iPhone Repairs Blog

Apple’s new service icloud, which replaces Mobile me has a wealth of new features, we take a look at them and the benefits they provide to the iPhone user particularly.

Find my phone is a great feature of iCloud which allows users to approximately locate the vicinity of their phone should it be lost or stolen, or under the sofa.

How to set up Find my Phone on your iPhone.

Firstly you must be running iOs 5 on your device. To upgrade your software connect to the mac and follow the onscreen details in iTunes.

You then need to make sure you have set up iCloud or logged in, to change settings go the the settings menu on your iPhone.
Apple’s new service iCloud, which replaces Mobile me has a wealth of new features, we take a look at them and the benefits they provide to the iPhone user particularly.

Find My Phone is a great feature of iCloud which allows users to approximately locate the vicinity of their phone should it be lost or stolen, or under the sofa!

How to set up Find my Phone on your iPhone:

Firstly you must be running iOS 5 on your device. To upgrade your software connect to the Mac and follow the onscreen details in iTunes.

You then need to make sure you have set up iCloud or logged in; to change settings go the settings menu on your iPhone.
Then make sure your settings are correct in iCloud and turn on the Find my Phone setting.
To enable automatic downloads for music, apps and books make sure you check the Store settings within the menu.

The Find my phone app allows you to locate your device and you can then choose to display a message or play a sound, remotely lock your device, or erase your data on it.

It’s a great feature that everyone should install, if you leave your phone in a cab or a bar or lose it within the house; it’s definitely worth installing.

Another brilliant feature of iCloud on your iPhone is the Find my Friends app, which in the same sense as Find my Phone allows you to locate your friends. Once you have added your friends (and they accept your request) you can then see where they are and a map of the location. Perfect if you lose each other on a night out or a busy shopping mall. Although some might add that it is a little invasive, and people have been caught out having affairs and not quite being where they said they were with this app!! Perfect if you are the suspicious type or want to check your kids are actually in school!

With the face of the iPhone changing drastically over the last 5 years since the release   the original IPhone we look at the problems that have arisen and the most durable model.

The original iPhone saw a very sturdy unit, with a very thick strong screen and quite kind (smart at the time!) aluminum casing, although it took a lot of scratches and denting, especially around the headphone jack area. The problem with the bonded screen on this model was that you could not replace either thebroken LCD or the cracked phone digitizer without replacing both, so if you had just a scratched external glass it was quite a pricey repair.

The next in line was the iPhone 3G which luckily had two separate screens, meaning you would only be looking at a £40/ £50 fee to replace one of the screens, which was a bonus to may users. The other significant change was therear case, but was this more durable than it’s predecessor?

Not really, okay the plastic might have been a nice change to the aluminum but it wouldn’t be long before most 3G/ 3GS users saw cracks in the plastic just from day to day use. The mains areas to be affected were the rear by the dock connector (usually from pushing the unit in to charge). Also cracks around the mute button were very frequent which in turn made the mute button loose.

With the long awaited arrival of the iPhone 4, customers couldn’t wait for the glass rear case, which summed up everything classy as Apple moved on with its new designs. The glass case and overall glass form of the iPhone 4 meant that it was a bit of a gamble to drop the iPhone and escape without smashing either the front or rear glass. A lot cheaper to replace the rear glass, as we have reverted to bonded screen again on this model as with the original iPhone. But it looks so neat!

Our vote for most durable goes to the original iPhone but you can’t compare looks with durability- as we are all in love with the 4S, even if it costs us a couple of repairs down the line!

Now what’s the iPhone 5 going to look like?!!!

With the iPhone 4S released instead of the speculated iPhone 5 last year we look into what could possibly better the iPhone 4s and rumoured release dates.

As it stands the most popular suggestion is that the iPhone 5 will be released in Summer 2012, with most commenting that the iPhone 5 will be launched at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Event which is usually early Summer (June)

So, what can we expect from the newest gift from Apple?

Many have suggested that the iPhone 5 will take on a total new form, as the 3G and iPhone 4 did, rather than slight adaptions in cases, like the 3Gs and the 4S. Mixed rumours, however, have suggested that the iPhone 5 may adopt either a new, teardrop shape or simply be an enlarged iPhone 4S, iLounge  a well- known Apple blog, claims the new model will be 8mm longer and use an aluminium metal case.

It is suggested that Steve Jobs was working hard on the iPhone 5 project, which will apparently be a “radical redesign”

Many rumours suggest that a larger screen with be the main change in form from the iPhone 4s, an A6 quad-core processor and 4G/LTE Technology.

