[OM_user]

I have no landline phone either and opted to use only my cell. It's risky to be sure, because cells are obviously more prone to breakage, battery depletion, loss or theft. But I live with that risk.
That's why I have additional coverage on my cellphone. After I lost my first cellphone a few years back I had to buy a new one (used actually) out of my own pocket. The $5 a month for coverage I have with Verizon allows me to walk into any of their stores and tell them my phone is broken/lost/damage, etc. and they set me up with a new one within 15 minutes. It's piece of mind for me since it's my only personal phone.
I don't know for sure but I imagine AT&T has a similar plan. That may not cover having to send the iPhone away for battery replacement, but it can help in a bunch of other situations you might find yourself in.
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As for this article, this was an excellent review with a ton of information. A bit of it was stuff we already knew, but it was good to read the perspective of someone using it, not just Apple's PR documentation.
I have one question about the web browsing on iPhone. I'm wondering how easy it is to enter text in fields on webpages, for ex. in a forum like this, or, more importantly, entering a name/password into fields like signing in to nytimes.com or macworld.com. I imagine it can be done since they show so many demos using the Times news page, but it isn't shown how this works. Can you easily pull up a keyboard after you click in a field? Or does the syncing fro your PC/Mac automatically add in your accounts to pages that require authorization to view.
Lastly, I'd like to see someone set up their iPhone to work with a company Exchange server. I've seen images of the Add account page under email and it looks like it supports Exchange, but I'm wondering what kind of info it asks for. I guess this may be one of those more 'manual' email accounts to set up that was mentioned in the review.

[Euge]

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That's why I have additional coverage on my cellphone.
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I don't know for sure but I imagine AT&T has a similar plan.

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AT&T doesn't offer insurance for most of their smart phones, including the IPAQ, Treo, Blackberry, Blackjack, or iPhone /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif
I imagine the phone costs are too high to make money on insurance.

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Can you easily pull up a keyboard after you click in a field?

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Yes, you can zoom in, and when you tap the field, the keyboard appears.

[jwharding28]

Do 3rd party outfits exist that offer insurance on AT&T phones?

[Nobody]

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If my car needs to be in a shop for a week, its my responsibility to deal with not having a car for a week.

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That's not true if you buy a Hyundai around here. They always give you a free loaner for as long as they have your car. Now THAT is service and that's what Apple customers deserve if they are to become future fanboys, IMO. Otherwise, it's just a load of apologetic nonsense excuses for why they decided to build a phone where you can't just change the battery yourself (i.e. BAD BAD BAD design decision there). Some people can't afford to be without their phone for 3 days and most people don't want a 'loaner' period. We have come to EXPECT to be able to change our batteries out ourselves on a phone.
So instead of being apologists for Apple, why don't we just call this what it actually is for a change and that's a BAD design decision on Apple's part. I know some people on here will never see the truth for what it is because they view the world through tinted lenses, but it is what it is to the rest of us.

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If my computer needs to be repaired and is gone for 10 days, its my

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Your comparison is a very BAD one because this is NOT a repair. It's a change of battery! But I get it. You LOVE Apple and you don't CARE if they make you jump through hoops. That's great. But it doesn't speak for all of us.

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On other products, they have a removable battery. The iPhone doesn't. If it did have a removable battery, it wouldn't be as thin, and maybe as durable. This is Apple's DESIGN decision. Its their product to engineer. And I assume they didn't make it non-user replaceable, just to be a pain in the ass to their customers.

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More apologetic excuses. My nearest Apple store is 70+ miles from here also, so even if they COULD do it there, it'd still be an inconvenience. I should be able to buy a new battery at Best Buy or something that is almost everywhere and put it in myself. Why does THIN mean it's hard to replace? I'm guessing they simply don't want you to take the cover off period (i.e. they want to discourage any and all hacking that might lead to an unlocked iPhone and royally tick off AT&T. It's the same reason iPhone doesn't have instant messaging. The reason it doesn't have Flash is that they want to push Quicktime. They're hoping iPhone will be a runaway success and that they'll be able to leverage that against web sites to switch to Quicktime and ditch Flash. If that doesn't happen in the next 6 months to a year or enough people complain, they'll suddenly reverse their decision and Flash will magically appear. You can't tell me they couldn't have had it for Version 1.0 because the plug-in exists for Safari 3.0 and iPhone uses Safari 3.0. They PURPOSELY left it out!

