iPhone disappointment

[ncbill]

I suspect it includes only the slower EDGE in order to keep down the monthly fee.

True broadband speed over cellular usually requires an add-on data plan with a hefty monthly fee (e.g. $60 w/ a voice plan, $80 w/o)

This way you pay one fee but are stuck with speeds about 2x-3x dialup (when away from Wi-Fi networks)

So you won't be using the iPhone for tethering to a laptop, or traditional web surfing, but it will be fine for email and WAP sites.

 

[Taan]

Sadness because of lost opportunity

I feel sad that apple had chosen to go with any carrier let alone cingular. They have what it takes to market this phone on their own. They already have powerful distrubution capacity in the U.S. and if anyone had the power to turn around the dynamics of the phone industry in the U.S. it was apple and it was with this phone.

In most parts of the world other than the U.S. the phone manufacturers have much more freedom in the products they produce because the consumer goes directly to them. Customers also have the option of buying subsidize phone for much cheaper from a carrier. Apple should have at least opted for this model. At least sell the phone unlocked at the apple stores at a premium and give an exclusive right to cingular to sell it for cheaper. That way, if you want the phone for cheaper; cingular is the only way to go. If you hate them and would rather have an unlocked phone that you can use anywhere in the world with any simcard chip; you pay a premium. I guess there is something i don't see???? All i know is when june comes around and i get the phone with a cingular contract they better not tell me they won't unlock it for me.

 

[clintob]

Cingular, T-Mobile, Boost, Virgin, etc are bottom of the barrel carriers. You get what you pay for. I was a previous customer of T-Mobile and I dropped them due to poor quailty across the US. I was also a customer of Nextel for a few years, great service but crap phones.

Premium carriers are Verizon, Sprint and Nextel. They are also more expensive, but again you get what you pay for.

Sprint would have been a much better choice for Apple. I would deal with downgrading to Sprint, but *NOT* all the way down to Cingular.

This is potential the most uneducated, ill-advised post I've seen in a long time.

It is a WELL known and WELL documented empirical FACT that cellular service varies quite a bit across the country. Verizon happens to have very good coverage in the Northeast, where you and I live, due to the fact they they have major headquarters in New York and Nothern Virginia. However, Cingular (which is also AT&T) is a LARGER network than Verizon. Look it up.

Yes, T-Mobile, Virgin, etc... those are bottom of the barrel carriers. Cingular and Verizon are at worst equal players in the market. There are statistics up the wazoo to back this up. Cingular has more subscribers, runs of the world's-standard (GSM) and has very highly rated service across the country.

I am a Verizon user (for various reasons, not the least of which being a long-existing family plan) so this isn't a biased opinion. But please, stop spouting off idiocy because you're upset you can't get the iPhone for Verizon. You should be used to it by now... nobody makes phones for Verizon. There's a reason for that... it's a proprietary format. GSM is what the world runs on - it's more widely used, more widely available, and more widely supported. Period.

--

On a lighter note - bravo Apple. I don't usually go bananas for new Apple products, but having been priveleged enough to watch the Mac (at least the end stages) and the iPod come to fruition, I am really excited and agree with Steve J. No hyperbole necessary here - the iPhone is truly going to change the business. The internet portion will take some time to gain traction since wireless networks are still hamstrung a little by lack of speed, but this is by leaps and bounds the coolest and most innovative devide since ... well... the iPod.

 

[radarbob]

You're right, that is a pretty poor statement - narrowminded and selfish.

"I don't care about anyone else, just myself." Nice...

I'd say that's a perfectly rational statement from a certain point of view. If he owned lots of shares in an overseas telecommunication Co. he'd care a lot. OR, to the extent that the overseas market affects his choices (like he was a frequent foreign business traveller for instance) in whatever country he is in, then he'd care perhaps.

But to say that's self-centered is, well, self-centered. You know, I don't care that many cars are built w/ the steering on the other side. Why should I? That's not jingoistic. Shoe sizing is different in Eurpoe. I don't care about that either.

