Apple admits it slows down older phones. What are your thoughts about it?

[anon(50597)]

My point is the lowered CPU is the same affect. And it's not likely to happen unless the battery is in horrible shape. Most of us won't ever experience it, because we upgrade our phones every year or two. If the battery is that bad, then it's time to replace it or upgrade. Or continue with a badly degraded battery with Apple's help to make it run better.

I totally agree with you. I believe they did it because of complaints they got from people with degraded batteries that didn’t want to get a new device. Apple helped tweak a little more life out for them.
People will believe what they want but I believe this is a lot to do about nothing. Bring on the TV lawsuit commercials.

 

[SprSynJn]

The effect of low power mode is a deliberate decision the user makes to manage power when they cannot charge. Phones can do it automatically but this falls off once the phone is charged, or if it’s connected to power.

That is a completely different scenario.

Like I said. You make no sense. That is not a point. That’s a distraction, because it’s a TERRIBLE comparison. Users didn’t choose this. Apple did, ignoring the fact that many users depended on the device’s performance to get use out of that device.

You seem to missing his point. Which is, you wont notice any change unless your phone is old enough to have battery issues. I saw the results that one website posted of the differences, they were minimal to say the least. While I don't agree with Apple's decision to initiate the change secretly, I seriously don't think they would have done so if the change would have meant a drastic difference in usability. That is why I am sure those lawsuits you are clinging to will amount to nothing.

 

[iN8ter]

You seem to missing his point. Which is, you wont notice any change unless your phone is old enough to have battery issues. I saw the results that one website posted of the differences, they were minimal to say the least. While I don't agree with Apple's decision to initiate the change secretly, I seriously don't think they would have done so if the change would have meant a drastic difference in usability. That is why I am sure those lawsuits you are clinging to will amount to nothing.

You’re missing the point. Low battery life and crippling performance is not the same thing.

I know battery life gets worse as the phone age.

I don’t expect my device to be permanently crippled as a result of that.

No other OEM does this.

I’m not sure why you people find this hard to comprehend.

It’s not a good trade off. This is why people buy new phones as a result of it, and why it’s an issue to begin with.

If you read the website and concluded the differences were minimal, then I’m inclined to believe you are illiterate.

 

[iN8ter]

If the choice is your device rebooting because the battery is degraded and the device is hitting it hard or degrading performance so the device still works, I will take degraded performance. If you are on an old device with lots and lots of charge cycles then its probably time for a new device or battery anyway.

Or battery.

But where was this advertised to the user?

The performance is destroyed to make the battery look “fine,” ruling it out of consideration for many people.

The way this is handled is deliberately misleading. It is designed to remove the battery as a suspected point of failure and frustrate users into upgrading, because they make far more money in that case.

A battery is 1/10th the cost of a new iPhone, but Apple makes the battery seem fine while absolutely destroying performance. What is the user going to think? The battery life excuse is pretty weak, considering how obvious the effects of this is on user perception.

Also, the battery life on that phone was fine. Read upthread.

 

[SprSynJn]

You’re missing the point. Low battery life and crippling performance is not the same thing.

I know battery life gets worse as the phone age.

I don’t expect my device to be permanently crippled as a result of that.

No other OEM does this.

I’m not sure why you people find this hard to comprehend.

It’s not a good trade off. This is why people buy new phones as a result of it, and why it’s an issue to begin with.

If you read the website and concluded the differences were minimal, then I’m inclined to believe you are illiterate.

Where do you keep getting this idea in your head that they’re “crippling performance?” You seem to be making that up. Almost like a knee jerk reaction. The same reaction people make when getting new phones because their phone isn’t performing as it used to. And how exactly do you know that other OEMs don’t do that? Where is your proof for all these conclusions you’re drawing?

I’ll be blunt, you’re overacting and calling people names because you yourself do not understand the situation. I’m inclined to believe you’re gullible due to a scare tactic used by tech journalists. Seems you fell for it. Shame on you.

 

[iN8ter]

Where do you keep getting this idea in your head that they’re “crippling performance?” You seem to making that up. Almost like a knee jerk reaction. The same reaction people make when getting new phones because their phone isn’t performing as it used to. And how exactly do you know that other OEMs don’t do that? Where is your proof for all these conclusions you’re drawing?

I’ll be blunt, you’re overacting and calling people names because you yourself do not understand the situation. I’m inclined to believe you’re gullible due to a scare tactic used by tech journalists. Seems you fell for it. Shame on you.

