iPhone 3G unveiled at long last: some fears allayed, some hopes dashed
June 11, 2008
Unless you’ve spent the past few days buried under a ton of lead-lined concrete with no access to the internet or traditional news media, the chances are you’ll have heard of this little part in mobile phone history: the follow up to the iPhone.
Steve Jobs made the widely foreseen announcement during the Worldwide Developers Keynote. To put it simply, rumours were right – it is 3G and it does have GPS.
Now for some more details. Here’s how it compares to the old iPhone model: in terms of size and dimensions, it is basically identical. iPhone 3G is a couple of millimetres thicker and wider but nothing you’d really notice. It does weigh slightly less than its predecessor, but again, not so much that you’d ever notice.
Both 480 x 320 3.5" displays are completely identical, as are the storage sizes which still languish at 8 or 16GB options. The cameras are each identical too, however iPhone 3G’s GPS system allows for geo-tagging and other third-party application support.
Surprise, surprise, that enhanced 3G technology has given the expected battery life a hit as well. iPhone 3G will offer something in the region of five hours of internet use, five hours of 3G talk time, 24 hours of audio playback and 300 hours of standby time.
The single best piece of news is the price. Jobs wants everyone to have an iPhone in their pocket and by God he’s going to make the handsets cheap enough for you to question whether you can afford not to have it. An 8GB model is going to cost $199; 16GB will set you back $299 and is also available in white. Tough break for the iPod Touch really.
All in all, it s a worthy evolution of the iPhone, but it’s not exactly ‘doing an iPhone’ on the, err, iPhone. Some prominent features that many were demanding (and not unreasonably) are missing. First up, the camera. Still the same crappy two megapixel affair, which is just not enough for a serious cell phone snapper.
Over the air 3G downloads are also missing, which really seems to be a serious oversight. The chance to browse for and download the latest tracks without connecting to a computer would seem like the very first thing Apple would want everyone doing, but that’s not the case apparently and leaves a big opening for a competitor to get in ahead. Quite probably Nokia.
It also doesn’t allow for VoIP functions like Skype over 3G. That’s basically because Apple is still pandering to the demands of the networks and not to the requests of consumers. You can still use it with Wi-Fi, but we’re left waiting for the crucial evolution that will take VoIP into the mainstream of mobile telephony.
Another missing feature that has been niggling away since the first model – the lack of Flash support. Unfortunately it is still out. Yep, the most popular piece of online video delivery software is left unsupported. Not very impressive.
Last and probably least, the Bluetooth functionality is still pretty weak, eliminating the chance to listen to your music wirelessly with stereo Bluetooth. Oh, and voice dialling. And MMS messaging. They are still absent. But that’s it I think.
Now for the more pleasant surprises. The iPhone software has been upgraded to 2.0 as suspected and this brings with it the Applications Store, which should see the fruits of software developers labour with the recently launched iPhone SDK coming to a head. Without doubt, there are a million and one exciting things that it’s going to bring with it, but right now it’s the games that are grabbing attention.
If successfully implemented – a difficult task given the device’s complete dependency on the touchscreen display – then we could be looking at a challenger to the Nintendo DS and Sony PSP. Monkey Ball has already been confirmed for the handset and Spore is due to arrive as soon as Will Wright manages to finish it, possibly around 2028. But we’re mostly looking forward to how existing games tie into it.
Will we be browsing the World of Warcraft auction house from our handsets or checking guild chat forums on the move? Or maybe even harvesting for resources while away from the main PC? The possibilities are endless – we just need someone to implement them.
Finally, my personal biggest gripe with the previous model was the recessed headphone socket which made it difficult to find compatible headphones that weren’t made by Apple. Now the problem is fixed and the headphone socket is recessed no more. Hooray!
So all in all, it hasn’t been the most groundbreaking of all iPhone announcements and we knew about the vast majority of the new features before Jobs even took to the stage. However, the price is great for anyone who has been put off by the cost before and the strategy is bound to serve Apple well in the coming months. It seems likely that Apple will continue to roll out further minor evolutions over the coming year, so if you were let down by the small amounts of storage or weak camera, rest assured that the company probably has them pencilled in for not far into the future.
The iPhone 3G rolls out on July 11th.
Written by Ilinx · Filed Under Apple
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