As if the iPhone 4 isn't under enough fire from some users experiencing the signal attenuation problem, other users began complaining earlier this week of very slow upload speeds over AT&T's 3G network. Once again, the alleged culprit is a "software defect," and this time it's AT&T promising that an update is on its way.
As AppleInsider first reported, some iPhone 4 users began noticing over the weekend download speeds that were hardly living up to their promises. The iPhone 4 features a faster High-Speed Uplink Packet Access (HSUPA) cellular radio than previous iPhones, which supports theoretical upload speeds up to 5.7Mbps--but users in some areas like New York and Philadelphia were seeing only 100Kbps (where I live in Chicago, some quick tests did not show the problem rear its head). Understandably, users began speculating that AT&T's network was once again overloaded by photo- and video-uploading vacationers, while others began accusing AT&T of throttling upload speeds.
AT&T finally commented on the matter Wednesday. Mark Siegel, AT&T's executive director of media relations, told Macworld in an e-mail that "AT&T and Alcatel-Lucent jointly identified a software defect--triggered under certain conditions--that impacted uplink performance for Laptop Connect and smartphone customers using 3G HSUPA-capable wireless devices in markets with Alcatel-Lucent equipment."
Siegel added that, "This impacts less than two percent of our wireless customer base," and said that Alcatel-Lucent is already working on a fix for the affected AT&T equipment, though the company has not specified an ETA for pushing the update to its towers.
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