Some owners of the new Apple iPhone 4 are reporting a fault that appears to be caused by its antenna. They say that signal strength plummets on the device, which uses the stainless steel band around the edges as the antenna, when they hold it in their hand.
Hundreds of people queued on Wednesday outside Apple’s store in Regent Street, Central London, to own the latest model, which has a camera that allows video calls, can handle multiple tasks at once and has a longer battery life.
Yesterday, however, social networking sites were buzzing with demonstrations of the signal problem.
The gadget website T3 posted: “The iPhone 4’s signal drops considerably when used with a conventional grip. A massive, massive issue. What are Apple going to do about it?”
One YouTube poster, awiginton, said: “I notice the phone will drop down to one or two bars if I happen to be holding it in the wrong position until I move my hand and then it jumps back up to four or five bars.”
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Some users suggested putting a rubber band around the phone to prevent contact between the metal and their hand.
Apple has yet to issue a statement.