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Apple admits slowing down older phones

by on21 December 2017


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Fruity cargo cult Apple has admitted that it deliberately tinkers with older versions of its iPhones to force its users to upgrade.

A feature Apple introduced last year was claimed to protect against problems caused by ageing batteries and was first used on the iPhone 6, 6S and SE last year during a software update, and on the iPhone 7 as of December with the release of iOS 11.2. The feature is planned to be rolled out to newer devices in the future.

Apple said it slowed down phones that have old batteries, batteries with low charge or that are old.

It told the Independent that the move delivered the best experience for customers, which includes overall performance and prolonging the life of their devices.

Apple claims that when a battery is in a poor condition, it may not be able to supply the required maximum current demanded by the phone’s processor at full speed. If that happens, the iPhone can shut down unexpectedly to protect the internal components.

Apple users noticed that this feature resulted in iPhone 6S  turning off abruptly, even though there was about 30-40 percent charge remaining in the battery.

“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”, said an Apple spokesperson. “We’ve now extended that feature to iPhone 7 with iOS 11.2, and plan to add support for other products in the future.”

Analysis of data by benchmarking firm Primate Labs collected from thousands of iPhones appeared to confirm the theory, showing multiple performance peaks for phones of different ages, slowing down from their maximum speed.

However, there is a question over whether Apple is doing it deliberately.

The confirmation will reignite the debate over whether the move is “planned obsolescence” with Apple triggering the device after a certain period to nudge users into buying new products.

Apple insists that this slowdown feature is not an example of planned obsolescence, and instead is designed to protect against battery problems and prolong the life of iPhones. However, it is odd that no other manufacturer feels the need to implement the software which does not seem to do much good. In fact even
Apple fanboys think this is a bug rather than a feature.

Of course, they are too stupid to think about buying a product which does not do this, and many can’t even be arsed buying a new battery.

John Poole, the founder of Primate Labs, said in his analysis of the Geekbench data that “users expect either full performance or reduced performance with a notification that their phone is in low-power mode. This fix creates a third, unexpected state.

“While this state is created to mask a deficiency in battery power, users may believe that the slowdown is due to CPU performance, instead of battery performance, which is triggering an Apple-introduced CPU slowdown”.

Apple charges £79 ($79) to replace batteries not covered under the phone’s warranty.

Last modified on 21 December 2017
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