Stress Testing the iPhone

[Padriac]

1) If nobody ever bought REV A products, the economy would come to a standstill. Somebody has to do it. I happen to own two REV A Apple products and I've had no problems with either.

2) Some people are complaining that the iPhone doesn't have enough features and some people are complaining it has too many. My guess: it's just right.

3) Stress testing can simulate years of wear and tear due to *use*, but it can't simulate problems due to the simple passage of time (i.e. discoloration on macbooks). It sounds like the iPhone will stand up to user-abuse pretty well, but we obviously don't know if there will be some random issue related to the passage of time.

4) Let's assume the Rev B iPhone comes out next year at this time. So I could wait for a year and get that better version or I could get the Rev A now. Assuming you keep a phone for 2 years, there's two scenarios. In one case I have the best version of an iPhone for 1 year (aka the only version), and then I lust for the better version for one year. In the other, I get to lust for an iPhone for one year and then get to have the best version for one year. The two cases seem roughly equivalent to me. Would you rather have Rev A now, and then Rev C later, or do you want Rev B later and Rev D much later? No matter what path you choose, there will always be a point where a better version comes out while you are stuck with your older version.

 

[natejohnstone@g]

Sounds Great to me! If it wasn't for the required $40/mo data plan I'd totally buy an iPhone now.
Hopefully there will be unlocked phones on the market soon so I dont' have to pay $40 a month for something I'll hardly use.

 

[Stella]

First of all, Apples rev A. models of more or less everything is far from perfect (read sarcasm). Secondly, this is Apples first cellphone. The cellphone market is extremely competitive. I think Apple needs to introduce a seriously revamped phone in europe, because the hardware as it looks today is basically that of a two year old premium phone here. The only thing Apple has going for themselves is the UI. period.
Dont confuse the iPhone with the iPod. The iPod was revolutionary 5Gb HD, UI, design... The iPhone has the potential to become revolutionary, but we are not there just yet. Not by far...

QFT.

Apart from the UI, the functionality of the iPhone is very ordinary, and limited ( due to a controlled 3rd party environment ).

p.s.. there are phones already on the market than have 4gig... and 8gig will come very soon.

 

[sam10685]

Awesome... I'm in a wheelchair so durability is actually more of a reason of me not getting this then the simple fact that I have another carrier. (t-mobile.) I still think i'll wait for the 2nd or 3rd revision. Hopefully then t-mobile is supported and the iphone is even more durable.

 

[Neroon]

Right, but from the way I read it, I thought they meant 5GB was the total amount of bandwidth used among all the testers. That is, all 200 testers logged a total of "over 10,000 hours on the phone, including over 5,000 hours of voice calls and 5 gigabytes of data usage"

5GB sounds very good for a single user for an Internet-centric phone, but if it's for all 200 testers, it seems like not a whole lot.

-Zadillo

(5 000 hours) * 20 kbps = 42.9153442 gigabytes

5 GB is reasonable. They probably didn't spend even close to 5000 hours downloading data. Most of browsing time is not spent loading pages. You generally spend more time reading a page than loading it.

 

[RedTomato]

I'm another one saying 5GB just isn't much.

I'm in the UK, with T-Mobile, with their cheapest data tariff, which is £7.50 / month, (the price of 2 pints of beer in a club) and that gives me around *5GB* per month.

(soft limit too, so no charge if I go over that every now and then).

 

[sishaw]

Hmmm...not what I wanted to hear

Engadget posted a poor review of the virtual keyboard by yet another supposed "inside source" who's had hands-on with the iPhone:

http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/23/new-details-about-the-iphone/

 

[MrCrowbar]

I love the virtual keyboard on my Tomtom. It not Multi-Touch so it's not possible to hold shift while you Type a letter. But I'm damn fast on it.

The problem might be that Blackberry (or similar) users have real keys and rest their thubs on the when not pressing. That's actually good for orientation and doesn't make your fingers tired that fast.

