Chip Guru Papermaster Loses Signal At Apple 374
ColdWetDog writes "Computerworld reports that Mark Papermaster has left his job as Apple's Senior Vice President of Devices Hardware Engineering. He was the senior executive in charge of engineering for the iPhone 4 and thus responsible in some unknown fashion for 'antennagate.' His name may ring bells from previous coverage of his jump from IBM to Apple. From a brief blurb on Daring Fireball: 'From what I've heard, it's clear he was canned. Papermaster was a conspicuous absence at the Antennagate press conference. Inside Apple, he's "the guy responsible for the antenna" — that's a quote from a source back on July 23. (Another quote from the same source: "Apparently the antenna guys used to have a big chip on their shoulder. No more.")'" Update: 08/08 03:01 GMT by KD : Swapped out a registration-required NY Times link for a Computerworld one; corrected the direction of Papermaster's career move.
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Re:I thought Apple said there was no antenna probl (Score:5, Informative)
Except they did say it was software [apple.com].
In fact, they said that the number of bars that were being displayed was wrong, and that was the cause of the death grip signal loss.
Re:I thought Apple said there was no antenna probl (Score:5, Informative)
They've fired off so many excuses that it's perfectly understandable if people mix and match them a bit. They did at one point claim that the big signal drop was only an illusion caused by the software displaying too many bars in the first place. I think they mixed that with the "well everyone else has a problem too" gambit, at least for a while.
Re:I thought Apple said there was no antenna probl (Score:2, Informative)
Actually they never said it was a software issue. They said it was a attenuation problem that all modern smart phones have.
Then they lied about that as well. Does the iPhone 4 and every other phone have attenuated signal to it when the hand blocks the signal yes.
The ADDITIONAL problem with the iPhone 4 is it detunes the antenna when you hold in in a certain spot. No other phone has that problem.
That's the real problem. Apple has tried to distract folks by both claiming at one point that it was a software problem, and then later by saying it's the same problem all other phones have.
Both are lies.
Re:*gate (Score:4, Informative)
Watergate was a huge scandal that, IIRCC, started with a low key investigation by a reporter into a burglary at the Watergate building that also happened to house an office of the Democratic party. It started small and ended up with a US President being forced to resign in order to avoid being impeached. Until that time most Americans trusted the government to follow the laws of the land.
Same thing has happened in regards to the antennae issues of the iPhone, it started with a few comments and has mushroomed into a real mess.
And please, anyone who wants to correct/amend my recollection of Watergate please do, I am feeling to lazy to Google it at the moment.
Typo (Score:3, Informative)
Correction: he left IBM to work for Apple.
Re:I thought Apple said there was no antenna probl (Score:5, Informative)
There was a bug in the signal strength indicator, which made the attenuation look pretty dramatic if you were in a low-signal location.
If only there were some sort of optional operating mode, something that you could call a "field test" mode, or something like that. Such a mode could replace the worthless "bar" graph with a quantitative RSSI value in dBm, displayed at 1-dB precision, so iPhone owners could tell exactly how much loss Steve's magical new antenna was causing, and under what conditions.
Oh, wait. There is such a mode, capable of being enabled on virtually any GSM phone... and Apple disabled it for the very first time when the iPhone 4 shipped.
Move along, these aren't the excuses we're looking for...
Re:Typo (Score:2, Informative)
Sometimes you win, sometimes you loose.
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
Re:*gate (Score:3, Informative)
Watergate wasn't about "moral standards". It was about abuse of power, plain and simple.
Re:I thought Apple said there was no antenna probl (Score:1, Informative)
So-called "Reviews" are nothing but ads, and have been for many years now. The only trustworthy source of reviews, Consumer Reports, threw Apple under the bus [pcworld.com] just as Apple have thrown their fall-guy under the bus.
Re:Ive is the one responsible for the antenna (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Wait a minute.. (Score:3, Informative)
Not exactly a design flaw... it's one little spot.
Is it a flaw? Yes, even if it is "one little spot". Does it result from an error in the design of the phone? Yes. Then it is a design flaw.
Re:I thought Apple said there was no antenna probl (Score:3, Informative)
Note that I didn't make any claims to the validity (or not) of the blame, just noted that they DID blame a software problem.
It is noteworthy though that they are issuing a fix in the form of a retrofitted bumper.
Re:Wait a minute.. (Score:3, Informative)
Except they don't, which is rather the point of this.
All phones suffer from signal attenuation to some degree, when the hand is in the way. The iPhone has an additional flaw that others don't.