From the iPhone we had, which got throttled.

The M8 I have, with awful battery life that performs as it always has, never reboots and never shuts off. It’s older than the iPhone was.

The 3rd Gen iPod Touch I have which still works fine. How old is that thing at this point? Nobreboots no shutting off. Even when I use them with BT devices, etc. it was more reliable than the iPjone after this kicked in.

Real life experience.

Where do you get your information from?

 

[SprSynJn]

From the iPhone we had, which got throttled.

Real life experience.

Where do you get your information from?

From the iPhone I have that also got “throttled.”

With no change whatsoever in performance.

You know, also real life experience.

 

[iN8ter]

From the iPhone I have that also got “throttled.”

With no change whatsoever in performance.

You know, also real life experience.

So you’re blatantly lying and proud of it.

Congratulations.

 

[SprSynJn]

So you’re blatantly lying and proud of it.

Congratulations.

Right on bro. You keep trying to prove a futile and utterly ridiculous point with hearsay all you wish. No one is buying it.

Good luck to you.

 

[doogald]

You’re missing the point. Low battery life and crippling performance is not the same thing.

I know battery life gets worse as the phone age.

I don’t expect my device to be permanently crippled as a result of that.

Your device is not permanently crippled. If it is affected by this issue, it slows down extremely briefly compared with normal only when battery demands get high when an older battery cannot supply enough power (such as when running an intense benchmarking app like Geekbench) to prevent shutting the phone down without warning. If your performance issues persist beyond that, you may have another issue; see this post: Apple's Bungled Battery Feature — Michael Glenn

Ever since iOS11 came out I had experienced a significant performance issue on my iPhone 6S. Animations and transitions were slow, app loading was noticeably and unbearably slower than iOS10 and my battery was draining faster. Many rumours swirled that others were experiencing this but not all. I did a settings reset which seemed to help a bit but it didn’t feel right and the battery kept draining. Even after point releases which improved responsiveness a bit my iOS10 like performance had not returned.

Then several weeks ago a Reddit conversation started spreading online that presented possible evidence Apple was reducing the performance of their iOS and possibly laptops when the battery life was sufficiently degraded. That day I decided to test the theory by getting my battery replaced at the Apple Store. After all my phone was almost two years old and surely the battery’s charge capacity was severely depleted as I’m a heavy user and I could determine if this rumour was true.

I explained the situation when meeting an Apple Genius and provided the Reddit theory. Her expression indicated that she has heard some wild theories before and although this was new it wasn’t truthful. She politely assured me that the OS isn’t designed to do such things but suggested we run a diagnostic.

Customers aren’t able to run performance or battery diagnostics on their own phone without third party tools and even then they get limited information compared to Apple. Her results showed something very interesting. My phone was depleting the battery two to three times per day in some cases. After I confirmed with her that I was not using it that heavily and the battery setting statistics also didn’t show an application using a large percentage of the battery she suggested a rogue system process that somehow persisted through upgrades and restarts.

She also let me know that my battery was at 83% health and that Apple won’t even do a replacement unless it’s below 80%.

So I went home and immediately did a local backup, wipe and restore. And voila! Performance issues were gone.

It’s not a good trade off. This is why people buy new phones as a result of it, and why it’s an issue to begin with.

Phones shutting down suddenly with 40% battery is also not a good tradeoff. One could argue that this should have been designed the way Apple runs it now in the first place. For an Android phone with similar problems, for a phone as old as the iPhone 6, see this thread on Android Central: https://forums.androidcentral.com/motorola-droid-turbo/770636-battery-problem.html

 

[Rob Phillips]

Your device is not permanently crippled. If it is affected by this issue, it slows down extremely briefly compared with normal only when battery demands get high when an older battery cannot supply enough power (such as when running an intense benchmarking app like Geekbench) to prevent shutting the phone down without warning. If your performance issues persist beyond that, you may have another issue; see this post: Apple's Bungled Battery Feature — Michael Glenn


[/FONT][/COLOR]


Phones shutting down suddenly with 40% battery is also not a good tradeoff. One could argue that this should have been designed the way Apple runs it now in the first place. For an Android phone with similar problems, for a phone as old as the iPhone 6, see this thread on Android Central: https://forums.androidcentral.com/motorola-droid-turbo/770636-battery-problem.html

Well said! Apparently some users prefer bricked iPhones over sometimes throttled iPhones.
As I’ve already stated, I agree with Apple taking steps to ensure devices continue to run properly. Their lack of communication, on the other hand, was disgraceful.

