Apple looks to protect dropped iPhones by shifting their orientation mid-flight | Hacker News Reader

Apple looks to protect dropped iPhones by shifting their orientation mid-flight

appft1.uspto.gov

50 pointsxmpir43 comments

Seriously, just allow the battery to eject on impact. The problem was solved; then apple made the problem again by having a non-removable battery.

Wow, I never realized this... So interesting!

I remember tossing my Nokia 3310 to a friend, and I completely overshot him. It hit a cement wall and just blew apart (disassembled) into several parts. After I pieced it back together I couldn't believe that it still worked. Try that with an iPhone...

I had a Nokia phone that had a flip, forgot the model name.

Once I dropped it from 4 stories high in a shopping center, parts flew everywhere, even parts that were supposed to be glued got unglued and flew.

But the flip got no damage, neither the screen... I went around picking the parts and assembling the phone again, interestingly one glued part was seemly hold in place only by the glue, but I noticed that if I twisted it only slighly, it would fit in place, and stay put, with the tension holding it in place without looking ugly, just awesome engineering.

After I assembled it entirely again, it worked fine, like if nothing happened, the only thing that could hint the accident was that any minor impact now made it fall apart again (because the formely glued parts now being held in place by tension).

3310 is a famous meme

http://i.imgur.com/fcCwKF8.jpg http://i.imgur.com/BeS47ZJ.jpg http://i.imgur.com/GlnPCk1.jpg

etc.

I had the same experience multiple with my Blackberry curve, back in the day.

Using a conservative estimate, it survived over 30 break-apart falls. Granted, I was exceptionally cavalier with it since it was even at that time (2009) a relatively old piece of hardware the company just couldn't wait to get rid of. I would literally play catch with it, toss it around and spin it on my desk like a top. Every time it shattered, I would re-assemble it like humpty dumpty and it would boot without issue.

That thing was indestructible.

3310 were amazingly durable, I remember them surviving the worst abuse, like throwing across the room or from the 1st floor. then they released a marketed as shock-dust-water-proof 5510 (? or sth like that) which I promptly bought and it got broken the first time it slipped out of my jumper hitting the wall.

Nokia Lumia 710 is engineered like that. Despite dropping it literally hundreds of times onto concrete, tiles etc mine still just falls to bits and has never broken.

Still scares me every time though!

I've seen so many people depressingly dragging their fingers over cracked iPhones and HTC handsets its unreal.

I actively threw a Nokia 3310 against a concrete wall from a couple of meters away. It disassembled into several parts, I put them back together and everything worked as new. One of the most durable mobile phones ever built.

i used 3310 as a bottle opener

Or make a device where the glass front doesn't go all the way out to the edge. Just a few millimeters of plastic, so you don't touch glass first, would absorb the worst of energy already.

The sheer weight of the iphone4 is probably a big factor also. I really don't know what apple engineers were thinking. Hmm let's make a phone harder and more solid than a wrench....because the most common way that phones are destroyed are by the users accidentally crushing them with their bare hands while they are holding them!

I've dropped my htc, with fixed battery, several times into the ground from pocket height and the screen is unharmed, it's not something i would do comfortably like you could with an old school phone but it still feels more reliable than an iphone because it's lightweight and its landing-gear isn't made of glass.

Iphone3 didn't have these issues either to the same extent, for these reasons.

Often it's just pure chance, one drop looks like a killer and you get nothing but scuff marks, other times it looks like a minor drop and your phone shatters.

Here's an Android Authority video of the iPhone 5 and SGIII getting dropped from several distances: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6M5q5TRuAsY

Is it a definitive test proving an iPhone is indestructible ? HECK NO ... but it does show that a densely designed phone can survive a variety of falls.

What’s the battery got to do with it?

Designing an object to predictably disassemble into multiple parts helps soak up the impact energy. The fact that many cell phones used to break up when dropped was not accidental, it was a deliberate engineering decision.

Well there seems to be a consensus.

as opposed to the convenience and accessibility of phones with conventional removable parts?

I don't deny that soaking up impact energy is an outcome, but I'm doubtful it was a deliberate engineering decision for purposes of impact survival

I have 3 generations of flip phones, from a old nokia to a Sony Ericsson w580i.

They all eject their battery upon impact. Considering it wouldn't be difficult at all for the battery cover be more tight, or have something that clips on, it's probably accurate to describe it as an engineering decision.

Why not both? Maybe the engineers said "Oh cool, what a nifty side effect, this further validates our decision"

that's what I was trying to get at. I think it was a neat side effect. I just don't necessarily subscribe to the idea that it was a priori goal or priority when these phones were being designed designed.

The battery historically was the most massive component. Letting it pop out of the chassis dissipated a great deal of the impact force, so the more delicate components were somewhat protected from the shock.

The battery flying out absorbs most of the impact shock. Try it it works well.

Have to agree with this. I have a Huawei from back in 2010, each time it falls it just falls apart. It's got a lot of scratches, but screen hasn't cracked. The worst fall was onto tarred road.

I actually never thought that the reason why it just disassembles so easily when it falls would be the same reason why I still have a functional phone 2 years later

My Galaxy Nexus has fallen around 10 times now, it doesn't even have scratches. It does fly apart every time, though.

I wonder if we'll get a deluge of jokes about which side a buttered iPhone would fall on.

Well, it wouldn't be much of a joke since this patent makes it predictable.

But the claim is the butter also makes it predictable, since "toast always lands buttered side down".

After toasting the iPhone, its electronics should no longer be in working order, so only the butter should be exerting its orientation preference.

You could always glue/tape two iPhones together...

Wouldn't it be more effective to deploy a small parachute?

No, the amount of surface area the parachute would need would in order to apply sufficient braking force in time would be too large.

That said, a bumper case where the "bumper" was an airbag would be eminently practical. If the phone could notify the case that it had been falling "too long" (which is to say the phone now believes it is travelling too fast to resist damage) a small electrical trigger to activate a chemical reaction and inflate a bumper cases 'edges' to 10x their size would effectively prevent any damage for most situations. Unlike the parachute the energy absorbing effects of airbags are available nearly instantly.

Deleted comment

Speaking of obvious...

here is a more readable article: http://appleinsider.com/articles/13/03/21/apple-looks-to-pro...

I suppose if you can keep the device from falling on a corner then you're good. That seems to be the worst-case scenario. It'll probably be a couple years before we see this in any of their devices.

Is apple trying to patent a gyroscope?

No, they're trying to patent a system in which one component is a gyroscope. They reference previous patents related to gyroscopes - if you bothered to look at the application.

Or they could actually design the iPhone to actually have enough metal and thick enough glass.

I've dropped my Samsung Nexus S a hundred times without damage. Just saying.

iPhone Cat coming soon.

iCat Phone coming soon too

i wonder if this will be implemented...

I doubt it. They're trying to patent this because the economic incentive is to patent everything regardless of if you plan to use it.

Says something about patents and their effect on society, doesn't it?

He just did?

The gp commenter just said something about the company's motivations for patenting. I expanded it by pointing out the implications for society in general when all companies do that. (Kantian imperative)

Yet another way to think about it: It turns IP into a zero-sum game, where it should be a positive-sum game.

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