Mobile Phone Lover

Last week, the Consumer Reports Magazine said that they wouldn’t recommend Verizon iphone 4 to users because of the serious antenna problem. However, the Electronics Research Company AnandTech now has fully tested the Verizon iPhone 4, and they found the antenna problem is alleviated, so the Verizon iPhone 4’s death grip reports are just overblown.

AnandTech’s founder Anand Shimpi accused that Consumer Reports does not disclose the data to support their claim, and the spokesman of Consumer Reports Melissa Valentino claimed that the testing performance of Verizon iPhone 4 and AT&T iPhone 4 are almost the same. But AnandTech indicated that Verizon iPhone 4’s signal reception is as good as other smartphones, and far better than AT&T iPhone 4.

AnandTech said when users hold it improperly, Verizon iPhone 4’s signal attenuated 16.5 db, but AT&T iPhone 4’s signal attenuated 24 dB. Meanwhile, AnandTech has tested 7 other smartphones, their average signal attenuation are 14.4 db, which means Verizon iPhone 4’s signal attenuation is 15% higher than average level, and higher 71% than AT&T iPhone 4. When users hold it properly, other smartphones’ signal attenuated 7.4 db, the Verizon and AT&T iPhone 4s’ are 15.5db and 19.8 db.

The obvious signal reception differences between Verizon and AT&T is the two antenna design. The Market Research firm iSuppli found by dismantling that they used the same antenna design, but Verizon iPhone 4’s antenna has made some improvements to enhance the signal reception. Specially, the Verizon iPhone 4 uses dual-antenna design to improve signal reception capability through multiple antennas.

Compared with its competitor, Verizon Wireless requires all smartphones to configure multiple antennas, so that the cell phone can switch signal to a better antenna. At the same time, the signal reception can be improved by two antennas. Krueger said that he expected Apple’s unborn iPhone will use this design in the future.

Verizon has released the CDMA iphone 4 on 11^th, Jan 2011. Although it is almost no more differences from the GSM iPhone 4 on its appearance and function, we still find some lightspots of this version CDMA iPhone 4 from media’s probation after the conference.

Personal Hotspot: Actually it is the expansion of original network sharing. It now allows you connect the network on iPhone 3G via Bluetooth and USB port, also it supports the network sharing for 5 devices at least via WiFi. This option has been transferred in the top of CDMA iPhone 4’s setting menu.

It is said that Apple will possibly update the iOS 4.3 to support this feature on GSM iPhone. But this option should be approved by the local network operators. For instance, the AT&T version iPhone didn’t support network sharing. In addition, we learned from media that Version may have extra charge on this feature.

Antenna Design: The split line on the metal frame are transferred from the original three points on GSM version (bottom left, bottom right and top) to the symmetrical four points. (See the picture below) In order to match the split line on the upper left, the mute switch has been changed slightly. According to media’s probation, the CDMA version iPhone 4’s prototype have no signals problem.

iOS 4.2.5: The operating system of CDMA iPhone 4 prototype is iOS 4.2.5(build 8E128), which is also different fron GSM iPhone iOS 4.2.1. But we are not sure whether it will upgrade when officially released in next month.

Protector & Bumpers: The position of CDMA iPhone 4’s mute switch has a slight difference with GSM iPhone 4 because of the new antenna design, so that large numbers of existing iPhone 4 protecor and bumpers are unable to be used on CDMA iPhone 4.

SIM slot: Version iPhone 4 doesn’t offer SIM slot as the same as other CDMA version from United States. But Apple may release the CDMA iPhone with changeable SIM card by cooperating with other countries’ CDMA operators.

Audio Data Synchronism: Version iPhone 4 still doesn’t support data communication when you are making a call. The COO of Apple Tim Cook said that it is the compromise as if CDMA users want to get iPhone.

White iPhone 4 Say goodbye: With CDMA iPhone 4’s comimg, the iPhone page of Apple’s official website has been updated. It is noteworthy that the white version iPhone 4’s photos have been completely removed in this update. Apple said that the white iPhone 4 would be released in the spring of 2011 long before, but it may have been completely abandoned according to the gossip.