The stellar launch of Apple’s incredibly popular iPhone 3G has been dented by a class action lawsuit was lodged in America. Britons up and down the country camped overnight in July for their chance to buy the ‘new and improved’ iPhone, which combines a mobile phone, internet access and digital music player.

But some customers claim they have reported problems with the 3G hardware, alleging that they had experienced missed calls and slow internet downloads. More than 5,000 topics were posted on Apple’s own online support forum. Apple released an update to the iPhone software that was sent out to phones this week, but did not give details of the problems that it fixed.

One customer, Jessica Smith from Alabama, decided to file a legal complaint in the district court against the U.S based company on August 19th. She said the handset had been ‘aggressively’ marketed as a phone that was ‘twice as fast for half the price’ compared to the old iPhone. Apple’s American website still has the slogan emblazoned across the page source.

In her complaint she says: ‘Immediately after purchase, Plaintiff soon noticed that her internet connection, receipt and sending of email, text messages and other data transfers through the device were slow than expected and advertised.

She also said she ‘experienced an inordinate amount of dropped calls’ in Birmingham, Alabama, despite living in an area with ‘excellent 3G coverage.’

In Britain, iPhones are only available through O2 through its own stores, Apple and Carphone Warehouse. It said it was still experiencing an ‘unprecedented demand for the device’ though they were confident they could supply all customers by the end of this summer. Also read more about Latest Gadgets and Mobile phones here.