A settlement has been reached in a class-action lawsuit targeting the iPhone 4′s antenna and reception problems, reports CNET. U.S. residents who bought the handset will be offered either $15 or a free bumper case, however the offer is only valid for those individuals who did not take advantage of Apple’s previous offer. The settlement comes from 18 separate lawsuits that were consolidated into one, all claiming that Apple was “misrepresenting and concealing material information in the marke...

Apple was undoubtedly losing sleep over the fact that Consumer Reports refused to “recommend” its iPhone 4 due to the attenuation issues affectionately referred to as Antennagate — Consumer Reports continuously praised the iPhone 4 despite saying it couldn’t recommend the phone — but now the Cupertino-based company can finally sleep easy. Consumer Reports on Tuesday proclaimed that the redesigned antenna system on Apple’s iPhone 4S is no longer affected by the dreaded death grip. &...

The hubbub hardly registered a blip on most people’s radar screens, but HTC recently found itself fielding some “death grip” claims related to its HD7 smartphone. The term death grip, in this context, was made famous earlier this year when customers found that a certain grip on Apple’s iPhone 4 would cause the handset to lose signal and drop calls. Apple uncharacteristically addressed the issue with a press conference, claiming most phones suffer similar issues when gripped near the an...

With Apple publicly stating specific handsets are susceptible to the same kind of antenna attenuation as the iPhone 4, and RIM and Nokia chiming in, we wanted to know what you guys are finding. Can you reproduce the same effect on your handset? Here is a handset that Apple didn’t specifically call out, the Verizon BlackBerry Bold 9650, and you can see it takes a nice hit when we hold it pretty firm in our hands. I’m pretty sure this has always happened, but I’m not sure I noticed until now...

The antenna issues plaguing the iPhone 4 have infuriated many iPhone users (and rightfully so), but have you ever wondered how Apple is training its employees to deal with the fiasco? Well thanks to one of our Apple connects, we now know the exact procedures AppleCare reps must follow when dealing with any reception complaints regarding the iPhone 4. Hit the jump to check them out. (more…)