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Iphone Power Software The Courts Apple Hardware Technology

Apple Hit With Class Action Lawsuit After Admitting To Slowing Down Old iPhones (appleinsider.com) 244

Posted by BeauHD from the didn't-see-that-coming dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Apple Insider: A day after Apple acknowledged slowing down iPhones with degraded batteries, a Los Angeles man is pursuing a class action lawsuit in the matter. Owners didn't agree to the prospect, and it hurts the devices' value, according to a filing by plaintiff Stefan Bodganovich, cited by TMZ. The case is said to be particularly concerned with the impact on iPhone 7 users. The suit asks that Apple stop throttling older devices, and pay compensation to affected people. Over the course of December, a number of people on Reddit and elsewhere have speculated that iPhones perform faster after battery replacements, mostly citing anecdotal evidence. Apple effectively confirmed that situation on Wednesday, but with the provision that it only throttles phones to prevent sudden, potentially damaging shutdowns. UPDATE: A second lawsuit has been filed against the company. Chicago Sun-Times reports "five customers have filed a federal lawsuit in Chicago against the tech giant for what they're calling 'deceptive, immoral and unethical' practices that violate consumer protection laws."
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Apple Hit With Class Action Lawsuit After Admitting To Slowing Down Old iPhones More

Apple Hit With Class Action Lawsuit After Admitting To Slowing Down Old iPhones

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  • Buy a newerer fasterer one (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Mr D from 63 ( 3395377 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @08:03AM (#55788649)
    Slow down old phones, customers see how much faster the new ones are....profit!

    • Re:Buy a newerer fasterer one (Score:5, Interesting)

      by torkus ( 1133985 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @09:45AM (#55789103)

      I also have to wonder if this was partly in response to the battery issues they had with the 6-series (or 6s, i forget) where they'd get unexpected shutdowns and battery capacity under ~40% was a complete crapshoot. I had one and regularly saw the phone power off at 20% battery...or go from 30 to 5 and then power off and back to 40% when powered back on.

      My guess is iffy battery performance messed up their capacity algorithms when it couldn't handle minor spikes in power due to CPU...so they basically just cut out the spikes in CPU to avoid further need of replacing batteries. And from there...it becomes a logical step to apply this to any device which might have anything similar happen. A slower phone is easier to accept than one which powers off somewhat randomly after all.

      I'd put my money on them being linked. It was a business decision to help limit battery replacement...and a "good idea" spread it to all devices.

      • Re:Buy a newerer fasterer one (Score:5, Insightful)

        by jellomizer ( 103300 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @10:17AM (#55789309)

        I expect it is. However I don't expect the Class action to win. This seems that Apple was doing its best to extend the life of older devices vs trying to shorten it. Could they have done better? Yes. They could have given an option to turn such a feature on or off, Set a notification that the battery is no longer optimal... Have a little more press in getting a battery fix for older phones, as it is possible....

        • The consumer friendly option would have been a statement: We shipped a few batteries that are shorting voltage under high load and have issued a patch. If your battery is effected, please come in for a free replacement to restore performance.

          • The consumer friendly option would have been a statement: We shipped a few batteries that are shorting voltage under high load and have issued a patch. If your battery is effected, please come in for a free replacement to restore performance.

            But it isn't what is happening. So why "admit" to a problem they don't have?

            And FYI, when a LiOn battery SHORTS, you KNOW it! Just ask all those unfortunate GN7 owners...

        • Here's an idea which actually helps customers:
          Offer a battery replacement at approved locations with the customer only paying for the price of a new battery. I would take my phone there, have the battery replaced, pay for the new battery and off I go.
          Customers are happy.

          Note: I don't own anything Apple-related and I probably never will.

          • Here's an idea which actually helps customers:
            Offer a battery replacement at approved locations with the customer only paying for the price of a new battery. I would take my phone there, have the battery replaced, pay for the new battery and off I go.
            Customers are happy.

            Note: I don't own anything Apple-related and I probably never will.

            Apple already offered a bunch of 6 and 6s owners FREE battery replacements, so there.

