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airport express + phone??

can u use phone with airport express? ie for wifi connection and also to stream music ?
 
My results so far . . . .

These are my comments to this original post. Other viewers comments are in RED. Mine are in GREEN. Let me know if anyone has other questions.

ORIGINAL QUESTIONAIRE:
This is a list of things that most reviews miss to address yet very important to people. If you are making a review, please touch these in-depth areas. If anyone thinks of more, add to the list.

1. Supported video format. 640x480 is the official saying, but in reality, all current video iPod actually support any size as long as the product of the height and width does not exceed 640 x 480. (The fact is more complex than that. You have to divide the height by 16 and width by 16 and then multiply the two values, and the product needs to be less than 1200. For example, VGA size of 640x480 = 640/16 x 480/16 = 40 x 30 = 1200. If you have a horizontal resolution of 720, then your vertical resolution needs to be less than 426 in order to be supported by the current version of video iPod. In other words, video with aspect ratio other than 4:3 or larger horizontal resolution than 640 can still be played by all video iPod.) I want to know if this is true on iPhone as well. After all, it has a 3:2 aspect ratio screen, and all dSLR photos are taken at 3:2 as well.

2. Embedded video format supprted in Safari (QT, mov, avi)?

Only Quicktime .mov files are allowed. NO avi, mpeg or wmv support. There is no FlipforMac plug-in or any other non-Quicktime plug-in within the Safari browser (as far as I can tell). I have tested several plug-in types of sites that I know contain avis, mpegs, wmvs and so far QuickTime .movs are the only ones allowed.

3. Downloading and playback of mp3/image files from Safari? (i.e. download an image, then view it in photo, then email to someone.)

ANY downloading can not be done, period. Another note. If you click on a YouTube link it will go directly to the YouTube application in the iPhone if that particular video resides in the h.264 format. For example, I had an email a friend of mine had sent me with a YouTube link. When I clicked on it, it found that same video in the h.264 format and started playing it within the YouTube app in iPhone, hence bypassing the Flash FLV issue of going only to the YouTube site. This of course only works if the video ALSO resides in the h.264 format (as of now, only a small percentage of the YouTube videos have been converted to the h.264 format). By contrast, another friend if mine also sent me a YouTube video with the typical YouTube link. But this video has not been converted, so I got the "This video can not be played" message.

Cannot be done. Trailers from rottentomatoes.com cannot be viewed even with QT icons. Videos from Apple.com can be viewed however, but not embedded within the browser, but open up a new YouTube like interface.

4. Actual load time of EDGE in practical aspect. The NYT's measurement of "100 seconds per page" was pretty useless, since no one start reading a page only AFTER THE WHOLE PAGE IS LOADED. No, the most important thing is to load the page, FASTER, than one reads the page.

I live in a mountain town in NC, and after several tests, I was getting an average load time of 180-200 kbps, which was not bad at all. If you have an iPhone and want to test your speed, I suggest to go to a site such as http://www.bandwidthplace.com/speedtest/idt4.php to test your iPhone. It does a real good job of testing all kinds of speeds and has a full selection of test designed for mobile devices.

5. Voice quality, speaker phone volume, ringer volume.

Voice quality: Overall very good, but I have heard better on mobile devices. On a scale of 1-10, I would give it a 7.

Speaker phone volume: Excellent! This device puts out a volume much louder than you would expect to hear from such a small device. I was able to hear movies and songs without my headphones with no problem.

Ringer volume: I would give this a 6. I wish it was louder. Several times the phone rang and it was hard to distinguish it form ambient noise (which wasn't that loud).


6. Photo management of large amount of photos-- testing speed and stability when handling more than 1000 high resolution pictures. (I already got 1500 high resolution pics ready.) Also test if it will resize automatically, or retain original size. Also to test if I can zoom all the way into 100% level without losing any quality.

