trapped behind a slide case, at least a quarter of the broken glass claims involved the back screen."
"Back screen"? "At least a quarter"?
I'm with Mr Anonymous Coward on this, even if he did use the word "fucktard"
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We USED to understand that things meant to be hand held and carried with you everywhere needed to be more durable than that. It's bad enough the screen is so fragile, but adding extra fragile glass just because is just plain stupid. Why don't they just add some nitrogen tri-iodide to make sure the device is destroyed if it's ever jostled off of the velvet pillow it's apparently supposed to be kept on?
Re:Statistics FAIL (Score:4, Insightful)
Note the complete statistical fail: the iPhone 4 has *two* glass screens - that means that all the fucktards that used to just scuff the hell out of the metal back are now dropping and breaking their back glass.
In that case, switching from metal to glass backing was an incredibly stupid design decision. Still Apple's fault.
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If it needs a case the design is poor. My Droid goes naked.
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The problem is Apple recently removed full cover cases [engadget.com] for the iphone 4 as apple engineers recently discovered if dirt or grit gets stuck between the protective case and the back of the phone the glass on the back has an increased probability of cracking [appleiphonereview.com]. So with antenna-gate [theregister.co.uk] just starting to cool we now have case-gate were it doesn't matter how you hold the iphone 4 it breaks [jetlib.com]. You would think Apple would use gorilla glass [corning.com] like
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So, you don't put glasses in a case; carry violins in a case; transport laptops in a case?
If I was wanting to hold my laptop up to my ear half the time, I wouldn't want to be constantly putting it in and out of a case!
Phones need to be used quickly and easily at a moment's notice. They should be designed such that they don't need cases.
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That's why most phone cases don't require you to take them off to use the phone.
What you say about being designed not to need a case (basically to come with a rugged case already enclosing it) is a fine ideal. But fundamentally, phone manufacturer's design what will sell. And thinness, lightness and shininess are selling points for all phones.
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I've got the T-Mobile version and it will lock-up once a month or so. I've not had the problem with Bluetooth or the mem card. Maybe I'm lucky. I do hate the long boot time. It makes XP seem quick.
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My 3G is as good as the day I bought it, going on 2 years ago now (or more - I'm well, well outside of contract). Battery is just fine. No scratches, bumps, breaks or damage. But then, I don;t treat it like crap, sit on it in my back pocket, put it in with my keys etc.
Doesn't have a case either.
Anecdotal evidence is anecdotal.
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