            And even regularly, Apple only charges $79 to replace an iPhone battery out-of-warranty, INCLUDING the battery ($99 for an iPad, other product-lines vary) !!!

            https://www.apple.com/batterie... [apple.com]

        • I expect it is. However I don't expect the Class action to win. This seems that Apple was doing its best to extend the life of older devices vs trying to shorten it. Could they have done better? Yes. They could have given an option to turn such a feature on or off, Set a notification that the battery is no longer optimal... Have a little more press in getting a battery fix for older phones, as it is possible....

          There already is a notification in iOS (and macOS) about degraded battery life. They just maybe need to change the thresholds on when that is displayed a bit...

          And, considering Apple only charges $79 to replace a battery, there really isn't any excuse to not do it.

          Afterall, this kerfluffle was actually started because someone had their battery replaced, and noticed their phone seemed to be running faster...

          But at least Apple is TRYING to do something about it. I wonder if Samsung and the other "Droid" phon

          • My Sony XZ1 Compact seems to have a whole series of battery saving features. Starts with smart charge so that the over ight charge is a trickle charge timed for 100% capacity just befote I wake up. Then there is the 100% charge is not actually 100% because chargi g to the real 100% capacity of the battery is not good for the battery. Time well tell how well this all works of course. Slowing the phone down when the battery is old would be a good idea too, but there should be a notification that you are now o

        • The Snapdragon 808/810 has a habit of frying cores [xda-developers.com] on the Google Nexus 5x and 6p. There are class actions on this problem as well.

          There is a fix for the problem - disable the 4 large/fast cores, and run the phones only on the other 4 small/slow(er) cores.

          As far as I know, Google has not pushed this fix out as an OTA. If the bootloader is unlocked, then an owner can apply an independent set of fixes (replace both the recovery and the boot.img, at the very least).

          Apple at least detects and compensates for a b

      • Re:Buy a newerer fasterer one (Score:5, Informative)

        by TheFakeTimCook ( 4641057 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @12:23PM (#55790257)

        I also have to wonder if this was partly in response to the battery issues they had with the 6-series (or 6s, i forget) where they'd get unexpected shutdowns and battery capacity under ~40% was a complete crapshoot. I had one and regularly saw the phone power off at 20% battery...or go from 30 to 5 and then power off and back to 40% when powered back on.

        My guess is iffy battery performance messed up their capacity algorithms when it couldn't handle minor spikes in power due to CPU...so they basically just cut out the spikes in CPU to avoid further need of replacing batteries. And from there...it becomes a logical step to apply this to any device which might have anything similar happen. A slower phone is easier to accept than one which powers off somewhat randomly after all.

        I'd put my money on them being linked. It was a business decision to help limit battery replacement...and a "good idea" spread it to all devices.

        If anyone would bother to read, they would already KNOW that Apple has already explained that this is in response to the 6/6s "premature shutdown" issue.

        Apple explained that, as LiOn batteries age, and as the charge level depletes, they become less capable of being able to deliver energy SURGES when processing/graphics demands them. This is a fact of physics, and nothing Apple (or anyone) can really control. So, in iPhones, this was causing the power-management hardware/software to essentially "panic" and shut down the phone before the gross-charge-level was showing a low-batt. situation.

        So, Apple decided to, under those circumstances, "spread-out" the current-spikes, by temporarily rearranging some low-level timing in the OS. The actual goal of this software update was to EXTEND the useful life of the phone's batteries, NOT to "make an old device slower to boost sales of a replacement".

        Apple contends (and probably rightly), that you would most likely NOT see these brief slowdowns under normal use; but that benchmark testing reveals them, due to the exceptionally-high-and long-term-demands those types of tests place on the system.

        https://techcrunch.com/2017/12... [techcrunch.com]

        tl;dr

        Nothing to see here, take off your tinfoil hat and move along.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by antdude ( 79039 )

        I saw this happen with my old used iPhone 4S with its original battery. I had almost 10% battery left, and iOS v9.x asked me to put low power mode. I told it to go to low power mode. And then it shut down. I think it was running PokeMon Go app when it was popular. :P

        Back in the summer, I used a portable external battery charger wih it, and noticed iOS v9.3.5's power usage went up a few percentage very fast when connected for a minute. It doesn't seem to read the battery correctly.

