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Jan 9 / Ozymandias

Edit: Tasty: Apple iPhone; Not-So-Tasty: Price

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As suspected, Apple announced their iPhone. More can be found at Engadget (including sexy picture) and other sources on the web. You guys know I'm also an Apple and OS X fan, and I have to say this is a pretty slick looking device. Lots of questions in my mind – the fact that it runs OS X makes it potentially interesting as a game platform though the hardware specs will help determine a lot there. I'd buy this tomorrow if it syncs email to an Exchange server as the Microsoft Smartphones do. Not clear whether it does or not – anyone know?

[Edit: My phone lust just got dampened by the price: $499 for the 4 GB, $599 for the 8 GB model. When will people learn that $600 is not the new $300? (Thinking consoles here, of course.) Lots of potential to the device, but is it worth as much as a PS3? (And I'm specifically talking about the PS3's hardware and future potential, of course - not the PS3 as it stands today.) I bet we'll see a $100 price drop by holiday.]

Related posts:

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  2. [Edit] PS3 Price Cut Redux (Drinking The Kool-Aid)
  3. Apple inCider (or Apple Gaming Strategy Theory #1)
  4. Apple’s iPad: Interesting, But Not Quite Baked Yet
  5. More iPhone Thoughts

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  • Kosher Infidel

    OMG.  I actually have a reason to upgrade now…

  • Aedrin

    * Battery lifetime up to 30 minutes. 5 minutes talk time. Battery replacement requires a qualified technician.

    ** MSRP $1599

    There’s another huge hurdle to overcome. I think 70-80% of the phones in the US market are flip phones (compared to 20-30% in Europe). This is not a flip phone, and people have taken a liking to the flip phone.

    And as other people have voiced, touch screens are cool. But they’re nothing like real buttons.

    Gotcha #3. I have a hard time believing Cingular would allow this phone. There’s most likely going to be disabled features. A full operating system which can run VoIP through WiFi. So either disabled features, or you can only use it with it, or it won’t come cheaper with 2-3 year plan. Or both…

    It’s hilarious that one of the slides has "Patented!" as one of the features.

  • J.Goodwin

    I’d like more information on how running OSX makes something an interesting games platform, given that "major release" in Apple’s world is defined as "two years old."

  • platinumbatto

    lets see Xbox 360 $299 / $399 , ok now the wii $250 nice now the ps3 $500 / $600  aite.. now the iphone $499 / $599 wtf.. aite this is insane.. wait and there is more it include a 2 year contract.. and it;s not unlocked. Ok now the ps3 looks decently priced an the wii and the 360 look amazingly cheap. wtf is going on with the industry. I am sticking with my dash and MS mobile products atleast they are reasonably priced for the consumers . Good bye to the apple / sony bone left in me..

  • Anonymous

    Re: "I’d like more information on how running OSX makes something an interesting games platform, given that "major release" in Apple’s world is defined as "two years old.""

    I’m specifically thinking about the fact that a platform that’s capable of running some version of OS X is likely a capable game platform – not talking specifically about game ports from OS X. Also thinking about the fact that there are good development tools for OS X, which is always a benefit. Evolve this "embedded OS X" version a bit more so it becomes the base for future iPods as well and you have a pretty compelling value proposition for publishers to target.

  • http://www.dglover.co.uk Anonymous

    Why do people go insane over Apple products?

    Sure, it looks sexy. That’s about all I can see that it has over other phones on the market.

    Maybe the UK and Europe just has a much better mobile market than on your side of the pond.

  • platinumacetric

    Ozy… there is no point ot rush out and go buy a $599 – - 2year contract phone just because it’s an apple. you can get almost the same stuff with othere companies.

    There is the motorola E680i and A1200 and these are very very stable. more stable than my dash.. and non of these phones have number pads they do carry a stylus but non of myfriends ever use it. the touch screen buttons are big for any finger tip pluse there is a ton of aps for them.

    if you want one that looks almost exactly like the iphone then you should get the philips S900 it has no keypad and uses a touch screen plus it’s very cheap and ofcourse it’s unlocked. It also has some cute functions with it ( picture and audio wise)  this phone is probably the same thickness as the Ravor if not thinner has has basically the same identical phone layout as the Apple version.. I wonder if they could sue apple for copying their interface design.

    you can find more info about this phone on this site.

    http://www.gsmarena.com/philips_s900-1598.php

    and if music is more what you wnat then you can get the new sony erricson w950 which has touchscreen and is built from the ground up for music.