Phone resized all photo from my iPhoto onto iPhone therefore when you zoom in on iPhone you can only zoom in to about 2x the original screen size. There is no way around it. Viewing hundreds of them is fast enough, can't complain much.


7. Test using existing ATT sim card instead of the new iPhone SIM Card.

Not possible.

8. Insert iPhone SIM card in a different phone (unlocked).

Got rid of my only other mobile phone, so I couldn't test it.


9. Test typing compound words such as butterfly. Will the auto-speller mess me up? For example, if I try to type butter, the iPhone suggests butterfly after I finished typing the last letter of "butter," when I normally press the space key, will it automatically misunderstand me as accepting the suggested "butterfly" word?

To accept suggested word click "space" to reject simply click on the suggested word label.

Ditto. The keyboard (after 2 days with it) seems easier and easier to use. Hopefully with a software update you will be able to have a keyboard come up horizontally in ANY application (not only in Safari, which right now is the only app that allows you to do this). This way, the individual keys have space around them and typing becomes much more of a smoother process.

But overall, quite ompressed with the keyboard.


10. Test how many Safari windows can be opened, pop up blocker, accessing websites with excess spamming, continuous pop-up, etc.

A total of 8 TABS or Safari windows are allowed.

Pop up blocking is set in your Safari "Settings" widget along with "Search engine" preference (Google, Yahoo, etc.), Javascript (On or Off), Plug-ins (On or Off - which I assume is only for the QuickTime plug-in, don't know what other Plug-ins Safari has in the iPhone), Accepting of Cookies (Never, From visited or Always), Clear History, Clear Cookies and Clear Cache.


11. Test apple.com's QT video playback. Test specially secure sites such as bankofamerica.com or direct loan service.

Apple.com QT played fine. Digg.com login is also fine (ajax and jave script). Haven't tried banking sites.

I have tried Bank of America and it worked fine. It recognized my iPhone as a mobile device, therefore it sent me to the Bank of America mobile site and I was able to access my account (though much more limited that I am able to see on my desktop machine). But it did work just fine.

12. Test ftp.domainname.com format ftp access.

No ftp access is allowed. I get a Safari message ("Safari can't download this file.").

ADDITIONAL INFO:

(1) There is no Junk Mail filter. So if you rely on your Mail program (as I do with Apple's Mail, which the Junk filtering works for 99.9% of Junk mail I receive) then you will get all your mail (as well as Junk mail). Hopefully a software update will cure this.

(2) When composing a brand new email, there is no way to attach a photo after you have started writing. The only way to send photos is by going to the PHOTO widget, selecting a photo and then clicking on the "Email this Photo" button. But when composing an email from scratch, there is no way to start writing then decide to attach a photo. So, if you want to send a photo in an email, go to the PHOTO widget FIRST, set it up to send in an email, THEN start composing your message. Again, hopefully a Software Update will fix this.

(3) When setting up your iPhone for the first time, make sure you have cleared all the emails from your server first. Otherwise, you will get ALL your current emails from either the last week, 2 weeks or month (depending on how you have your current email app set up in your preferences). For example, I have it set up in Apple's Mail program to leave all my emails on the server for a week. So, when I set up my iPhone, I got all 136 emails from the last week. What I wanted to have happen is to have only my NEWEST emails appear. I ended up deleting most of them. A pain in the ass, but something i should have thought of before setting my phone.

(4) the weather widget doesn't seem to have all the world's cities listed. I'm not talking about some small town in Wales or anything. I wanted to include Buenos Aires. You know, the CAPITAL of Argentina (I have a lot of relatives living there - sister, cousins, grandfather, etc.). But all the weather widget could find was Buenos Aires, Punta Peru. I liked it better when AccuWeather.com was handling these things. Hopefully this will also get fixed. Not a big issue, but a pain nonetheless.

