More Apple Phone Rumors and Speculation

[Mac'Mo]

i thought the white chocolate by LG looked kinda like an iPhone

[mo0805]

i'm not going to make any assumptions about what the apple phone will or will not be, but if one is coming out I'd be willing to bet that it's going to be a great product. I just want it to come out so I can play with it.

[Evangelion]

Originally Posted by ppnkg

I really don't understand why an ipod+phone should cost $600+. What's so complicated about adding a phone function on the ipod?

Well, for starters phones have to pass very strict regulatory-approvals, and that could drive up the cost.

[Zadillo]

Originally Posted by uNext

What can apple really offer in the pda market that phones like the treos, htc's nokias & blackberrys dont already offer?

I mean come on one thing is to adore a company, buts its another when people just want a cool factor phone with ipod capabilities?

I really dont see any type of break thourgh functionality beiong deployed by apple.

Plus stop calling it iPhone please.

I remember in an interview where the owner of this site and another mac related website where asked
about why they think an apple phone would be so much better then veteran companies that push design and functionality already in the
cell phone market. Their whole answer was based around iPod, they did not answer the question properly. All they kept saying is ipod functionality and ease of use. Seriously motorola appeals to the young and hip (razr) nokia pushes technology and sleek designs into its phones. Treo and blackberrys appeal to business and end users both in functionality and looks. You have Htc's etc.

Last i checked the iPod was a music player far from a phone-Also last i checked apple had 0 experience in the cell phone market.
Apple is very predictable just look at their history they re-writte their own products and evolutionize it-and pass it as INNOVATIVE
an apple cell phone is most likely in the works i mean they had the newton before (flopped) they had the apple tv and the experimental set top box (both flopped) and now their bringing back those same ideas in hopes they nail it the second time around.

But in all honesty aopple should just stick to making computers thats what we know them by. They have failed horribly on other bussiness ventures and i think they will not succeed in the phone market. Too many well established cell phone makers out there that have an extreme amount of epxrience in this market. Their phones have been recreated after years and years to pefection to appeal.

A cell phone with ipod capabilites and nothing else? I have a slvr that do just that. So basically people are willing to spend up to 600 dollars for a apple branded slvr? WOW are you the same ones complaining about gas prices when they go up?

I will pass get on with the computers apple

I really can't believe no-one has responded to this post directly yet.

The arguments you are making here sound a lot like the arguments made against Apple getting into the mp3 player market. People looked at the mp3 player market at the time and said, basically, what's the point of Apple doing this? There are already lots of people making mp3 players, and they are all great. What can Apple possibly offer?

Generally speaking, the idea that cellphones have reached the pinnacle of perfection is laughable to me. Yes, there are cellphones that can browse the web, let you read and send e-mail, etc. but a lot of people still find them to be pretty cumbersome and not really be all that great at these tasks. Frankly even Windows Smartphones and Treos are not perfect (and the Treo especially is worth noting because the Palm OS as we know it is dead, and the Treo has really stagnated, with Palm having to make incremental changes to it while waiting for a new OS to use).

I think there's plenty of room for improvement in how mobile phones work, and I think Apple absolutely could do a lot of good in this area.

[BenRoethig]

Originally Posted by Warbrain

I could see Apple seriously selling this phone unlocked while keeping the price down a bit. Apple would kick-start that market of unlocked phones that has so far been dormant in the United States.

It's dormant because its next to impossible to get an unlocked phone to work here. Most of the major carriers have taken steps to make sure their networks only work with phones they sell.

[Warbrain]

Originally Posted by BenRoethig

It's dormant because its next to impossible to get an unlocked phone to work here. Most of the major carriers have taken steps to make sure their networks only work with phones they sell.

Only on CDMA. If you have a contract with a GSM carrier, like Cingular, you're able to go and buy a phone with a SIM card slot and use your Cingular service on it without any problems at all. Trust me, I've done it before. The CDMA carriers, however, have locked in their services and yes, do make it a pain in the ass.

And it's dormant because Americans have become so used to having their phones subsidized by the carriers and won't pay 200-600 dollars for a phone.

[Zadillo]

Originally Posted by BenRoethig

It's dormant because its next to impossible to get an unlocked phone to work here. Most of the major carriers have taken steps to make sure their networks only work with phones they sell.

Palm is directly selling an unlocked version of the Palm Treo 680, and I believe they have sold unlocked versions of other Treos as well. I haven't heard of any issues with any major carriers here making it difficult for these to work.