Today’s latest rumour (Tuesday 31^st January) is that the iPhone 5 will feature NFC (near field communication for those of us not in the know) which will enable contactless communication and payment form.

Speaking to Fast Company, Ed McLaughlin of MasterCard said: ‘we’re rapidly moving to a world beyond plastic. In many ways, plastic is just convenient packaging.’

He added: ‘the timeline is always as rapid as it makes sense for consumers. That’s a combination of having a critical mass of the merchants, which is what you’re seeing right now, and getting devices into the hands of consumers. I don’t know of a handset manufacturer that isn’t in process of making sure their stuff is PayPass ready.’

There is much speculation surrounding the iPhone 5 but most believe that the iPhone 5, even if it is ready, will have to wait it’s turn, the iPad 3 will surely need to be the next in line for Apple’s release in March.

As with everything Apple, one thing is for sure, we will all be on the edge of our seats wondering when we can touch it!

Apple have announced that the iPhone 4s will be launched in 22 countries in the next stage of the huge 4s release, set for China on Friday 13^th January.

“Customer response to our products in China has been off the charts,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “With the launch in China next week, iPhone 4S will be available in over 90 countries making this our fastest iPhone rollout ever.”

The full list of new countries to be able to get the iPhone 4s is Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Bolivia, Botswana, British Virgin Islands, Cameroon, Cayman Islands, Central African Republic, China, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Grenada, Guam, Guinea Conakry, Ivory Coast, Jamaica, Kenya, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritius, Niger, Senegal, St. Vincent and The Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, Turks and Caicos and Uganda.

Unicom has been the exclusive iPhone carrier in China and there has been no suggestion that this will change.

In further news from China, Apple lawyers have contacted a Chinese toy company, ‘Inicons’ to request they seize trading 1 ft models of former Apple CEO, the late Steve Jobs.

Tandy Cheung, Inicon boss, said before receiving the letter from Apple, ‘Apple can do anything they like. I will not stop.’

The models are set to retail at $99.99 from February this year and are 1ft and built on a 1:6 scale.

Apple’s laywers said, ‘Mr Jobs has not consented to the use of his name and/or image in the Product.’

With Chinese company boss Cheung stated after taking legal advice that he believes there is no such copyright against a ‘normal person’ claiming Jobs is not a celebrity and that he is not a product and that Apple have no claim over him.

Even id sales do go ahead on that basis should it be true then the company should find they will suffer problems using the 2 Apple logos that the figures also apparently show. The company claims they have already stopped taking pre-orders and the figure can be seen selling on e-bay for over the retail price.

In 2010 Apple stopped the sale of unauthorised Steve Jobs bobble-head dolls made by a different company in China.

If the InIcons model does get to be sold, buyers will get ‘One realistic head with two pairs of glasses, one body and three pairs of hands’ plus a complete Steve Jobs outfit – poloneck, blue jeans and trainers.

The small figure will also come with a stool and a backdrop that reads “One More Thing” – an example of the trademark phrase Jobs used to announce his new gadgets.

Is all of this enough of an advance for the iPhone user? Probably not- as for most of us the exciting release of a new iPhone only marks the beginning of a long and speculative wait for the next.

We all know how annoying it is when you just need to make one very quick two -second call to someone and your battery runs out. Damn it!  Don’t be caught short stuck at your Xmas party. Here are some top tips for maintaining your battery life on your iPhone 4S.

Keep your Phone updated

As with any new Apple product, a lot of updates are brought out to fix bugs that people complain about, so to make sure your phone is running the best it can, give it a weekly update. It’s surprisingly how quickly little issues can be fixed by a software update. Apple is usually very on the ball with this one.

Check your settings

Personally when I am at home, I have no need at all for locations settings to be on- or to set the time zone. So have a good look through your settings as they are constantly using battery power searching for your gadget. Turning them all of when not required can really help keep your battery life going.

Check your Brightness settings.

I was out recently with a low battery and wanted to keep as much as I could. I wasn’t using the Phone so I turned the brightness levels right down- a great tip for holding on to that last little red bar whilst it is just sitting in your handbag or pocket.

Turn off Push notifications

These are no good for when you have little battery power. Have a look through and turn off the ones you don’t need for the time being while your battery is low., you may not need to know the weather for example for a while.

Other things to consider are:

Turning off the Wi-Fi if you are not using it, disabling Vibrate if you do not require it, disable Siri and ‘raise to speak’ and set your phone to lock automatically, PLUS avoid using the phone to play music or search the web when the battery is low too.

