iPhone 3G

[[AK]Squidly]

My favorite apps so far are:

Pandora - Fantastic free music application.

Shazam - Works flawlessly, every time. Then when you have a song, you can hit one button to buy it from iTunes, or another to play a related video from Youtube.

Texas Holdem - GREAT game. Fantastic production values. The best poker game on any platform, based solely on playability.

MLB At Bat. Get live results and video clips (new ones uploaded as they happen, and great performance even on Edge.)

Twitteriffic/Twinkle - Front ends for Twitter. They work great.

Jott - Works almost like magic. Your recording is sent to a team in India that transcribes it. Seriously.

ToDo - By http://www.appigo.com. Todo list that interfaces with a web component. Built your list online with a real keyboard, then sync it with your iPhone. Or add items on your iPhone and sync it back. Works with Toodledo, which made it an auto-buy for me.

[Slaughter]

White or Black 16gb?

Your "I just dropped my iPhone" thread will consist of "and the plastic got gouged something awful". <3 Metal casing on EDGE iPhone (of course they say that the plastic casing on the 3g is better for reception).

[[AK]Squidly]

Scratches, like wrinkles are inevitable. If it bothers you, buy one of they myriad cases available.

More good Apps:

"Crosswords" - By 'Standalone Inc.' Great crossword game.

"Units" - FANTASTIC, must have utility. Convert any measure. Time, volume, currency, area, length, speed, energy...wow...

"Wordpress" - For bloggers

"Evernote" - Save (and have transcribed) audio, text, or photos. Take a picture of a whiteboard and it'll be transcribed for you.

[[AK]Clay]

"Units" Good catch - I'll be sure to add that one to my list. Evernote sounds interesting - So with this, do you just write something by hand on paper and take a picture w/ the camera and it'll automatically convert that to text?? Wow. I've attached a simple PC version I use at work - love it. (rename it to .exe to run it. It's self contained, so no installation)

How reliable is Jott btw? Is there a "training" period for it to learn your voice? I assume you were joking about it going to India!

For phone protection, the film you put over the front of the glass works great. It prevents scratches nicely and the optical clarity is perfect - Beaker has one on her iTouch. I'll be getting a 3 pack of those babys. As to the case - normally I'm not a fan of those leather/plastic cases that people put their phones in as it just makes stuff bulky. But I may get one anyway - that big piece of glass just seems fragile. I plan on carrying this thing with me everywhere, and I do drop things.

[[AK]Squidly]

The idea behind Evernote is...you're in a meeting. You're writing tons of stuff on a whiteboard. You take a picture of it, and it not only transcribes the words, but converts them into tags for searching later on.

Also your notes, or if you're on the road, street signs, etc.

Jott really does send your message to India to be transcribed. It is very reliable and almost always correct. If something is unintelligable, they put [..] around that spot. You also get a copy of the audio file so you never lose your note.

Go to the website and read up on it... there is a regular phone number you can call to Jott, as well. You can set up email addresses. Then you can call the number, say a code name of the person you want to mail, then start talking. when you're done, an email is sent with the audio file and the transcript. Rocks.

[[AK]Clay]

Well it’s in – I love it! Just the way it fits in your hand, and up against your ear when talking just exudes perfect fit and comfort – and quality. As a basic phone, it’s quite good. Sound quality is there, reception blows away what I was getting with Sprint. This phone gets signal in my basement, which just amazes me.

The philosophy of design on thing is so cutting edge ahead of the game it’s incredible. Attention to the little things is so well thought out – for example, when you dial a number, it starts calling of course, and you see the screen. Put the phone up to your ear, and the accelerometer knows it, so it turns off the screen, move the phone off your ear to look at the screen mid-conversation, and the accelerometer knows it and turns the screen back on. Saves power (and heat) and works beautifully. The whole design is full of little things like that – very well thought out phone. If you’re an engineer, check out the built-in calculator. Just a basic calculator, until you turn the phone sidewise, and with the wider view automatically turns into a scientific calculator. Just neat.

The part iPod works well, music sound is excellent. Apparently the first generation iPhone had issues here – this one is flawless. The interface is great as well.

I love the way it sync’s up to iTunes. On the computer it’s mostly Beakers music, but very easy to dump only what I want into my iPhone, and leave the rest. The way it sync’s up w/ my contacts and schedule in Outlook is very handy.

A lot of people gripe about the camera – I think it works great. Certainly the best cell phone camera I’ve ever had.

The built in GPS coupled with Google maps is crazy. I was watching my blip overlayed on the satellite image on the highway system driving into work today. Totally awesome. I’d like to be able to use it as more a basic GPS (w/ coordinates, altitude, speed, time to destination, waypoints, etc), but don’t know how to do that. I might have to download an app for that, not sure.

I haven’t even played with downloading apps for it yet – the built in stuff is just so cool most of what you need is already covered.

An interesting thing is the cost. At $300 capital, that’s a steal. They get the rest out of you w/ the 2 year contract. But if you compare it with Sprint, it’s not a whole lot more. Basically, with the iPhone you are forced to pay $30/mo more for the data plan, but otherwise I think the costs are the same as any other AT&T phone. The fact we get a corporate discount due to who I work for doesn’t hurt, so the monthly cost for switching up to the iPhone isn’t that bad – it’s worth it to me at least. The part I find most irksome is that they don’t include texting w/ the data plan. Come on AT&T, that’s just overt greed and annoying.

There are a couple downers. The battery life isn’t so hot. I drained it less than one 8hr day in the office just playing around w/ it and checking my e-mails as time allowed. Apparently on an iPhone cable works with it – even though Beakers iTouch is basically the same device with the same looking cable that fits, the phone won’t charge up with the iTouch cable. The EDGE network is pretty slow – I’m not so impressed with my $30/mo value for the data package I was forced to buy. Mostly that’s because there’s no 3G network in my area – and probably won’t be for a while. Still, it is pretty cool to be able to surf and e-mail from anywhere.

Conclusion – loving it. When your current contract expires, replace it w/ an iPhone.

[[AK]Beaker]

Will you please stop watching your phone while driving to work.

I prefer you watch the road!

Or maybe I should just get better life insurance on you.