On a touch screen like the iPhone has it, you can't rest your thums on the screen itself because every contact will be registered as input. You can probably filter out a lot with software ("large horizontal area = resting thumb; ignore that") but you have to get the idea behind it. I'm super fast typing on my Tomtom. When I hold it in my hand, I type with 2 thumbs, when it's mounted in the car, I use the four fingers (not the thumb) of my left hand.

Touch-Keyboards are awesome once you get used to it. I wish people would get rid of the stiff unergonomic QWERTY though and make something more advanced and optimized for 2 thumbs.

 

[Much Ado]

On a touch screen like the iPhone has it, you can't rest your thums on the screen itself because every contact will be registered as input. You can probably filter out a lot with software ("large horizontal area = resting thumb; ignore that") but you have to get the idea behind it.

Well, the Engadget report did say that quite a bit of presure was required to register an 'input' so i think you'll get away with resting your thumb/finger on the keypad.

We need more first hand reports!

 

[sishaw]

I first learned to touch type on a manual typewriter. QWERTY was originally developed to try to accomplish two goals: (1) put commonly used letters, as much as possible given 2, under your more dominant fingers (why the "a" is under your pinky, I don't know, maybe because of 2); and (2) keep letters that are often typed together - e,a and s,h for example, apart from each other to avoid jamming the keys. I still don't think it's been beat for efficiency for whole-hand typing. Certainly not by that silly Dvorak keyboard.

The creative design solution for thumb typing might still be to come. At least with QWERTY, those of us who learned on typewriters, yes we're older, know where the keys are intuitively.

But I agree with your conclusion. Maybe there could be a better solution for thumb typing. I'm still anxious to get some hands-on with the iPhone.

 

[xUKHCx]

Sure, place ANY phone in a pocket with keys + coins (and who carries coins anyway? Pirates?) and said phone will get scratched.

Well my K800 must not be a phone then, after a year of carrying it around in my pocket there are some very minor scratches if you look at it from an angle but there are no visible scratches.

Don't get the remark about coins, currently i have 21 coins in my pocket ammounting about £11 or $22

 

[Stella]

Engadget posted a poor review of the virtual keyboard by yet another supposed "inside source" who's had hands-on with the iPhone:

http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/23/new-details-about-the-iphone/

Good link. However, for the sake of Apple, I hope this report isn't accurate.

Especially this one:
"Users must scroll through the address book (or use the alphabet-drag on the side) -- one cannot bring up the keyboard and type in a name, as many of us are used to."

Seems as Apple have dropped the ball on usability. Candy Eye over usability makes a poor product.

 

[MrCrowbar]

I first learned to touch type on a manual typewriter. QWERTY was originally developed to try to accomplish two goals: (1) put commonly used letters, as much as possible given 2, under your more dominant fingers (why the "a" is under your pinky, I don't know, maybe because of 2); and (2) keep letters that are often typed together - e,a and s,h for example, apart from each other to avoid jamming the keys. I still don't think it's been beat for efficiency for whole-hand typing. Certainly not by that silly Dvorak keyboard.

The creative design solution for thumb typing might still be to come. At least with QWERTY, those of us who learned on typewriters, yes we're older, know where the keys are intuitively.

But I agree with your conclusion. Maybe there could be a better solution for thumb typing. I'm still anxious to get some hands-on with the iPhone.

Someone reasonable

Dvorak is cool once you learned it. I'm using it a lot on my Macbook. I tried to learn regular touch typing, but it annoyed me that the pinky finger has to move so much. I'm a (quite virtuose) guitar player, so I don't mind having to strech out my pinky all the time, but it's annoying to know it could be avoided with a better keyboard layout.

There are very nice ways of reducing the number of keys while still being able to type fast. T9 on older Nokia phones works great for example. The input device should try to guess what you want to type to save you time and effort. The iPhone doesn't seem to be that bad at it if you watch the 20 minute video. It kinda corrects your typos and has auto-completion.

It will be interesting to see whether it's possible to use the iPhone one handed, i.e hold it in your hand and use your thumb for the touch screen. I bet lots of people will find interesting new ways to type fast on that thing, I can picture teenagers typing with all the fingers of one hand. I actually type lots of google searches with my left hand and have the right hand on the mouse when surfing. It's annoying to move the right hand around all the time. But I love the Macbook's large touchpad, I use it a lot, even when the mosue is connected, especially because of the 2D scrolling.