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(I doubt they're making money hand over fist with the $80 fee.) I trust they

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LOL. I don't know of ANY cell phone battery that costs anywhere NEAR $80. They are SOAKING iPhone users. Oh, it takes skill to change the battery? Again, that tells me it's either a BAD design or they PLANNED to make money that way in the first place, in which case it's worse than BAD, it's downright evil (as in the worst sort of Capitalism evil where they expect you to pay through the nose for every little thing; kind of like the 'renting songs' concept instead of buying them once that the industry has kicked around for some time). I'm an Electronic Engineer with two degrees who has built entire projects from Auto-Cad to etching, drilling and mounting my own boards, so I don't care how much skill it takes to change that battery, I could easily do it myself, but alas there is no such option.

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took in consideration how many people need to replace their battery, and how often. If 90% of people had to change their battery every 6 months, I trust they would have designed it differently.

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That's the problem. You 'trust' WAY too much, IMO. Apple is not a religion or a god to me. It doesn't deserve my faith or my trust. It's a company out to make money off our backs, nothing more. If they want our money, they should earn it. Clearly, these things will not and have not stopped many people from buying it anyway. I'll wait and see what version 2.0 has to offer and reevaluate it at that time. V1.0 holds too many drawbacks. I'm guessing most will disappear by version 2.0. Of course, by then, someone like Nokia might have its own iPhone killer and I can get it on Sprint's MUCH faster network instead. If they could run Firefox 3.x on such a phone, I'd be a happy camper. Imagine 3rd party downloadable browser extensions for your phone! THAT would be awesome!
The bottom line for me is this is a phone that claims to be OSX and running a 'real' version of the Internet, but it's just not true. They purposely left Flash support out. They purposely left instant messaging out. MAYBE it'll get one or both of them in time, but with no announcements about anything they plan to do in the future, I have NOTHING to base a decision on if I need those features. Apple is TOO closed mouthed about the future, IMO. People tend to make (or should make, IMO) buying decisions on what they know long term, not on what they HOPE for long term. Apple does not need to be so secretive at this point. The hardware is out. How about a nice 'to do' list. How about 'to do list' support in Calendar for that matter? Maybe it's coming. Maybe it's not. They won't tell us ahead of time.

[Dan Frakes]

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I have one question about the web browsing on iPhone. I'm wondering how easy it is to enter text in fields on webpages, for ex. in a forum like this, or, more importantly, entering a name/password into fields like signing in to nytimes.com or macworld.com. I imagine it can be done since they show so many demos using the Times news page, but it isn't shown how this works. Can you easily pull up a keyboard after you click in a field?

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Whenever you tap on a text field on a Web page, Safari zooms in to that field and pops up the keyboard.

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Lastly, I'd like to see someone set up their iPhone to work with a company Exchange server. I've seen images of the Add account page under email and it looks like it supports Exchange, but I'm wondering what kind of info it asks for. I guess this may be one of those more 'manual' email accounts to set up that was mentioned in the review.

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The "Exchange support" basically amounts to IMAP support; in fact, the setup screens for Exchange and IMAP accounts are identical. Your IT department has to enable IMAP on the Exchange server.

[np3]

The iPhone is extremely attractive to me, but there seems to be one sticking point. I've heard conflicting reports in terms of the email functionality. I have been a blackberry user for a few years now, and have come to depend on the push technology. I am one of those "fast thumb typers" that is referred to in the review! How easy/difficult is it to get emails on the iPhone? Will I have to wait for them to load each time I open the Mail application? I also heard that Apple has entered into an exclusive deal with Yahoo, where Yahoo will push their emails only to the iPhone. This is total word of mouth (haven't had to time to research & confirm), but if so, between AT&T & Yahoo, Apple seems to be limiting it's options for consumers. If anyone has any feedback about any of this, I'd appreciate it. Thanks!

[hillstones]

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Let's hope that Apple will offer upgrades to the operating system and apps. I would not like to have to buy new hardware to get upgraded software. This is one topic I haven't heard much about.

