Apple iPhone (8 GB) Smartphone

For months I have been seeing adverts for the Apple iPhone. It's a freakin' phone, not the second coming of Christ but you wouldn't think that is the case with new iPhone owners. Two weeks ago the bedlam began; Tommy wanted to get his hands on the iPhone in the worst way. Why? When I asked him his only reply, with a rather scary grin I may add, he replied, "Why not?" Considering that I bought into the Nokia N-Gage craze, I really didn't have room to argue about it. It wasn't until I saw the price of it that I seriously thought him insane. Moreover, the monthly service charges were fast approaching one hundred dollars. To make things even worse, there are the accessories that you have to get. No, these are not mandatory but think of it like this, if you buy a car you want to get some toys for it. The same thing applies to the iPhone. iPhone accessories are going to be a huge cash cow … that is, if people can still afford them after they buy the phone, accessories and pay the activation fees and service fees.

I am not an Apple user, I don't have an iPod and chances are I probably never will. I really wish I would have kept up to speed with the iPhone and all it's functions, it would have made the learning process a bit easier and I wouldn't feel like a complete moron when I pick it up. After having this in the house for 24 hours I can say that my initial judgment of the iPhone was a little skewed. That doesn't mean I am going to run out and buy an iPhone of my own, why bother doing that when I can grab Tommy's and use his? OK, I will admit it, there is a slight twinge of jealousy when I hear it ring or he slides his finger across the screen to make a call.

Before You Read This

I am not a high tech person. Until last year I was perfectly content with Windows 98 [and I still miss it], my DirectTV remote control baffles me at times and I still can't figure out why my computer monitor gets all fuzzy when my cell phone rings. This isn't going to be a highly technical review of the iPhone. If you want to read something that is - for the most part - a cut and paste from the Apple website then why not just go there and read it? I am sure that Epinions and every other consumer review website will be flooded with these 'cut and paste' type of reviews. Well, that isn't going to happen here. I have no idea what some of the things mean or how some of the features work but I can say this, if you have five or six hours to kill, playing around with an iPhone is the best way to get to know how it works and more importantly, which features will work best for you.

What Exactly Is An iPhone

It is a light weight, compact media machine, well, at least that is what Tommy said about it. I am going to be brutally honest here, I really love the iPhone. Not the phone itself but the media frenzy behind it and the falling prices on other phones from other companies. Finally there is a bit of competition out there and if manufacturers want to retain their core customers they need to step up to the plate and serve us something tasty. For other consumers this could be a godsend; it could make phones that are otherwise outside their financial grasp a bit more affordable but I doubt this will do much for the monthly service fees or service plans. That ultimate is what makes it or breaks it for me. Until I can find a plan that I really feel is worth it, I will stick with my prepaid Boost service and not complain in the least when I have to go buy a refill card.

Seeing an iPhone online and seeing one in person are two completely different things. Tommy drove to a neighboring town to pick this up [with a stop at a friends house after the purchase] so I knew that by time he got back, well, there would be fingerprints, slobber and drool all over it. It is small, too small for someone like me. I like a bit of size and weight to my phone otherwise I drop it, have to fish it out of my backpack or end up having it slide off my shoulder. This is four and a half inches long and two and a half inches wide; the thickness is what really makes this posh, less than a half inch thick. How much does it weigh? Five freaking ounces. Yeah, that means that it definitely isn't for me.

What is it capable of? My answer is simple; it can play music, display images, take pictures, allow you to watch movies, access the internet and oh yeah, be used as a mobile phone. If you ask Tommy, it's the greatest thing since sliced bread. Too bad you can't eat it because $749.00 would buy a hell of a lot of groceries In my honest opinion is it a gadget - the hottest and newest thing to have. Everyone wants it and even if they don't openly admit it, they want to get their hands on it to try it out. Tommy blew the money he was saving for a PS3 on this and opted to go with the 8 gig version instead of the 4 gig one. Why? He said that in the long run it would save him money [typical male response] because he wouldn't have to buy other "things" to make it more "usable".