The sad part is, Apple wants to keep it as simple as possible, so I highly doubt there will be any alternative to the QWERTY keyboard. There's no search function on the iPod section of the iPhone either. I never get to my song by scrolling around the artist or album section in itunes, I just go to the search and type a few letters. That takes 2 seconds and I have the song I was looking for. I'd love to be able to bring up the keyboard everywhere on the iPod section. Same thing for the Safari-Section: COMMAND-F (Safari 3 or Firefox) is equally important as Google to me.

Oh well, I think I won't be using the iPhone that much for surfing. I just want a phone that syncs well and is not a total pain in the 'you know what' for doing the most basic things. I still have a very old Nokia with no color screen and love it.

 

[MrCrowbar]

Good link. However, for the sake of Apple, I hope this report isn't accurate.

Especially this one:
"Users must scroll through the address book (or use the alphabet-drag on the side) -- one cannot bring up the keyboard and type in a name, as many of us are used to."

Seems as Apple have dropped the ball on usability. Candy Eye over usability makes a poor product.

Yea, I've frozen the 20m video a unch of times, looking for a way to search the contacts or songs, but apparently, there's no way to bring up the keyboard. I'm so used to the instant search field in pretty much every OSX app

(Get "Inquisitor" for Safari. It's probably the most useful plugin out there.)

 

[JoeG4]

Approximately 200 field technicians have been secretly testing the iPhone for 10 weeks, logging over 10,000 hours on the phone, including over 5,000 hours of voice calls and 5 gigabytes of data usage. This is reportedly twice as much testing as other phones.

This means, we should expect 3 or 4 glitches that will never be fixed in Revision A.

 

[sishaw]

Someone reasonable

Dvorak is cool once you learned it.

Maybe I'm being to hard on the Dvorak keyboard. A lot depends on how one learned to type. But the order English letters happen to be in has no relation to efficiency, it's just how the alphabet historically developed. QWERTY, old tech as it is, was at least an attempt to create an efficient system.


I'm not sure I fully trust this Engadget account of the iPhone virtual keyboard. Something like typing varies a lot by individual.

 

[Flowbee]

I'm another one saying 5GB just isn't much.

We're not talking about downloading large music or program files. I'm sure this is mainly web surfing, email, maps, stocks, and weather.

My websites, on average, cost me about 5gb of bandwidth for every 80,000 or so pageviews. That would be a whole lot of websurfing in a month.

 

[Flowbee]

Good link. However, for the sake of Apple, I hope this report isn't accurate.

Especially this one:
"Users must scroll through the address book (or use the alphabet-drag on the side) -- one cannot bring up the keyboard and type in a name, as many of us are used to."

Seems as Apple have dropped the ball on usability. Candy Eye over usability makes a poor product.

I think a lot of people will complain for the first couple of days that they can't figure out how to do such-and-such, or how confusing single-tap vs. double-tap is, or how hard it is to type on the keyboard. It's a new interface... it'll take a little time to get used to. (Just like switching from windows to mac, for the first few weeks everything seems "wrong.") I suspect most of that will die down after about a week or so.

Anyway, even Apple admits that it will take a week of use to get comfortable with the touch screen typing. The Engadget report comes from an "inside source who's been fooling around with a unit." Doesn't sound like they've spent much time with it.

 

[MrCrowbar]

Maybe I'm being to hard on the Dvorak keyboard. A lot depends on how one learned to type. But the order English letters happen to be in has no relation to efficiency, it's just how the alphabet historically developed. QWERTY, old tech as it is, was at least an attempt to create an efficient system.


I'm not sure I fully trust this Engadget account of the iPhone virtual keyboard. Something like typing varies a lot by individual.

