I can’t really explain the off topic post other than say that I have other hobbies and don’t want to have a second blog.  Below is my assessment of the iPhone after 7 days of ownership.  On my scale of 1-10, here is how I rate the iPhone.

 

6 – Availability.  I stood in line the day after the phone came 0ut for about 2 hours.  I jumped in line about 3pm and was able to get a white 16GB phone.  They were out of the 16GB black.  Today, I went online to check availability and availability looks spotty…..Apple Biltmore did not have any in stock today.  You can check their website after 9pm to see which stores have which colors/sizes before you go to shop.  I spent this morning trying to call the Apple Biltmore store, but there was no answer (after 10am).

 

8 – In store experience.  The Apple employees are always so friendly, and last Saturday was no exception.  Once I had an employee assigned to help me, the process was quick.  He retrieved the phone from the back quickly, and used his handheld device to ring me up on the spot. 

 

After one week, I returned to the Apple store to have them address a hardware problem with my iPhone (see Speakers below).  When I got there, they welcomed my dog Banjo and I into the store.  However, it seems that I have to talk to the folks at the Genius Bar to have them verify the problem.  The first available appointment was 2 days later (on Monday).

 

10 – Switching Services.  The Apple employee that helped me took me thru the process of switching my service from Verizon to AT&T.  Since I did not have a contract with Verizon, this made things very simple.  I must say that Verizon gave me great customer support in explaining the process before I went into the Apple store.

 

9 – Activation.  Despite the horror stories in the news, this process was pretty simple for me.  There was one hitch though.  At the end of my sale, the Apple employee pointed me to one of Macbooks in the store to activate my phone.  I plugged in, and iTunes found my phone, displayed an error, then said that I had activated successfully.  I was a bit worried since it never asked me for my Apple ID and wondered if it may have activated under the last guys Apple ID.  I went home and plugged into iTunes, I entered my Apple ID and it really activated this time….quickly. 

 

10 – Ability and ease to add new applications to your iPhone.  This is one of the cool things with the App Store.  And you can add apps to your new or old iPhone or iTouchApp Store. A lot of cool free apps, but I haven’t tried any apps yet that you have to buy.  Beer lovers check out iPint, and Star Wars fans check out PhoneSaber.  Control your PC with VNC.  Other great free apps are Where, Yes/No Free, Pandora (this ROCKS), RotaryDialer, YPMobile, Showtimes, FlatLux, Shazam.  The extendability is limitless.

 

3 – Navigation Software.  This is a big disappointment for me.  Having had Verizon’s navigation on my previous phone, and used the Navigation system in Hertz rentals, there are some key shortcomings with the iPhone navigation.  First, there is no turn-by-turn audio which means if you are driving, you have to look at your phone.  Second, even the turn-by-turn instructions on screen are difficult to use on the phone.  I believe that this can be corrected with software enhancements and am seeing articles on the web that show companies are developing better software.  I am optimistic that this will get better.  There are other location based applications that look like they work pretty good.

 

9 – Syncing.  I am now using a Macbook and have MobileMe.  They tout that you can sync with PCs now with MobileMe, but I haven’t tried it.  iTunes works like a pro and the same as an iPod.  Applications can be retrieved from iTunes and synced.  Address Book and iCal do a great job syncing.   This is great since you don’t have to enter all your contacts from your phone.  I have 4 POP3 email accounts set up to send/receive directly to my iPhone.  Syncing with iPhoto is great!  I set up 2 smart albums (one with photos 1 year or newer, and one with rating = 5) to give me all my favorite and recent photos automatically synced to my phone.

 

9 – Multitouch User Interface.  This is an awesome user interface and meets my needs in almost every way.  I do not use this phone for work email.  The keypad is slower to type on and a bit more innacturate than something like a Blackberry.   This will definitely force me to be concise in my emails. 

 

7 – Making and receiving calls. The biggest problem is no voice dialing.  The closest thing I could find is a free app called SpeechCloud that you can download.  It will let you say the person you want to call from your Contacts.  But, you will need to still choose the number manually. 

 

I could set my old phone to use a single digit for speed dialing.  This was very easy to use for driving.  Now, I have to unlock my phone, hit the phone icon, hit the Favorites icon, then tap a contact that I put in favorites.

 

Receiving calls are pretty simple.  Muting, taking and call waiting are simple taps on the screen.

 

Setting on vibrate, silencing a call and sending to voicemail are all easy using hard buttons on the edge of the phone.

 

9 – Phone Service.  I have been a Verizon (Cellular One previously) customer for about 15 years.   Frankly this was my biggest worry about switching.  Verizon has given me great service, and would have preferred to have an iPhone with them.  But, so far, I don’t have any AT&T complaints.  No dropped calls yet, but I only get 1 bar at my house in North Phoenix (I-17 and Dixaleta). 

 

8 – WiFi.  I have a wireless N network at my house and I have no problems using this with encryption.  The only annoyance is if I am someplace on the 3G network because I cant authenticate to an exisiting wifi, I get popups about wifi availability. But, you can disable this. 

 

8 – 3G network and availability.  I have had it when I wanted it, but I have noticed places where it is not in range of 3G. 

 

7 – Using Safari.  I can’t really compare this to any other phone since I never thought this would be realistic to use on my old phone.  If you can find websites that are designed for mobile devices, this is much better.  Try reading this blog on your iPhone as an example.  I found that I need to have my pictures stored smaller rather than telling the browser to display them smaller.  This makes my web page load slow. In the iPhone.  Normal web sites are difficult to read and you will have to zoom over the text to read.

 

5 – Battery Life.   Man, this thing eats the battery.  My typical day over the last 7 days had me listen to the music for my 1 hour commute each way.  Once at work, I may spend up to 30 minutes farting around.  Maybe another 30 min showing it off to co-workers.   I also spent about another 30 min on the phone throughout the day.  Once I got home and showed it to my neighbor, I had gone through 75% of the battery.  Plan to tote your car charger and USB charger around with you. 

 

10 – Form Factor.  Apple has this mastered.  This thing slides into my pocket so easily.  It is stylish, with curved edges.

 

5 – Speakers.  One of my speakers is not working properly.  I am not sure I would have noticed this problem since the speaker actually sounds pretty good.  When I put my finger over each one of the speakers, it was obvious that there was one speaker that was not working.  Speakerphone works great (even with one speaker).  You can even listen to music through the speakers, granted, they are not that loud.

 

9 – Video.  Quality of video stored on your phone is awesome!  Rent a movie from iTunes to check it out.  Connecting to YouTube to watch videos is not very good quality (especially on 3G). 

 

10 – Cool Factor.  Need I say more?

 

8.5 – Overall Rating.  Overall, I love this thing.  Making and having phone conversations work well. The range of applications let you carry just one device.  The navigation application is not usable if you are the driver.  Battery Life is poor.

 

-GrillDude