Right off the bat I could see that there were things that I loved about the iPhone and things that I hated about it. There are no buttons to press, well, I take that back, there is one and that is on the bottom front of the phone. Outside of that, everything is handled by the touch screen. Anyone else seeing a problem with this yet? America is a society of multi tasking and more often than not that means doing five things and once and not making any progress on any of them. Imagine if you will, a man sitting in Mc Donald's, iPhone in hand, staring blankly at the screen. Those fries and hamburger are doing a number on the touch screen and even if you can't see it, the fingerprints are slowly etching their way on to the screen. That's one of the main reasons that this comes with its own cleaning cloth. Keep the screen clean or eventually you will pay a hefty price for your lackadaisical ways. Yes, there are several different skins and protectors that you can buy for the iPhone, all of which are - at this point in time - a worthwhile investment if you plan on using your iPhone outside the house or in a place where you can't sit down and wipe it down when you are done using it.

The main screen is where all the action happens, the icons allow you to access different programs or features and most of them perform perfectly. There is a way to customize what you see on the screen but Tommy opted to stay with the standard iPhone set up. No sense in confusing yourself until you know the phone inside and out. The screen is easy to use and the icons aren't as small as you would think them to be. Using the virtual keyboard isn't hard, there is no need for a stylus like you use with a PDA so right there, that is a perk for someone like me that is forever losing things.

What Comes With The iPhone?

When Tommy came back with this, everything was in a huge plastic AT&T bag so I had to sort through everything. He was standing there with headphones on saying how cool the iPhone was and that he could listen to music and answer calls at the same time. Wow, I can do that too, just take out an ear bud and hit the talk button on my phone. But hey, boys love toys so I indulge him. The headphones aren't a necessity because there are built in speakers on the sides of the iPhone. They don't crank out a lot of sound but considering the overall size of this, it sounds pretty good. You also get the USB cord and power cube that attaches to the USB cord to charge the phone. The docking station is small so it can fit pretty much anywhere on your desk. Tommy charged the phone briefly at his friends house but did follow the recommendations and allow it to charge completely before he [umm we] started playing around with it.

This is a good time to mention that there are currently no rebates or promotions going on for the iPhone. Now, that doesn't mean that individual stores won't have perks for customers or that they won't slide you something for free but nationally, there are no 'perks' given for buying a phone or signing up for the service. Does that mean that a month or two down the road you won't get something in the mail saying, "Bring this to your authorized AT&T store for a free gift" - only time will tell about that. Seeing what you get in the box and the price on the paper, you can't help but feel a little ripped off. Those are my words, not Tommy's. If you ask him this is better than the release of the PS2, Metal Gear Solid, Super Sheetz Chili Dog Specials, Christmas morning and the Easter bunny leaving you a crisp five dollar bill.

Since this is an Apple product I was worried that it would only work with an Apple computer. I guess if you are going to spend over six hundred dollars on a phone then you won't have a problem forking out more money for an Apple computer. But that isn't the case, this will work with a lot of different Windows based systems like Vista or XP. Can you import a Word document to the iPhone? I spent about ten minutes trying that and had no luck. Does that mean it is impossible? No. Does it mean that you can't? No. All it means is that I haven't figured out a way to do it yet. If worse comes to worse I guess I could email it to myself then access it on the iPhone, edit it and send it back to myself and access it from the desktop or laptop. Surely there has to be a simpler way and damn it, if there is, I will find out how.

Battery Power & Life

What's one thing that sucks about the iPhone? The battery. Tommy charged this for two hours and checked the battery power read out and it said that it was fully charged. "The Book" [user manual, 125 pages long and crammed with infrmation] claims that this has up to eight hours of talk time but that just simply isn't the case. Tommy used it for about two hours and it needed to go back on the charger for a few more hours. I am sure that he wasn't just chatting on the phone but even so, my crappy, bottom of the barrel Motorola i215 could be used for a lot longer than that without it up and dying on you. Part of this could be the light sensors in the iPhone, it adjusts the brightness of the screen based on how much light it is reading in the room. The more light that there is available, the less it draws from the battery. That means don't go running into the bathroom to play with this because you want to see how cool it is in the dark. Yes, that is the voice of experience talking.