(5) Video resolution, quality is SUPERB!!! Can't get over how beautiful everything looks on this screen. YouTube videos on this thing looks 200% better than any YouTube video you will find on their site. Good choice on having them go with h.264 on this. You can really tell the difference.


More to come later.
 
Bad News :(

Not a bad piece of advice at all; you could even save that e-mail address in the contact info for people you regularly MMS to make it more convnient.

Are there size limitations when e-mailing photos using MMS though?

So I tried this other day from Mail on my powerbook and it worked fine. Then I tried it last night on my iPhone and it didn't work :( It might have been a size limitation thing tho as the picture didn't show up in my sent items...
 
So I tried this other day from Mail on my powerbook and it worked fine. Then I tried it last night on my iPhone and it didn't work :( It might have been a size limitation thing tho as the picture didn't show up in my sent items...

When you say it didn't work on your iPhone, do you mean the MMS never showed up, or that it just stripped the photo out?

Here's a question; the photo you e-mailed to the mobile number e-mail address....... would it go through if you e-mailed it to a regular address?

Trying to see if it was getting stripped out on the mobile side (I've seen this before, where stuff sent via mobile e-mail addresses doesn't work if its too large), or the iPhone simply won't e-mail out larger photos or something.
 
Hmm - worse news...

When you say it didn't work on your iPhone, do you mean the MMS never showed up, or that it just stripped the photo out?

Here's a question; the photo you e-mailed to the mobile number e-mail address....... would it go through if you e-mailed it to a regular address?

Trying to see if it was getting stripped out on the mobile side (I've seen this before, where stuff sent via mobile e-mail addresses doesn't work if its too large), or the iPhone simply won't e-mail out larger photos or something.

I just sent an e-mail to my gmail account and I never got it at all! Crapola :(

Maybe it's just a bug in my phone because I know you SHOULD be able to send a picture via e-mail - why else have an "e-mail photo" option?

Eh well - guess I'll be waiting for the 1.0.1 software update...
 
I HATE Verizon. :mad: My iPhone experience, minus the phone part, has been awesome. I love the device, very intuitive and quick, but porting has been a huge pain. Of course, it's all having to do with Verizon. First of all, when I originally set up the port on iTunes, iTunes took my name as Nick and not Nicholas (for some reason - still don't understand this as I entered my name as Nicholas). The woman with AT&T told me this usually halts Verizon from porting numbers. She politely waited on the line while I called Verizon to verify my account name (exact spelling, since I get online bills and their online system was down - I couldn't check on my computer. How convenient). Once I was connected with Verizon and told them I was having my number ported, the man on the line became suddenly rude and unhelpful. He went as far as stating "I'm sorry sir, we don't give out personal information" when I asked for the exact spelling of my name on the account!!! After I explained to him it was ME, the account holder, asking for MY name, having previously verified my social security number! Idiots. I immediately asked for a manager, who was very helpful. Turns out (as previously stated) AT&T had my name wrong from the VZW account, and have changed it. The port was accepted by VZW, I was told, but the number won't be pushed to AT&T until tomorow afternoon! I am extremely frustrated at this point. I'm very glad however that AT&T, up to this point, has been nothing but helpful, and my iPhone has been absolutely great. Battery life is really amazing me! I used the phone for 4 hours last night browsing (both edge and wifi), listening to music, playing with google maps, watching vids and texting, and my battery is only 2/5 down. Nice :D
 
Question about file downloading

I saw a question about file downloading earlier but didn't see a definitive response.

Is it possible with Gmail, Yahoo, or Hotmail to receive a Word, Powerpoint, or PDF file by email and download/view it?

Also, if the Word document is written in a foreign language (specifically Japanese), will it be possible to view it properly?

Thanks!
 
I am totally delighted with my phone. It only took 5 minutes to activate and 20 minutes to transfers songs/movies/cal/& bookmarks. I love how everything just flows flawlessly :)
 
I saw a question about file downloading earlier but didn't see a definitive response.