Re:I thought Apple said there was no antenna probl (Score:4, Informative)
Not sure how you got any of that from the multitude of Apple stories that have been going on everywhere.
Apple first said their customers where holding it wrong. People posted montage videos of Apple ads/commercials of people holding it in exactly the way that makes the phone drop calls.
Then Apple said that *an additional problem with the phone* was the cause of a perceived problem with the phone. Somehow these two problems were to cancel out and owners of the phone were supposed to feel better about this. All iphones have been misreporting their ability to perform their (arguably) primary function and this is being spun as a *solution* to the problem of dropped calls. Nice job, this problem just got swept under the rug, but people were still unable to make calls. The attenuation problem that they claimed all phones had was linked with this supposedly because the user was looking at a call barely connected and when the grip changed the position of the phone, the reception changed and a call was dropped. This was called normal.
It wasn't really until Consumer Reports came out with a real easy to follow video where they have the phone on and touch it in the corner and signal strength drops dramatically. No movement of the phone, very simple. Apple finally says, "Here is a free bumper to cover up the design factor we had told you to obsess over, we'd now like you to obsess over our generosity. We're still not going to really admit a problem."
Some guy gets fired, apparently getting to be the first guy to take credit for something while Jobs is in charge.
Re:This is the difference between Apple and MS (Score:5, Informative)
If you're referring to Wozniak, I'm going to take exception to your remark.
I just assumed he meant Ballmer.
Re:I thought Apple said there was no antenna probl (Score:5, Informative)
I should point out that most GSM phone manufacturers now make it very difficult to enable Field Test mode -- to the point of even removing the functionality from phones. Nokia is one example of a GSM phone manufacturer that has done so. So your claim that field test is "enabled on virtually any GSM phone" is false. I should know as I used to be a field testing geek until I could not longer purchase a suitable GSM/UMTS phone to do field testing with.
Re:I am sure there is nothing wrong. (Score:4, Informative)
And I resent having to buy Apple hardware if I want to run OSX.
Oh, and if you do buy some "PC except Apple's" I bet a few people here on Slashdot could recommend operating systems besides Win7 you could run on it.
Re:Wait a minute.. (Score:5, Informative)
ALL CELL PHONES, ALWAYS will have their antenna detuned by a human's touch, and THEY ALL have a death spot.Sure do. Show me any cell phone, I'll show you how to detune the antenna, and I'll find it's death spot.
It's not just a matter of detuning, but how much it gets detuned. For example, this story [anandtech.com] claims a significant drop of signal compared to a couple other phones (iPhone 3GS and HTC Nexus One). For example, when the reviewer clenched tightly the iPhone 4, he got a 24 dB drop in signal. The HTC Nexus One does 7 dB better (which is more than a factor of 5 stronger signal) and the iPhone 3GS does a full 10 dB better (slightly more than a factor of ten stronger signal). "Holding naturally" still has an almost 20 dB drop in signal strength for the iPhone (that's a factor of hundred drop in signal strength) while the iPhone 3GS has almost no attenuation in signal strength.
Re:Tell a fanboy (Score:3, Informative)
Yes, only 0.5% of people called Apple to complain about the antenna issue
The other 99.5% dropped the call
Re:This is the difference between Apple and MS (Score:0, Informative)
What exactly makes it better then XP? Where exactly is the "wow!"? The only things I can think of are a slightly better taskbar with previews and the ability to type in the 'start' menu
You seem like a non-technical simpleton. Its OK. There are plenty of your kind here on slashdot; most are part of the anti-ms troll brigade. Here, go and educate yourself.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technical_features_new_to_Windows_Vista [wikipedia.org]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Features_new_to_Windows_Vista [wikipedia.org]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Features_new_to_Windows_7 [wikipedia.org]
Its probably a mistake trying to engage with anti-ms trolls, but OTOH, you just admitted to your ignorance so maybe theres hope !
Re:Tell a fanboy (Score:3, Informative)
The reception problem on the iphone really isn't that big of a deal. As opposed to fan boys there are haters too. However my experience with the iPhone 4 is that it's reception is about the same as other phones in the area that use AT&T (after say a minute for the bar counting algorithm to resolve. ) and a lot of the real disappointment was a lot of people were expecting the new design to have a noticeable difference. Then you have the haters who saw this one flaw and really put it out of proportion. Yes apple put the weak spot in a bad place. However knowing about it isn't really a major issue. Better then some phones that i have used in the past where I covered the spot and I spend a lot of time trying to get my hand holding the phone right. So what did the over press do. Just give iPhone owners a free accesary.
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