On the upside to the power situation, the way that it is powered is pretty cool. The iPhone slides into the docking station that is connected to a USB port. That port can go into your computer or iPod or into the square little battery cube. That is what gets plugged into the wall. The downside, yes, there is always a downside in my opinion, if you want to take this with you on a trip or to the office you need to take the USB cord and power cube with you. I couldn't find a way to plug the docking station directly into the power cube but I am sure that if there is a way to do that, eventually we will figure it out.

If you own a cell phone you know that the battery and battery life is one of the most important things to consider. I have had pretty good luck with the Motorola ones so far but I knew that if I had a problem with them, I could buy a new one. That isn't the case with the iPhone. If it malfunctions or refuses to hold a charge, you have to contact Apple about it and let them deal with it. There is no way, that I have seen or read in the manual, to replace the battery. This means that you can't go out and buy an extra one or a replacement. Your iPhone is coved under a one year warranty plan; after that it will cost you $79.00 plus shipping fees to get the battery replaced. If the phone out and out dies after the one year warranty then you will have to pay $249.00 for service on the 8 gig version, $199.00 on the 4 gig version.

A Smart Phone?

But it's first and foremost a phone right? Well, ask a iPhone owner and they will snicker at you. Yes, it is a phone but it has so much more to offer the user that if you just it just as a phone, you are wasting your money buying it. One of the really cool things about the phone is that it's freakin' smart. If you are in a certain application like browsing a website and you turn the phone it changes the way you see the screen. This happens with the music service too; that was something that I didn't know about when I was playing around with it and it was a little annoying until I figured out that it was supposed to do that. So far we haven't been able to figure out if there is a way to disable this feature from the applications and we've read through "The Book" several times.

As far as the overall sound of the phone, when you use it as you would a regular phone [up to the ear] it sounds good but a lot of that depends on who you are talking to, the background noise of both callers and if you are actually holding the phone or trying to multi task and pressing it to your face with your shoulder. The iPhone is smart, maybe too smart. One of the things that is mentioned in the user manual is that the iPhone can sense when you are using the phone a certain way. It will temporarily turn off the touch screen so that you don't press the touch pad and activate something. Yeah, that is a little too space age for me.

A Glorified iPod?

So what abut the music features? Well, it will play songs that you burned a year ago or ones that you purchased from iTunes. I have to admit, seeing this in action is awesome. You can upload the cover art from CD's and use them as a way to store tracks so they are easy to fin. The Cover Flow is a nifty thing for people who don't just want to hear the music, they want some eye candy along with it. The sound is good but it didn't really impress me. Sorry Apple, I will stick with my Philips MP3 Player for the time being. You can use the provided headphones to listen or the speakers on the side of the phone. The headphones are nice but they look a little on the dinky side. That is the case with all earbud style headphones, none of them look like they are going to last all that long or hold up to a lot of use. Can you use a regular pair of headphones with the iPhone? Chances are they won't fit into the hole but there is hope, several companies have come out with adapters that you attach to the headphones that will allow you to use your headphones with it. Unless that set has a microphone, you won't be able to answer calls with it so in that case, it's just to listen to music or watch movies and save the life of the headphones or from excess wear on them.

I guess if you were thinking about getting a new iPod and a new cellular phone you could kill two birds with one stone and get the iPhone but you do have to think about your budget, how much you are willing to spend for service every month and what happens if you lose or destroy your iPhone. Can you buy insurance on the iPhone in case it is lost? What if it is stolen? I called the AT&T store after Tommy broke out into a cold sweat and asked them about this. You can buy an insurance plan that will cover it in case it is stolen but you have to provide a police report. What happens if you lose it? In layman's terms, you are basically out of luck. Chances are if you buy an iPhone you aren't going to misplace it or leave it somewhere, but things like that do happen.

The Most Important Purchase

Even before the iPhone was released, there was talk about the screen - as soon as I saw it I thought, "Humm, that isn't going to last very long in this house". Yes, you do get a cleaning cloth with it but I highly doubt you are going to sit there and polish it every single time you use it. Even new BMW owners give their babies a break now and then. So what's the most important purchase you can make in regards to your iPhone? A case to protect it. Now, we aren't talking those cheesy cases that you buy for your beloved Nintendo PSP or GameBoy Advance, we are walking about something that fits like a second skin. Tommy ordered one from Amazon for about ten dollars and is waiting for it to arrive. His friend ordered one and paid extra for expedited deliver and said that it is worth its weight in gold and doesn't obstruct the iPhones functions [non touch screen functions that is] in any way, shape or form.