    Thanks

  • Aedrin

    "Why do people go insane over Apple products?"

    To be cool. It’s all about marketing, not having a good product (c.i.p. the iPod).

  • http://www.insomnimania.org mykie

    * $500 for 4gb

    * 2-year contract (I’m guessing $600 without)

    * Cingular-only service

    * 2MP camera

    * Only GSM+EDGE (400kbps) Internet…

    Why is this so compelling?

    Not to sound like I’ve just guzzled the Haterade, but the iPhone sounds more like an iPhlop.

  • J.Goodwin

    The other funny one today is that iTV thing.

    It’s priced the same as an Xbox360 and won’t let you play games.  You get some of the secondary features as a 360, without any primary features.  Amazing.

  • Pete

    For those comparing prices — aren’t consoles sold at a loss and made profitable by all those ridiculously expensive games and accessories?  Compare it to other smart-phones, and try to judge the size and resolution of the screen before you do.

    For the others — it clearly couldn’t be a clamshell design, or have real buttons and still have that screen and multimedia capabilities.  I have my doubts about the touchscreen concept (never worked too well for me on my awful windows mobile pda), but I’ll see it in action before judging.

    A bit worrying about the Cingular only thing though; is this another Apple-America only thing, like iTunes movies (though MS is just as guilty there with US-only content)…

  • http://a-simian-mind.blogspot.com Shawn Oster

    Off the cuff…

    - This is obviously meant to battle PDA/SmartPhones, not cell phones.

    - The network lock, Cingular/AT&T, ranks high on the suck scale.  Their service is great in some areas but craptastic in others.  This pretty much makes it dead to me.  Extra suck for the fact that unlike normal phone vendors you’re not going to get some slight knock-off for the other carriers, like the different kinds of RZRS.

    - How are the buttons activated?  How about those cold weather days, what about using it with gloves?  I live in Denver, this stuff is important to me :)

    - Scratch-proof?  Phones, even smartphones, take an amazing amount of abuse.  How sexy does it look after being shoved in the same pocket as your keys or dropped on the ground?  Depending on how the screen is activated you’re going to have some interesting looking covers for this since you can’t obscure the entire front.

    - Is there *any* tactile feel to this thing?  When answering calls in the car or txting I work more by feel than look.  Heck, I can do an amazing amount of things on my phone without ever looking at the screen.

    - I love the concept of course, it looks sexy as hell and it feels very "of the future", Minority Report style.  Apple is known for rocking on the hardware front though so I’m sure they have some answers to these questions but I’m curious just how well they answered them.

  • RomeoDude

    Don’t forget, that price tag is WITH a contract…. I don’t really wanna see what it looks like without a contract.  At first it’s amazing, then when you read the fine print with the price, it’s kinda disgusting…. the 8 gig iPhone is as much as a Mac Mini.  Looks like a pretty good example for future phones: robust touch screen, nice hi res screen, wi-fi…. If it was a little cheaper and available for Verizon, I’d be all over it.

  • Aedrin

    "aren’t consoles sold at a loss"

    Most of them, yes. Nintendo’s aren’t however.

    "This is obviously meant to battle PDA/SmartPhones, not cell phones."

    The name ‘iPhone’ should have been ‘iPDA’ then.

    "it clearly couldn’t be a clamshell design, or have real buttons and still have that screen and multimedia capabilities. "

    Obviously. But the fact is most US cellphone users carry a clamshell/flip phone. And the fact is that most users like the look/feel of buttons.

    I’m curious as to what the price is without a 2 year lock in. Probably around $999-1199. That’s not something most people can afford. How well would the iPod have done if it would’ve cost $800?

  • Anonymous

    As usual Apple making a very nicely designed machine in both hardware and GUI and making it cost twice than similar solutions. No iPod for me, no iPhone either (and that not counting that I have no clue how to code for MacOSX while I can mke my own software with .Net Compact Framework for any windows mobile option…)

  • Joseph

    I think the phone is very over priced also.

    I’m also sure it will sell quickly.  Ipods are near $400. People pay $400 or so for blackberry phones.

    Apple products do 2 things very well. #1 They look cool. #2 The user interface is second to none.

    I have no doubt that the IPhone will be a dream to use and the AppleTV will make the XBOX look like a piece of second rate junk.

