Apple reduces speed of iPhones as batteries wear out, report suggests

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/dec/19/apple-iphone-reduce-speed-old-batteries

John.

 

Not really sure how I feel about this honestly.

 

That's...creepy.

 

Classical Apple Swiss cheese to force sheeple to upgrade. Happened to me when I had my iPhone 4S, it updated to iOS 8 and the phone became slow as heck and the battery was horrible. Then it also happened to my wife's iPhone 6 so she upgrade to the iPhone 7

 

I mean - I can sort of understand the logic behind it - if your battery is at 80% wear level - downclocking and undervolting may improve runtimes somewhat but would it be enough is the question. I honestly think that people should just replace the battery rather than be forced to use a slow device.

 

oh no I know my battery, it was a wide spread issue across the forums at the time. They did it on purpose and the phone became super laggy to the point you hated it and wanted to throw it and buy a new one.

Samsung did the same thing with my Note 4, upgraded to Lollipop and the battery life dropped from an easy 2 day to a max of 1 day with the same apps/same usage and that was a brand new 1 month old phone. Yes I could manually downgrade to KitKat but the nags to upgrade would never stop bugging you

 

Ok, first off. It's not to "make people upgrade". It's to conserve battery life so the devices gets reasonable battery time. My old ipad 2 is suffering from a crappy battery and the performance of the device is suffering. However, I can still sit and read and surf for 6 hrs or so on it. I am waiting for the new battery to arrive to get it fixed. If they never did this...my old ipad would last like 30 min. So...NO, it's not some big apple conspiracy to make people upgrade etc. It's conserving battery time while being used. I think it's smart. You would want to upgrade much faster if your device just died every 30 min - 1 hr. Actually my 3 old galaxies were like that. And they were less than a year old.

My iphone 6s is running 11.2. It's just as fast as it always was. I had 2 days of glitchy call use but it has smoothed out again now and everything is fine. I just hope that my essential does the same thing when the battery starts to wear. If not...it will be tossed in the junk drawer if I have to charge every couple of hours.

 

There are two separate issues. First is the software patch itself, which may have a fair justification. But then there's the part where they don't tell you that they're doing it, even if you come into an Apple store to complain about performance issues. Which is a real problem.

If they had a disclaimer somewhere "performance has been throttled due to the age of your battery to prevent the risk of sudden shutdowns. Have your battery replaced for $80 to restore full performance," this wouldn't bother me. But this was being used to push people into buying new $1000 phones instead.

 

Apple should have been upfront about this from the beginning, if this "wide spread slowdown" were "real" and really needed to be applied globally to "previous generation" model phones, whether they were sold 1 year ago or just yesterday - they all get slowed down - that's baloney.

Battery aging is a known thing, and not detrimental to performance as a wide-spread thing, this "slowdown" doesn't need to be applied to every phone / tablet.

There should be a visible section in Settings that addresses this issue, and gives the owner an option to enable a "slowdown" to preserve battery or leave things as they are running as fast as normal.

In fact this could be rolled up into the normal battery saving options. For Samsung S7 Edge there is a High Performance (10% OC!!) option, along with 3 levels of battery savings (normal, savings, superduper savings).

I think Apple made up a bunch of baloney to cover their butt's after getting caught slowing down the previous generation devices to generate upgrade sales.

 

HMscott. They ALL never slowed down. Only ones with degraded batteries. Like I said, I have 3 iphone 6s phones. one is a year old (my 19 year old son's, he dropped it at a party in University last year. Apple replaced it for free since they quoted me the wrong price for the repair)...and 2 other 6s phones, my wifes and mine, which are 2 years old. All phones are getting high numbers in benchmarks, and show little battery wear. Therefore, NOT ALL older model iphones are being throttled and "slowed down".

EDIT: I am not an apple fanboy etc. I have android devices, apple devices, blackberry devices, windows mobile devices. I look at things from a realists point of view...not clouded by fanboy'ism on any side. I would be first to call apple out if they were slowing down ALL Iphones. That's a different ball of wax all together.