Is it possible with Gmail, Yahoo, or Hotmail to receive a Word, Powerpoint, or PDF file by email and download/view it?

Also, if the Word document is written in a foreign language (specifically Japanese), will it be possible to view it properly?

Thanks!

NO DOWNLOADING of any kind is allowed via a Browser (Safari).
Attachments are allowed in email. In these emails attachments you can view PDFs, Word and Excel documents, but not PowerPoint. You can view these items, but not alter them or edit them.

As far other language sets (including Japanese) in Safari, it looks like they are included. I have visited Chinese, Japanese and Russian sites and all of the fonts showed up just fine. Very good to know.
 
can u use phone with airport express? ie for wifi connection and also to stream music ?

Wroks great with my Airport Express. Can not receive NOR stream iTunes music.

One note on the Wi-Fi. I usually get good reception. But sometimes I am sitting 5 feet away from my Airport Express, but the signal on my iPhone is only one or two bars (or curve lines). If I click on my Wi-Fi settings and turn it off and back on again, it will then come back full strength. Does anyone have any idea on why it does this? I just did this about 10 minutes ago and it still seems to be fine (full strength now).


EXTRA WI-FI SECURITY:
I use the Access List (via the Access Control Tab in Airport Administrator)within Airport Administrator, so I just got the WiFi address from my iPhone (Settings/General/About/Wi-Fi Address) and added that info to my Access List text file I use to authorize who can use my Wi-Fi. Just a nice way to add a little more security to your Wi-Fi network.
 
Wroks great with my Airport Express. Can not receive NOR stream iTunes music.

One note on the Wi-Fi. I usually get good reception. But sometimes I am sitting 5 feet away from my Airport Express, but the signal on my iPhone is only one or two bars (or curve lines). If I click on my Wi-Fi settings and turn it off and back on again, it will then come back full strength. Does anyone have any idea on why it does this? I just did this about 10 minutes ago and it still seems to be fine (full strength now).

I get this sometimes with my MacBook - I have no reason why but I too would like an answer for this.

If I get any info as to why this is I'll let you know on this thread ;)
 
So far I am thorougly pleased with the iPhone. The only issue I have seen so far is the earpiece speaker sounding a bit tinny but I will take it to the Apple store and have them check it out and if its broken then Im sure it will be replaced.
 
As far other language sets (including Japanese) in Safari, it looks like they are included. I have visited Chinese, Japanese and Russian sites and all of the fonts showed up just fine. Very good to know.

Some languages are available, but many which do display in OS X are not, including Vietnamese, Arabic, Hebrew, Thai, Hindi, and Tamil.
 
I am very happy with my iPhone. In fact I am typing with it now. The iPod is great and the phone is better than my Razr. So here are my troubles.

I have some trouble syncing with itunes. It starts and the "Sync in progress" screen goes away. Eventually iTunes says the device has turned off. This morning with a full charge it worked fine.

Safari needs flash. I thought it wouldn't be a big deal, but it is. A lot of the web uses flash and I enjoy it's visual effects.

The iPhone forgets wireless access routers if the SSID is not broadcast.

I need MMS.

You don't get scroll bars on frame element on web pages like tvguide.com tv listings and the text field on vbb that I am typing in now.

Still the iphone is awesome. All these issues can be fixed with software. Go get one right now!
 
I can't think of any true criticisms of the device so far.

Sorry, but have you even used the phone?

Yes, the iPhone is pretty and nice, but it's FULL of issues. I'll name the ones that bother me the most, a couple of which will most likely lead to me returning this overpriced brick:

(1) Recessed headphone port. Renders 90+ percent of all headsets useless. Conveniently the ones from Apple work. Unfortunately for me I don't like Apple's overpriced, lousy sounding headphones. So my Seinheisers won't connect to it unless I buy an adapter. Hey, wow Apple is conveniently selling these adapters in their stores. Imagine that.

