Crew_Chief
07-02-2007, 01:36 AM
I would like to start out by saying sorry to everyone; I know I’m going to a lot of hatred for posting a review for a Cingular iPhone on Sprintusers, but I’d like to explain why I’m doing this, and try to discourage anyone who currently has Sprint from making the same mistake I did. Plus, I know you want to know how the iPhone seriously holds up against the competition, and against Sprint.
I will be comparing the first generation iPhone with the first generation Treo 755p, and against my Sanyo-9000.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/the_pathogen/2-1.jpg
I don’t quite recall when the iPhone marketing campaign was first launched, but if you have walked into a public place within the last 6 months, you’ve heard the iPhone’s name. Last week you heard the advertisements everywhere, I don’t even watch TV (hell, I don’t even have cable) but I saw pictures of it everywhere. This is easily the single most marketed and wanted phone since Bell released theirs over 100 years ago.
That being the case, and the fact that I’m a millionaire that likes toys, I had to get one. I bought this on Saturday June 30th, at a local Cingular store inside a mall. There were 4 other people buying this exact same phone at the same time I was there that day. I actually stopped into a 3rd party store first, only to be told that corporate Cingular stores and Apples stores carry this device exclusively. When I told the young man behind the counter that I wanted an iPhone, and that I was a new customer to Cingular, he didn’t seem too pleased. I figured this would be the best day for a cell phone sales person, literally millions of people want to sign up for service as soon as possible, I figured his commission check would be triple that month.
Immediately he hands me a small sheet labeled, “Important things to know about activating an iPhone” Included on this list were several things I found interesting:
“We do not activate you phone, it must be activated through iTunes”
“There is a 10% restock fee if the package is opened”
“This phone is not covered by any sort of additional insurance, besides the limited warranty provided by Apple at Apple Stores, in order to replace your phone you may be required to mail your phone to a service center and be without your phone temporarily.”
“You must activate the phone and sign up for a two-year service agreement with Cingular to use this device.”
Wow, that’s a lot, and that wasn’t all, there were other very interesting bulletins on this laundry list of reasons not to buy this phone, but that’s all I’m going to list. Let’s just quickly review for those of you who didn’t completely comprehend everything listed above: it’s going to cost you 50 or 65 dollars just to open the plastic and turn the phone on, it then requires a 36 dollar activation fee to activate it, which is not refunded by Cingular even if you return the device. This means you pay 86 dollars just to handle an iPhone in your hands. Also, if it breaks, or you lose it, or damage it, you must buy a new phone at the price tag of 499 or 649.
That being said, I bought one. Now I understand why the sales person wasn’t too happy, he probably makes little to no commission on a phone he doesn’t activate, I’m sure the guys at the Apple Stores are loving it though, I bet they get paid on gross sales, not on contracts. The salesmen basically just ran my credit to see if there would be a deposit (which can be up to 600 dollars with Cingular), and then ran my credit card to give me the phone.
“Fantastic!” I thought, I now have an iPhone.
When I got back to my office, I tore open the packaging and opened it immediately. The presentation inside the boxes lets you know that you just paid 499 for this product, and that it’s going to rock your world. I turned it on and the screen was beautifully vibrant, and the phone said to me, “You need to activate your phone with iTunes.” I should mention right here that I’m a WMP sort of person, not an iTunes person, although I’ll blow 86 dollars on a phone I’m going to return, I’m not going to pay for music downloads. So I install iTunes and fumble around with it, until it launches the activation screens. I have to say that it didn’t take very long to activate, maybe 20 minutes, but internet is very much required to activate it, and also a computer that supports iTunes along with a credit card.
It’s a beautiful, naked, and fun to touch, just like how I like my ladies; I had the feeling that me and this device would get along.
I currently have one of the sweetest Sprint phones out right now, the Palm Treo 755p, and I heard that the iPhone can do everything that the Treo does, plus more. Now is the time to find that out. So, let’s review how this phone actually works:
The touch screen its self works very well, but it only works when you touch it with your skin, I couldn’t get it work wearing gloves, nor did my Treo Stylus work either. You have to touch it with your finger or toes or tongue, whatever works best for you. I’m okay with the finger only touch screen, unlike the Treo, the iPhone features a huge screen, and the buttons on the main page are certainly large enough to tap easily. Right away I saw a problem compared to the Treo, even though I can navigate most things on my Treo with the touch screen, the button movements are so much more responsive that I prefer them. But the iPhone was designed to not have buttons, so the response time is good, but not nearly as good as a Treo.
Now that I actually can use it, I wanted to play with the software next of course. There’s only 16 things this phone actually does, and that’s all it does; text, calendar, photos, camera, YouTube, stocks, maps, Weather, clock, calculator, notes, settings, email, iPod, Safari (web browser), and the phone it’s self. I started navigating through each program, played with a bit, and then tried another one. There are no games or 3rd party applications at all for the iPhone, or at least that have been released.