 

As a person who has had a degraded battery cause shutdowns on WIndows Phone 8.1 - they are not lying about that aspect - about 2 years after initial purchase, my phone became very unstable due to battery wear and would often freeze or crash.

 

If Apple is testing the battery capability to decide to slow down the device, I think it should popup a dialog and warn the owner - and suggest warranty replacement of the battery - if they still have original warranty or Apple Care.

If the device stops performing as out of the box, then it's no longer performing as promised, and Apple needs to fix it, not slow it down.

If there is a battery condition test, the results should also be displayed, with a scale showing how far under the minimum it is to run at full performance, or how far it is away from not being able to provide full performance, with an estimate of how long it will be before Apple's software recommends reducing performance.

I really think Apple has completely botched this whole thing, and needs to completely re-do their approach to the problem.

Solve the problem with a battery replacement, free, and give the owner the option to reduce battery stress well before it can no longer offer full performance, to prolong the battery life.

Apple also needs to redesign their batteries to give full performance longer, like we have with Android phones.

If what Apple is saying is true, then they've got a real problem with their battery designs; otherwise why aren't Android phones exhibiting the same problems???

Again, I think this is all complete BS, and Apple got caught pulling a fast one on their customers - either way - covering up for faulty batteries - or covering up their attempt to slow down older models to get owners to upgrade to new devices.

 

Given your experience, would you want your phone slowed down as a fix, or get a replacement battery?

Do you think slowing down your phone would provide enough of a change to improve your battery life? That's the thing I can't see as being correct.

Normally when a battery starts going soft you aren't going to extend it's charge life significantly by reducing performance "a little", you have to disable a lot of features and slow it down a lot to make any kind of measurable extension of run time.

And, that battery is going to continue to degrade rapidly over time, given the small effect of slowing down the device, it's a really useless temporary solution.

The other obvious question is, why doesn't Apple have some kind of indication that the battery is going bad and needs to be replaced?

If Apple has gone to the trouble of figuring out that a battery bad enough to slow down the device, it is obvious it's time to replace that battery, and the customer should be made aware of that problem.

Apple brags about the littlest of features, why didn't Apple herald this wonderful feature that notices your phone battery is going bad so they automatically slow down your phone?

 

Well - my phone was out of warranty at that point so an option to restore it to functionality at the cost of performance would have been fine since several months later it became unusable because of CPU/GPU or RAM damage (not sure) but that's why I had to upgrade mainly.

 

Shouldn't batteries last longer than the warranty? I mean, you know, the screen still works, the other parts are running fine, but the battery poops out - too early in my estimation - I have phones and other devices with lithium batteries that are running longer than 2 years, without showing any softness in recharge time or run time.

I think your battery failed earlier than it should have, unless that make / model is well known for it's battery failure right at the expiration of the 1 or 2 year warranty?

I also think Apple's batteries are failing way too early if they are indeed failing to the point Apple is throttling performance to "save them" and increase run time and battery life.

I think Apple needs to come clean and fix this issue for real with a complete solution, including warranty and out of warranty battery replacement instead of clandestinely throttling the performance.

 

The battery didn't fail per se. It just got degraded due to constant use and cycling. It's fairly normal. I mean, I used it every day from 100% to 0% and recharged it. Sometimes twice a day. I'd argue it lasted a fair bit before failing to deliver the power needed for the CPU to operate properly. I should add - I also used it in -10*C environments.

 

You can use AIDA64 to check wear level of battery. I had 4% wear level when design and original capacity was 2100mAh. I just did battery calibration and lost 4% of battery now. Now, AIDA64 shows zero wear level after Hard reset. It reports 2000mAh just like Apple tech specs.

 

How is an iphone owner supposed to know when their iphone has been throttled by Apple for the "battery problem"???