Above idea’s are proven and trusted tips to improve the battery life of iPhone 4/4s.  All these ideas above should help you preserve just enough battery power to call that cab to escape from the Christmas party!

Merry Christmas!

Many companies out there are offering to recycle your old iPhone. We look at the best of the bunch, with a 16GB 3GS. Should you recycle or repair? Before going down the recycling route for money, it is always worth checking out repair costs as these can be significantly more worthwhile and value for money than trading in your old unit

Environfone are offering £72.03 for your old unit, which isn’t bad, depending on the condition of the unit, although most repairs (aside from the logic board) would cost less than this, so it is really worth sending the iPhone in to a repair centre to see before you make up your mind.

Mazuma would offer around £43 for a non- working iPhone, but that can mean that even it could just have a broken touch screen or bleeding LCD, which would only cost around £40 to repair.

The Phone recycle banks are offering a bit more at around £89, but this would still only equal a couple of repairs to make it fully working.

If you chose to have the broken screen, LCD, dock connector or headphone jack repaired then you could be looking at gaining a lot more for it once it is repaired so definitely take a look around.

Repair centers often charge around £10 to fully diagnose your unit and return it if you decide not to have it repaired. So many people out there think their unit is beyond repair but this usually isn’t the case, even those suffering water or liquid damage to their iPhones.

If you ideally want to upgrade your unit then it is always worth asking the repair center to offer you a price to as you may find they will offer more than some of the online recycling companies, who are offering an average price, not looking at your unit on face value.

Most people are shocked at how little it can cost to repair an iPhone, even if it looks worse for wear. Our advice is to always check the repair route first, you should be nicely surprised at the value for money a repair can be, plus it is looking after our planet. Don’t just throw it away; consider all your options first.

As the excitement of the iPhone 4s and its voice controlled feature Siri take to the world, the question on everyone’s home button is (literally) “Why doesn’t Siri understand me?”

It appears thousands of iPhone 4s users are having complications with Siri understanding them, with some even boldly asking “Is Siri racist?”- that may be pushing it for a voice controlled feature, but some users around the world are really getting frustrated.

Some iPhone 4s users on forums claim to have only bought the iPhone 4s for the Siri feature and are now disappointed that they don’t have the best communications with Mr. Siri.

We take a look at some of the most common complaints.

Top of the list for reporting problems are users with strong Indian, Japanese and Scottish accents. It appears to be the vowels that Siri has a problem with and users grammatical sentencing. There is a you tube video of a Japanese man asking “What weather for today?” and Siri innocently replying “Which Linda do you want to call”…very frustrating for the poor guy, but perhaps the grammar needs to be correct for Siri to pick it up, no offense but as the old saying goes “ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer”.

The fact is, as much as the words are correct, you need to ask Siri a grammatically correct question to receive an appropriate response. Many users say that if they slow down, Siri picks up accents just fine, as long as the grammar is correct.

We tried Siri out with some of our accents and it appeared to work perfectly asking in a heavy Scottish accent “What time is it?” and Siri also responded well to Indian accents using clear English vocabulary.

The question is should we be taking Siri so seriously? It’s a novelty feature that will take some time to evolve. Some love it, some hate it but come on, Siri’s new, let’s not start being rude to him just yet.

To see how Siri felt about these latest comments we asked Siri “Are you popular” to which he responded “We were talking about you, not me”

Ooooh don’t be so defensive Siri!

It’s hard to believe so many iPhone new stories exist, but take a look at the stories below that have hit the news in the last couple of weeks, you wouldn’t think iPhones would make the news so often…. it really is a strange world…

A 48 year old man in Illinois has recently been arrested after drunk dialing 911 5 times to complain about this iPhone 4s not working.  He didn’t explain to the police what was wrong with the iOS device nor made it clear how they could assist him but after tracing his home to Bristol, Illinois, police arrested the man with “refusal to comply with orders from deputies” and resisting and obstructing a police officer. Gives another perspective to drunk dialling…

Moving across the globe to Sydney, Australia, where this week in the news we see an iPhone set alight onboard a flight between Lismore and Sydney. The passengers iPhone 4 began to show “a significant amount of dense smoke, accompanied by a red glow”. The crew managed to extinguish the fire but the iPhone (or 4s) definitely did not survive, totally ruining the phone and it’s glass rear casing. This story is not the first over Apple products overheating and Apple recently recalled the original Nano for defective batteries.