Navigation through and between programs is fluid and easy, the iPhone’s hardware is extremely impressive in that light. There’s almost no load time what-so-ever with programs. On the Treo, there is a bit of a wait time, but none so excessive that I actual pause and think to myself, “What is my phone doing?” I don’t think the iPhone’s software would crash very often (I haven’t experienced a crash or rest yet), I think the platform it’s biased off of is stable enough to support all the preloaded stuff that came along; this is opposite of the Palm OS, which barely can run its self without crashing.
My most important feature I use every day is my Navigation systems. Right now I carry around two phones, my Sanyo 9000, and my Treo 755; I carry around the Sanyo 9000 because I need the GPS so very badly every day, and Telenav is my solution. I was happy to hear that the iPhone comes with a navigation system, and it was the first program I tested out. When it loaded it looked exactly like the program I use on my Treo, GoogleMaps. Infact, it is the same program I use on my Treo! It looks exactly the same and works exactly the same. This phone has no Navigation on it what so ever!!! Nor can you buy a 150 dollar Bluetooth receiver to install navigation! Sure, you can get driving directions from it, but you can do that from any POS phone with internet access. Hell, Sprint’s Directory Assistance can actually locate where you’re at from your phone and give you driving directions better then the iPhone can! Disappointing.
Next I had to try out internet browsing. I knew that almost anything can beat the Treo’s Blazer, I’d bet that a monkey with chalk drawing me websites would be Blazer, so how will the iPhone’s web browser work? Very well actually. Safari is a decent browser in and around its self on Mac’n’trash and converts easily to a mobile phone. I tapped the URL address and the on-screen keyboard came up (which I’ll talk more about later), after I fumbled for way too long just trying to type google.com, it finally worked and I was presented with a very nice layout. I then did a Google search for Myspace (which again took way too long to type) and way presented what I believed to be an extremely small version of the Myspace. You see, when Safari on the iPhone loads a webpage, it shows you the whole page, it zooms you out to see everything. You then need to double tap to zoom in to see text or click a link. This is a pain in the butt on a page like Myspace, where no matter where you click it’s a link. I must have tapped “stop” 5 times before I got to the login field like I wanted. Again, the onscreen keyboard, which was now a nuisance. A cool thing about Safari is that when you rotate the phone, the whole program rotates too (as you’ll see in the video), so you can get the best possible view you want. I have to say that the iPhone probably does have the single best internet browsing I’ve ever used on a device of this size, apart from the tap-to-zoom and the keyboard, it’s exactly what I was looking for. Again, browsing on this thing is great. Web pages even load quicker on the iPhone then they do on my Treo, because on the iPhone it shows as much as it possibly can while loading, where as my Treo waits until it’s nearly done downloading before it shows you anything.
I will be comparing the first generation iPhone with the first generation Treo 755p, and against my Sanyo-9000.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v648/the_pathogen/2-1.jpg
I don’t quite recall when the iPhone marketing campaign was first launched, but if you have walked into a public place within the last 6 months, you’ve heard the iPhone’s name. Last week you heard the advertisements everywhere, I don’t even watch TV (hell, I don’t even have cable) but I saw pictures of it everywhere. This is easily the single most marketed and wanted phone since Bell released theirs over 100 years ago.
That being the case, and the fact that I’m a millionaire that likes toys, I had to get one. I bought this on Saturday June 30th, at a local Cingular store inside a mall. There were 4 other people buying this exact same phone at the same time I was there that day. I actually stopped into a 3rd party store first, only to be told that corporate Cingular stores and Apples stores carry this device exclusively. When I told the young man behind the counter that I wanted an iPhone, and that I was a new customer to Cingular, he didn’t seem too pleased. I figured this would be the best day for a cell phone sales person, literally millions of people want to sign up for service as soon as possible, I figured his commission check would be triple that month.
Immediately he hands me a small sheet labeled, “Important things to know about activating an iPhone” Included on this list were several things I found interesting:
“We do not activate you phone, it must be activated through iTunes”
“There is a 10% restock fee if the package is opened”
“This phone is not covered by any sort of additional insurance, besides the limited warranty provided by Apple at Apple Stores, in order to replace your phone you may be required to mail your phone to a service center and be without your phone temporarily.”
“You must activate the phone and sign up for a two-year service agreement with Cingular to use this device.”
Wow, that’s a lot, and that wasn’t all, there were other very interesting bulletins on this laundry list of reasons not to buy this phone, but that’s all I’m going to list. Let’s just quickly review for those of you who didn’t completely comprehend everything listed above: it’s going to cost you 50 or 65 dollars just to open the plastic and turn the phone on, it then requires a 36 dollar activation fee to activate it, which is not refunded by Cingular even if you return the device. This means you pay 86 dollars just to handle an iPhone in your hands. Also, if it breaks, or you lose it, or damage it, you must buy a new phone at the price tag of 499 or 649.
