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Apple Stores Will Not Fix Your iPhone With A Defected LCD

Posted July 23, 2007 8:55 PM by Tanner Godarzi
Categories: Problems 

If you do not already know about the defect, it was mentioned earlier today by our newest Blogger Jovan. I had the same problem and took my iPhone to the Apple Store at Fashion Island. Instead of getting my iPhone fixed or replaced they refused to do anything when they themselves, manager included, acknowledged the polka dotted screen, tested and confirmed the problem, but passed it off as pixelation and said my warranty would not cover the iPhone.

I had called Apple Care earlier today explained to them that I see a grid of white dots over my iPhone. The support rep said they would take care of the problem and was checking to see what would be the best method, taking it into the Apple Store or mailing it to Apple. She had said if it wasn’t too much trouble it would be a lot easier to bring it to a local Apple Store as they would swap it out.

This was the easier route for me so I scheduled an appointment for the Genius Bar and left. When there I explained the problem of a grid of white dots appearing on my iPhone and how others had experienced the same problem. After looking at it for a few minutes the Genius could see the grid but barely. He went over to his manager and showed him, he saw it too and they then proceeded to judge it side by side with another iPhone. They said they could not see the grid on their iPhone but saw it on mine.

Unfortunately I was told that they were passing it off pixelation which was causing the grid of dots to appear and they would not do anything to fix it or replace my iPhone. They themselves told me there was a problem and said my warranty did not cover this because it wasn’t hampering my ability to use my iPhone. I told them that others are having this problem as well and that iPhones with this defect were not as bright as the normal ones.

I am not the only one with this problem, a forum posting at Macrumors shows users have the same white dotted grid on their phones.

Update 1

Here some pictures of my iPhone with the defect.

image

image

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Comments

  1. Mine also has the small green dots on the black background. But I never noticed them until I read this article. And it required turning up the brightness all the way, which I never have it that level (I usually keep it around 1/4 bright). I noticed it when watching a movie as well.

    Posted by Shabbis on July 23, 2007 9:42 PM

  2. Telling people that they have to fix your product because “other people are having this same problem” NEVER works in a store…I’ve used that excuse about 5-10 times, and it has failed me all.

    Posted by Bryan T on July 23, 2007 11:26 PM

  3. I think this problem may change in the near future.  Apple is probably getting tons of people calling on a daily basis.  Articles and forums like this one bring even more attention to this issue and will bring forth more calls and complaints.  Honestly Apple is lucky this didn’t get out til after the 14 day return period, but if they don’t do something about this it may get turned into a pretty big issue and possibly have an impact on sales.  In all my experience with Apple I have had not a single complaint about their customer service, I hope this will not ruin their perfect record.  Hopefully there will be a solution in place in the coming weeks.

    Posted by Chris on July 24, 2007 12:03 AM

  4. @Chris, the only possible solution I can think that might be logical is a recall for these defective LCDs. If the managers know about this already then it would be wise for them (but would suck for us) to wait it out until Apple announces something, no use in giving out or going through the repair steps for an iPhone Apple will directly take over anyways.

    Posted by Tanner Godarzi on July 24, 2007 12:13 AM

  5. I sent my phone into apple when I recieved my engraved “Applecare Service” iPhone. I am curious to see what happens when it returns. Probably nothing.

    Posted by Gregg on July 24, 2007 1:35 PM

  6. I had a similar experience with the Apple Store.  I had called the Apple Care line and they said it was up to me to either return through them or to go to the Apple Store.  The Lead Genius told me that it’s a known issue and is not a hardware problem and would do nothing for me.  He took down my S/N as a way of letting Apple know that I had experienced the problem, but took down no contact information whatsoever.  It’s incumbent upon me to figure out if Apple will ever come clean on this and offer a fix.

    Gregg - did you ever receive your phone back from Apple repaired, ir did they replace it?  I’d love to know…

    Posted by John M on August 3, 2007 2:02 PM

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