Apple Changing the Number of Signal Bars the iPhone 4 Shows

Apple has sent a letter to owners of the iPhone 4 stating that this smartphone overstates the strength of its wireless signal. It has promised to release a small software update that will fix this issue.

Many users of Apple's latest smartphone has noticed that when they hold the iPhone 4 in a certain way, the signal strength meter will drop by 4 or 5 bars. According to the letter sent to owners of this device, this isn't because the signal strength is actually dropping dramatically, but because the smartphone's software for calculating the strength is badly written.

The letter says:

"We were stunned to find that the formula we use to calculate how many bars of signal strength to display is totally wrong. Our formula, in many instances, mistakenly displays 2 more bars than it should for a given signal strength."

Apple says a software update to update the signal strength formula will be sent out in a few weeks.

To be clear, this software update won't give the iPhone 4 better reception. Rather it will more accurately state how strong a signal the device has.

The iPhone 4's Achilles Heel
The iPhone 4 has a new design in which the outer edge of the device is used as a collection of antennas. While in most cases this improves the phone's wireless performance, holding the unit in a certain way can reduce it.

Tightly holding the device so that the user's hand covers the black strip in the lower left corner of the metal band will interfere with reception.

Users are complaining that covering the lower left corner of the iPhone 4 will result in a dramatic signal drop. According to Apple's statement today, much of this drop isn't real because the signal meter was overstating the signal strength to begin with. The promised software update will take care of this problem because it will stop the device from overstating its connection -- it won't actually improve the connection, though.

Apple also says that "the iPhone 4’s wireless performance is the best we have ever shipped," and that its testing shows that this model has better reception than the iPhone 3GS.

Overview of the Apple iPhone 4
Apple's fourth-generation smartphone is a significant upgrade from the previous one, starting with its 3.5-inch, 640 x 960 touchscreen, a much higher resolution than any iPhone has offered before.

It has a new slimmer design and runs iOS 4.0, the latest version of Apple's operating system, on a 1 GHz Apple A4 processor.

The iPhone 4 comes in two configurations: a version with 16 GB of storage costs $200 and one with 32 GB goes for $300. These prices are for new AT&T customers willing to sign up for a two-year contract, or current customers who qualify for a subsidy. Current customers who don't qualify will have to pay $200 more.

The iPhone 4 has a 5 megapixel rear-facing camera with a flash, as well as support for recording 720p video at 30 frames per second. In addition, it includes a small front-facing camera for video chatting with an app called FaceTime.

This smartphone has 3G wireless networking, as well as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and a GPS receiver.