(2) Got a lot of email you want to erase at the same time? Nope, can't do it. You have to remove them all one by one by one by one. Like many of Apple's products, the features on the iPhone "just work", but they seem to work half-assed.

(3) Notes. Completely useless. Was this designed by and for children?

(4)Main reason I'll be returning the iPhone unless I hear Apple say they're going to address it soon: the volume from the headset and from the speakerphone are atrocious. Why can I play movies and music from the speakers loudly but can barely hear people talking, Apple? Tons of people complaining about this on Apple's forum. And yes, my volume in Settings is maxxed as is the volume on the side of the phone. It's a huge problem.

(5) Edge network is slower than slow. Holy crap does it take a long time for websites to load.

(6) No ability to make one's own custom ringtones from SONGS WE ALREADY BOUGHT. Thanks Apple. Oh and I hear they'll let us do this soon...for 99 cents each. Thanks for the raping. Very MS-esque.

(7) Where's the option to add folders to my POP3 mail account in the Mail program? Oh right, there isn't one. Half-assed yet again.

(8) Can't drag and drop music and movies/podcasts from iTunes onto the iPhone like you can with every other iPod. Thanks Apple for forcing us to Synch everything. Brilliant. Best iPod ever? Riiiiiight.

(9) No flash support in Safari? WTF

(10) No ability to cut and paste? Seriously, WTF?

It's a nice phone, it's far from perfect, and it needed to be perfect since it cost 600 bucks and a forced 2 year contract. Mine's most likely being returned simply because of the lousy headset and speakerphone volumes.
 
(6) No ability to make one's own custom ringtones from SONGS WE ALREADY BOUGHT. Thanks Apple. Oh and I hear they'll let us do this soon...for 99 cents each. Thanks for the raping. Very MS-esque.

You can no doubt blame the RIAA for this one.
 
Good overall Christmas wish list...

Sorry, but have you even used the phone?

Yes, the iPhone is pretty and nice, but it's FULL of issues. I'll name the ones that bother me the most, a couple of which will most likely lead to me returning this overpriced brick:

(1) Recessed headphone port. Renders 90+ percent of all headsets useless. Conveniently the ones from Apple work. Unfortunately for me I don't like Apple's overpriced, lousy sounding headphones. So my Seinheisers won't connect to it unless I buy an adapter. Hey, wow Apple is conveniently selling these adapters in their stores. Imagine that.

(2) Got a lot of email you want to erase at the same time? Nope, can't do it. You have to remove them all one by one by one by one. Like many of Apple's products, the features on the iPhone "just work", but they seem to work half-assed.

(3) Notes. Completely useless. Was this designed by and for children?

(4)Main reason I'll be returning the iPhone unless I hear Apple say they're going to address it soon: the volume from the headset and from the speakerphone are atrocious. Why can I play movies and music from the speakers loudly but can barely hear people talking, Apple? Tons of people complaining about this on Apple's forum. And yes, my volume in Settings is maxxed as is the volume on the side of the phone. It's a huge problem.

(5) Edge network is slower than slow. Holy crap does it take a long time for websites to load.

(6) No ability to make one's own custom ringtones from SONGS WE ALREADY BOUGHT. Thanks Apple. Oh and I hear they'll let us do this soon...for 99 cents each. Thanks for the raping. Very MS-esque.

(7) Where's the option to add folders to my POP3 mail account in the Mail program? Oh right, there isn't one. Half-assed yet again.

(8) Can't drag and drop music and movies/podcasts from iTunes onto the iPhone like you can with every other iPod. Thanks Apple for forcing us to Synch everything. Brilliant. Best iPod ever? Riiiiiight.

(9) No flash support in Safari? WTF

(10) No ability to cut and paste? Seriously, WTF?

It's a nice phone, it's far from perfect, and it needed to be perfect since it cost 600 bucks and a forced 2 year contract. Mine's most likely being returned simply because of the lousy headset and speakerphone volumes.