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It going to happen. Apple is on record that they will update both the System Software & Applictions.
Look at the iPod, get update from time to time. (<---no longer true!)
Look at the Apple TV, first get YouTube and now Photo streaming, 2 features not on the 1.0 version.

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Apple no longer updates the iPod family with system software. They introduce a new iPod with new features to force the customer to buy a new iPod. For example, a lot of features from the 5th Gen Video iPod and Nano can be added to the previous Color iPods with a software update (Improved Search, Screen Lock, Stopwatch, Support for the external FM Tuner, Gapless playback, etc).
However, Apple has chosen to abandon previous iPods and force customers to buy new iPods if they want new software-based features. When those features were demonstrated, it was clearly noted that only the current 5th gen iPods would receive the update. The features noted above could easily be added to prior color iPods through a software update, but Apple wants you to buy a new iPod to get new features.
So I could easily see Apple demo new iPhones with new features and a software update would only apply to the current hardware release, leaving earlier hardware releases out in the wind.
In the next few years, the iPhone price will drop significantly. The original iPod Photo at $599 was a complete failure. Apple quickly realized this and offered models with less accessories and various hard drives to lower costs to increase sales. The current 80 GB iPod Video at $349 is much more popular than the original iPod Photo.
The "early adopters" are quickly buying iPhones and good for them. But I think most people are waiting for a future generation with real storage capacity. I am not wasting $600 for 8 GB of memory. Flash memory is not that hard to come by, they could have done a larger model.

[jayman30]

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Another design reference is the Treo with it's relatively sealed case (and SIM card tray) for the "innards," but with a removable battery tray. It's quite solid, but still has a removable battery. Sure, it's thicker, but that's not solely because of the battery design (and it's also why I refer to it simply as a design "reference").

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I understand what you mean about a removable battery being a desirable feature, but my Treo 650 died after being dropped from waist high onto concrete, the battery popped out and went flying. The plastic case, screen and battery were badly gouged and scuffed.
I'm considering the iPhone for its durability alone. The CNet torture test test was brutal--I don't know of any other phone that could survive that abuse with out a protective case.
jayman30

[MacAddict4Life]

First just let me say, I got one on Tuesday, and I love it.
That aside, lets talk GPS. If I am not mistaken, Federal law in the US has, for awhile now, said that EVERY phone MUST have a GPS locator. This is to allow the adoption of advanced emergency services support, so that when you call 911 you can be connected to local dispatch, AND they can get your location. Many municipalities support this already (in the City of San Francisco a 911 call routes to local dispatch, though I do not know if they use the GPS to get your location).
I do not know if such a GPS locator is adequate for use the same way a commercial GPS is. If it is not, I would expect GPS to be an add-on, and not internal later. Those who don't need or want it wouldn't have to pay for it, plus it could connect via Bluetooth (or the dock connector) and have its own battery, taking the burden of another wireless transmitter off of the internal battery, therefore minimizing the battery life hit from use.
There are several other ways an external could be done, and I definitely think an add-on is more likely unless the integrated GPS federal law requires is adequate for driving directions and whatnot.

[Jason Snell]

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If I am not mistaken, Federal law in the US has, for awhile now, said that EVERY phone MUST have a GPS locator

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Nope. Federal law says that most phones must have a locator (doesn't have to be GPS; it can triangulate based on cell tower reception) that resolves within 300 meters and furnish that data to emergency personnel (doesn't have to be a feature accessible to users).

[BenUNC]

so I am assuming I am just missing it, but where are the battery life tests recorded?

[midnightrider379]

apple seems to be the leader in everything just look at he iphone now everyone wants to make one that looks like it, look at the ipod its the same way the mac air wasn't the first sub-compact it just did it best

[Ozzie2001]

This article ignores the fact that the iPhone 3G make a whole line of stereo docking systems obsolete. Some really expensive car docks no longer charge the iPhone 3G and some cool desktop solutions are also rendered obsolete. How can you tell if a desktop system is going charge the iPhone 3G? I need reviews of iPhone 3G supported systems/adapters. Does anybody offer an adapter to make the hundreds of devices that used to charge the iPod and iPhone work with the iPhone 3G? I would really like to use the charger in my MINI Cooper to charge the 3G power hungary phone like it did with the previous iPhone and IPod. Or charge the phone in the JBL On stage?