Apple's Fix For iPhone 4 To Show AT&T Network Weakness

Lending new meaning to "more bars, more places", Today Apple announced that they've been lying about signal strength since the original iPhone.  They admitted that the formula used to display signal strength, shows two or more bars too many.

This flaw is where Apple puts the blame for the iPhone 4 reception problem.  The one where the signal goes away when you hold the phone.  That instead of 3 or 4 bars... when this problem happens you really have a very weak signal and by grounding the antenna by touching it, you lose service.

So, they will be releasing a patch for all iPhones (except perhaps the original) which will display the "true" signal strength.  Except that now iPhone users will find out just how crappy the AT&T signal may be in their area.

BTW, I don't buy this excuse... they say that the iPhone 3GS had the same bad formula.  But they don't drop calls near as much as the new iPhone 4.  Apple's designers had a victory against the Apple engineers as no engineer would make a phone where you held the antenna.  By showing fewer bars, Apple can blamed the problem on AT&T.  By making the first few bars taller (to make them "easier to see"), Apple hopes that their fans will be lulled into a sense of having a good signal.

Apple admits iPhone 4 reception issues, says fix is coming - CNN.com