#1, the bigger issue to me is how long will it take for competitors to make their excellent products WITH the full functionality. I want to replace these buds in the worst way. But already, I got to test it out when a friend called and I had music going outside on the street and it did work well. He didn't even comment about it but I was bugging as I prefer my bluetooth Jabra 500.

But to return the product because it'll need a $10 adaptor. Uh no. These guys are apparently coming out with a quality product including the mic and hopefully features:

http://www.macnn.com/articles/07/06/28/altec.lansing.upgrader/

#2. some folks have already indicated it's best to eliminate large amounts of mail on any server before loading. Obviously some folks didn't get to do that. But you can control that in your settings. Clearly not everyone or most anyone will go through learning this before plowing ahead. If you have an email account with lots of junk mail, you have a problem. Can you say new email account?

#3. well this may see some software enhancements, but it is what it is now

#4. I would like more volume via the headset. Don't know if software can address this and/or if other earbuds will.

#5. I got 120K on mine and it's fine. We're talking the first wave here.

#6. Put me in the camp that doesn't freak about this. It'll probably change in short order but a charge for each. That's so telecom. How do you pay all those engineers at Apple who are changing the world anyway?

#7. That seems like a legit request. Software upgrade in year 1?

#8. This is not perfect but since I never had an ipod I'm not freaking about this either. In short, it's the best ipod because it does what an ipod can't.

#9. Everyone knew this. I'm guessing that's a longer term issue. When battery power is improved to handle the waste in such repetitive tasks.

#10. Another in the list of software enhancements, I'll venture to guess. Would think cut and paste will be in a software upgrade before the next hardware version.

But I'm still looking at this as an exceptional product particularly for the groundbreaking aspects including the touchscreen, UI and smooth functionality integration.

And they did get it out to market in a big way. So congrats to Apple's engineers. A really fine effort especially on version 1.0.
 
(1) Recessed headphone port.

Just bought an adapter for $9.99 that allows ANY head set to work with the iPhone.

(2) Got a lot of email you want to erase at the same time? Nope, can't do it. You have to remove them all one by one by one by one. Like many of Apple's products, the features on the iPhone "just work", but they seem to work half-assed.

If you have that many emails you need to erase, until Apple issues a software update that may correct this huge problem for you, use your mail account on your system.

(3) Notes. Completely useless. Was this designed by and for children?

Who the heck uses notes any ways?

(4)Main reason I'll be returning the iPhone unless I hear Apple say they're going to address it soon: the volume from the headset and from the speakerphone are atrocious.

No problems with mine. Sound is loud and clear, playing Youtube videos, to music and phone conversations. Might be a defect with your particular phone? No one else I know who has this is complaining, and keep in mind, people write reviews mostly when they have a gripe, so the thousands of other iPhone users out there who have no issue with it are not commenting on positive reviews in general, so don't judge it based on a few complaints on an Apple forum.

(5) Edge network is slower than slow. Holy crap does it take a long time for websites to load.

True, that was one of my biggest issues with the iPhone, the lack of 3G. HOWEVER, as it has been pointed out, ATT and Jobs have mentioned the implementation of GAN onto the network, much like what T-Mobile already had running. GAN, or General Access Network. Formally known as UMA, or Unlicensed Mobile Access:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generic_Access_Network

Otherwise, WiFI has been great in NYC, there seems always be an unsecured network to "use", especially in Union Square and other public area's with free access. If you're on the road driving or such, not much need for EDGE or WiFI any ways as web browsing and other high-bandwidth uses require full attention, which isn't allowed when driving. The use of WiFi sort of implies that the iPhone is a mini-computer as opposed to what has been deemed a "smart phone", which is why Jobs pushed the WiFi ability in the device and will continue to do so. It is where technology is headed, and depending on your area, EDGE isn't atrocious, I got "moderate" download speeds of 1.1 mb in 30 secs in my area.