 

[anon(50597)]

Your device is not permanently crippled. If it is affected by this issue, it slows down extremely briefly compared with normal only when battery demands get high when an older battery cannot supply enough power (such as when running an intense benchmarking app like Geekbench) to prevent shutting the phone down without warning. If your performance issues persist beyond that, you may have another issue; see this post: Apple's Bungled Battery Feature — Michael Glenn


[/FONT][/COLOR]


Phones shutting down suddenly with 40% battery is also not a good tradeoff. One could argue that this should have been designed the way Apple runs it now in the first place. For an Android phone with similar problems, for a phone as old as the iPhone 6, see this thread on Android Central: https://forums.androidcentral.com/motorola-droid-turbo/770636-battery-problem.html

Very well put and easy to understand, for most.

 

[Bijutech1]

Not to belabor the point that’s already been brought up on the news but Apple is already getting hammered in the lawsuit for admitting that it’s slowing down older iPhones like the iPhone 6 and models below and maybe they should use this as a time to reflect on things that would make the customers feel more better and use feasible and more effective methods that can aid battery life and not irk the crap out of customers Who expect more for what they are getting from a company that tries to please customers

 

[Bijutech1]

Nobody expects it to happen right away but hopefully it’s a long-term goal for them

 

[Just_Me_D]

Not to belabor the point that’s already been brought up on the news but Apple is already getting hammered in the lawsuit for admitting that it’s slowing down older iPhones like the iPhone 6 and models below and maybe they should use this as a time to reflect on things that would make the customers feel more better and use feasible and more effective methods that can aid battery life and not irk the crap out of customers Who expect more for what they are getting from a company that tries to please customers

Could they have done it differently? Of course. Having said that, “every” user with an iPhone 6 or older isn’t unhappy or even concerned about this matter like the loud mouths are trying to make it seem.

 

[doogald]

Just to be clear, the only phones being throttled when the battery has deteriorated are the iPhone 6, iPhone 6s, iPhone SE, and now iPhone 7 with iOS 11.2.1. (The Plus models of the 6/6s/7 phones are not being throttled. The Geekbench article only talks about the 4.7" phones.)

No phone **older** than an iPhone 6 is being throttled by this change in iOS since iOS 10.2.1.

 

[anon(5630457)]

I'd be pissed if my expensive device was being throttled for "my own good". Either give me a notification that the battery needs to be replaced or explicitly state that older phones will be throttled to preserve battery.

I won't be purchasing another iPhone until either of those two conditions are met. My opinion isn't going to change on this.

 

[comiken205]

I'd be pissed if my expensive device was being throttled for "my own good". Either give me a notification that the battery needs to be replaced or explicitly state that older phones will be throttled to preserve battery.

I won't be purchasing another iPhone until either of those two conditions are met. My opinion isn't going to change on this.

I agree to where we should be able to check out battery degradation ourselves. However, if they say it’s to prevent the phone from robots and for the experience of the user the. It’s a good reason. But they should tell us, “yo, change your battery soon”

 

[doogald]

I'd be pissed if my expensive device was being throttled for "my own good". Either give me a notification that the battery needs to be replaced or explicitly state that older phones will be throttled to preserve battery.

I won't be purchasing another iPhone until either of those two conditions are met. My opinion isn't going to change on this.

The second condition is met. Apple's official statement:

Our goal is to deliver the best experience for customers, which includes overall performance and prolonging the life of their devices. 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, which can result in the device unexpectedly shutting down to protect its electronic components.

Last year we released a feature for iPhone 6, iPhone 6s and iPhone SE to smooth out the instantaneous peaks only when needed to prevent the device from unexpectedly shutting down during these conditions. We’ve now extended that feature to iPhone 7 with iOS 11.2, and plan to add support for other products in the future.

 

[Rob Phillips]

I'd be pissed if my expensive device was being throttled for "my own good". Either give me a notification that the battery needs to be replaced or explicitly state that older phones will be throttled to preserve battery.

I won't be purchasing another iPhone until either of those two conditions are met. My opinion isn't going to change on this.

Agreed the user should get some sort of heads up. Even a pop up that says “Hey, your battery is garbage so we’re going to start slowing your phone down when needed until it’s replaced.” The good news is this is a big deal now so I’d be shocked if Apple wasn’t working on a solution.