That being said, I bought one. Now I understand why the sales person wasn’t too happy, he probably makes little to no commission on a phone he doesn’t activate, I’m sure the guys at the Apple Stores are loving it though, I bet they get paid on gross sales, not on contracts. The salesmen basically just ran my credit to see if there would be a deposit (which can be up to 600 dollars with Cingular), and then ran my credit card to give me the phone.
“Fantastic!” I thought, I now have an iPhone.
When I got back to my office, I tore open the packaging and opened it immediately. The presentation inside the boxes lets you know that you just paid 499 for this product, and that it’s going to rock your world. I turned it on and the screen was beautifully vibrant, and the phone said to me, “You need to activate your phone with iTunes.” I should mention right here that I’m a WMP sort of person, not an iTunes person, although I’ll blow 86 dollars on a phone I’m going to return, I’m not going to pay for music downloads. So I install iTunes and fumble around with it, until it launches the activation screens. I have to say that it didn’t take very long to activate, maybe 20 minutes, but internet is very much required to activate it, and also a computer that supports iTunes along with a credit card.
It’s a beautiful, naked, and fun to touch, just like how I like my ladies; I had the feeling that me and this device would get along.
I currently have one of the sweetest Sprint phones out right now, the Palm Treo 755p, and I heard that the iPhone can do everything that the Treo does, plus more. Now is the time to find that out. So, let’s review how this phone actually works:
The touch screen its self works very well, but it only works when you touch it with your skin, I couldn’t get it work wearing gloves, nor did my Treo Stylus work either. You have to touch it with your finger or toes or tongue, whatever works best for you. I’m okay with the finger only touch screen, unlike the Treo, the iPhone features a huge screen, and the buttons on the main page are certainly large enough to tap easily. Right away I saw a problem compared to the Treo, even though I can navigate most things on my Treo with the touch screen, the button movements are so much more responsive that I prefer them. But the iPhone was designed to not have buttons, so the response time is good, but not nearly as good as a Treo.
Now that I actually can use it, I wanted to play with the software next of course. There’s only 16 things this phone actually does, and that’s all it does; text, calendar, photos, camera, YouTube, stocks, maps, Weather, clock, calculator, notes, settings, email, iPod, Safari (web browser), and the phone it’s self. I started navigating through each program, played with a bit, and then tried another one. There are no games or 3rd party applications at all for the iPhone, or at least that have been released.
Navigation through and between programs is fluid and easy, the iPhone’s hardware is extremely impressive in that light. There’s almost no load time what-so-ever with programs. On the Treo, there is a bit of a wait time, but none so excessive that I actual pause and think to myself, “What is my phone doing?” I don’t think the iPhone’s software would crash very often (I haven’t experienced a crash or rest yet), I think the platform it’s biased off of is stable enough to support all the preloaded stuff that came along; this is opposite of the Palm OS, which barely can run its self without crashing.
My most important feature I use every day is my Navigation systems. Right now I carry around two phones, my Sanyo 9000, and my Treo 755; I carry around the Sanyo 9000 because I need the GPS so very badly every day, and Telenav is my solution. I was happy to hear that the iPhone comes with a navigation system, and it was the first program I tested out. When it loaded it looked exactly like the program I use on my Treo, GoogleMaps. Infact, it is the same program I use on my Treo! It looks exactly the same and works exactly the same. This phone has no Navigation on it what so ever!!! Nor can you buy a 150 dollar Bluetooth receiver to install navigation! Sure, you can get driving directions from it, but you can do that from any POS phone with internet access. Hell, Sprint’s Directory Assistance can actually locate where you’re at from your phone and give you driving directions better then the iPhone can! Disappointing.
Next I had to try out internet browsing. I knew that almost anything can beat the Treo’s Blazer, I’d bet that a monkey with chalk drawing me websites would be Blazer, so how will the iPhone’s web browser work? Very well actually. Safari is a decent browser in and around its self on Mac’n’trash and converts easily to a mobile phone. I tapped the URL address and the on-screen keyboard came up (which I’ll talk more about later), after I fumbled for way too long just trying to type google.com, it finally worked and I was presented with a very nice layout. I then did a Google search for Myspace (which again took way too long to type) and way presented what I believed to be an extremely small version of the Myspace. You see, when Safari on the iPhone loads a webpage, it shows you the whole page, it zooms you out to see everything. You then need to double tap to zoom in to see text or click a link. This is a pain in the butt on a page like Myspace, where no matter where you click it’s a link. I must have tapped “stop” 5 times before I got to the login field like I wanted. Again, the onscreen keyboard, which was now a nuisance. A cool thing about Safari is that when you rotate the phone, the whole program rotates too (as you’ll see in the video), so you can get the best possible view you want. I have to say that the iPhone probably does have the single best internet browsing I’ve ever used on a device of this size, apart from the tap-to-zoom and the keyboard, it’s exactly what I was looking for. Again, browsing on this thing is great. Web pages even load quicker on the iPhone then they do on my Treo, because on the iPhone it shows as much as it possibly can while loading, where as my Treo waits until it’s nearly done downloading before it shows you anything.