(6) No ability to make one's own custom ringtones from SONGS WE ALREADY BOUGHT. Thanks Apple. Oh and I hear they'll let us do this soon...for 99 cents each. Thanks for the raping. Very MS-esque.

Agreed. I am pissed that Apple has crippled the Bluetooth ObEx exchange for the iPhone, as I could browse with my RAZR and download and upload my own videos, ringtones and pictures. There are NO services through bluetooth on the Mac, no dial up gateway, ObEx, or configurable serial ports. Instead, Apple attempts to control use of the phone through iTunes, most likely for quality control and a smoother user experience, but for advanced users it leaves a bitter taste in our mouths.

(7) Where's the option to add folders to my POP3 mail account in the Mail program? Oh right, there isn't one. Half-assed yet again.

POP3 (as in hotmail?)? I know with my .Mac account it syncs my mailboxes through iTunes perfectly. Again, this will surely be a software update at some point.

(8) Can't drag and drop music and movies/podcasts from iTunes onto the iPhone like you can with every other iPod. Thanks Apple for forcing us to Synch everything. Brilliant. Best iPod ever? Riiiiiight.

Agreed. See my response to (6)

(9) No flash support in Safari? WTF

Not sure how I feel about that as flash seems to be very outdated. Many web developers are straying from it as it taxes bandwidth and is outdated in general. There are new things to come in the works.

(10) No ability to cut and paste? Seriously, WTF?

Completely agree. Especially when texting multiple messages, or in any program in general. That annoying magnifying glass pops up whenever I attempts to drag over a line of text.

While all your points are valid, the positive scenario is the innate beauty of the design, that the iPhone is 95% software driven. Anything may be added with software updates (with the exception of the 3G hardware of course). As I have spoken to a few tech's at the 5th Ave Apple store, even video capturing through the camera may be implemented in the future through software/firmware updates. Landscape virtual keyboards would be a great addition to all of the applications including SMS messaging, as well as voice/handsfree dialing, portrait mode for the camera, video conferencing and movie making and uploading via Youtube, iChat or some other IM program, improved sound quality through increasing the software limit on the volume, etc.

Keep in mind, this is the first phone ever developed by Apple, Inc., so there are certainly many issues that will be addressed in the very near future. Don't give up, in a way we're sort of the "test market guinea pigs", but this is an amazing device, even with all those flaws. :)
 
I purchased an iPhone on Friday. When I opened it up and began the activation process I was so excited I could hardly stand it. iPhone was just heavy enough to feel right, the perfect size, and the design is flawless. I plugged it into my Mac, found out I needed to update itunes to 7.3. After doing that I followed the instructions on the screen for converting an existing AT&T number. I was immediately disappointed to find out that because my business pays my bill, the account is under a TID number rather than SSN, that I could not activate phone. I called ATT and they gave me a solution for Monday to parse out the line. MONDAY!! No way..gotta have it now..Its worth 80 bucks per month for the next two years to not wait 2 days.

After activating the iPhone with a new line of service I have some impressions mainly about how it fits into my digital picture: I am coming over from the Blackberry. I rely on it for phone, email, sms, tethering and calendar. Browsing is next probably followed by camera. I have an Ipod which I rely on for music, sharing pictures, some video. The Iphone does a pretty good job of balancing the best of both.