    • perhaps they should have a button that allows you to make a binary choice between:

      would you prefer:
      maintain balanced quality of service as your battery degrades or accelerate the battery and possibly court a battery-swell fire?

      • accelerate the battery and possibly court a battery-swell fire?

        Is that choice real or artificial? Why would normal battery protection not be sufficient, unless its not good enough to begin with? Why don't other old phones have this problem?

        • they do. havent you ever notice how battery degradation snowballs? never noticed fires in cell phones? it doesn't man every phone catches on fire.

          • never noticed fires in cell phones? it doesn't man every phone catches on fire.

            No, I haven't noticed nor seen any information regarding any increase in risk of old cell phones catching fire due to taxing an older battery. Is this unique to Apple?

      • perhaps they should have a button that allows you to make a binary choice between:

        would you prefer:
        maintain balanced quality of service as your battery degrades or accelerate the battery and possibly court a battery-swell fire?

        EXACTLY! Well put, sir!

    • Slow down old phones, customers see how much faster the new ones are....profit!

      Customers replace battery, old phones again as fast as when new, less profit.

    • Actually, I'd suggest that this is more accurately viewed as a speed improvement, not a slowdown. I know, I know, it sounds weird, but hear me out.

      Prior to this fix, the affected phones weren't necessarily capable of supplying sufficient voltage during peak demand, so they would simply shut down spontaneously sometimes (potentially corrupting data in the process), resulting in a 100% reduction in performance. As such, while the peak performance of these phones may now be lower than what it was when they wer

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by shanen ( 462549 )

      If I ever saw a mod point I'd add a "Funny" to acknowledge the format of your reply. Then again, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have squandered an "Insightful" mod, even if brevity is the soul of wit. As of my writing, when the story is already about to fall off the Slashdot front page, there are no comments moderated "Funny", even though I think the target was juicy for jokes, and most of the "Insightful" comments were barely at best.

      To me the main insight in this topic is something along the lines of "Why wou

  • Unsurprising (Score:3, Interesting)

    by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @08:03AM (#55788653) Homepage Journal

    If you bought a new phone because the old one got slow, when all you needed was a new batter costing 1/10th as much even at Apple's official service charges, you were tricked into wasting a lot of money.

    • If you bought a new phone because the old one got slow, when all you needed was a new batter costing 1/10th as much even at Apple's official service charges, you were tricked into wasting a lot of money.

      Of course; because EVERYTHING is one big conspiracy against YOU, right?

  • SERIOUS QUESTION... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 22, 2017 @08:07AM (#55788663)

    Does the slow-down also happen when the phone is plugged into the wall?

    If yes, then this lawsuit has a huge case here! Still, it should be noted in the manual at the minimum of this 'feature'.

    • This is the question to be answered and will go a long way towards anecdotally showing intent.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Junta ( 36770 )

        No, it could then been argued they were just sloppy and didn't implement it in a sophisticated enough way.

        Short of some actually explicit statement, it's going to be hard to 'prove' "they did this to force a new phone purchase".

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by Anonymous Coward

          Contrary to nerds' beliefs, judges and juries are allowed (encouraged!) to infer motives from actions, and allowed to conclude that you're a fucking liar when you try to claim this was simple incompetence on your part. "Cui bono?" is a real thing that gets asked all the time.

          People and companies regularly lose legal cases where they never explicitly confessed to some offense, and if If Apple's best defense is "We'll just perjure ourselves!", they're in for a world of hurt.

          • IANAL, but I am a law student, and parent is correct.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Junta ( 36770 )

            In this case I'd say it is a very plausible statement. It's one thing if such a convenient consequence happens as a side effect of conspicuosly doing something a very particular way. Here the simplest way of implementing such a mechanism *also* happens to be the one where certain use cases are needlessly throttled.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by nasch ( 598556 )

          It only has to be "proven" by a preponderance of the evidence, meaning it's more likely than not.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Junta ( 36770 )

            In a civil case, sure, but even then inferring malicuous intent may be difficult.

            I suppose the court could order them to make it configurable and/or exempt certain scenarios, but I wouldn't be expecting a payday out of it.