 

[the Helix]

My 3¢

Although the iPhone is now the apple of Steve's eye (after all, it is the fruit of much of his latest efforts).

When all is said and done, the iPhone may turn out to be a lemon since it offers more than what is practically necessary. As I mentioned in my previous post above, when I think of the iPhone, visions of a nail being driven in by a jackhammer come to mind. Sometimes a simple hammer just works better.

A poster above already mentioned that not too many people have really gone bananas over it. I am not too peachy-keen on it myself. Let's at least hope that when Apple does produce this iPhone, there won't be too many "sour grapes" regarding the price of the phone.

 

[4God]

ummmm... nope. those prices are WITH a 2 year service contract; you still have to pay the monthly + usage fees for 2 years to cingular, that is not included. the original poster you were trying to be a smartass towards and outwit was right. try to get your facts straight before being smarmy.

Eeeeaaassy there, I misunderstood. Forgive me please. If he had inserted the word "monthly" between PLUS and service, I probably would have got it. However, I noticed that you did not comment on the other points.

iPhone is $499-599 PLUS service plan? Yikes!

As far as I understand, the price is 499 and 599 with 2 year contract.
Thus, 499 and 599 is after 2yr contract saving most phone gets when you buy one.
You still do have to pay for monthly fee.

Gotcha and thank you for your kind clarification.

 

[seven2k7]

Ok ok i think we are missing the point here. 1. iphone is awesome 2. They want to compete with Palm, Windows and Simbuan (dont know if its spelled right.)

The phone is cool and its has a bunch of things WE mac user can use. Here are the problems that i think will stop me from going to cingular and the iphone for now.

The iphone does not have a office suite.
EVDO is freaking awesome i would switch to Verizon before i do cingular.
GSM is ok but i see more advancement here in the US on CDMA.


Im pretty sure that the iphone will come out in CDMA it has to. I cant live without my Treo 650. They should of shown more on the iphone besides those "FUN" apps. Remember they want to compete with Blackberry Treo Windows. True some of these companies have their faults but they have been out for awhile. Palm hasnt upgraded their OS in awhile and their processors on their phones are slow. Windows phone have no software for them. Blackberry is a portable email phone. Simbeuan apps are few. I really think they should of gear towards more in getting out another phone like a treo or windows phone. If apple doesnt it do it in a hurry then im pretty sure that palm might come out swinging or something. I dont think this phone is a PDA phone in the least. Its wierd though cause it kind of fools you into thinking that it is..like the sidekick. It pc and mac compatible but its only photos and music. I am a tech at Apple school and having this phone will be great. Like i said before businesses use Nextels which is own by sprint now. I know that nextel uses a sim card but look at the market who uses nextels. Now sprint has tip toed their way in there. Verizon is making their mark in the business worl caus eof their reliability in service.

This is what i observed. I like the iphone. Apple did reinvent the phone, but remember now they woke up Palm and Windows and the rest. So i think i will wait and see before i jump into cingular.

 

[chrisdazzo]

I was really hoping the phone with have been on Verizon. Cingular is bottom of the barrel in terms of service, right along with T-Mobile.

I think Apple bad a pretty bad move here. Verizon or Sprint would have been a much better choice.

Oh well, guess I won't be buying one. (I am ordering an Apple TV as soon as the store is updated though)

didn't cingular help develop the iPhone software, though?

apple did make a HORRIBLE move by making this cingular-exclusive... couldn't it be unlocked and used for any service since it's quad-band?

 

[craigatkinson]

didn't cingular help develop the iPhone software, though?

apple did make a HORRIBLE move by making this cingular-exclusive... couldn't it be unlocked and used for any service since it's quad-band?

Verizon would never have allowed such a feature rich phone to have been included in its lineup. I wouldn't be surprised if Apple did approach Verizon and Verizon told them to cripple the phone and they would include it and Apple told Verizon to screw themselves.

