[PMUP]

Why doesn't MacWorld spend a little time reporting all the problems with iTunes and the iPhone that users are having? One quick visit to the the local Genius Bar at any Apple Store or a online visit to Apple's own support discussion forums will reveal the pain that users are feeling. Here is my experience with iPhone 2.0.1 and I know I am not alone.

First iPhone 3G crashed and bricked under 2.0 software requiring 22 total restores in just 22 days. Long story shortened, got replacement iPhone 3G, updated to iTunes 7.7.1 and iPhone 2.0.1. Crashed and bricked everyday since updated. Tried two different Macs. Uninstalled iTunes software, re-installed. Nothing helps.

Most of the time it crashes and bricks leaving me with a frozen Apple logo after a third party app quits, but not exclusively. After one third party app quits, none of them ever start again. Restarting the iPhone and even hard resets do not help. Sometimes updating or downloading an app directly on the iPhone crashes and bricks it.

When it bricks it means a total restore and when it happens on the road you have NO phone at all! No app quitting should be able to totally brick a phone.

A quick visit to the Mobile Application folder reveals a serious bug in iTunes 7.7.1 as it updates apps by creating a new file and incrementing the filename, never deleting the old file. iTunes thinks there are updates when there are not and does not know when there are updates available. Sometimes when iTunes tells you there are updates there are 5 or 6 of the same app in the App Store it wants to download, which if you let it creates new files incrementing numbers again. In one week I had about 6 to 10 copies of the same app!

iTunes Store password goes gone bad on me about 20 times since the rollout forcing me to keep resenting my password.

Sometimes MobileMe mail will not send and ask again and again for a password.

Calls to Apple, Genius Bar visits and feedback has yielded nothing. If you are having some of the same problems please comment. I was hopeful when the updates for iTunes and iPhone came out, but it has not made my problems go away. This is the worst product rollout in Apple history I can remember and I am a long time Mac user.

[daniel2828_MW]

You're not alone, PMUP. I have the original iPhone "2G" running 2.0.1. I've had to restore on three separate occasions after my phone got bricked "in the field" by simply quitting or starting an application. And since I'm a fairly patient person, I could almost live with that if restores didn't take the better part of a day because of freezes during the restore process when installing a backup. And speaking of backing up, I'm now on my third hour of doing so. Hopefully, no one will call me and distrupt the process this time, since I have yet to be able to create a fresh backup since installing 2.0.1. I'm almost starting to worry about screen burn-in, given that my "Sync in Progress" screen has been on for so long.

I won't even start in about losing WiFi capabilities (along with many others as apparent on the Apple Discussion Boards) after installing 2.0. I was so hoping 2.0.1 would fix it. So with lousy Edge service in my area, and no WiFi, and with my phone tethered to the dock most of the day so that I can't make calls, I've basically got myself slightly less than an iTouch.

I will say that Contacts seems a little snappier with 2.0.1 (though I haven't had much of an opportunity to play with it to make sure), but there are certainly more serious issues that I trust Apple is concentrating on.

[wardoggie]

FWIW, I got the "unknown error (6)" message. I searched apple's support forums and one recommendation worked. I have an MDD G4 with a USB 2.0/firewire card (to replace the bad firewire on the mobo). I had plugged in a USB hub to that which is basically a cable extender because nothing else was plugged into that. But for some reason, I shut down, unplugged everything else from the card and plugged the iPhone sync cable directly to the USB card and it worked. It only took about 90 minutes to work this all out. I guess I am lucky in that I've never had any problems with apple software updates on the Mac side of things. But this was frustrating!

[Goodyear]

I have the exceessive heat problem and it happens when 3G is active. The phone appears to keep trying to access the 3G or Edge network and doesn't give up. During this time you can almost watch the battery drain.

[Goodyear]

This same thing happens to me and it is no better with the release. The only difference I see is the screen appears to be more repsonsive. I hope Apple gets the 3G and weak connectivity issues resolved.

[garneaum]

I don't know if this is a 2.0.1 update or not, but I just noticed that if I change a color on an iCal calendar, that color now ALSO updates on the iPhone Calendar app. I'm pretty sure that wasn't the case before, but I'm not 100% certain. In any event, I'm glad this is the case. The colors are important to me as I glance at my calendar.