Actually, early typewrites were designed so you could type fast. Close to the Dvorak kayout actually. The problem was you could type too fast, for example small words like "and" or "for" were and single hand gesture because of the letters being so close to each other. The hammers got jammed when they were moving simultaniously. So the layout was changed to what is the current QWERTY. People got used to it though and no one dared to change the layout when the hammer problem was solved by using electronic typewriters and computers. The only really cool thing about QWERTY is that you can type "typewriter" very fast, because it's all in the top row. Salespeople impressed custumers with it.

QWERTY is efficient in the way you don't type faster than the typewriter can handle, but it could be much more efficient just by changing the arrangement of the letters. Imagine the original Macintosh came with a Dvorak keyboard when it came out, with QWERTY as an option. Most people would be using Dvorak nowadays, just like we use graphical user interfaces.

I actually know a software developer who works with a joystick and a one hand keyboard (actually a gaming controller from Saitek) for programming. This guy is in his mid twenties and types faster with one hand than you can read and has an amazing accuracy and speed with the joystick. Also has plenty of buttons on the stick with macros that do shortcuts and macros. Keyboard and mouse is ok because it's very intuitive, but you can work a lot more efficiently if you're willing to learn to do it (and can afford the equipment). I believe Multitouch is the way to go for a handheld device. The next big steps will be immersive interfaces with real 3D (think 360° hologram) and input device that can basically read your mind. Then comes the brain enhancement technology that literally puts the somputer in your head. At some point, man will transcend biology an migrate to artificial bodies that "live" longer, are expandable and can communicate directly with each other...


Back to the topic: I think that engadget article is based on nothing but pure imagination and the videos on the apple.com.

 

[aswitcher]

Has anyone seen anything about the iPhone being used outside the USA on global roaming, and what things didn't work once off the AT&T network?

 

[SiliconAddict]

thats fine, but we'll be using it when your stuck with your crappy phone on whatever carrier you have right now.

so while we are flipping through our music videos and telephone calls with our finger while your slamming text messges through a keyboard and listening to music on your ipod we'll be doing it all on one device

see you in about 6 months with an iphone

Not a chance. I will never go back to Crapular. EVER. I got frusterated and burned HARD in late '05 with those [beeps.]
And my phone does EVERYTHING I want and need it to do. Lacking features != crappy. Again I buy a phone for voice communication. That is all. I couldn't give less of a crap about browsing the net. (Even though I can do that on my company provided WM phone.) I couldn't care about video. I couldn't care about audio. That is what my iPod is for.
I'll feel sorry for you guys if your iPhone breaks and you loose your movies, music, and communication capabilities. If the same happens to me at most I will loose entertainment features or communion features. Not the entire ball of wax.
So yah. iPhone looks moderately interesting, however I seriously question if I would use even half of its features. *shrugs* To each their own.

What I am waiting for is a video ipod to replace my 60GB iPod Photo. I fully expect this to hit sometime this fall.

 

[0007776]

QWERTY, old tech as it is, was at least an attempt to create an efficient system.

Actually it was an attempt to create an inefficient system to slow down typists on early typewriters so that the keys would not jam

 

[Stella]

I think a lot of people will complain for the first couple of days that they can't figure out how to do such-and-such, or how confusing single-tap vs. double-tap is, or how hard it is to type on the keyboard. It's a new interface... it'll take a little time to get used to. (Just like switching from windows to mac, for the first few weeks everything seems "wrong.") I suspect most of that will die down after about a week or so.

Anyway, even Apple admits that it will take a week of use to get comfortable with the touch screen typing. The Engadget report comes from an "inside source who's been fooling around with a unit." Doesn't sound like they've spent much time with it.

I'm sure there will be complaints due to lack of knowledge regarding the UI - absolutely right. However, the inability to go directly to an address book entry is quite a large omission. You cannot rely on the multi-touch features for everything.

Personally, I'm looking forward to an iPod that has the multi-touch UI - that would be an awesome device. That, for me , is far more interesting than the iPhone ( which my current phone has far more functional than iPhone, anyway ).

 

[MrCrowbar]

Is that how stress testing is done?

(Sorry, I'm so proud of that 5 minute photoshop job )

 

[ppnkg]

The true test will come when that ibook guy gets to use his sledgehammer on the iPhone ...