So, who’s getting the 3G tomorrow?

My friend and coworker, Mike, and I will be waiting outside the UVillage Apple Store at 5am. Never have I been so amused with my own geekiness.

oh, rub it in, Andy. :-P

Actually, I figured out what I’m going to do. Should only be a few weeks out. :-)

still poor from moving :_(

I’m waiting to see yours.

Alright, my review in brief:

Pros:

• Push email/calendar/contact integration with Amazon was a snap.
• 3G is real quick. There is not a noticeable difference, really, when I jump on my home wifi network vs. when I’m running on 3G.
• LOVE having a real web browser. It’s great to be able to browse website like, say, antibox and have them actually work on a mobile device.
• Music on my phone is great. This means one less device I have to carry around.
• GPS really works and the potential for location-based service is huge.
• The app store is sweet, though pretty sparse right now. Currently enjoying: Twitterific, Loopt, Apple Remote, AIM. I would like more people to get on Loopt, please.
  
  Cons:
  
  
• Biggest complaint is the complete lack of search/organization of pretty much anything. I can’t search contacts, I can’t search email, I can’t reorder my email by sender or when it was received.
• No native google talk support. :( Gone are the days of Andy always being on the gchats.
• It lacks multi-threading support. I can’t remember why, but I remember reading that this was done on purpose. Basically, this means that, for example, if I’m signed into AIM and I navigate away from it to write an email, I get signed out of AIM.
• Battery life is definitely going to be a small problem for me. I woke up shortly after 8, it is now noon, and my battery is half-discharged. 3G hurts. I think I’ll need to keep an extra power cable at work.
• This is not necessarily a con. The keyboard is, of course, very different and taking some getting used to. However, I’m rapidly learning that you merely need to get within a letter or so of the actual letter you meant to hit. Apple’s “guessing” software does a great job knowing what you meant to type.
  
  Overall, I think it really depends on what you’re looking for in a mobile device. It’s also worth noting that alot of the “cons” I mentioned will likely be fixed within a couple months.
  
  Were we to pit this device against my blackberry in the following categories, here is the obvious winner, from my view:
  
  
• Productivity & Utility: Blackberry
• Fun / Social Interaction: iPhone (overall—esp. with the apps that are available)
• Media: iPhone
• Documents: iPhone
• Enterprise Integration (ease): iPhone
• Battery Life: Blackberry
• Web/internet related: iPhone
• Usability: iPhone
• Not lacking obvious features: Blackberry
• Stability (so far): iPhone
• Not randomly erasing itself: iPhone

Andy (and all), I think Apple’s official explanation for lack of “multi-threading” support is that they’re concerned about stability and processor bandwidth. I guess they run pretty close to capacity as it stands. With your statements on battery life, I’m led to believe this is probably of concern as well. I also wouldn’t doubt AT&T having something to say about multiple apps on a single device being able to call out to the cloud creating undue load on the network (given that AT&T appears babyish about running a solid network with plenty of capacity for everyone).

That said, it sounds like there will soon be a capacity (provided by Apple) for the OS to monitor servers that can “badge” the icon for an application to let you know that service wants your attention. Then you’d have to hit the icon to see whats up (for example… the little red circle with the number in it that shows up on your email, could also show up on your gchat or AIM icon to let you know to launch the application and check for messages.) At least, that’s my recollection. I may be mistaken, though.

I’m headed to get my iPhone on Thursday. I will add my own thoughts to Andy’s on or about that date. :-)

Think I’m gonna pass on this one… the cool stuff just isn’t worth the limited battery life and clunky (in my opinion) design. I like real buttons, and I’m never usually more than a few feet from a computer if I want to web-surf.

Well, that didn’t take long.

I’ve switched back to a BlackBerry. I realized as the work week started that the iPhone’s “push” email is very sub-par. I’d have emails arriving sometimes 15-20 minutes after they actually arrived.

What a bummer. :(

OK, so I got mine (finally) yesterday. Since push email isn’t really that crucial in my professional life, and because I’m not already accustomed to the way RIM and the WinMo team design their products, I think iPhone is going to be a pretty darn good fit for me. The apps are pretty much as sweet as they’re said to be, and for the most part everything has – thusfar – worked as promised. Aside from a few minor usability paradigms that are currently foreign but which I am confident I will eventually just get used to (as would be present in any gizmadgit), I’ve found the interface remarkably intuitive. The touch board isn’t as difficult to use as a lot of people have made it out to be, and in fact, as someone who is used to T9, I’m feeling wicked fast on the touch board.

I’m giving iPhone 3G a B+, just cuz it lacks some obvious features (as Andy said, why the fuck can’t I search contacts?) and to prove I’m not just a silly fanboy, gleeful over his really cool new toy (even if I am pretty gleeful over my really cool new toy).

Post updated by Adam on 2008/08/08 05:09