Brickin’ Zee iPhone?
Posted on | July 11, 2008 at 12:57 pm | 3 Comments
You’d think I’d learn.
Remember a week or so ago? When Sony released the big new 2.40 firmware update for the PS3, I downloaded and installed it on the first day. Only after I installed it did I learn that the update caused many PS3s to stop working and Sony pulled the update from its servers the same day. Luckily, I was not one of the ones affected and the update went smoothly. Sony says the problem was caused by a conflict with some particular set of “administration data” on the PS3’s hard disk. I guess I didn’t have that data configuration. Sony quickly released a 2.41 update that didn’t have the problem, which I also installed. But apparently the people who encountered a bricked PS3 from the 2.40 update have no recourse but to send their unit back to Sony for replacement. Ow! Imagine being without a PS3 for a few weeks!
Everyone kept asking me this week if I was going to upgrade to the iPhone 3G on the first day, today. I decided awhile ago I wasn’t going to do that. I was going to get along with my old iPhone and the new 2.0 firmware update and see what happens. I was really looking forward to that update, since one of the things it does is allow the installation of third-party applications through Apple’s iTunes Store. That’s what I’ve been waiting for ever since I got the iPhone. Sure, the 3G networks speed, the GPS, and the flush headphone jack are all good enticements to upgrade the hardware, but I couldn’t really justify it at this point. My main goal is to use the iPhone to replace my PDA eventually, so the PDA functions that third-party apps could potentially enable are a big step toward that goal. The sooner I could get those apps on there, the better.
So when Apple updated iTunes last night to the 7.7 version, which allows access to the iPhone Apps Store and which is probably also necessary for the iPhone 2.0 firmware update, I installed that right away and had no problem. I browsed the Apps Store a bit and it looks like there’s some interesting stuff available, although not everything I need yet. I also kept checking to see if the firmware update was available. I was hoping it would happen after midnight Eastern time, but it didn’t. I checked it the first thing when I got up this morning – still no update. Then, after I ate breakfast, I checked again and there it was! I set it to “download and install”. The download was like 232MB and was going very slowly, so I hit the showers to get ready for work.
When I got back to the PC, it had finished the download and it was starting the install. It had to backup the iPhone’s data to the computer because the new firmware requires a completely clean iPhone to install. It took it awhile, but it appeared to do the backup and the install okay. It looked like it got to the part where it was going to restore the data and re-activate the phone, and then suddenly I got an error message about being unable to access the iTunes Store and “The network connection has been reset”. The display on the iPhone was telling me to connect it to iTunes. The iPhone showed up as connected in iTunes, but with just the name “iPhone” instead of the one I gave it, and the configuration screens were blank. I could go to the iTunes Store and navigate through that okay, but every time I clicked back to the iPhone icon, I got the same error message. Aaargh! The iPhone was a brick – it could only make “emergency” calls. I couldn’t understand why it said it couldn’t connect to the iTunes Store when I could connect to it for browsing. Or was it complaining about the network connection between the phone and the PC? But the phone was registering inside of iTunes and would appear and disappear in there when I would connect and disconnect it.
I tried rebooting iTunes – didn’t help. I tried rebooting the PC – didn’t help. I tried rebooting the phone – nothing. Panic set in. I was late for work and my phone wasn’t working. I tried calling Apple Support, but trying to get someone to talk to was a pointless task. I finally found the discussion forums on Apple’s website and it looked like many other people were having the same or similar issues. It appears that the Apple servers just got slammed from all the new 3G activations and from people like myself upgrading the firmware on the old phones. One poster said an Apple CSR told her to just keep trying – click away from the iPhone icon in iTunes and then back to it. That’s what I’d been doing for the last half an hour anyway, but I kept getting the error message. Finally, right after I read that, I tried again and got “Accessing iTunes Store” without the error message. And lo and behold, after a minute of that, it started the restore process, and a few minutes later I had a fully functional iPhone again, with the new firmware installed. I didn’t have time to reinstall the music on the phone, which I had wiped out before the install so it didn’t have to back it all up. Nor did I have time to check out the new 2.0 features. I just grabbed the phone and scooted out of the house.
So, what have we learned from this? The first lesson is not to update on the first day of release. Check the Internets and see how things are going with the update first. The second lesson is hopefully learned by Apple. Assuming it really is a demand problem, they should’ve staggered the release of the software and the new hardware, and released the software early (if it was ready). I know firsthand the problems of anticipating user load and how hard it is to test for that sort of thing beforehand, but they should’ve been better prepared.
Okay, time to check out those third-party apps!
Latre.
Posted from my iPhone.
Comments
3 Responses to “Brickin’ Zee iPhone?”
July 12th, 2008 @ 4:59 am
Sounds like buying a new phone woulda been simpler.
Unlike my wife’s iPhone, my crappy old Nokia is just as out-of-date today as it was yesterday. Who’s ahead NOW?
July 12th, 2008 @ 8:43 pm
The Apple zealot in my office is very glad he didn’t go buy an iPhone because the iStore would have kept him from registering it anyways.
You’d think Apple would put a few more servers online, but no.
July 14th, 2008 @ 9:12 am
Sounds like buying a new phone woulda been simpler.
As long as it wasn’t an iPhone, since they had just as much trouble activating the new ones as firmwaring the old ones.