If so, what did you pay, and what do you think???? I know the initial pre-reviews were good, but I'd love to know what 'real' people think.

I remember hearing that the one down side was that the iPhone doesn't include phone serivce...meaning you have to pay extra for your cell phone plan? Can they convert the new iPhone to use your current cell phone number?

After seeing all the lines on TV, I'm amazed that no one here has bought one.......yet!!!

quote:

Originally posted by Barb (and Art):
I remember hearing that the one down side was that the iPhone doesn't include phone serivce...meaning you have to pay extra for your cell phone plan?

I've never heard of phone service included with the price of a phone - although sometimes a free (or discounted) phone is part of the package when you switch providers and purchase a new calling plan, but it's the plan you're buying, not the phone (unless you're buying a phone with a pre-paid SIM thrown in, which is not usually the case in the U.S.).

quote:

Can they convert the new iPhone to use your current cell phone number?

That actually works the other way. If you have a current cell number with another service provider (iphone only works with AT&T), you would need to port your number to the new service. So the phone doesn't convert to your service, you switch your service to what works with the phone.

quote:

After seeing all the lines on TV, I'm amazed that no one here has bought one.......yet!!!

For the cost of the phone, you could purchase an airline ticket to Italy (albeit in off season). Personally, I don't have the need for a new $600 toy. I have a Razr phone, Palm PDA (with wifi), laptop and ipod, which pretty much covers my technological needs. Sure, it might be nice to have an all-in-one device and maybe I'll consider it if the price comes down, but for now, I'll wait. However, if you read the other thread on this subject, there seem to be quite a few STers that plan on getting one.

My nephew in North Carolina did buy one (actually his boss bought it for him, along with one for himself), and my sister was going to visit him this weekend, so I will find out what they think. I'm not sure what time he got to the store, but I know he wasn't there all night or anything like that. She said he was number 70 in line and that they were very well organized about the procedure. They assigned numbers to all the people waiting, and then only let a few at a time into the store to make their purchase so it wasn't a mob scene.

I still have not seen one in "the flesh" and I really have no desire to own one (well at least not at that price) since I'm not a big cell phone user, but I would like to play with one a bit. I wonder if the crowds at the Apple Stores will die down in a week or so to the point where you could walk in and have a hands-on experience.

I believe the cheapest service plan you can get with the iPhone is $60 a month.

- Roz

Update on my nephew's iPhone: The phone itself is great; he loves it. However, as others have reported, the weak link in this chain is AT&T. Even though he was just trying to move from a previous Cingular account, and followed all the instructions for setup with iTunes, he still does not have phone service.

He has spent approximately 8 hours on the phone with AT&T support over the past two days, and they CANNOT get the phone to recognize that his AT&T number should now be assigned to the iPhone and not to his old Motorola.

He can surf the web and get email on the phone via a Wifi connection and is delighted with the speed and ease of use and the beautiful interface. He said it just jumped on to his home network with no problem. So the Apple computer part of it works great. It just won't make or receive phone calls!

- Roz

Maybe they should cut out the phone part and just make it a portable device for the web, email, videos, music, etc. I would consider it then if I didn't have to also pay the monthly 60.00 phone fee.

You know, girasoli, that's a good point. I don't suppose you can buy the iPhone without an AT&T contract. But it would be a great travel computer, wouldn't it, even without the phone?

quote:

Originally posted by girasoli:
Maybe they should cut out the phone part and just make it a portable device for the web, email, videos, music, etc. I would consider it then if I didn't have to also pay the monthly 60.00 phone fee.

My Palm TX covers that pretty well. It has wifi, so I can surf the web and download email (when there's an available signal - and when there isn't, I can synch it up to my cell phone, although I've never tried it). It also has music and video capability, although I don't use it for that (I use my ipod). What I like best is there's no monthly fee, so if I have a month when I'm not traveling much, I'm not paying $60 for service I'm not using.

I just got back from a trip to the mall, where the Apple store was practically empty and there were lots of iPhones in the hands-on display area. So naturally I had to go in and play with one. It really is very impressive. The display is so bright and clear, and the text on web sites very readable. I checked out Slow Trav, and it looked great.

I love the way you "pinch" the screen to zoom in and out. The onscreen keyboard took me a little getting used to, but after a few minutes I was getting better at it, and I think it is definitely a good tradeoff for having so much screen space.

I really wonder if Apple might bring out a wifi iPod that would have the capabilities of the iPhone without the phone piece. I would certainly be tempted to buy one of those. I am someone who hardly uses a cell phone, but would love to have a pocket computer with all those features. (I did confirm that there is no way you can buy the iPhone without the AT&T contract.)

- Roz

Roz, I just posted on the other thread about my experience playing with the iPhone. But I didn't mention that my brother-in-law had no problem activating his iPhone. From start to finish, including loading his music, photos and movies, it took 15 minutes. And the phone quality is excellent. But I did hear that Apple sold way more than they expected to this weekend (something like they anticipated 200,000 but instead sold over 500,000), so I imagine that activating that many plans in one weekend overloaded AT&T's system. I'm sure it will calm down in the next week or so.