    • Yes (Score:3, Interesting)

      by ytene ( 4376651 )
      This exact points was covered in the discussion thread to an earlier slashdot article which covered this story.

      Someone posted the results of some speed tests they had performed and it indicated that the performance degradation is driven by a software check on the handset version, not the condition of the battery.

      Apple have a tremendous opportunity to dig themselves out of this with some excellent PR - by issuing a new version of iOS which doesn't only remove this feature, but which includes an App t

      • Re:Yes (Score:5, Interesting)

        by The MAZZTer ( 911996 ) <megazzt.gmail@com> on Friday December 22, 2017 @08:37AM (#55788803) Homepage
        I've read comments saying people have had their batteries replaced with new ones and the slowdown goes away. So which one is it? Both of these can't be true. It either happens based on battery age (which is fine, maybe even a desired feature, but it should have been disclosed and maybe had controls) or OS version (which is not fine and can easily be interpreted as predatory).

        • So which one is it? Both of these can't be true.

          Of course they can both be true.

          If Apple is slowing down phones based on battery life, then this lawsuit is idiotic. I may hate Apple, but this is a desirable feature (assuming it's documented). I would bet a kajillion dollars that these same people would sue Apple if their phones stopped working prematurely due to NOT slowing down the phone to extend battery life. This claim should be summarily dismissed as monumentally stupid.

          However, if Apple is intentionally slowing down phones based on the model, th

          • I may hate Apple, but this is a desirable feature (assuming it's documented).

            That's the whole point. It has never been documented. Apple tried to hide it as much as possible until they got caught.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by torkus ( 1133985 )

          This is Apple and millions upon millions of lines of code.

          It COULD be both - out of arrogance, stupidity, or ill intent (or all three).

        • So which one is it? Both of these can't be true.

          Of course they can since this is likely a feature of a newer OS version.

    • The phone doesn't run off mains power when plugged into the wall. It still runs from the battery, and the battery charger circuit is running to fill the battery. Two separate loops.

      If the battery cannot deliver the voltage necessary for the phone to run at full power with full stability, they would still need to throttle it in order to have an acceptable user experience.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by karnal ( 22275 )

        In order to charge a battery, the charger needs to provide higher voltage to put in current - otherwise, no charging occurs. Even with a "separate" loop, you'll have a higher potential (voltage) at the terminals when charging/plugged in; ergo a higher voltage provided to the phone even if the battery is degraded. This higher voltage will be slightly higher than the peak nominal voltage of a "fresh" battery, so it should trigger higher performance if the phone is just looking at a simple voltage state.

    • Does the slow-down also happen when the phone is plugged into the wall?

      If yes, then this lawsuit has a huge case here! Still, it should be noted in the manual at the minimum of this 'feature'.

      Probably does; because the phone is still running off the battery. The battery is just being charged at a rate that is designed to charge it across AVERAGED use; the charger cannot deliver the same current-spikes as the battery. This is why many laptops actually run SLOWER (throttle back) if you take the batteries out and just run on the AC adapter's power.

  • No fan of apple but... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by thegarbz ( 1787294 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @08:10AM (#55788673)

    This is retarded. There's clear reasons why someone would potentially want this feature. The suit shouldn't request they stop doing it, but rather make it optional and put it in control of the user.

    Full disclosure: Typing this on a laptop which gives me the choice of performance or battery life in the power settings.

    • Re:No fan of apple but... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Baron_Yam ( 643147 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @08:19AM (#55788699)

      >This is retarded. There's clear reasons why someone would potentially want this feature.

      No, they were deceptive. Obviously the feature is great when it stops your phone from rebooting... but paired with hiding it (instead of say, giving a battery condition alert) and making the battery non-replaceable, what they've really done is put an artificial expiry date into their phones.

      Even if they didn't mean to be deceptive (and I'd bet the engineers didn't, but don't ask me to extend the same credit to sales & marketing), that just makes it unintentionally deceptive.

      They still need a good hard smack to help them never do anything like this again.

      • Re:No fan of apple but... (Score:5, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 22, 2017 @08:37AM (#55788799)

        This kind of thing merits a prompt on every reboot.