-Zadillo

[palhen]

Originally Posted by Much Ado

Sure, it should work on PCs like the iPods do, but can you honestly see Steve and co. resisting the temptation to offer incentives for Mac users (iLife integration, .Mac syncing, iCal syncing...)?

If it is a multi-platform phone, i'd bet that Mac users get the best end of the deal, as part of the "Go on, get a Mac" campaign started by the iPod.

(A nice big 'Export to iPhone' button in iMovie, for a start... and so on)

MA.

Sounds very plausible, but the extra would probably only be in software. And that would exclude some of the more far-out wishes on this forum...

Henrik

[uNext]

Originally Posted by Zadillo

I really can't believe no-one has responded to this post directly yet.

The arguments you are making here sound a lot like the arguments made against Apple getting into the mp3 player market. People looked at the mp3 player market at the time and said, basically, what's the point of Apple doing this? There are already lots of people making mp3 players, and they are all great. What can Apple possibly offer?

Generally speaking, the idea that cellphones have reached the pinnacle of perfection is laughable to me. Yes, there are cellphones that can browse the web, let you read and send e-mail, etc. but a lot of people still find them to be pretty cumbersome and not really be all that great at these tasks. Frankly even Windows Smartphones and Treos are not perfect (and the Treo especially is worth noting because the Palm OS as we know it is dead, and the Treo has really stagnated, with Palm having to make incremental changes to it while waiting for a new OS to use).

I think there's plenty of room for improvement in how mobile phones work, and I think Apple absolutely could do a lot of good in this area.

The diffrence between the mp3 player then and the cell phone market now is way diffrent BOTH IN FORM FACTORS AND THE TECHNOLOGY AVAILABLE.

Back then the mp3 players on the market where bulky not sexy at all. Low capacity, no appeal so the market was for the grabs. Apple came out with something appealing sexy and with a large capacity so they snatched the market.

The cell phone market now is full of devices with fan base already behidn them. (Sidekick,treo's, Htc's,Nokias) They all offer capabilitys that a laptop
provide in a small pocket size device. (you have cell phones with mp3 player capabilities, video ,instant messages, email etc.)

Apple will really have to have a serious trick up its sleeve for the "PHONE" to not be compared to anythign out there. The margin is so slim because phones now a days give you everything you want in 1.

So i am asking again

What can the apple phone provide thats not already out there? Besides the ipod features? Which is a limitation alone.

slim design? form factor? if they release a phone with a QWERTY KEYBOARD built in
it will compared to the treo. If it comes out with a instant message & email feature it will be compared to the sidekicks and so on.

This can tarnish a companys product-because then alot of people will just simply start comparing it. Look at the zune when i go to best buy any mp3 player is now an ipod-i could be asking for a zune or creative and the first thing they say is "OHH YOU MEAN LIKE AN IPOD"

[Zadillo]

Originally Posted by uNext

The diffrence between the mp3 player then and the cell phone market now is way diffrent.

Back then the mp3 players on the market where bulky not sexy at all. Low capacity, no appeal so the market was for the grabs. Apple came out with something appealing sexy and with a large capacity so they snatched the market.

The cell phone market now is full of devices with fan base already behidn them. (Sidekick,treo's, Htc's,Nokias) They all offer capabilitys that a laptop
provide in a small pocket size device. (you have cell phones with mp3 player capabilities, video ,instant messages, email etc.)

Apple will really have to have a serious trick up its sleeve for the "PHONE" to not be compared to anythign out there. The margin is so slim because phones now a days give you everything you want in 1.

So i am asking again

What can the apple phone provide thats not already out there? Besides the ipod features? Which is a limitation alone.

slim design? form factor? if they release a phone with a QWERTY KEYBOARD built in
it will compared to the treo. If it comes out with a instant message & email feature it will be compared to the sidekicks and so on.

This can tarnish a companys product-because then alot of people will just simply start comparing it. Look at the zune when i go to best buy any mp3 player is now an ipod-i could be asking for a zune or creative and the first thing they say is "OHH YOU MEAN LIKE AN IPOD"

I think there is more to it though. Remember, with the iPod, Apple didn't just offer a slicker or nicer looking mp3 player. It also had a better interface, and the integration with iTunes.

