Hre is an update to the post about buying a new iPhone, after I have had a chance to use it for a few days.  On Saturday, I broke down and finally bought a new iPhone. After Apple reduced the price of the 8Gb model by $200, it seemed like a good deal. My existing phone with AT&T cost me $20 a month for the data plan (with no text messaging) and the new iPhone data plan is the same cost, so on a monthly basis there was no increase in costs, plus I get 200 text messages included. There is just no comparision between my old Windows Mobile phone and the new iPhone. I can actually use the iPhone for email and web browsing while that old phone was almost worthless for that. I actually don’t use my phone as much for voice calls as for data, so it made a lot of sense to go with the iPhone.

I have now had a chance to use the phone for a few days and clearly state that this is by far the best phone I have ever used, even exceeding the Blackberry phone that I had while I was working.  I would even go as far as to say it is the best user interface on any device I have ever used.

My previous phone was a Cingular 3125.  It had Microsoft Mobile 5.0 on it but had a regular cell phone keypad. It was very hard to read email messages on it and for me to send a message meant only a few words.  I did like the slim design.  However it got poor reception. When I complained about that initially, the Cingular store said it was just our local town and since I was new to Cingular, I was not sure.  But with the iPhone, now on the same network, gets 4 bars of reception in the exact same place my old phone barely could get one.

The iPhone is the first phone I have ever seen that browsing the web is at all practical.  Sure it is not as useful as a regular computer, but you can’t put a computer in your pocket either.  The fact that it uses WiFi is a big plus since the Edgne network can be slow (as I already knew from my old Windows Mobile phone).  It would have been nice to have the iPhone use the new 3G network, but for me I rarely would be in a place to take advantage of that at this point in time.

There are tons of reports on the workings of the iPhone so I will stop here and just say I am very pleased with the phone.  I just need to learn to type on the touch sensitive screen that has no tactile feedback. I am improving but have some ways to go.   Apple has once again taking a mature market and turned it upside down.

Categories: Computer
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