Rumor has it that Apple will release a new iPod in the fall - probably with some of the features of the iPhone... should be interesting.

In the meantime, I'm extremely tempted to get an iPhone. The AT&T plan will only cost me $20 more a month and that includes unlimited data, so it really doesn't seem like a bad deal. I currently have a Razr, which I don't use for data, just as a phone - I don't even have a data plan. I also don't have a Palm or even a laptop, so the idea of a portable device that I can use to check email, Internet, maps, etc. sounds very appealing.

-Krista

Krista, my nephew did finally get his phone activated at 1:30 a.m. on Monday, so he's happy. I think his problem was related to the fact that his previous Cingular number was on a corporate plan, which AT&T doesn't offer for the iPhone, so they had to change a lot of stuff to set up his new individual plan with the same number.

So keep us posted if you decide to get an iPhone!

- Roz

quote:

Maybe they should cut out the phone part and just make it a portable device for the web, email, videos, music, etc. I would consider it then if I didn't have to also pay the monthly 60.00 phone fee.

My DEll Axim does everything except the phone, and it has Word, Excel, GPS and all sorts of programs I've loaded. I love it and it fits in my pocket. I'd probably love an I-Phone if it was a different phone carrier. I haven't had much luck with ATT being available in the locations I visit a lot.

quote:

So keep us posted if you decide to get an iPhone!
- Roz

My husband surprised me with one for my b-day and I love it! So far it's all good. It activated easily, the keyboard seems easy to use and the reception has been great. We even tested it in some out of the way rural areas when we went winetasting.

Favorite features: the Google maps (though it would be even more awesome if it had GPS capability), the screen (the resolution is amazing) and the camera (surprisingly good quality, there's a photo on my blog today that was taken with it).

One feature that I wish it had: video camera. And then you would probably need more memory, so that's really two things that it could use.

-Krista

For those who are still mulling the pro's and cons, I did a summary of pro's and cons' based on the funny but informative NYT's pieces and other articles, at http://andrys1.blogspot.com

I haven't met one person who didn't love their iPhone, but I wasn't encouraged to buy one myself. My current cell phone has video, has ability to scan in business card info for the contact list, and takes decent photos.

BUT I would, as others have said, probably buy a version that was priced lower and didn't have the phone part! Not likely they'd price it lower since there'd not be monthly large income from the phone part though ...

- Andrys (impressed by what the gadget can do)

It sure does look like a fun toy! I love David Pogue's NY Times clips. He is hilarious! Whenever I watch him, I end up watching all of his other clips and wasting at least an hour of my day, although I guess it is not really wasting my day as he is quite entertaining.

Andrys, I LOVE your photos! I am in the process of trying to organize, copy, merge, etc. my nightmare iPhoto library but once I am done, I plan on viewing all of your slideshows.

Krista, congrats! You will have to tell us how you like it after using it for a while. I looked on your blog, but couldn't find the phone. The cake looked yummy though.

Just watched the Pogue video, hilarious, thanks.
The pinching and flicking through stuff is so trick. And using it in lieu of a laptop while traveling--I would definitely, definitely do that. Would have been useful the past month especially.

I'm still going to wait for version 2 (which one hopes will support Java for goodness sakes) or the new iPod but until then shall merely lust. A lot.

girasoli and Trish,
I'd never seen Pogue before but he was so hilarious I watched that first video many times (especially when his friends are talking about the ipod but he can't say anything yet) and then sat there laughing through his other video reviews. His "My Way" operatic video on the iPhone is pretty funny too and led a blogger-columnist on huffingtonpost.com to complain that the NYTimes was now doing ads for the iPhone! A few of us of course drew his attention to the fact that the downsides are given and that the iPhone just IS a real draw.

Glad you enjoyed some of the photos, girasoli. The slideshow lets us show a few of our favorites, but my galleries are a bit of a mess.

quote:

I looked on your blog, but couldn't find the phone. The cake looked yummy though.

Sorry, I meant that I took the photo of the cake with my iPhone not of my iPhone. You guys all know what the iPhone looks like, but I thought you might want to see the quality of the photos it takes.

I've been really impressed with the camera. For a phone camera it's pretty good. And it's so easy to download the photos to your computer. On my old phone I never did figure out how to do that.

-Krista

Krista, I thought it was like a "Where's Waldo" thing were the phone was somewhere in the picture. It does take nice pictures. Do you have a Mac or a PC? I was wondering which for th ease of downloading.

Andrys, your photos can't be half the mess my iPhoto organization is at the moment, but after about 27 hours of work, it things are finally starting to be put in place.

Krista, what a nice husband you have to give you such a great birthday present! It is too bad that the iPhone does not include video, as I was reading today about a new service AT&T has just added for streaming video from one phone to another over its network. Guess that will come in the next version of the iPhone, probably along with GPS, and you will just have to get a new one!

- Roz