I called him to ask him about this and he said that it is designed to protect the iPhone from getting scratched or damaged but you can't use the touch screen when it is on the iPhone. In this case, it pays to have the iPhone headphones on when you are on the go so you can answer calls and listen to music without having to remove the skin [case]. To me, this is a weird concept - you put something on it to protect it but at the same time it means that you can't use certain functions. I checked out some other shield and cases and decided to order Tommy the InvisibleShield one. It cost about three times as much as what he paid for the one he ordered from Amazon but it is guaranteed for life and doesn't impede with the performance of the iPhone.

Yahoo Mail & Messenger

So you say you can't get enough of Yahoo Mail or Yahoo Messenger? Well, with the iPhone you won't have to fire up your computer, log on and weed through things to stay in touch with family, friends or business contacts. This was something that really, really impressed me when we were transferring data from the computer to the iPhone. Everything that Tommy or I wanted to put on the phone was able to be transferred, and it didn't take an hour to do it or three hours to figure it out. As far as linking it with other messenger programs like AOL IM or Windows Messenger, that is something that you will have to access through the internet and once you are on their page, open the messenger program from there. Since neither of us use those it isn't a huge problem for us so that's not something we are all too critical about.

Other Cool Things You Can Do With Your iPhone

If you are someone that likes to have a lot of different tones or sounds on your phone for various alerts there are no shortage of options with the iPhone. You can get them up for your voicemail, text messages, emails, phone calls, appointments or calendar settings, sending emails out, locking the phones functions and even when you are typing on the virtual keyboard.

The Safari browser is nice but I don't like it as much as Opera or FireFox but I am not used to it yet. You can do the same things with Safari as you can with most other browsers including bookmarking, doing searches, access your email, have multiple browsers open and even import your saved bookmarks from your desktop computer.

You can set your iPhone up to display a persons photo graph or chosen image when they make a call to you or you access their name from the phonebook option. This is pretty cool but you are going to want to keep those pictures G rated, you never know who is going to be around when the phone rings.

If you like to make lists or write notes, there is an option in the notepad to send the information in an email. This is something that I can see is going to get a lot of use between Tommy and myself. This can save us a lot of time when we are both traveling or are out of the house all day. We can type stuff up on the fly and email it to whomever needs to see it.

Service Plans

Tommy went to pick this up by himself. If I were there chances are I would have tried to talk him into getting the 4 gig one instead of the 8 gig. It would have saved about two hundred dollars but I know that a couple months from now, he would be complaining that he was running out of memory. Since I didn't go with him, he was left with the choice of which pricing plan to go with. Thankfully he remembered what I said about going with the "middle of the road" when faced with these kinds of choices. AT&T is the provider for this in our area; for all I know they may be the only provider in the region or state. As soon as he came back from his little high tech adventure I started pouring through the massive amount of paper work that was in the bag. Contracts, early termination fees, over your usage fees, warranty information [one year, limited, lots of specifics t read about] .. how many innocent trees died for this promotion? I was digging through the mountain of papers that I got a call. It was Tommy calling from the kitchen asking me if I wanted anything to drink. That's when I reminded him that he only had 900 minutes a month; after which I heard a click followed by dead air.

The AT&T plan that he went with includes 900 day time minutes, unlimited night time [9:00 pm to 6:00 am] and weekend minutes, unlimited SMS / text messages [this is an additional fee of $20.00 a month] but are limited to 300 kbs per message, if you go over that, there is a .50 cent per message fee. Tommy is a text message addict and can easily send 50 - 75 a day, more when he is working or sending out jokes or porn to people. AT&T does offer a 1,500 text message package for an additional $15.00 but why risk it, you might was well spring the extra five dollars and get unlimited. This is a two year service contract with a $175.00 early termination fee. There are some important bits and pieces about activation and termination that you need to read before you sign or agree to anything and you do have 72 hours to cancel the contract and not be penalized. I have to assume that since AT&T has cornered the market on service plans for the iPhone that these are "across the boards" rules and regulations and won't vary much from store to store although if you live in a different state, there may be different rules to protect you so that "72 hours to cancel without an early termination fee" clause might not hold the same weight in every state.