In Idaho, a 28 year woman has been arrested for trying to get the owner of a missing iPhone to pay $100 to receive the phone back, charged with theft by extortion. The thief started to text the owner asking them to pay the $100 or they would sell the iPhone on for $300. Police assisted the owners in their text replies saying they would pay $86 (not sure where they get that figure from!) but they arranged a meeting with the thief in a park, where the thief was arrested.

Whatever next…..

ASOS

After huge online success with their clothing website, ASOS have launched an app for the range of Apple products. It has been perfectly designed for the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch and makes spending your money so much easier! The app incorporates a ‘Save for later’ function, helpful when you are taking a peek at party dresses for the Christmas party on your lunch break and want to leave it until you get home to pay. The application also includes a great locator so customers can find out where they are able to drop returns to be sent back to ASOS. We love ASOS and we love their brilliant new app.

Skype

With 60 million people now using the Skype app on mobile devices, it really has done what it set out to do. The app was downloaded over a million times in the first 36 hours of its release.

We love it in our office, as with friends and family living abroad, it is not only the cheapest way to chat and talk but the app allows you to use Skype on the move, at the airport or even out shopping. For many of us that have chosen to use it this way, it almost makes the text message redundant.

The Skype for iPhone update includes a new feature that reduces the shakiness of an outgoing Skype video chat when using your rear camera. Therefore, if you’re using Skype video to show friends and family your new haircut or new shoes, the image they see will be less shaky.

Dropbox

Dropbox is a free service that lets you bring all your photos, docs, and videos anywhere. Once you install Drop box, any of your files will automatically be saved to your iPhone, iPad or computer.

With the Dropbox app, you can take everything that matters to you on the go.?? Read word documents or look through your photos while you are out. This really is great when you have been working on a business document at home and have forgotten to email it to your work computer. You can show family and friends photos from your iPhone right there and then. The beauty of this app is that even if you lose your iPhone your documents, attachments and photos will have been saved to Dropbox. A truly great idea, Dropbox uses the tag “simplify your life”- and it really does.

Right Move-

Brilliant for house hunting as it finds your location and shows you what’s for sale nearby. So, when you have said to yourself “I’d love to live here” you can easily have a quick look at houses and prices in that exact area, Right Move will find you using GPS and show you exactly what’s on offer.

The Right Move app has a massive file of properties, making it possible for you to search over 1.2 million properties for sale or rent across the UK.

What stands out about the Right Move app is that is brings up results on a map so you can see the exact location to you and the details of the house or flat all in one.

The app also boasts Zoomable floor plans, allowing you to check if the house you have your eye on is big/ small enough for your needs.

We all agree that this is a great little app and is a real aid when you are looking to rent or buy but are not certain of the area you actually in.

With Christmas fast approaching and Apple gadgets always at the top of the hit list, we look at the option of an iPhone 4s or if your loved one already owns one then one of the many iPhone 4/4s cases.

The sleek design and the fancy boxes make Apple gifts perfect for anyone lucky enough to receive them at Christmas, and if you have a budget of around £500, it would definitely make someone happy, not just for the day but for a whole year and possibly years to come.

With the new 4S available in black and white with it’s amazing new camera and stunning new voice controlled features such as Siri, you could make someone a very happy elf this Christmas.

But what if like us, you couldn’t wait to see what Santa brings and already own an iPhone 4s? Well, there are plenty of accessories already out for this model…. which perhaps may even suit the budget a bit better.

If you prefer something a little bit different from the usual leather cases then here are some great ideas for smartening up someone’s iPhone 4/4s or even for your own Christmas list.

For Mum/ Sister/ Girlfriend

Photobox are doing iPhone 4/4s Photo cases from £21.99 meaning you can add a lovely photo of your self to a sleek back case for that loved one in your family for a very reasonable price.

A Not on the High Street designer has come up with a wonderful Teak dock for the iPhone at £23.99 which would really look smart in an office or at home, slightly different from the normal white or black plastic docks.

Ladies alike, we love the new cases for the iPhone 4 by Cath Kidston, 3 gorgeous designs, and our favourite is the mini dot design, check them out for £24.95.

For Dad/Brother/Boyfriend

For the heavy handed it’s definitely worth taking a look at the Case Mate tank (approx. £40) or along the same tough design frame is the Griffin Survivor Extreme duty (starting from around £20), you should be free to treat your phone almost anyway you like and still protect it’s fragile Apple casing.

Or for something a little bit different check out Grove Bamboo for unique wooden case designs, with price starting from $69, a wonderful range of handmade wooden case designs or even design your own.

Here’s hoping for an iPhone 4S this Christmas, but hey let’s not be too disappointed if all we receive is a stocking full of satsumas…. it’s the thought that counts……