Original URL: https://www.theregister.com/2013/02/12/ios_six_point_one_point_one_update/
Apple releases fix for iPhone 4S iOS 6.1 connectivity cockup
'Battery problems? What battery problems?'
Posted in Software, 12th February 2013 01:45 GMT
If you're an iPhone 4S owner experiencing 3G connectivity problems since updating to iOS 6.1, Apple says it has a fix.
On Monday, Apple released iOS 6.1.1 for iPhone 4S to address the difficulties that owners of those smartphones have had since upgrading to iOS 6.1 on January 28.
iPhone 4S owners may understandably hope that Monday's update might also fix some of the battery problems about which they've complained since the January 28 iOS 6.1 upgrade. Apple, however, didn't address battery issues in its announcement of the 6.1.1 upgrade; it merely said: "This update fixes an issue that could impact cellular performance and reliability for iPhone 4S."
Despite the fact that some iPhone 5 owners have also complained about battery life after moving to iOS 6.1, Monday's iOS 6.1.1 update is for iPhone 4S owners only – it doesn't even show up as available whan iPhone 5 owners access the over-the-air upgrade at Settings > General > Software Update.
To be fair, in the same Apple Support discussion thread that harps on battery problems, some iPhone 5 owners have said that iOS 6.1 improved their battery life.
Whatever.
In the UK, iPhone 4S owners were warned by Vodafone not to upgrade to iOS 6.1, saying that "Some customers may occasionally experience difficulty in connecting to the network to make or receive calls or texts or to connect to the Internet."
In addition, 3 Austria told The Reg that some – but not all – of their customers had experienced "the same problem," and that "we have sent a SMS to all 4S customers proactively to warn them NOT to download the actual upgrade."
Now that iOS 6.1.1 has been released, we'll wait for the requisite day or so while iPhone 4S owners install it and report their experiences with the promised fix for "cellular performance and reliability" – and, optimists that we are, on any possible battery-life improvements.
By the way, although Apple also pointed users to its security-issues webpage for "information on the security content" of the upgrade, as of late afternoon here at Vulture Annex in San Francisco that information had yet to appear on the page to which Apple linked – a lag that is par for the course when Cupertino upgrades iOS or OS X. ®