 

[Artofilm]

This site really should be called...

I remember this name change idea has come up before.

 

[johnnywad]

ONE reccomendation

I would buy the wide screen Ipod alone for $599. And a lot of you would be crazy to say you wouldnt as well. I dont even care that I can't download directlyfrom the device. I want to manage files while I sync and dowloading is done there anyhow. Not to mention all the other cool crap on the phone and email and maps and satellite and on and on...
THE ONLY CHANGE I SEE THAT THEY NEED OT MAKE IS TO SWITCH VIEWS DURING TEXT AND EMAIL TO LANDSCAPE TO ALLOW A BIGGER KEYBOARD. This would also change the location of a majority of the touch interaction from the lower 40% of the screen and dispribute it across a greater surface making smudges and wear less noticable. I would gladly sacrifice seeing more of the email or text conversation for larger keys. I have confidence that this option will be included by ship date.

 

[magriver]

Compare to Nokia N800

Looking at the Nokia N800, that isn't even a phone. It will hook up through a bluetooth connection to make calls over your cell service. At the price of $399 unlocked, that is making a iPhone unlocked in about 10 month at $499-$599 a huge step up. Just take a look at the specs the iPhone beat it by a mile.

 

[Anuba]

I would buy the wide screen Ipod alone for $599. And a lot of you would be crazy to say you wouldnt as well.

Well then call me crazy, because I wouldn't buy a widescreen iPod with a puny 4 or 8 GB storage, anymore than I would buy a Porsche with a 2 bhp scooter engine under the hood. Sure it's a Porsche but it's useless, and so is a widescreen iPod that holds like one movie. "Oh it's so great, you can have aaaall your music and movies and photos and email and contacts and widgets and blah blah blah"... provided that the above consists of:
5 music albums, 1 movie, 10 hi-res photos, 20 emails with no attachments, and 20 contacts. Wanna take some great 2 megapixel pictures on the road? No problem, just delete all your music! Oh BTW, we just released new software for the iPhone with some great new stuff. It will take up 1.5 gigs of that 4 GB flash memory.... but hey, it's great stuff!

 

[asphalt-proof]

The more I read about the iPhone the more I am leaning on waiting till the sencond or third generation.
Lack of 3g is understandable actually because only a very small customer base exists for it right now. But I expect that it will grow very quickly and by the time Apple comes out with the 2nd gen. we will seo 3G.
The big killer for me right now is no Outlook/Exchange syncing.
But closely following is that it is a closed system (as it stands now). One of the great things about smartphones/PDAs is all the third party apps available. Developers could develop some really amazing applications that may be very niche or obscure but vital for different people. I hope that Apple decides to open the system but I have doubts. They haven't exactly been ver open to opening up the iPod.

That saidl I love the look and the possibilities that the iPhone presents. It really could be a paradigm-shift for how everyone interacts with a mobile phone, PDA, internet device.

 

[clintob]

Well then call me crazy, because I wouldn't buy a widescreen iPod with a puny 4 or 8 GB storage, anymore than I would buy a Porsche with a 2 bhp scooter engine under the hood. Sure it's a Porsche but it's useless, and so is a widescreen iPod that holds like one movie. "Oh it's so great, you can have aaaall your music and movies and photos and email and contacts and widgets and blah blah blah"... provided that the above consists of:
5 music albums, 1 movie, 10 hi-res photos, 20 emails with no attachments, and 20 contacts. Wanna take some great 2 megapixel pictures on the road? No problem, just delete all your music! Oh BTW, we just released new software for the iPhone with some great new stuff. It will take up 1.5 gigs of that 4 GB flash memory.... but hey, it's great stuff!

