I Got to Play with the IPhone

One of the advantages of having rich relatives is that you get to play with their toys. That was exactly what I did when I visited my uncle in Manhattan a few weeks ago. My uncle isn't really a techie but he's more of the follow the crowd type. He was one of the first to buy an iPhone when it was launched even though the only thing that he thinks mobile phones are good for is for making calls. I'm the techie in the family and when he voluntary surrendered his iPhone to me to play with during the week I was there so that, "I could study the features and teach him how to use it", I happily obliged.

The Design

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not an iPhone fan. In fact, I think I've been bashing the iPhone even before its release in some of my articles. But when I got hold of that sleek, thin phone in my hands, all thoughts of hatred flew out of my head and I was just in awe. The iPhone is hands down, the prettiest phone I've ever seen. It has a brilliant glass screen. Yes, glass! This is the first phone I've encountered that has a glass screen rather than plastic. The LCD displays brilliant colors but my uncle's iPhone already has a spatter of fingerprint smudges when handed to me. The phone is all screen save for one button at the bottom for accessing the menus. On the top is a button for controlling calls and also serves as the phone's power button. On the left side of the phone, you can find the volume control and a ringer mute switch and at the bottom of the phone is the speakers and the place where you connect the syncing dock or charger. At the back is the camera and the Apple logo and yes, there's no hatch for the battery. The phone feels solid in my hand and the screen is a pleasure to touch. I have a PDA phone which I would never dream of using my fingers on so the iPhone's touch interface took a little time for me to get used to. Whenever I fish the iPhone out of my pocket, I always feel the need to grope the side for a stylus which I always do with my own phone.

What I like

Clearly, the best thing about this phone is its innovative user interface. I had a blast double tapping the menus or zooming in and out of photos by using my thumb and index finger. I also liked how the iPhone can change to landscape view by just tipping the phone sideways, I think they call this technology accelerometer. The iPhone's Cover Flow technology is great fun, I loved flipping through album covers, it's like flipping through my grandfather's old records collection. The iPhone's iPod gives out good quality music, much like the fifth-generation iPod, however, the speakers is only good when not turned to the loudest setting because music would sound distorted. However, since I'm not a music man, I can't rave about the iPhone's iPod features, mainly because I'm one of the few people left who refuse to succumb to the iPod trend.

Now I'm not a music kind of person but I am an Internet freak so for me, the best feature of the iPhone is the Safari browser. I think this is the only reason why I would be buying the iPhone. iPhone is the first smart phone to feature a full-pledged Safari browser and yes, it's not a watered down version, the page won't load horizontally, you would get the whole, as is, web page. The only downside about the Safari browser is that it doesn't support Flash and Java. The iPhone's intuitive interface works great with the Safari browser. I just double tap my fingers to zoom in or out of a web page and just by swiping my finger on the screen the web page would move accordingly. The iPhone does an excellent job at playing videos, either through YouTube or videos directly uploaded to it. If I'm in the market for a multimedia phone, then hands-down, the iPhone wins, no contest.

What I didn't like

Sadly, as not much of an Apple fan, I'm bound to spill everything I hated about the iPhone and I have to tell you, there are lots of things I hated about it. First off, the keyboard; why do they have to make a QWERTY keyboard? It's a phone, the least they could add is a phone pad interface. Pocket PCs has a lot of input option including a phone pad, I wish Apple thought of putting at least another input option aside from the QWERTY keyboard, for those of us who has been so used to typing on a mobile phone.

During the height of the iPhone's hype, I kept asking myself why Apple didn't make the iPhone 3G compatible to take advantage of AT&Ts 3G network. I didn't like the iPhone for not being 3G ready and already judged it based on that fact even. Well, to my surprise, AT&T's EDGE network didn't really bother me that much. Maybe it's because I came from a country where dial-up is still the way to connect to the Internet. Besides, I always access the EDGE network during the off-peak hours.

So since AT&T's EDGE network turned out okay for me, what else did I hate? For starters, let's start with the camera. The iPhone has a 2 megapixel camera but lacks video recording capabilities. I mean, the lowest of the low-end phones which only has VGA cameras has video recording capabilities so why the heck did Apple decide not to let the iPhone record videos? I guess that's only for Steve Jobs to answer.

I was even more surprised to know that the iPhone lacks MMS capabilities. MMS! The most basic of phone features and yet the iPhone has none! I mean, sure, why would I need MMS for when I already have a web-based email, but still, this is the first time I've heard of a smart phone that doesn't have MMS. I can't really comment about the iPhone's poor email support since I only use web-based email but I think other reviewers are complaining about this. I was also surprised that I can't customize my ringtones. I've browsed through the manual and searched the net for customizing ringtones on the iPhone but sadly, I don't think you can.

I haven't used the iPhone to make phone calls during the week that I had it since I think my uncle is already an expert on that function alone so I can't comment on the call quality.

The iPhone also lacks third party applications. I think that's the real killer. I have tons of business applications on my PDA which helps me edit Excel and word files and view documents. I also have tons of games on my Pocket PC and the only games I could play on the iPhone are web based "widgets" that aren't even that much fun to play.

Bottom Line

I think the bottom line is, the iPhone is really a great multimedia phone except for its camera function. If you're into music, videos and the internet and you don't want lugging around an iPod and a mobile phone with you at the same time, the iPhone is the best way to go. However, for the businessman who wants corporate email compatibility and applications to edit and view documents on the go, this is probably not the best phone for you, just stick with your Treo, Blackberry or Pocket PC.