Hi folks, I'm Johnny Q. Newby -- just got my first iPhone! I've been a Mac person for years and decided to finally drop Docomo, my provider of the last 9 years (Japan's biggest mobile company) and join the iPhone team.
I love this thing so far, but there are a few things that I'm having trouble understanding. And I'm guilty of making a really dumb mistake -- I thought the phone volume was defective when, in fact, it was just benig muffled by the plastic sheet that protects the phone's face!
I put a hole in there and all is well.
So rather than get befuddled and frustrated about some of my other gripes, I'm posting here in hopes that you veterans can fill me in.
* Battery life is inconsistent. The first day I had the phone, after charging it all the way up, it seemed to lose one percentage point about every three to five minutes. I think I got about 2 hours of usage plus 7 hours of standby before having to recharge it. OK, I'm thinking, this thing eats batteries; I'll just have to plug it in each night. But then the second day, it hardly lost any power at all. I was able to get 1:40 of usage plus about 14:00 of standby this time! Even better, but then after the next charge-up, I went to bed with the iPhone sleeping and at 70% and woke up to a chargeless brick -- well, not a brick, but I had to charge it again! Is it always this up-and-down? What could make the battery drop to zero so suddenly? I have Wi-Fi off, have turned off all the push stuff, and leave it sleeping.
* Speaking of sleeping, how do you get the iPhone to sleep without locking? I don't want the thing running all the time -- the battery will die -- but I hate having to rub that stupid slider (can it at least be changed to right-to-left? Left-to-right is awkward for a left-thumbed user!) every time I look at the phone. Even if I turn Auto-Lock to "Never", it still locks the phone if I put it to sleep. I want it to sleep, but *not* lock. Don't tell me this is impossible!
* Also related to sleeping and the battery, how do I know what applications are running? Running many applications at once is a sure way to run out of RAM. How do I make sure an application quits when I return to the home screen?
* As for the Region Format, are we required to use the same region for telephone numbers format and date format? They have nothing to do with each other! I want the dates in English, but US telephone number format won't work in Japan where we have variable-length area codes. I tried using the UK instead, but the phone must contain a database of UK area codes and number formats, because it saves the numbers that way even if I've called someone in Japan. (E. g. 0741-23-4567 and 03-3234-5678 will become 07412 34567 and 033 2345 678; awful) Can I customize this somehow? Here, the area code varies but the last four digits are always a group. Even just running all ten digits together without any spaces would be fine.
* Why does the number 1 take up less space than the other digits in the iPhone's "Helvetica" font? Call me a picayune fussbidget, but when using the calculator, it's pretty annoying.
* Has the iPod portion lost a bit of functionality compared to dedicated iPods? I can't seem to find a way to jump to a desired position in a song like you could on the iPod (click the center of the wheel, then slide to the part you want to listen to). In landscape mode, you can't even see how far into the song you are!
* Also in the iPod, do my songs have to be listed in alphabetical order? How about by date added (my favorite way)? iTunes seems to be not an application but a portal to the iTunes Store. Is the full functionality of (Mac) iTunes available? Ordering songs by date or year or whatever?
I love this phone so far, and want to iron out these litttle niggles before I get frustrated. How do I solve these things? I beseech you humbly.
I love this thing so far, but there are a few things that I'm having trouble understanding. And I'm guilty of making a really dumb mistake -- I thought the phone volume was defective when, in fact, it was just benig muffled by the plastic sheet that protects the phone's face!
I put a hole in there and all is well.So rather than get befuddled and frustrated about some of my other gripes, I'm posting here in hopes that you veterans can fill me in.
* Battery life is inconsistent. The first day I had the phone, after charging it all the way up, it seemed to lose one percentage point about every three to five minutes. I think I got about 2 hours of usage plus 7 hours of standby before having to recharge it. OK, I'm thinking, this thing eats batteries; I'll just have to plug it in each night. But then the second day, it hardly lost any power at all. I was able to get 1:40 of usage plus about 14:00 of standby this time! Even better, but then after the next charge-up, I went to bed with the iPhone sleeping and at 70% and woke up to a chargeless brick -- well, not a brick, but I had to charge it again! Is it always this up-and-down? What could make the battery drop to zero so suddenly? I have Wi-Fi off, have turned off all the push stuff, and leave it sleeping.
* Speaking of sleeping, how do you get the iPhone to sleep without locking? I don't want the thing running all the time -- the battery will die -- but I hate having to rub that stupid slider (can it at least be changed to right-to-left? Left-to-right is awkward for a left-thumbed user!) every time I look at the phone. Even if I turn Auto-Lock to "Never", it still locks the phone if I put it to sleep. I want it to sleep, but *not* lock. Don't tell me this is impossible!
* Also related to sleeping and the battery, how do I know what applications are running? Running many applications at once is a sure way to run out of RAM. How do I make sure an application quits when I return to the home screen?
* As for the Region Format, are we required to use the same region for telephone numbers format and date format? They have nothing to do with each other! I want the dates in English, but US telephone number format won't work in Japan where we have variable-length area codes. I tried using the UK instead, but the phone must contain a database of UK area codes and number formats, because it saves the numbers that way even if I've called someone in Japan. (E. g. 0741-23-4567 and 03-3234-5678 will become 07412 34567 and 033 2345 678; awful) Can I customize this somehow? Here, the area code varies but the last four digits are always a group. Even just running all ten digits together without any spaces would be fine.
* Why does the number 1 take up less space than the other digits in the iPhone's "Helvetica" font? Call me a picayune fussbidget, but when using the calculator, it's pretty annoying.
* Has the iPod portion lost a bit of functionality compared to dedicated iPods? I can't seem to find a way to jump to a desired position in a song like you could on the iPod (click the center of the wheel, then slide to the part you want to listen to). In landscape mode, you can't even see how far into the song you are!
* Also in the iPod, do my songs have to be listed in alphabetical order? How about by date added (my favorite way)? iTunes seems to be not an application but a portal to the iTunes Store. Is the full functionality of (Mac) iTunes available? Ordering songs by date or year or whatever?
I love this phone so far, and want to iron out these litttle niggles before I get frustrated. How do I solve these things? I beseech you humbly.