I think you're DRASTICALLY underestimating how much space 8GB is. Yeah, 4GB is pretty tight for multimedia content, but 8GB really is a lot more space than you'd think. A 2-hr movie optimized for an iPod screen shouldn't be more than 600-800MB, so you can have 2 or 3 of those, 5GB worth of music, and still have 1GB left for email and photos. A 2 megapixel image isn't gonna be more than a few hundred KB, so what are we talking about here?

Yes, you can't carry ALL your music 20 feature films and hundreds of high-res photos. But why do you need to? Be realistic. You can carry enough movies to watch on a long plane ride, enough music for hours and hours of listening without repeats, and enough photos to show HD slideshows to your family of several hundred images. And there's still space for plenty of email.

What is everyone's problem with the iPhone?? It's an AWESOME device, and it's truly groundbreaking in nearly every way. We're all spoiled by how incredible the iPod is, but consider all the other functionality and form factor of this device, anyone who claims it isn't absolutely unbeliveable what they've accomplished is a fool and has no idea what goes into creating this kind of hardware and functionality.

 

[Anuba]

Yes, you can't carry ALL your music 20 feature films and hundreds of high-res photos. But why do you need to? Be realistic. You can carry enough movies to watch on a long plane ride, enough music for hours and hours of listening without repeats, and enough photos to show HD slideshows to your family of several hundred images. And there's still space for plenty of email.

Yes, but the constant swapping of content is a major pain in the butt. I have a 4 GB Nano and I hate it because whatever I fill it up with, a process which always involves annoying compromises, I always want something else.

What is everyone's problem with the iPhone?? It's an AWESOME device, and it's truly groundbreaking in nearly every way.

At the risk of repeating myself: Yes, it's a great interface, yes, it's a great design, the sensors and the multi-touch and all that is just amazing - but the puny memory combined with the fact that you can't swap the battery amounts to an absolute, ABSOLUTE dealbreaker. It's idiotic. I'm not even on the fence about it, I know I don't want it and won't buy it, period.

If you think I'm the only one who has an issue with the battery, rewatch the Keynote - it's the one place where Steve pauses for applause but is met with cold and utter silence. There won't be any watching of movies on long flights because by the time you land, the battery will be dead and you won't be able to take calls until you've recharged it for two hours at the hotel. You can do anything on it, just stay within 10 ft of a wall outlet. This is no iPod you use sometimes, this is an always-on device. Every cellphone ever made allows you to swap the battery, except iPhone. The ****ing idiot who made this decision shouldn't just be fired, he should be shot. Actually that's way too lame, he deserves a much more gory and drawn out death.

And I'm sure Greenpeace will be thrilled that environment pooper #1, Apple, has now introduced their five hundreth product with a glued-in battery that costs a fortune to replace, so all used iPhones will just end up in the trash on top of the iPods.

iPhone is a Porsche without an engine, a supermodel with no legs, you look and go "yeah... but no" and that's it. Better luck next time.

 

[stormj]

3g

I personally in person, yes, me, spoke to the engineer who worked on the networking protocols on the iPhone at their booth at MacWorld yesterday afternoon.

There is a 3G model in the pipeline, he confirmed.

I'm waiting for that one. But as for this "waaaah! I hate Cingular" you can find people who say they hate Verizon or Sprint just as much. As many others have said, Cingular uses GSM. That's the end of the story. As for /dev/toaster, he claims to have travelled so much, he should know that that's what almost the entire rest of the world uses.

The same engineer told me that the decision to stick with EDGE was based on several factors. First, it doesn't require a separate CDMA stack for the data connection. Second, it's simply not rolled out enough in the US on GSM compatible networks. Third, the music store downloads aren't on this one. Fourth, the WiFi support can work in a lot of places.

I understand all of those factors, but I still think that an expensive, cutting edge (no pun) phone for early adopters should have HSPDA. Period. But one eventually will.

This isn't the final iPhone. There will be more. Quit whining.