Are they just supposed to "guess" because their iphone seems to be acting slower than normal that it's being performance throttled?

How can you know, for sure?

 

Short answer: You can't really figure out if its done willingly or not. I'm not an iPhone user since I gave it to my mom and she never noticed anything.
Unless you're a heavy user you may not even notice anything. Next year iphone X will be slowed, a $1000 phone throttled for better battery life.
In essence, iphone can only last a year( by Apple standards) until new phone comes out. Best option is to sell it & buy an Android flagship.

 

I have yet to have any of my android batteries last longer physically than my iphone. I was swapping out my batteries in my Samsung after only 1 year because they could not keep a charge longer than an hr. I agree apple should have given a warning. Android phones ARE exhibiting the same problems....their batteries wear out after a year or two as well....but instead of throttling to keep your full day charge...they just go flat in 2-3 hrs instead. I know, I own them.

 

How come my 2 year old iphone 6s is not throttled? The x will not be throttled until the battery is REALLY bad. my phone still has 95% battery life left. NOT THROTTLED, my ipad 2, has 10 percent battery life left....it has been throttled back, but Is still useable for 6 plus hrs a day under heavy use. To say that EVERY idevice is going to be throttle is false, and you come off like a fanboy.

 

You remind me of my uncle and his love for iphones. He always buys flagship phones from Samsung and from 2 years or so, he switched to iphone 6,6plus and then 7 plus and he has similar views like yours.
Atleast you know its time to replace the battery on android phones.

Like you said you were lucky. Who knows X will be throttled or not since it will be older when XI comes out.

 

Apple is slowing down your iPhone - WAN Show Dec. 22 2017
03:15 Apple slowing down older iPhones

 

Apple Sued After It Admits To Slowing Down Older IPhones
December 24, 2017, 11:11:00 PM EDT By RTT News
http://www.nasdaq.com/article/apple...-to-slowing-down-older-iphones-20171224-00011

"(RTTNews.com) - A lawsuit has been filed against Apple Inc. ( AAPL ) after the tech giant admitted to purposefully slowing down older iPhone models in order to prolong the life of the devices.

Apple said last Wednesday that it does take some measures to reduce power demands and keep the devices running at optimal performance if there is an older battery that has a lower battery charge.

Apple noted that lithium-ion batteries become less capable of supplying peak current demands when in cold conditions, have a low battery charge or as they age over time, causing the device to unexpectedly shut down to protect its electronic components.

However, two California residents, Stefan Bogdanovich and Dakota Speas, have brought a class action lawsuit in California against Apple. The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the central district of California.

The plaintiffs said that they have noted that their older iPhone models slow down when new models come out. They also said that Apple never requested consent, nor did they give consent to slow down their iPhones.

The plaintiffs alleged that they "suffered interferences to their iPhone usage due to the intentional slowdowns" caused by Apple.

They are seeking damages from Apple as the company's wrongful actions caused them to suffer economic damages and other harm for which they are entitled to compensation.

For comments and feedback: contact [email protected]

http://www.rttnews.com "

 

What if you replace the battery? Does the older phone start working properly again?

 

nope, because this is just an excuse. You and I know that they are doing this on purpose to push people to upgrade

 

I will give you the REAL answer. Yes your device works as new again. After your device sees proper battery voltages etc, it will return as it should.

 

I know when it's time to replace the battery on my iphone too. At least I can still make it through a day without having to charge 6 times like my android phones when their batteries wear out.

 

So how much does it cost to get an iphone battery replaced.

John.

 

And another question would be if Apple will agree to change a battery on older model (i.e. iPhone 5) or just say to buy a new one.

 

Hello marketing strategy

 

Which android phone if you willing to share?

 

I have had 3 different galaxy Note devices, HTC one, nexus 4, blackberry keyone.....and Soon to be essential phone, and blackberry's new phone. The main ones that were crappy were the Samsungs. They were terrible...all ate the batteries after 6 months.

