Let the games begin!
in [Wireless Internet]
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From: Justin on 3 Jul 2010 08:47 nospam wrote on [Fri, 02 Jul 2010 22:21:54 -0700]: > In article <i0mese$o49$1(a)news.eternal-september.org>, Justin > <nospam(a)insightbb.com> wrote: > >> >> "More suits filed in iPhone 4 antenna fracas" >> > >> > big deal. people sue for all sorts of reasons. sometimes they're valid, >> > sometimes they're not. >> > >> > google is in trouble for wifi data breaches, violating patents and >> > privacy policies, but you don't hear much about that do you. >> >> Are you kidding? It was all over the tech news a month ago. > > nowhere near as much as the iphone antenna issue. four lawsuits already > and the phone has been out a week. Germany, Ireland and a few other countries I can't remember off the top of my head sued google over the wifi data mining. > meanwhile, google tracks every search you do and indexes your email (if > you use gmail) for ad targeting. not much fuss over that. Google tells you up front what they do with your data
From: Larry on 3 Jul 2010 10:27 Justin <nospam(a)insightbb.com> wrote in news:i0nbhl$pcn$1(a)news.eternal- september.org: > data mining. Precisely my point about the horrors of cloud computing..... -- Global Warming and Creationism are to science what storks are to obstetrics... Larry
From: Justin on 3 Jul 2010 12:10 Larry wrote on [Sat, 03 Jul 2010 14:27:22 +0000]: > Justin <nospam(a)insightbb.com> wrote in news:i0nbhl$pcn$1(a)news.eternal- > september.org: > >> data mining. > > Precisely my point about the horrors of cloud computing..... yep, however this point had nothing to do with the cloud
From: Jeff Liebermann on 3 Jul 2010 12:50 On Fri, 02 Jul 2010 17:46:49 -0700, John Navas <jncl1(a)navasgroup.com> wrote: >"More suits filed in iPhone 4 antenna fracas" ><http://news.cnet.com/8301-31021_3-20009625-260.html> At first, Apple said this was a problem common to any phone and suggested buying a rubber case or holding the phone differently. Translation: Apple doesn't have a clue about RF and is now in damage control mode. Blaming the victim is a great start. <http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2010/07/02appleletter.html> To fix this, we are adopting AT&T�s recently recommended formula for calculating how many bars to display for a given signal strength. The real signal strength remains the same, but the iPhone�s bars will report it far more accurately, providing users a much better indication of the reception they will get in a given area. We are also making bars 1, 2 and 3 a bit taller so they will be easier to see. Translation: AT&T recommends playing with the cosmetic bar graph. <http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/iPhone-4-Teardown/3130/2> Apple has gone a step further and tuned the phone to utilize whichever network band is less congested or has the least interference for the best signal quality, regardless of the actual signal strength. Early reports suggest this feature, while buggy in its early stages, will greatly improve the phone's reliability on AT&T's fragile network. Translation: Apple uses the SNR (signal quality) and not the signal strength (-dBM) to control the phone. Recalculating the bars does not control xmit power or initiate a disconnect. That's done by the calculated SNR or BER (bit error rate) which should be visible if the internal diagnostics works on the iPhone 4 as it does on the 3G. <http://www.wirelessinfo.com/content/Inside-the-iPhone-field-test-mode.htm> Playing with the RSSI to bars conversion is just a smoke screen. More likely, there are considerably more changes included. However, I don't think that's the problem. My guess(tm) is that the antenna Q is too high. My ancient LG VX8100 phone has an external antenna. I can grab the antenna, wrap my hand around it, and the signal drops maybe one bar. Running a fast test in field test mode, normal -79dBm 4 bars hand on antenna -89dBm 3 bars -10dB is a large drop, but not 2 bars or enough to cause a disconnect. That's because the 30mm long antenna is fairly low Q, broadband, and seperated from direct contact by about 2mm of plastic. From various reports, the iPhone 4 drops more like 3-4 bars when the antenna tip is touched. If that's true (I haven't played with an iPhone 4 yet), that's a -30dB or more drop, which is far too sensitive to survive hand contact. My very unofficial conversion table from -dBm to bars: Bars -dBm 1 -102 to -112 2 -94 to -101 3 -87 to -93 4 -77 to -86 5 -38 to -76 tested on my VX8100. More, borrowed from one of my previous rants on the subject: Deja Vu. When the Motorola RAZR antenna landed on the bottom of the phone, instead of the top, there was considerable debate about how to handle the problem of how to hold the phone. I'll spare you the arguments and details, but it was decided to do nothing. Eventually, through trial and error, the customers were expected to understand how it works and optimize how they hold the phone. Most did, but a few had to be told by the dealer what was happening. However, the RAZR was different because covering the antenna area reduced the signal levels, but didn't shut down the phone. With the iPhone 4, there appears to be a much more drastic reduction in signal level. My guess(tm) is either the PA might be shutting down from excessive VSWR, or the antenna Q is so high, that touching it near the tip has a drastic effect on the tuning. It looks about the right size for a PIFA antenna at 800 MHz, but I'm not sure. Touching the end of the PIFA antenna is a bad idea. Apple could have reduced the effect by burying the last inch or more of the antenna under some cosmetic plastic, but apparently decided that styling is more important than function. Note that projecting external antennas have been on cell phones since the stone age. Internal antenna are a recent development. Touching the antenna on an old external antenna cell phone had little effect, so it's there's no reason an external antenna shouldn't work on the iPhone 4. Something else is going on, but without an iPhone 4 to play with, I'm guessing. -- Jeff Liebermann jeffl(a)cruzio.com 150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558
From: Richard B. Gilbert on 3 Jul 2010 14:40
Justin wrote: > Larry wrote on [Sat, 03 Jul 2010 14:27:22 +0000]: >> Justin <nospam(a)insightbb.com> wrote in news:i0nbhl$pcn$1(a)news.eternal- >> september.org: >> >>> data mining. >> Precisely my point about the horrors of cloud computing..... > > yep, however this point had nothing to do with the cloud Who is responsible for the integrity and security of data stored "in the cloud"? Why should I, or anyone, be willing to entrust his data to it? |