Qualcomm Chip Embargo To Boost iPhone?

[HawaiiMacAddict]

Aloha everyone,

I really don't get all the negativity here. it's like the "speed bumps" of the recent MacBook and MacBook Pro updates. It sounds like cell phone envy. I mean, really - how many of the loudest complainers are actually contemplating purchasing a Ver. 1 iPhone, and how many are adopting the "wait and see" attitude? Or, more like it, how many are just standing on the sidelines biching and moaning about the iPhone only being offered with AT&T? Get over it, you can get an iPhone with the cell phone company of your choice in five years, but until then, please be quiet about the carrier. Personally, I love the idea of the iPhone, but would rather have it replace my 30GB (5G) iPod, so I'll wait until the memory onboard gets up to 32GB (hopefully that will be by Christmas this year).

Of course, I just may go ahead and get Rev. 1 anyway - my wife has asked me a couple of time if I wanted to get it, which is amazing considering she would most likely be the one to complain about the price of it The only other consideration is that we have a family plan with AT&T (with an additional line for my mother-in-law) that runs until December 2008, so I don't know how the change to an iPhone contract will affect me.

I changed from T-mobile to Cingular due to T-mobile's inability to give me good service in Hawaii, and that was before the iPhone was announced - before I knew that Apple was going with Cingular/AT&T. Thus far, AT&T has been much better, with the exception of my particular cell phone, an LG, whose battery gets sucked dry by the bluetooth capability.

Every time I see the iPhone, I want to buy it again I could care less about the lack of 3G, and am a bit wary of the data plan price to be offered by AT&T, but until the pricing plan comes out, I won't worry about it. Who knows - we could all be very pleasantly surprised!!! Of course, we know that both Apple and AT&T will be making money off of us, but imagine if one of the ways AT&T wants to make money is by offering a lower monthly usage cost for the iPhone as compared to other networks and their "smart" phones. By offering good service at a lower price, they could draw in more customers and provide more revenue than by targeting a smaller demographic at a higher price. Of course, I may just be full of it as well

HawaiiMacAddict

 

[slackpacker]

Listen here.... HOW Many of you bought Version 1 or the Razor/Blade or any of the Sprint or Verizon or Microsoft smart phone offerings or the Nokia this or that.....?!

Did you pay for the email...Photo....ringtone and internet data plan?

Did you ??

YES ....You all did without a care in the world. Think of that.

 

[mambodancer]

New Macs

Remember the days when Apple used to release new Macs? ahh those were the days...

I've said it elsewhere but I'll say it again. The iPhone is a new Mac. Just as is the AppleTV. They are just specialized versions of Macintosh computers running OS X.

 

[asrmatt]

looks real fragile and a pain in the ass to work. What supports the keypad while you type, your other hand?

Another great innovation from LG.

Absolutely yes.
But it's mainly used to watch tv on it. they actually sell it with payed subscription to many satellite TV chanels (news, sports events, ecc...).

EDIT:And let me add that, believe it or not, TV commercials for this phone here in Italy where done by Paris Hilton riding around Rome in Vespa!

 

[MacMe66]

3G was one of the obvious advantages of some of other providers' phones. Since they won't be able to import any 3G phones for a while, that advantage against iPhone is eliminated, making iPhone more attractive.
***

So, you're admitting the only way the iphone can 'win' is by the other carriers being restricted in their offerings???

Pretty weak position I would say...

Why do you turn around his statement by adding "the only way"? a silly answer.

This news are candy enough to put a smile on apple investor's face. iP is entering the stage on 29 of June and as if they won't feel enough heat yet, they lit up fire under their own chairs. Looking forward to their iPhone answers next year - with stolen intel technology? haha!

Re Qualcom and how they screw their component buyers: who trusts ANY product made by a company who obviously infringes competitor's patents and is unable to resolve those issues out-of-court? Qualcom will loose a lot of business for bringing in such a trojan horse to the phone makers, and those for sure will try to find a quick work-around, maybe calling Broadcom?

 

[kjs862]

I'm hoping that wifi works well on the iphone. I was just thinking though, on my college campus you need to install vpn client to access the schools wifi network. How will you do this with the iphone?

 

[sundoggy]

3G is a must, and it's probably on the way (esp in Europe)

3G is easily integrated into the iPhone, the limiting factor is ATT's network. You can bet the farm that when the iPhone comes out in Europe and Japan it will utilize 3G (I think that's even been hinted if not stated). The US as a whole is way behind Europe and Asia in this respect, but it's not due to the phone makers--it's typcial US red tape, and the carriers. Most of this 3G technology has been developed in the US, but due to our slug-slow government, who's primary mission is to protect old school telecom ineterests , it's hit snags here. So remember this: You won't see the iPhone in those international markets without 3G.

Also, remember, ATT is working on its own 3G network. I am not sure when and where this will go live, but you can be sure that Apple will be there with a 3G phone when they do. I imagine it's already working. If not Apple is plain stupid. This can't be the first real internet smartphone without the 3G--no one wants to go back to dial up speeds, and not to mention that the most compelling aps will need the bandwidth (video, web aps, etc). In my opinion the iPhone won't hit full capability without 3G, so this may even accelerate their 3G work.