 

99.00 Cdn direct from apple...cheaper from third party places.

 

Of course. They will replace your battery if they have them in stock. If not, take your ip5s to a local place, and get it done for like 40-50 bucks.

 

Do note that the battery packs you get from 3rd party vendors vary a lot in quality. Some are out right terrible. Some may be better than the original. It's hard to tell in advance.

 

That's why you goto a reputable 3rd party dealer with warranty etc.

 

Lawsuit: Apple slowed iPhones on purpose

You're not crazy. Apple is slowing down older iPhones. (Apple Byte)

 

LAWSUIT FILED IN ISRAEL AGAINST APPLE FOR CAUSING IPHONE SLOW DOWN

The lawsuit accuses Apple of having “a clear interest in hiding the information from users because it would prefer they replace old iPhones with new ones as soon as possible.”

A class action lawsuit was filed in Israel against Apple accusing the company of breaching its duty toward users by failing to disclose that “innocent” software updates would slow the performance of older model iPhones.

The $125 million lawsuit was filed on Monday in Tel Aviv and comes on the heels of at least four other lawsuits filed in the United States. The lawsuits were filed after the disclosure last week by Apple that it provided software updates that slowed the phones in order to make aging batteries last longer. Lawsuits filed in the United States charged that when faced with the slowdown, consumers concluded that they had to buy new and more expensive iPhones. Let it come in spades!!

 

I have had a Galaxy S3, Moto X (2014), and S7 Edge, and none of them had any noticeable degredation of the battery in six months. I used each for two years (except for the S7 Edge where I’m currently one year in) and my experience doesn’t at all match what you describe.

I wonder if it was not actually the hardware failing on all your Android phones but something in particular that you were doing software-wise on all your Android devices that can’t be done on iOS? Because if every single Android phone or every single Samsung Galaxy phone had battery problems after six months, you wouldn’t be the only one complaining.

 

I would love to know how many people would prefer user replaceable battery`s at the expense of a slightly larger and heavier phone, I would jump at one.

I am still babying my 4 year old HTC M7, It`s regarded as the hardest phone in the world to replace the battery in, even service centers cannot do it without HTC specialized equipment.

John.

 

Add me in.

 

I am going to pick up a second hand Samsung S4, A great phone with a big screen and it`s battery is user replaceable, I have seen used one`s being sold by individuals for £40 and refurb grade A for £90 or less.

John.

 

Why not get a Nokia 2/3 for stock android and better battery.

 

Agreed.

This "obsession" with thin at the sake of functionality is terrible. I keep going back to my Lumia 1020. The best peice of hardware EVER for a mobile phone. Camera is still unmatched for image quality, build quality was awesome. if your battery or screen were damaged...it was SOOO easy to replace with an easy and ingenious locking mechanism. the size was perfect, it looked different than any other phone, and worked great until MS decided to kill mobile. To change the screen and/or battery, just have to pull the sim tray, there was one torx screw to loosen the screen clamp, and poof, you had the screen out, and access to the battery right under the screen. I replaced my screen in it two times...had the dropsies with that phone.

 

I like Samsung TouchWiz i have used it for many years, I have an Samsung Tab S1 10.5" and it`s the best thing i have ever bought, though i would not buy the S2 or S3 as i hate the 4:3 aspect ratio.

John.

 

I have an Nokia Lumia 1020, the 41mp and real flash, amazing though i do not like Windows Mobile, I wish i could install Android.

John.

EDIT: Do manufactures like no-replaceable battery`s so buyers are more likely to buy a new phone instead of having to send the phone to a service center to get the battery replaced.

 

John,

That is part of it...but sometimes , in the case of the 1020 I think it was to give the body of the phone a smooth sleek look and feel...Hence the easy peasy access to the battery inside. What color is your 1020?

 

I have the black version, I have barely used it, I just keep checking the battery level every couple of months and then charge to 80%.

John.