        "The OS has detected that the battery has deteriorated to the point that it may affect device stability. Should battery saving mode be enabled to attempt to work around this issue? (Battery saving mode will slow down all phone operations.)"

        If you click no, they can either prompt you where to get a battery replaced, if that is at all feasible, or rather give you a small coupon on the discount of a new phone. If the phone crashes after that point, well you were warned.

        That would be the ethical way to handle it... I'd rather know the true state then wonder if the phone is infested with malware.

        • This kind of thing merits a prompt on every reboot.

          "The OS has detected that the battery has deteriorated to the point that it may affect device stability. Should battery saving mode be enabled to attempt to work around this issue? (Battery saving mode will slow down all phone operations.)"

          If you click no, they can either prompt you where to get a battery replaced, if that is at all feasible, or rather give you a small coupon on the discount of a new phone. If the phone crashes after that point, well you were warned.

          That would be the ethical way to handle it... I'd rather know the true state then wonder if the phone is infested with malware.

          But the way Apple explained it, it is explicitly designed to NOT "slow down ALL operations"; but rather scoot the timing of some operations around under high-demand conditions ONLY, so that instantaneous current-demand SPIKES, which is what a degraded battery has trouble with, are "smoothed-out" somewhat, keeping the battery-voltage from temporarily (and instantaneously) "crashing" and causing an unintentional and unexpected shutdown or reboot.

      • the slowdown should go away as soon as the phone is plugged into the wall (And yes , using a 2.4A charger (5V) gives enough power to an iPhone to 1) work normally 2) charge).

        • the slowdown should go away as soon as the phone is plugged into the wall (And yes , using a 2.4A charger (5V) gives enough power to an iPhone to 1) work normally 2) charge).

          But possibly not enough INSTANTANEOUS current to avoid dipping into the battery now and again.

      • I'm not sure what "no" means in this context when the suit is asking

        "The suit asks that Apple stop throttling older devices"

        and my comment talked about that, and your reply made zero mention of the topic at all.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by sl3xd ( 111641 )

        making the battery non-replaceable

        Most watches take roughly the same amount of care to replace the battery as an iPhone, and (shocker), they also require tools to replace the battery. My car's battery isn't exactly trivial to replace, taking tools and 15-20 minutes to mount & secure it properly.

        Hell, my toddler's bath toys require tools to replace the batteries in their child-safe battery-compartments.

        Replacing the battery on an iOS device isn't something that can be done without tools and a clean table, but it's easily doable. The phon

    • Re:No fan of apple but... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Junta ( 36770 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @08:23AM (#55788731)

      Additionally, in laptop land they tend to issue a warning when battery performance is degraded compared to original condition. It wouldn't be such a terrible idea for mobile devices to do the same, so long as there were a reasonable way to service the battery (which often there is not).

      • I have never bought a cellphone where I couldn't replace the battery. Funny enough, my current phone is 3 years old and the battery still lasts about as long as it did originally.

        Makes you wonder whether they deliberately use crappy batteries when building them non-replaceable so after 2 years when the battery croaks you wouldn't want to spend half the price of a new phone for a replacement battery and instead get a new phone, while using better quality on batteries where they know they'd have to stock spar

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Junta ( 36770 )

          I wouldn't even mind if they required tools to replace the battery, so long as said tools didn't likely damage the phone and they didn't solder in the battery leads or use adhesive on the battery.

          My laptop uses what is described as a 'non-removable battery', but a phillips head screwdriver lets me in, I can unplug the battery and swap it out. Similar story for batteries in playstation controllers, though I'm convinced sony ordered screws made of playdough, the heads of those screws are way too soft, though

        • Li-ions in phones are chosen for capacity, not longevity, and are usually run at the limits of their rated voltage limits to get the highest possible initial chemistry. This just reflects consumer demand: People only look at how long their possible new phone will run for when new, not how long it will run in two years.

        • I have never bought a cellphone where I couldn't replace the battery. Funny enough, my current phone is 3 years old and the battery still lasts about as long as it did originally.

          Makes you wonder whether they deliberately use crappy batteries when building them non-replaceable so after 2 years when the battery croaks you wouldn't want to spend half the price of a new phone for a replacement battery and instead get a new phone, while using better quality on batteries where they know they'd have to stock spares because people would actually buy them...