I am glad that he went with the unlimited text message plan for this because I know that he is going to spend a lot of time sending text messages. When I saw the way that you have to type them up [an on screen keyboard I the QWERTY format] I figured that it was going to be a lot easier for him to use than that to use the T9 or numeric input that most phones have. A word to the wise, read and reread the contract about text messages and think long and hard about how many you send. The plan for the iPhone counts every single message - inbound, outbound, sending to multiple users etc. If you do a lot of texting or sign up to receive a lot of notifications then you may want to think about the 1,500 plan or unlimited.

Activating the phone, from what Tommy said, was easy. He stopped at his friend's house on the way back here and they went online and did the set up through iTunes. His friend had also purchased an iPhone and had his working in under ten minutes; thankfully he mentioned to Tommy that he was buying one so he offered to help him with the set up. Tommy said that he had the option to activate the phone at the store but didn't want to have to wait for someone to walk him through the process or have to wait in line again. The AT&T store that he went to is about 22 miles from the house, why he wanted to go there instead of a closer location is beyond me. He did do some calling around to see who had multiple phones and who was sold out of them so that may have been one of the reasons he drove all the way to South Hills Village for this.

Tommy did not get a text message letting him know that his service was activated, his friend did. He wasn't aware that he was supposed to get a text message letting him know about the activation so it wasn't like he was sitting there waiting for it to come through. In order to get an iPhone and activate it you do need to have a major credit card, be at least 18 years old [unless it is part of a family plan and someone else is assuming the billing fees] and have an iTune account.

The Bottom Line

Is the iPhone worth the money? That all depends on what you are going to do with it, how much you text or access the web and if you can afford the phone and service plan. Realistically you are looking at about a thousand dollars a year to have the iPhone up and running - and that is with a mid level plan that offers you unlimited web but limits your daytime minutes and number of text messages.

There is no denying that the iPhone looks great, performs nicely and offers you a lot of cool things but for someone like me, well, it can be overwhelming. I am sure that there are going to be a lot of stolen iPhones in the near future. The good thing about that is those stories will replace what color Britney Spears underwear is if Paris Hilton is following the rules of her probation. It's a sad day in news when the front page of my local newspaper is dedicated to iPhone sales and the people who camped out to get one. Sounds a lot like the Tickle Me Elmo and Cabbage Patch Kids craze huh?

The iPhone has a lot of potential but only time is going to tell if it is really the next "big thing" or if it falls by the wayside. From my side of the fence, I am impressed with the things that it can do but I am not sold on the notion that this is something that is going to replace desktop or laptop computers in the future. For now I am happy with what I have but that doesn't mean that I won't use the iPhone for email, surfing the internet or sending text messages. There are a lot of cool things that you can do with it but until the price drops, it's something that I'm just not willing to invest in. If I were smart I should have gotten a job with Apple to get a free iPhone .. at least that is the rumor that was floating around .. all employees were given a free iPhone. Everyone I talked to that worked for Apple was tight lipped about it or were playing dumb.

Twenty four hours after the purchase, Tommy was still fascinated with his iPhone and learning more about it with every slide of the finger. He wants to download movies, songs and images for the Cover Flow art section and thankfully most of that can be done without any extra fees .. at least that is what he says. We'll have to see when the first months bill arrives. If he wants to fork out that kind of money every month that's fine by me. I'll kick in a little cash to pay for the text messages I send and if I download any songs at iTunes but outside of that, he's on his own with the iPhone!


As always, thanks for the visit…

~^V^~ Freak ~^V^~

© 2007 Freak369



Kyocera 1135
Audiovox MVX-475
Kyocera 2135
Nokia N-Gage
Motorola i215

Uniden Eco Trek2 Series 2 Way Radio [FRS420]

Verizon Mobile Phone Service in San Diego
Boost Mobile Prepaid Cellular Service
Verizon Mobile Phone Service in San Diego