But remember one thing... the iPhone also has wi-fi, and I'm sure this will make up for a lot of the temporary holes. Sure, you may be stuck on the road or at a restaraunt with the 2.5g speeds, but just walk into your local wifi enabled cafe, and you're surfing big time. I would expect I may be doing 50% of my web activities within wifi networks. That being said, they need to include a good ap for finding wifi networks to make it even easier (or if not, they need to get the third party SDK out ASAP).

That SDK will be important down the road. After the initial hype and massive buying the feature/application requests will start coming in, and that's when they'll need a Palm-scale partner development community (though they don't need the Palm 3rd party quality, which is hit and miss). My Treo periodically restarts, and I'm sure it's because of third part aps.

Well, no big deal. I'll be waiting for a year or so before I take the dive, though I usually like to early adopter.

 

[scotto07]

I don't see how people can vote positive on this. Because of some patent dispute there is/will be less consumer choice and less availability on data-centric phones. This decreases competition and will probably drive up prices.

Some people like me who are stock holders would rather see apple make huge profits rather than having "consumer choice" it all about the money baby!

 

[Earendil]

Re: Complainers.

Since when did those that use Apple computers complain about the number of features and the size of the numbers? Call it brain washing, but I've been with Apple since the early 80s (when I was born ), and Apple has never pushed hard in the numbers and features set. Even the mhz war, though I'd say they lost, they didn't play.

Apple does a few things to push the envelope, putting a vid cam in the laptops, brilliant. But Apple doesn't pack a bunch of useless sh*t into their devices in hopes that they satisfy 100% of their consumers on paper, but when it comes to use, completely disappoints.

Apple devices, for me, have never been about the stats, or the features. There are those features that I *require*, and if you *require* a phone with 3G, tough luck. But good news, there are other phones with 3G! Go buy one and shutup! For me, the iPhone is about *practical* use. It does things that no one I've personally ever had does, and it appears it does it very well.

I currently can't for the life of me figure out how to set up speed dialing on my current phone. I've done it on many others, I'm a CompSci major and can even find my way around windows preferences, but this phone is beyond me. That is *NOT* acceptable. Even Windows is easier to navigate than some of these very phones.

I see this phone, like many Apple products, as more than specs on paper, I see it as the ease of use, the real world functionality, and its ability to actually effect the way I live my life. And that said, I'll be writing for the price to come down a smidgen, the the capacity to go up a little. And if by then they add 3G, I won't complain.

So, if you aren't seriously willing to hand over $600 on June 29th *if* the iPhone had 3G, than really, shaddup!

[/endrant]
*Deep breath* okay, I'm better now

~Tyler

 

[scrambledwonder]

That was my first thought when I saw this story yesterday. There must be some Verizon executives swearing up a storm right now.

Well, they have their swimming pools full of gold doubloons and 500-foot yachts to console them.

 

[scrambledwonder]

<rant>

All this talk about 3G and nobody thinks about the processor in the iPhone. It's like hooking an old Apple LC up to gigabit Ethernet. You can have the fastest connection in the world, but the iPhone won't be able to render the pages fast enough to keep up with it. So EDGE is just damn fine, until the processors become a whole lot faster. Mind you, that'll probably be next year if you consider Moore's Law.

But when you do consider Moore's Law, ANY piece of technology today will look like stone tools when compared to gadgets three years from now.

Just get over the fact that you're going to pay a lot of $$ for stuff that's going to be outdated very quickly. That's how technology is progressing.

</rant>

p.s. = Notice proper HTML tag formatting above.

 

[Eric1285]

The reason that other companies are saying the iPhone is good for everyone is because they think that it'll increase interest in high end phones. A lot of people are hoping (and many are also predicting) that the iPhone can really open up the smartphone market, because to date, most smartphone users are business people. Everyone is hoping that the iPhone will convince more people to shop for smartphones.

 

[Hmac]

Regardless of this news, lack of 3G in the iPhone is pretty weak. Maybe people will let that pass in the US but in Asia and Europe where 3G is the norm for mid to high end phones (and HSDPA, 3.5G is the norm for a high end phone), the market is likely to be less forgiving.

Having said that, only time will tell.

Why in the world does anyone think the iPhone won't be available in a 3G version? Of course it will. Speculation all over the place is that it will be available as soon as January, and those shadowy people that track component orders for the electronic industry have reported in Gizmodo that the Taiwanese company that's been building the current release iPhone have been bringing in 3G chipsets for the iPhone since they started building the GSM iPhone (probably the same people that hang around Apple with WiFi sniffers).

Anyway, AAUI, 3G is a migration path to WCDMA for Europe to try to get them out of the technologically inferior GSM hole they've dug themselves into.

 

[SPUY767]

Anything that makes my Apple stock surge makes me a happy camper. I'm actually quite surprised to see that there hasn't been a more positive move today as a result of this information.