You are focused on just the features themselves that things like the Treo, Sidekick, Windows Mobile Smartphones, etc. offer, but features by themselves aren't everything.

The actual interfaces and functionality of a lot of these phones leaves a lot to be desired. The Treo, for example, is popular, but the Palm OS it runs on is really a pretty big mess right now (don't get me wrong, I'm a Treo fan, and have used a Treo 650 exclusively for almost 2 years now, but I can see where it is getting long in the tooth).

Seriously, yes, there are phones out there that offer all sorts of features, but how many of them offer really good interfaces? I've tried testing out sending e-mail on a variety of phones, and they are generally a pain.

Really, I think there is a lot of room for improvement. Cell phone companies seem to be doing a decent job overall with creating slick phones that look nice, but the UI aspect of them still seems to have a long way to go, whether you're talking about the LG Chocolate, Sony's Walkman phones, the Treo, the various Windows Mobile 2005 phones, etc.

[Much Ado]

Originally Posted by Zadillo

I think there's plenty of room for improvement in how mobile phones work, and I think Apple absolutely could do a lot of good in this area.

Quite right.

I'm fed up of using phones that feel like they were designed by blind technophobes. There is so much work to be done in this area, and if Apple want to spearhead the change, i'm all for it.

[mo0805]

Originally Posted by c-Row

Now that would make sense, yeah.

no actually, that wouldn't make sense. VoIP phones are trash. The sound quality on them is trash, and they drop calls when bandwidth is scarce. I would prefer my cell phone NOT double as a VoIP phone. But remote for iTV... yes that would be nice.

[peharri]

Here's what I think the iPod Phone should look like:

1. Multisystem phone working with all world wide deployed mobile phone standards on all frequencies. Support for Rev. C of CDMA and 3GPP Release 8 of UMTS, plus WiMAX. Uses SIM cards, even on CDMA networks.
2. Should be credit card sized.
3. 16Gb Flash for music
4. 7 day battery life
5. Built-in web browser
6. 5MP camera
7. Bluetooth and 802.11n
8. Voice control
9. Entire face should be a touch screen. Recognises your finger prints both for security and to eliminate the need to lock the keypad.
10. Free nights and weekends.
11. Free mobile to mobile, even across different networks
12. Apple should pretend mobile phone carriers can brand and lock the phone, so that they subsidize it, but then should put in a "secret" code that, when entered, causes any logos painted onto the phone to dissolve, remove all locks, and change the software to Apple's branding. This code should be communicated to everyone on the understanding that Verizon employees never get to hear about it.
13. Can run Parallels, allowing the user to run both Apple's firmware, plus anything third rate and defacto standard like Symbian.
14. Java. Dunking it into a cup of hot water results in a delicious cup of piping hot coffee within seconds.
15. Integrates with Mac OS X, Mac OS, AmigaOS, and Sinclair QDOS. Windows support permanently "RSN".
16. Slideout screw-driver and pocket knife.
17. $199, with $399 mail in rebate.
18. Phone automatically able to send in its own mail-in rebates.
19. Reception and transmission power so powerful you can reach your home network even outside of its coverage area.
20. Multimedia messaging.

What do you think?

[nukiduz]

i think i won't read any other imposibly-overfeatured-gadget post. enough please

[scburns123]

Perhaps this is the Apple Phone we are all looking towards!!!

http://www.google.com/patents?vid=US...+phone#PPA6,M1

[dernhelm]

Originally Posted by Much Ado

Quite right.

I'm fed up of using phones that feel like they were designed by blind technophobes. There is so much work to be done in this area, and if Apple want to spearhead the change, i'm all for it.

Actually a phone designed by someone who was blind and not a techno-weenie would probably have a lot going for in terms of usability that our current phones do not have. For one thing, it would be a lot easier to figure out how to send a call to voicemail when your phone is ringing in your pocket and you don't want to take it out and deal with it.

For another if it were not designed by a techno-weenie, it would probably be easier to use the 300+ features these phones come with - or better yet, the 295+ useless features would simply be eliminated, and stuff like turning on and off bluetooth to enable synchronization to your computer would be 100 times easier.

[cvorden]

Maybe its a newton with a phone built in

[mauros]

Have you look at this http://www.hardmac.com/news/2007-01-04/#6267

They already have it !!!!

