Voice memo bug impacts iPhone users
updated 12:10 pm EDT, Mon July 13, 2009
iPhone voice memo bug
iPhone owners continue to be affected by a bug in the device's voice recording software, discussion on Apple's support forums indicates. The problem manifests itself when trying to play back a voice memo; although a memo will show the expected runtime, hitting play may not produce any audio. The scrub bar remains locked at 0:00, even though the play button toggles to show the pause option.
The error has been recurring since at least late June, and is so far hardware-independent, affecting the iPhone 3G and 3GS. Apple is currently coping with several iPhone-related troubleshooting issues however, including overheating, broken Wi-Fi connectivity and an SMS vulnerability. Some of these may be addressed in the iPhone 3.1 update, presently in beta testing. Apple has not set a clear deadline for the firmware's release.
Mac Elite
Joined: Oct 2000
Fix - kinda
I've spotted this too. It happens because recorded memos get stored in the regular music library and are synched back to iTunes on the computer. If you subsequently remove the track from within iTunes on the computer, it gets removed from the iPhone on the next sync but the voice memo app doesn't get updated so thinks the recording is still there.
To avoid the problem, remove the recording from within the voice memo app, NOT via iTunes on the computer.