          Apple charges a flat fee of $79, including the battery, for out of warranty iPhone battery replacement.

          That's HARDLY "Half the price of a new phone". ANYONE's new phone.

      • Additionally, in laptop land they tend to issue a warning when battery performance is degraded compared to original condition. It wouldn't be such a terrible idea for mobile devices to do the same, so long as there were a reasonable way to service the battery (which often there is not).

        Apple does have a degraded battery notification in iOS; but it probably needs the thresholds looked-at.

        Apple offers out-of-warranty iPhone battery replacement for $79, including the battery, which is QUITE reasonable.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by torkus ( 1133985 )

      I bet that laptop also gives you the ability to check battery health too...you know, without returning it to the manufacturer to have some oddly titled 'guru' run a set of completely automated tests that give results which have standardized actions to take in response.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Ichijo ( 607641 )

      Good idea. But how do you access that setting when your phone keeps rebooting due to the degraded battery and you don't have your charger with you?

      • If your phone keeps rebooting then it needs to be repaired, not gimped.

        If you're looking for a technical solution to not having a charger with you, then you're probably out finding yourself in a forest, otherwise the opportunity to borrow some charge long enough to boot and change a setting is pretty much available everywhere.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Ichijo ( 607641 )

          If your phone keeps rebooting then it needs to be repaired, not gimped.

          So instead of automatically adjusting current draw of the CPU as the battery ages, they should set a fixed CPU speed according to the current draw of a battery at the end of its useful life?

          In other words, you want to pre-gimp the phone instead of gimp-as-you-go. I suppose there's some merit in that.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Khyber ( 864651 )

      "There's clear reasons why someone would potentially want this feature"

      What's retarded is you thinking this is a feature rather than utterly-shit design. Li-ion batteries at their worst state output ~3.6V. The processor in my Droid phone, desktop GPU, desktop CPU, etc. only needs ~1.2V to operate. Where did apple fuck up so badly that the voltage from the battery can sag so low that it forces a processor shutdown or throttling?

      • No, what you're describing is defective design. What I'm describing is a clear desire for a feature to throttle performance on purpose to extend and old phone's battery life.

        This shouldn't ever be used to fix the shoddy design that is the reboot problem.

      • "There's clear reasons why someone would potentially want this feature"

        What's retarded is you thinking this is a feature rather than utterly-shit design. Li-ion batteries at their worst state output ~3.6V. The processor in my Droid phone, desktop GPU, desktop CPU, etc. only needs ~1.2V to operate. Where did apple fuck up so badly that the voltage from the battery can sag so low that it forces a processor shutdown or throttling?

        You don't understand the di/dt figure of merit, do you?

        It's not about steady-state, AVERAGED current draw, it's about the SPIKES!

  • Tim Cook rails against the privacy-invading business model of other tech companies, then we learn they accept billions in secret payments from Google to enable said business model on their phones.

    Apple release a software fix they claims resolves a shutdown issue they previously denied even exists, then we learn the "fix" was a hack that throttles the phone performance to unusable levels, which serves to both save them hundreds of millions in additional recall costs while also surreptitiously motivating

    • Tim Cook rails against the privacy-invading business model of other tech companies, then we learn they accept billions in secret payments from Google to enable said business model on their phones. Apple release a software fix they claims resolves a shutdown issue they previously denied even exists, then we learn the "fix" was a hack that throttles the phone performance to unusable levels, which serves to both save them hundreds of millions in additional recall costs while also surreptitiously motivating users to upgrade to a newer model to get a usable phone again. These are not the actions of an ethical company.

      Companies are generally not in the business of being completely honest and transparent. Some companies are just less dishonest than others. A company exists solely for the purpose of making money at any "legal" means necessary. They do this through a veneer of honesty and integrity. Show me a large company that has behaved 100% honestly and ethically. I am hard pressed to think of any.

