Skip to footer

Weeks after launch, iPhone 5S hit with 'blue screen of death' complaints

In related news, a new study indicates that apps on the iPhone 5S crash much more frequently than apps on the iPhone 5 or 5C. 

|
Reuters
Customers shopped at the Apple Retail Store on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, New York, Sept. 20, 2013.
  • By Matthew Shaer

The Blue Screen of Death, or BSOD, is a bug so infamous that it has earned its own extensive Wikipedia page. In recent years, the dreaded BSOD has popped up on Windows machines, PlayStation portables, and the Nintendo DS (see also: The Xbox 360's "red ring of death"). And now there are reports that the Apple iPhone 5S has a BSOD all of its own.

As Tom Warren of The Verge points out this morning, a number of users have taken to Apple forums to complain about a bug that seems to occur when users attempt to access iWork apps. Others have found the error popping up during the use of Numbers, a spreadsheet app, or the ESPN application. Either way, the result seems to be the same: A blue screen, followed by an unrequested reboot. 

"This is happening to me when using Facetime, Safari, the camera and assortment of other apps," a user wrote this week on the Apple support forum. "I tried restoring my phone and deleting every non-Apple app. My phone has started crashing every few hours and sometimes takes as long as 30 minutes to cycle between the blue screen and Apple logo." 

No word yet from Apple on what exactly is causing the bug – or exactly how to fix it. 

In related news, a new report from analytics company Crittercism (hat tip All Things D) suggests that apps crash much more frequently on the iPhone 5S than they do on the iPhone 5 or iPhone 5C. "Anytime there is new hardware or software release, we see issues," Crittercism CEO Andrew Levy told Ina Fried of All Things D. "Inevitably, over time, those issues get resolved."

But what accounts for the increased amount of crashes on the iPhone 5S? Well, Don Reisinger of CNET thinks it might have something to do with the hardware on the phone. 

"Although app developers were able to fix iOS 7 bugs for months while the software was in testing, thus limiting crashes on the iPhone 5 and nearly identical iPhone 5C, they weren't made aware of the iPhone 5S' 64-bit architecture or its M7 coprocessor until the device was unveiled," he writes. "Those app developers are now trying to catch up." 

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Weeks after launch, iPhone 5S hit with 'blue screen of death' complaints
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Technology/2013/1011/Weeks-after-launch-iPhone-5S-hit-with-blue-screen-of-death-complaints
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe