Sorry - didn't explain it well. Not if they would be "opened" or not. But, if Apple would still be taking pre-orders for shipment on the 14th? Sometimes their shipment slips when you don't order early enough.
I would check it myself but when I went to check it it told me that I already had one on order (through AT&T) and would have to cancel that one first. I didn't want to cancel through AT&T and then go to the Apple online store to pre-order and then get a message saying "4-6 weeks shipment" or something like that if they have sold out already.
Oooh; I get what you're saying now. I think they'll take preorders up until.. well technically, it depends on what they mean by pre-order.
One example is that it stays like this all the way through the 13th, and then they stop. If you preorder, you get yoru device as it ships BUT they only have so many preorders READY. Once it reaches that magic number, you get put on the list and yoru phone ships when it's made.
The OTHER large set of devices is at the carrier stores and Apple Stores, so people can rush in and buy them.
At that point, when the online reserve and in store reserve is gone, they will be funneled out and you can order online or try and get lucky like with the iPad 2. You could walk in and get lucky or just order online and wait for a few weeks.
I think that, for online, if you ordered before say, 8am today, you should be good. As the day goes on people are going to get online and order and then the numbers start shooting up. Although people love Apple products, not many people on the East coast will stay up till 4 to preorder, especially when a lot of people are still in contract and the phone looks exactly the same as before.
Looks carry a LOT of weight in the mobile phone market, and the average consumer is just looking at this and wondering what's so different than their 4S. Remember, we are quick to say that "specs don't matter", but then also quick to assume people will eat this thing up when it's just A SPEC BUMP with SIRI.
The last bit was me getting off my rocker, but yea, I think the orders will go about like that. OR they'll just stop when they run out of online stock, seeing as they might not want people thinking they will get the phone on launch when ordering at 1pm today.
With my upgrade credit I got the phone for $175 and it's saying it should ship by October 14th. I'm hoping the ship date stands as I'd like to have my new phone by the time I leave for Denver the following week. My husband has an iPhone 4 with AT&T but he's not upgrading this time around. My Verizon phone has been slowly dying and I'm ready to finally get the iPhone (already have an iPad, iMac, Mac Mini, Apple TV - so we are Apple Centric household).