    Apple puts a pretty wrapper around existing idea and marks it up 1000% for profit. Their hardware and build quality are crap. Not many care because by the times yours breaks there is a newer prettier one for sale.

  • Sean

    I agree with you…I was blown away by the phone, but I was a bit shocked by the price.  One news source stated that the listed price was with a 2 year contract, but I’m not sure whether that’s what Jobs meant to say or not.  If not, there’s always the potential that we could see $50 or $100 off for taking a contract.  It’s extremely expensive for a phone, but "phone" is only one feature when you think about it.  It’s actually a high end PDA that happens to have phone capability…and that’s not something that sells at the $150-300 smart-phone price.  Also, it’s OS X.  That says to me open source…what it can’t do now people will make it do in the future.  Make your own widgets, run your own programs…heck, maybe even make some calls!

  • http://www.klio.org/marks/ Mike Kozlowski

    I’m not sure why the price is so surprising.  I think I paid $450 for the PPC-6700 at Sprint, and while I like it a great deal, that’s not half the phone the iPhone is, measured in units of awesomeness.  

    As for the Cingular thing, I expect that Apple is in the rare (unique?) position of being able to dictate terms to carriers and thereby not get their hardware fucked with in the way that Palm or Microsoft OEMs do.  An Apple exclusive in exchange for hands-off treatment is the sort of deal that I bet Cingular would make.

    (And comparing the price to the PS3 is silly, because a) I want this a lot more than the pointless and redundant PS3, and b) it’s obviously not the same thing, and about as useful as comparing it to a 24" monitor or a high-end video card or a good pair of headphones.)

  • Porktree

    The best part about this phone is hte embedded OS!  Sweet weeping jesus, terminal sessions, bash and ssh over 802.11 – and the implication that the next gen of the OS X server will have PUSH tech in it’s email server.  WebDAV file server volumes mounted on my phone!  And bah, the price, it’ll come down (look at the crappy Razor’s starting cost, not to mention how much the first ipod’s cost). mmmmm, 3 more words – Visual Voice Mail! Have you check that out yet Ozy? My only ‘bummer’ is that this is a Cingular exclusive, and I like TMobile.  So, until the unlocked phones hit the market I guess I’ll stick with my sweet WM5 phone.

  • imaginedbug

    I wonder how long it’ll be before Linksys sues Apple for using the iPhone name, which Linksys not only uses (for VoIP phones) but also owns the rights to.

    Just check http://www.linksys.com > products > wireless > voice & phone.

  • http://www.klio.org/marks/ Mike Kozlowski

    Pork:  It doesn’t appear that the "OS X" will actually mean arbitrary Unix programs running.  They’re saying no user-installable software, at least according to unreliable sources.

    Bug:  They came to an agreement beforehand, Cisco announced.

  • http://feelz-good.spaces.live.com/ Feelz Good

    Let’s be honest on the price, what’s it cost to get a smart phone and a zune or ipod?  If you have both of those can you do everything the iPhone can?

  • 20

    The phone is way over priced! I would be willing to pay it, but I’m not willing to pay Cingular high rates. Cingular and Nextel are the worst carriers around now. If I could get this unlocked and untouched for the same price I would probably purchase, but as long as Cingular  is the one I have to give 2 years to – NO THANK YOU! Cingular is known for branding on their phones and disabling features that the manufacturer included to make the phones so great. I don’t buy a phone if branded and haven’t in almost 4 years. Look on gsmarena.com for the newest phones and places like plemix.com for the prices (just don’t buy from plemix! :D .

  • Aedrin

    "Cingular is known for branding on their phones and disabling features that the manufacturer included to make the phones so great."

    Verizon does this even more than Cingular.

  • http://www.slashcry.com dozens

    Consider it a PDA first, with cell phone capabilities second.  And in that respect, only the 2 year contract sucks about it.  

    I’m sure the second version will be better…similarly how I wouldn’t even dream of getting a Zune now, but maybe the next iteration once they improve on the features.

    As to the comment from Shawn Oster:

    "How are the buttons activated?  How about those cold weather days, what about using it with gloves?  I live in Denver, this stuff is important to me :) "

    I’d say its probably about as the same as punching in numbers on any cellphon with gloves on…not going to happen.  Maybe my Razr isn’t the best choice but I have to take my gloves off unless I just want a mismatch of keys being pressed.