  • ... if this nasty little trick was unique to Apple, or if any of the other big handset manufacturers have been doing this. Has anyone seen any discussion of that?
    • I've been through 3 upgrades on my 1 year old Android device and it is just as fast as it was when I pulled it out of the box. And I am even using a budget ZTE Android phone. Of course, I do very little with it other than make calls, text, and maybe watch Netflix and listen to Spotify. I certainly do not use social media and I have few apps installed.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Apple uses much smaller batteries than most other high end phones. Those small batteries can't deliver as much power, and are apparently marginal to begin with so when they age the phone needs to throttle.

      For example, the iPhone 6 has an 1800mAh battery. Other high end phones of that era had at least 2500mAh, many over 3000.

      • Apple uses much smaller batteries than most other high end phones. Those small batteries can't deliver as much power, and are apparently marginal to begin with so when they age the phone needs to throttle.

        For example, the iPhone 6 has an 1800mAh battery. Other high end phones of that era had at least 2500mAh, many over 3000.

        Hey stupid!

        Apple has smaller batteries because their SoCs USE LESS POWER on average than those current-hogging Snapdragon pieces of shit!

  • Future news - lawsuit settled (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Kohath ( 38547 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @08:55AM (#55788885)

    Class action lawsuit settled. Lawyers to get $30 million. Phone customers to get a coupon for $5 off a new iPhone.

    • Which brings up an interesting point. Class actions are intended to punish companies not reward consumers. But with $256bn cash on hand, how do you punish a company like that?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Kohath ( 38547 )

        Just punishment should have a “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard of proof. Class actions have a 50.1% standard. Class action settlements have no standard of proof at all — it's just lawyers playing games to try to impose litigation costs on companies and offering to make it all go away for a big lawyer payday.

    • Expecting a new iOS release having the "slow down" feature as an option (including a big warning if you put that option OFF).
    • We should pursue a class action lawsuit against lawyers.
  • This is the suit I would love to see:

    A class action suit has been filed against Dewy Chetham and Howe by members of the class ripped-off-twice. The ripped-off-twice were consumers who lost $10000 to $50,000 to misdeeds and dereliction of fiduciary responsibility by Fly-By-Night Financial Consultants. A class action suite was filed by Dewy Chetham and Howe and they obtained class action status and extracted 2.8 million dollars in damages. But they inflated their bill, 10$ to photocopy a page, 500$ an hour for para legal, 100,000$ for two lap tops etc. Further the puny offering of $3.84 for each member was so low no one bothered to collect it. Now the class memebers are suing Dewy Chetham and Howe for malpractice, and dereliction of duty to their clients, for botched negotiations and settling for unreasonably low damages. They are seeking punitive damages and restitution equal to their original loss.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • From what I understand, the most computationally power efficient way (as in flops per watt-hour) to control ECU throttling is to stay at the lowest speed when idle, and immediately throttle up to the highest speed when there's any meaningful demand on the CPU. This is not only the most efficient method, but very nearly the fastest, having a vanishingly slim performance disadvantage vs. locking the CPU to the maximum speed at all times. All the desktop OSes control frequencies this way by default.

    So is Apple

    • Exactly what Apple are doing is still not fully understood, but it seems to involve reducing either the maximum CPU speed, or the length of time in which it can stay at that speed. If their claims that this is about stability are to be believed, this would make sense: They want to cap maximum instantaneous power draw below what they are confident an ageing battery can provide. Otherwise the battery voltage may dip below what is required for stable operation

  • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by sl3xd ( 111641 )

      I guess Apple is safe, then. The battery isn't glued in on iOS devices; I've replaced the battery in every phone my wife and I have ever had.

      iOS devices are clearly designed to be serviced. Much like a watch, requires tools and more skill than a two year old.

      Seriously, your "non-replacable battery" is pure bullshit. As with any machine, you need to use the right tools for the job.

      Even on the glued-in MacBook batteries, Apple has always had a solvent to release the glue for servicing, and (shocker), it's eve

    • Re:We need to start taxing (Score:4, Insightful)

      by TheFakeTimCook ( 4641057 ) on Friday December 22, 2017 @01:48PM (#55790807)

      We need to start taxing devices into which batteries have been glued. If an end-user can't replace the battery themselves, the lifespan of electronic devices is cut significantly. This results in more waste, and should be taxed accordingly.

      This practice needs to stop.

      Apple has a flat-rate iPhone battery replacement service for $79.

      Now what?

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