iPhone humbug?
 

Am I the only person on the face of the earth who doesn't understand all the iPhone hype, and has no particular desire for one?

Surely there have to be others. Unite, my brethren!

yes.

No, you are not ;)

I admit that I wanted to buy the new 3G, but the SAR value is extremely high (round 1.3). So I decided not to buy the iPhone.

I think I'll buy the new Samsung Omnia (i900 / http://samsungomnia.org) that has nearly the same features as the iPhone, also looks very nice and has only half the SAR value. Unfortunately it's not available yet :(

Greez, Jonathan

No.

I don't understand the hype either. That said, I do hope that all the hype will force companies like Microsoft to fix their stuff. WinMo is in desperate need of a major overhaul.

Don't get me wrong, it's a pretty phone, and it has a nice interface, but it's by no means perfect.

SAR didn't even enter my mind. Normally I'm the first person on the block to get any new gadget. I usually have it hacked to do stuff the manufacturer only half-intended by the time that my neighbors have one. But for some reason, the iPhone (and the original one) haven't done anything for me. I mean, I play with friends' and think "well, this is kinda fun", but the lack of real buttons for the keyboard is annoying. People tell me that you get used to it. But I can touch type on my Blackberry. They can't do that on their iPhones.

The rest of the features are nice, I suppose, but I just don't care about YouTube at all, and I like Blackberry push email. The Safari web browser is cool, but if I want serious web browsing I'll just use my computer. It has a bigger screen anyway. As for Google Maps with GPS - I can do that on my Blackberry.

I dunno. If I could get the iPhone for its current price with a 1 year contract, I might consider it. But the iPhone service plans are also overpriced.

Also, I've become kind of an open-source snob of late. I run Linux everywhere I can. Apple is the antithesis of open source...

Maybe I'm just getting old - I turned 30 last week. :)

As far as I can tell the $30/month iPhone data plan is identical to other ATT 3G plans. Am I missing something?

I don't see it happening. As long as they are just an OS OEM to the hardware manufacturers it isn't going to get measurably better. And they are unlikely to go into the hardware market. The time lag they have in developing the software, getting it to the vendors for driver development and then getting it back for certification is just too long of a cycle, meaning that any features they try to add are always 6-9 months away. WinMo 7 has supposedly been "out" for the hardware manufacturers for a little while now, but it still isn't on any hardware platforms and won't be for a little while yet. They'll continue to improve the product, but it'll continue to struggle catching up in terms of features/functionality.

And I'm not all that excited by the iPhone either, though I will readily admit that I haven't used one.

Its certainly not perfect, eg the texting is nowhere near as good as a plain old phone with T9. The battery life is poor and will result in a lot of charging on the fly.

But purely for the reason it will stop me travelling with an ipod, PDA and mobile phone and has a simple user interface it meets my needs.

I think sometimes people start believing the Apple hype and expect too much.

Oddly enough, the best blog post I found about all this came from.. um, Nokia.

I was tempted. I really was. But I will probably just get a Touch. And keep hoping Blackberry Connect is released for the E71.

The iPhone doesn't work below 0 C? What exactly happens?

Sorta.

I've been finding used iPhones online which keeps me from having to buy the data plan on a 2-year deal.

The 3G speed is very attractive. But I really don't want to do business with The Death Star, and T-Mobile's 3G isn't compatible.

Is/are Google Mobile Maps supported yet? I use it all over Europe on T-Mobileweb GPRS connection. A-GPS makes iPhone marginally more useful than my iPAQ 6510, but I don't need $200 worth.

"Yet"? Not sure I understand. It always did even on the 2G.

And from the iPhone site: http://www.apple.com/iphone/features/maps.html

No idea, I guess it stops working or something until it warms up again.

In typical Nokia fashion, they are making a fool of themeselves.

The N95 (the current Nokia flasgship phone) ALSO has a listed operating temperature of 0c - 35c, just like the iPhone.

Same goes for their newest one, the N96.

They'd better do their homework before trying to find stupid things that make Apple look bad.

And FWIW, the problem is mainly with Li-Ion cells at that temperature. Plus, the LCD slows down a lot at sub-zero temperatures.

:)

Ahem.
 

"Just like Google Maps on your computer, Maps on iPhone lets you switch between views of Google Map data, Satellite images, and a Hybrid of both."

http://www.apple.com/iphone/features/maps.html

In my lexicon, "just like" isn't the same as the original. I don't know who wrote "Maps on iPhone" - but I'd like to see a side-by-side comparison with GMM.

You're grasping at straws here :)

It's a Google Maps app.

No, it's not like what you see on your computer screen, but it's a way smaller screen.

For that matter, Google maps on any cell phone or PDA is not like on your computer, because it's smaller and if you're on EDGE it's slower.

So if you're saying that Google maps on the iPhone isn't Google maps on a laptop, I'm not sure that anyone would disagree but I'm not sure what you're saying other than a tautalogy. :)

I use GMM on an iPAQ and a Wing. Neither is a laptop. I would like to be confident that GPS Maps on iPhone is the "same" as GMM. But I'm not.

The quote you referenced said: "Just like Google Maps on your computer...."

Therefore it's not unreasonable to think that's what you were comparing to, is it? Hence the apparent tautalogy of what you said. :)

I'm sure you'll share it with us when you know the answer.

I've used both. On the iPhone, it's better.

Why do you say it's better? Have you used GMM on any PPC on a WiFi connection? That works in most cities.