[Data]

If apple would bring out a phone, i would be happy already it it would just work with my mac os, in the syncing and so on with adress book.
I am so dun with all those orther phone brands, the one can do A another one can do B .9 out of 10 times you only find that out after you signed a contract and can't go back.
I always loved my SE p610 , it synced ok, i could use it with adresbook to send sms over bleutooth it was small and a good baterrij life, so when that one was finished, i thought ok, let's get a new one with more memory and more features from SE because the old one worked so well, so i did.
I went for the P910i nice phone .little big but ok, it does syncing but no sms via adresbook, and that was a feature i used regulary.
I was realy p***** when i found out it did not do that, and when you then try to find out why , SE says goto apple and apple says goto SE.
Just for that reason alone i would like Just a phone, not even ipod phone made by apple, so i know the software will be compatabill with the mac os.

The phone sould be like the mac's themselfs, JUST WORK, with my Mac, i could not care less bout PC user's , they can buy windows bassed cellphones ;-).

[DVK916]

Well I won't be getting on for sure. Since apple won't support CDMA, and I use sprint.

If apple does make a CDMA version, which is comfirmed that they won't. They need to include support for EVDO Rev A, since these networks have already been launched. Big diffrence in speed.

[Much Ado]

Originally Posted by dernhelm

For another if it were not designed by a techno-weenie, it would probably be easier to use .

As i say...

[sishaw]

Originally Posted by Zadillo

I really can't believe no-one has responded to this post directly yet.

The arguments you are making here sound a lot like the arguments made against Apple getting into the mp3 player market. People looked at the mp3 player market at the time and said, basically, what's the point of Apple doing this? There are already lots of people making mp3 players, and they are all great. What can Apple possibly offer?

Actually, in my recollection, MP3 players at the time were either flash-based, in which case they had extremely small capacities, or they were big,, clunky hard-drive based boat anchors. Then along came the iPod--small, light, elegant, high-capacity, and I and a lot of other people said, 'now THIS is more like it' on our way to buying our first-gen iPods.

One area where Apple could add value to phones is the user interface. No cell phone I've ever owned has what one would call a simple or intuitive interface--it's more like something you put up with so you can use the phone.

We'll see what, if anything, Apple comes up with.

[Zadillo]

Originally Posted by sishaw

Actually, in my recollection, MP3 players at the time were either flash-based, in which case they had extremely small capacities, or they were big,, clunky hard-drive based boat anchors. Then along came the iPod--small, light, elegant, high-capacity, and I and a lot of other people said, 'now THIS is more like it' on our way to buying our first-gen iPods.

One area where Apple could add value to phones is the user interface. No cell phone I've ever owned has what one would call a simple or intuitive interface--it's more like something you put up with so you can use the phone.

We'll see what, if anything, Apple comes up with.

That is true, the iPod was also notable for offering larger capacities (although it's 5GB capacity was still smaller than the 20GB hard drives found in things like the Nomad Jukebox or Compaq iPaq Personal Audio Player) in a form factor closer to flash-based systems. But the other downside of the other mp3 players at that time were that the interfaces for navigating the music on them weren't that good, and the software for synching and managing music on them was either non-existent or not very good (heck, before Apple released iTunes for Windows, you had to use MusicMatch).

[DisturbedLen]

To me, music is not the most important thing for a phone. A phone could not replace my 60GB iPod. The most important features would be:

1. A clean GUI with a large display.
2. Integration with iCal, Mail, Bookmarks, etc.. WITHOUT a .Mac subscription. (I fear that a .Mac subscription is somehow going to be tied into this phone thing.) I want IMAP support, not just for .Mac email.
3. Decent camera
4. A freakin clip! Right in the box. Hardly anybody includes these anymore...

Simplicity will work best. Cramming 9000 features into a phone will make it fail. Apple won't do that. But I do expect some type of "wow" feature that will make it different from other phones on the market.

[sishaw]

Originally Posted by Zadillo

That is true, the iPod was also notable for offering larger capacities (although it's 5GB capacity was still smaller than the 20GB hard drives found in things like the Nomad Jukebox or Compaq iPaq Personal Audio Player) in a form factor closer to flash-based systems. But the other downside of the other mp3 players at that time were that the interfaces for navigating the music on them weren't that good, and the software for synching and managing music on them was either non-existent or not very good (heck, before Apple released iTunes for Windows, you had to use MusicMatch).

That's right, I do remember that! Also, an independent software writer came up with something called "Ephpod," which is what I used until iTunes for Windows came out. The web site is actually still up.