iPhone. I’m not getting one, but it’s a step in the right direction.
I had a 5-day intensive course at Bentley this past week, so this post has been in the works since Steve Jobs’ MacWorld keynote on January 9th. On that day, Apple released the iPhone, Apple TV (formerly known as iTV), and an updated Airport Extreme Base Station.
There are three major problems with the iPhone. Most importantly, it has less-than-desirable battery life with no removable battery (yes, of course there will be third-party batteries available at some point). Second, it’s only on Cingular, which is arguably the worst mobile service provider in the United States (ok, they are probably better than Sprint). Finally, the phone does not support 3G for fast mobile Internet access (instead the iPhone uses older technology called EDGE).
However, the iPhone is no doubt a revolutionary phone that will lead to more powerful mobile devices. So, in summary, I say to Apple “thanks for announcing this product six months ahead of time because it will give other companies a chance to create a device just like it.” Of course, there is already one device that looks just like the iPhone (the LG KE850).
I am going to continue to stand by my initial thoughts on the Apple TV, when I predicted its failure. It is pretty funny that the technology behind Apple TV has been around for a while now (from Netgear, D-Link, etc.), and now people are buying into once Apple slaps their name and interface on it (granted, it is a good interface from what I can tell). But, overall, this device will only be adopted by some current Apple customers, despite the fact it also support Windows computers. There are better, cheaper devices that support more video formats (e.g. XVID, DIVX) to serve the nerd community.
Out of all the devices, I am probably most likely to buy the Airport Extreme Base Station. The price is steep at $179 for a router, but it looks sleak, supports draft N wireless networking, and has a USB slot to attach a printer.
No Comments Yet