But I don't imagine either will work very well on a bicycle in rural France.

It's better because the user interface is much easier to use. Map scrolling is smoother and screen redraws are much faster than any PPC version I've ever tested.

That said; I personally prefer Windows Live Search because it adds things like gas prices and voice recognition.

You have a very valid point here - for some reason, Google no longer has their name openly associated with maps on the iPhone (at least not on the Apple site).

It was introduced as a 100% Google app, and they even had the Google CEO on stage to announce it back in 2007.

That said, a 20 second search shows that it still is clearly a Google made app for the iPhone:

http://www.google.com/mobile/apple/maps/

Okay, Mr. Google convinced me there. Funny about that branding, though. Is this a further manifestation of Jobs trying to wrest world control away from Bill G?

Don't worry. Jobs only wants the cool, fun people. :p:p:p:p:p

Well, at least the people who are cool and fun by his standards. The people who want to be nonconformists - just like all the other Apple brainwashees. :)

Open source is where it's at!

I got to play with one the other day (the new 3G one). It is beautiful, BUT...
battery barely makes it through the day, ATT 3G is extremely (emphasis) limited coverage, can't take a picture and email it to somebody (at least not that we could see), no storage card, no REAL GPS (only a-GPS so cell tower related), limited to Google Maps which does not provide turn-by-turn routing like a real GPS (text only), not so great as an actual phone (poor battery, mainly).
This thing is fantastic as an iPod, but lacks some function as a PDA, in what I've seen. Style over function, to a degree. I have a Win Mob 6 phone that does a lot more, but not as stylish.

You can email photos, it's pretty easy to do...
The GPS IS "real", in fact, it's more real than most units. A-GPS is assisted GPS, which combines satellite GPS with additional information from cell towers.
The app store only just opened, so at the moment there is indeed only one GPS app, but Apple have already announced that more are coming.

I agree with the rest, and battery life is something that's going to come back and haunt them for a long time.

What amazes me most is that all their arguments for not releasing the first iPhone with 3G turned out to be bogus. They are using a 3G chip that was available last year, it's almost like they scammed everyone into buying the EDGE version knowing that they'd all want the 3G version after a year, essentially making them buy 2 phones :D

No. Although, one Mr. P. Barnum did offer some pertinent insight :)

I'd rather gargle with used, rusty razor blazes than own any product put out by the Clandestine Cupertino Cabal ;)

I've recently recieved my 3G iphone. I came from a palm 680... So far web browsing is ok- I had fairly speedy EDGE browsing (WAP/mini-html) on my 680 so it's comparable on the 3g iphone (on 3G/Wifi) but it's full sized and I actuallyu prefer the smaller form web (easier to read). Battery life I think has been great- I've always been data heavy on my PDA (Chatter-email/web on the Palm) so I guess a full day has been about what I am used to (even less than a full day sometime). Having Wifi has been great... The best app so far- Pandora radio- I love it on my desktop and now I love it on my iphone. works great over 3G I used it for about 2 hours this AM and still have pretty good battery left (80%)

I'm sure you aren't the only one.

I'd love to have one, but I don't want to pay $50 - $60 a month to the cell phone company. So, I'm very happy with my unlocked GSM razr using t-mobile to go as my provider which ends up costing me less that $10 a month with my light usage. (Plus the one-time cost of an unlocked GSM phone, you buy 1000 minutes for less than $100 -- discounted a bit online from 3rd parties -- which have a 1 year expiration date. Calls are 10 cents a minute, text messages are 5 cents with the 1000 pre-paid minutes.) My phone is an unlocked quad band GSM phone, so it pretty much works anywhere in the world.

Yes, I am the master of using 4 year old cell phone technology on the cheap, I guess. I also don't think I'm in the iphone target market.

IMO, the iphone service plan means it isn't for everybody. If you are already paying $40 a month for your cell phone plan, then I guess the extra $20 a month for the unlimited data plan isn't that huge of a difference. (It is, and it isn't.)

-David

Fair enough - but I already spend $90/month for my service. The extra $30 is annoying but not insurmountable.

On the other hand, with T-mo now I get 1500 anytime minutes, free nights & weekends, 1000 text/mms messages, and unlimited blackberry data. The iPhone plans don't come close to that. :)

I'm with you. I have no interest in paying that much for a phone or the service. Call me a troglodyte, but all I want from my phone is to be a phone.

Isn't that a paradox - that's exactly where a high-SAR phone's radiation enters first :D .

But I agree, I couldn't care less than about the SAR.

The reason why I abstain at this time - the iPhone is a bandwidth hog. If you use it abroad, you will be ruined in no time.
I have yet to find a temperature at which my N95 actually does work. It never reads a GPS signal and finds wireless networks within about 2' distance from the transmitter. The N95 will be my last Nokia phone ever.

Your N95 is broken.

:)
Sure ... only that I swapped it twice already .. and it's not that these functions are missing .. they are just messed up.

Then it's just bizarre :) I've played with N95s, though I don't own one, and (particularly with the latest firmware) they're quick to lock onto GPS, and fine for wifi across a room.

Funny, Nokias have always been my favorite phones (until I got a Blackberry). I've always experienced them as intuitive to use and capable of holding on to the weakest of signals.

a-GPS requires your cell service. True GPS does not. My HTC Mogul has a-GPS, too, and only works in the Verizon CDMA network (or so they have told me. Verizon is my carrier). I have a bluetooth GPS that I use with Tom Tom Navigator 6 that runs on that phone.