Apple iPhone 3GS Black (16 GB) Smartphone

When the original iPhone came out it was revolutionary!  A smartphone with a huge video screen and w/o a keypad or keyboard? Crazy!  While the original iPhone did not have everything I dreamed of, I bought it out of gadget love and have held on to it until now.

Why did I finally make the leap after skipping over the iPhone 3G? It's because the 3Gs is exactly what I wanted 2 years ago when the iPhone was first announced.  My original wish list for the iPhone included a GPS, better camera and MMS.  While the latter came a 'lil late thanks to stalling on at&t's part, it's finally here! To make this review easier to read, I'll just do a series of benefits I've seen comparing the new iPhone to the old iPhone.

Pros

- The first thing you'll notice is that programs and webpages load a LOT faster on the iPhone 3Gs compared to the original iPhone. While this was expected, I was actually surprised at how much faster things actually were comparing the two phones side by side.

- The new 3Gs only features like voice command, compass and GPS have really come in handy and makes a lot of the programs on the iPhone very pleasant to use.  Now if you press the "locate me" button twice on Google maps, it actually tells you which direction you're facing in maps which is amazing to me.

- When I first got the iPhone, I made the same mistake like many users to buying a bunch of random apps that I'd use once or twice then never look at again.  However, now that I have the 3Gs, I find myself reusing some of the apps and buying new apps that I didn't know about before.  The reason isn't because I'm on a wild shopping spree but that the improved speed of the CPU really does make the apps more tolerable - which makes using the apps a much smoother experience.

- Like the commericals say, there really IS an app for almost everything. Searching the app store is easy and downloading over 3G is also very fast.

- I live in Atlanta so your mileage may very... but some of the main issues I've had with at&t regarding their service with the original iPhone have disappeared with the new 3Gs.

- The new 3.2MP camera not only zooms but also does video on top of still shots. This is certainly way better than the original iPhone.  The quality of the shots and video are also very good. Definitely not Pro like qualities but good enough for YouTube.

- I no longer use MS Exchange so I can't quite comment on the new secure connection support with MS Exchange, but the 3Gs is now the only version of the iPhone that will work with MS Exchange.

- Pairing the 3Gs with MobileMe allows me to keep tabs on my files as well as locating my iPhone in the event it becomes lost or stolen.  You can also push a text message to the phone or remote wipe the phone in the event theft happens.

Cons

- One thing I've noticed about the new phone is that the battery charge doesn't last very long compared to the original iPhone. (1 to 2 days at best.) With my old phone, it seems like I can go 3-5 days w/o charging at times - granted I did not use it as much as the 3Gs.  Apparently this is still better than the Palm Pre which barely last a day.

- The new 3G/3Gs cases feel a bit cheap compared to the old metal case. However, I did get the perfect compliment case to the phone from Case-Mate (The I.D. case for the 3Gs) to make sure the phone is protected.

- The new phone doesn't come with a dock. Considering how much we spend on these phones, it was kind of a crappy move for Apple to not include one in the price.  However, now that I use a phone case, I guess it's not really a huge issue since I would have to remove the case to charge it on the dock.

Over all, it's really hard to find faults with this new phone. I remember life before the iPhone involved the phone, a wallet, a camera and/or iPod when going to work or going out.  Now, I can carry a phone, a camera, a video recorder, an iPod, a compass, a flashlight, a web browser, a PSP, a pedometer, a voice recorder, a GPS, a calculator, newspapers and a bunch of other useful items w/ me all in one slim device!

With the exception of the expensive voice/data plan, this really is one of the best purchases and one most important items I can have on me at all times.