A couple of additional features would put it over the top for this business user that likes everything Apple. Push email, once you've had it, it's hard to give it up. Sometimes it matters how soon you get a msg...especially when people you work with have grown accustomed to a timely response. Up to 15 minutes to get an email by today's standards is unacceptable. The good phones have it the others don't. The ability to tether would be nice too. Right now I have a sim card that I pay for unlimited BB service on, I have a another sim card that I pay unlimited data on for my Globetrotter Express 7.2 card for my Macbook Pro, and now I have this iPhone sim that I am paying unlimited data on--ATT must love me, but long term I won't love them if I am required to pay for data on each device when I can only look at 1 unlimited datas worth. From what I understand, if I wasn't required to be provisioned for BB, if I had a phone like the Blackjack, I could use the sim card from that in my globetrotter, I could also tether at 3g speeds with the blackjack, and have a phone, media player etc. But it wouldn't be a BB or made by Apple. The ability to download from itunes store directly (perhaps only when connected via 802.11 would be fine); this might require the iPhone being considered an "authorized computer" for the purposes of authenticating..which is fine by me, Jobs told me it was a computer..I can't wait until I can download a song on the way home from work, be listening to it on my way through the door and have it begin to stream to airtunes on the home speakers as my wife greets me with a cocktail. Maybe airtunes will support video by then and it will pop-up on my TV. I'd be happy if half my dreams came true. Perhaps a Steve could write something that would allow the network to be optimized in such a way that when excess bandwidth was available over the air downloads could occur.

I have tried to swap the sim cards around with little luck: Neither other card worked in the iPhone for calls or data. The iPhone card worked in the BB for calls but data the connection was refused as it was when I put it in express card. The iPhone was able to connect 802.11 and function with no phone with and without the other cards.:apple:
 
my first two days with iPhone

so here's what it was like for me

I left work around 5:30ish and got in line at the state st AT&T store in Chicago. There were quite a few people in front of me. I ended up waiting about an hour and a half. there were three people in front of me when the manager came out and said they were out of 8 gb models. 2 of them decided to get one elsewhere and i ended up with the 4. I dont really care too much either way.

I got it home and was able to activate and sync in what felt like 10 minutes. I went out for sushi/cocktails then live band karaoke. This was a triple birthday celebration so let's be frank: i got trashed. I had no trouble at all using it even under these condurions.

I walked around without yesterday trying to get it to recognize hot spots. Last night my band had a show and i tried to send a text message to multiple people and realized that you can't which really sucks because i do that a lot. Also a text message can't be forwarded.

This morning i was trying to browse the web - myspace, macrumors, slashdot - and safari was crashing constantly. I rebooted (for the first time) and that fixed it until now. A few minutes ago the browser crashed while viewing the (124 page) pdf manual. I'm typing this on the phone now. I'm a little worried that it's going to crash before I finish.

I'm really good at typing and this keyboard and auto( phone just rang - I made dinner plans but I didn't look for directions like in the commercial)-correct is awesome. I noticed while typing that the auto-correct seemed to stop working after the first paragraph or so but it's back now.

That's it. So far i'm really happy with it. Cgeers (ayto-correct seems to gave gone away again)

-w
 
One pet peeve I have is that itunes won't sync Firefox bookmarks.

Which OS are you using? If you're using Windows... I don't know. However, if you're using OSX, you really may want to consider Safari. Browsing is a whole lot more elegant- and it's faster.

safari.png
PWR!
 
I've brought this up before, but after looking it I thought it might be worth bringing up again. It look to me that T-mobile includes WiFi access with its Edge access (but I'm just surmising that from their website):
<http://hotspot.t-mobile.com/services_plans.htm>

That's something like 10,,000 hotspot in the US alone.

Someone mentioned AT&T has an add on which I looked into and it looks like they charge another $30 for WiFi access at their hotspots (the previous poster said it included 6,000 McDonald's locations). AT&T has a $20 add-on, but that's for those already paying for the more expensive laptop data plans. Given the features of the iPhone it sure would be nice to see At&T include WiFi hotspot plan with the regular iPhone plan (of for a small add-on like $10 per month).

Or even better, AT&T and T-mobile parter/merge/acquire so that the T-mobile and AT&T hotspots are all included in the plan.

Incidentally, T-Mobile has an 802.1x connection to their hotspots that makes connections pretty seamless (compared to logging on through a browser webpage). Does anyone know if AT&T hotspots offer some easier connection method too?
 
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