 

[clintob]

If you think I'm the only one who has an issue with the battery, rewatch the Keynote - it's the one place where Steve pauses for applause but is met with cold and utter silence. There won't be any watching of movies on long flights because by the time you land, the battery will be dead and you won't be able to take calls until you've recharged it for two hours at the hotel. You can do anything on it, just stay within 10 ft of a wall outlet. This is no iPod you use sometimes, this is an always-on device. Every cellphone ever made allows you to swap the battery, except iPhone. The ****ing idiot who made this decision shouldn't just be fired, he should be shot. Actually that's way too lame, he deserves a much more gory and drawn out death.

And I'm sure Greenpeace will be thrilled that environment pooper #1, Apple, has now introduced their five hundreth product with a glued-in battery that costs a fortune to replace, so all used iPhones will just end up in the trash on top of the iPods.

iPhone is a Porsche without an engine, a supermodel with no legs, you look and go "yeah... but no" and that's it. Better luck next time.

Alright boss... step one, deep breath. Step two, a little less caffeine.

Yes, of course there are things about the design that don't make sense to us, or that seem like oversights. But please, stop acting as if this is the worst phone ever created or a terrible product of the first order. This is an awesome product, plain and simple. It has a lot of drawbacks, sure, but you can't have everything perfectly to your liking in every product. Be real.

I can sit here for hours talking about all the problems and quirks and annoyances and even major issues with OS X or the Powerbook or the Mac Pro or even the almight iPod.

Seriously - there's a reason why the iPhone is all over the cover of every blog, newspaper and nightly news program. It's truly a remarkable device... there's no way you can argue against that. Trying to is just sour grapes.

 

[stormj]

Comedy

At the risk of repeating myself: Yes, it's a great interface, yes, it's a great design, the sensors and the multi-touch and all that is just amazing - but the puny memory combined with the fact that you can't swap the battery amounts to an absolute, ABSOLUTE dealbreaker. It's idiotic. I'm not even on the fence about it, I know I don't want it and won't buy it, period.

Oy vey.

It's the first iteration. If people hate the battery thing, they'll probably fix it. I really don't think there's that many people out there that go around swapping batteries in their cell phone. Most of them probably read this board or xda etc.

My 8525 has ****** battery life with BT and Wifi off all the time and is barely tolerable with DirectPush turned off. Yet, I keep it because it rocks with bells and whistles.

I own only one battery.

 

[Anuba]

Yes, of course there are things about the design that don't make sense to us, or that seem like oversights. But please, stop acting as if this is the worst phone ever created or a terrible product of the first order. This is an awesome product, plain and simple. It has a lot of drawbacks, sure, but you can't have everything perfectly to your liking in every product. Be real.

But that's what I'm saying, it's an awesome product in a plethora of ways. Where we differ, apparently, is the gravity of these flaws. In your view the 4/8 GB thing and the battery life/design are minor flaws, if you even consider them flaws. To me these aren't minor flaws, they're declarations of war. It's a fancy Michelin 3-star restaurant dinner cooked by a world renowned chef, and there's a great big runny dog turd in the middle of my plate. No matter how delicious whatever is under the turd is, I'm not just going to brush the turd aside and eat it, instead I'm going to projectile vomit. Utter goodness doesn't cancel out utter badness in a product, it's only as good as its weakest link.

Trust me, this is just one of those things people will rant about endlessly. With one of the G4 desktop models it was an extremely noisy fan which people made parody sites (g4noise.com) and mock commercials about. With the G4 Cube, it was the cracks. With one of the iMac G5's it was a 33% hardware failure ratio. With the Gen1 iPod Nano it was a surface so scratch-prone you couldn't see the display after a week. And with iPhone, it's gonna be the battery, and endless horror stories about people stuck in blizzards and stranded on mountain tops because the ¤%)(#¤=)"#(% iPhone battery was dead again.

 

[Dsr1205]

i agree with OP, cingular sucks.

 

[nickspohn]

Damn, we even complained when there was no iPhone in existence!