Attention US iPhone users: use a standby alarm clock for now
If you live in the United States, you're probably already aware that the nation is set to switch to Standard Time on November 7, moving clocks one hour back. What you may not be aware of is that if you're using an iPhone or other iOS device as your primary alarm clock, it might not make the switch as planned -- and you could end up late to work on Monday as a result.
iOS 4 introduced a bug into how iOS devices handle the switch between Daylight Saving and Standard Time. The bug got some attention when it first hit New Zealand back in September -- when our clocks rolled forward an hour, our iOS alarms did not. Many New Zealanders woke up an hour early following the switch to DST because of this bug, myself included. The same thing happened a couple weeks later when certain Australian territories switched to DST, and Apple promised a fix.
Southern Hemisphere iOS users had it bad enough being woken up an hour early, but when Europe switched to Standard Time last week, iOS users there found their alarms going off an hour late. The internet was flooded with reports of Europeans whose iPhones and iPods failed to wake them up on time last Monday. At the same time, some of our US commenters noted that alarms in the States were going off an hour early.
Apple has posted a support doc on its iOS DST issues, and the company recommends changing repeating iOS alarms in the Clock app to single-use alarms instead as a way of skirting the issue. This procedure worked for us in New Zealand, but it has the added inconvenience of having to remember to set the alarm every day.
Bottom line: if you're worried about being late to work on Monday, or losing an hour of sleep, the best advice we can give you is to use a different alarm other than your iPhone or iPod touch for now. While the issue is reportedly resolved in the forthcoming iOS 4.2 update, that update is unlikely to be publicly released before the changeover to Standard Time this Sunday -- so if you're on thin ice at work already, don't depend on your iPhone to wake you up on Monday morning.
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If you live in the United States, you're probably already aware that the nation is set to switch to Standard Time on November 7, moving...
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My alarm went off an hour late as well. Set for 4:30am, went off at 5:30am. I had another that was set for 6:30am, went off at 7:30am. Time was correct to reflect DST.
4.1 (8B117)
@MRBlue: What you suggest is for setting the TIME on the phone, not fixing the problem of the internal time on the phone being correct, but the alarms going off an hour late. But, you are correct when you say this is a simple fix that Apple should have never let become an issue. It's not that hard to test something that happens and has happened twice a year, every year for over 100 years. "seemingly no one on the internet has attempted to resolve but rather just give Apple a hard time" is a quote that almost had me in tears laughing. First, no one on the "internet" can resolve this, it's internal Apple code. Second, can you image the attack on Microsoft from all corners of the Internet if Windows 7 couldn't handle daylight saving time properly and their fix was support telling people to set a manual alarm EVERYDAY until we get around to fixing this? If anything, Apple has been given a very big pass on this one.
November 08 2010 at 12:31 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyMy 6:00 AM alarm went off today right on time. Good deal.
November 08 2010 at 12:23 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyI have an iPhone 4, I live in Atlanta, GA (US, Eastern time zone), and my alarm went off an hour late today. iOS 4.1 (8B117).
November 08 2010 at 12:14 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyMy iPhone4 worked perfectly today. The clock set and the Alarm went off at the correct time.
November 08 2010 at 10:19 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyMy iPhone 4 iOS 4.0 changed times and my alarms work fine and are on time!
November 08 2010 at 9:45 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyGuys, this isn't hard. I'm not excusing Apple because this was pretty f'd up but here's the simple fix:
- Settings
- General
- Date & Time
- If it's set to "Automatic" swipe it over to change the time manually and if it doesn't fix itself automatically (which mine did) then just set the hour +1 then set it back to Automatic
- Done. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.
Again, Apple needs to address this and they suck a little more because of this little faux pas (ed note: I live in Phoenix where we DO NOT recognize the silly tradition of DST) but there is also a very simple fix that seemingly no one on the internet has attempted to resolve but rather just give Apple a hard time.
Interestingly and uncannily I don't think even Apple tried this since I've read that their solution was to set up alarms manually until a patch is released.
Why is everyone saying the alarms will ring an hour late tomorrow? Didn't Apple specifically say that the alarms will be fine after November 7th? (http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3542). My guess is that if you haven't experienced the bug yet, you won't.
November 07 2010 at 6:42 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyHmm... Didn't know about the bug until my iPhone woke me up on-time this morning using my recurring Sunday morning alarm. I was going to buy into the idea that it was just a bug in the Clock app, but now I am leaning toward the function in the system clock that auto-adjusts for DST. I have my system clock set to use the cell phone time servers. Maybe that's the difference?
November 07 2010 at 5:30 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyOr just use an original iPhone and not be able to load the latest iOs thus avoiding this pesky bug.
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TUAW (or The Unofficial Apple Weblog) is a website devoted to tips, reviews, news, analysis and opinion on everything Apple.
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