News Apple unveils iPhone 3GS 16GB, 32GB

Agree with the above.

A far cheaper phone makes calls and sends texts. If you need the all-singing-all-dancing ability to surf the web, play music, make video calls and all sorts of other stuff in one device, great. But I'd rather carry around a phone, an MP3 player and a laptop/netbook. Mostly because... in your all-in-one device... what do you do if the battery runs out? With discrete devices, you don't lose the ability to do everything if one battery runs out. If I needed an all-in-one phone, I'd probably get the Nokia E90.

I don't think I've sent an MMS ever. I keep getting the damned things from my network, but send one? Not with how much they cost!

...

For those who want or need one, great (I know my advisor will be all over this - he loves new Apple kit!) but the price tag is extreme. At least on PAYG.

...actually, I wonder what the uptake rate of PAYG iPhones has been? Anyone know?

 

Payed for firmware? Geez. 540 pounds? 626 euros. No way.

 

Oh go on then, I thought for all of two seconds and came up with this. It has the benefit of actually having a usable camera with a real flash too.

The iPhone may or may not be better than that depending on what you want to do with your phone but to me there is no way an iPhone is 2.5x better especially when you're tied to one operator and only to apps approved by Apple.

 

To be fair its expensive but not that bad if your a contract slave any way.

SE Xperia X1 : Free on a £45 18month contract= 810
SE C905: Free on £35 18mth= 630
iPhone: Free on £35 24mth = 840 though the same £35 doesn't get you the same package

I expect the new iphone will be priced similarly to the old one maybe £50 or so more


edit: Just check the sim free price for the C905 and it ~£350 so the iPhone is a fair old bit more expensive.

Nother edit: just read this on the bbc and it looks like nearly £200 plus 18mths @ £35 = £830

 

as someone who has actually lived with both an n95 and an ipod touch for 18 months, i politely deride your comparison of an n82 to the iphone. there is a world of difference in usability. and don't get me started on the nseries PMP software.

 

Can we hear from someone who has an iPhone and doesn't like it?

The only negative comments are from those who don't have one. Knowledge is power as they say.

 

Rather have a reasonaly priced Sony Ericson mobile and a netbook tbh.

F*ck Apple!

 

I don't own an iPhone and I never will for one reason: I don't want Apple telling me what I can and can not install on my phone. The hardware's great, the OS & usability is amazing, and I generally have no other complaints about it. However with Windows Mobile I can install any app developed for the platform - not just what Apple says I can have. If it upsets the rest of the OS or causes problems, then that's my fault for not reading things or not doing things properly; I can make my own mistakes, and I don't like being told what I can and can not do.

Sure I know you can jailbreak the iPhone, but you risk problems with further updates & OS revisions. More to the point though, why should I have to put up with doing it in the first place? There's already a platform out there with great hardware, massive developer support and a committed community. Sure the interface isn't as good as the iPhone, but HTC have made great improvements - it's not far off.

The iPhone isn't a bad thing really, they did the same for the mobile phone market as they did with the portable media player market: came out with a product that was mildly innovative and was incredibly simple to use - this raised the bar, so everyone else had to double their efforts to keep up and stay competitive. The same is happening now with mobile phones (although I'm not suggesting Apple is the market leader in either sector).

 

According to all the reports I've read online, there will be no special deals for original iPhone 3G pruchasers. If you want a 3GS, you will need to pay off your existing contract.

http://www.macworld.co.uk/mac/news/index.cfm?newsid=26245

For me, that's 6 months @ £35, plus the cost of a new phone + new 18 month contract. So that won't be happening.

TBH, the only thing in the new hardware I'd like is the voice over stuff. But Unless O2 change their minds and do something reasonable for upgraders, the free upgrade to OS 3.0 will do for me.

 

I have a touch and nearly everyone here has a full iPhone. Our collective response is still that it's too expensive. Sure, the iPhone is nice and all - but £540, seriously? It's not that good.

 

My negatives for the iPhone are pretty concise.

I want a physical button for call answering, or the ability to map the 'answer' function to the Home button.

I'd like the battery not to suck so bad.

Everything else is being addressed in 3.0, for me, so.. Eh.

 

the n97 recently went on sale for the sim free RRP of £700. you can get it PAYG for £500. i know which of the two i'd rather have.

 

And that is surprising how?
We had that topic again and again in the past few months. WHY would any provider offer you a free upgrade path just because a new model is being released?!

As someone else pointed out: You don't get a new car for free when they release a new model of the one you own. And they never did that with phones either, UNLESS the first wave was faulty. Call the iPhone overpriced/overhyped/crap/whatever, but it's not faulty.

You want to be trendy? You want to have the latest gadget? You want to enlarge your iPenis? PAY FOR IT! That's how it's been since the invention of money and gadgets and that's how it'll stay until there is noone left on this or any planet.

I, personally, want an iPhone. I wanted it from the first day I saw it. But it was and is too expensive so I'll just wait for the 3G to drop like a stone price-wise [1-2 months after 3GS hits the shelves I guess] and grab that for a lot less than it is now.
That's the plan, at least.

 

Well I will be in the que for one the day they come out. I dont replace my phone everytime the contract ends and its about time I got a new one. As for the price I get a MP3 player, Video Player, Phone, eMail and portable games console all in one, so in effect the price is fair.

The real kicker has to be that Microsoft are going to charge $200 - $400 dollars to upgrade from a broken OS (Vista) to how it should of worked to a point with Windows 7. Where as Apple are going to charge people just $29 to upgrade to Snow Leopard, but I bet most people will be getting the cash out to pay for the upgrade they should be getting for free.

You work it out.

 

..What in the hell does that have to do with a phone?

Can you install either 7 or Snow Leopard on an iPhone? Nope.

 

just an apple lover. i must say i absolutely hate apple's posturing when it comes to vista/win7 bashing. it does them no favours to, in one breath tell everybody how much microsoft sucks, then in the very next breath evangelise the amazingness of Exchange support.

"hey everybody! microsoft sucks! everything they ever did sucks! we pwn them! but did you see this exchange support? it's awesome isn't it! that's right, we rule!"

you work that one out.

 

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Ha!

I have an ipod touch, which I hasten to add I bought solely so as to test some web code I was writing on mobile safari. I was hoping to get some secondary usage out of it as a data transfer and generic flash storage device, as well as an mp3 player, and I have to say it is quite the mos comprehensively useless pile of junk it's ever been my intense misfortune to waste £100 on. You can't just plug it in as a USB device and dump mp3s on it, oh no. You have exactly one PC where you can send stuff to it, you can't get stuff back off of it, and doing so involves the ridiculous chicanery of itunes and "syncing the device", which seems to be a precise analogue to "drag files onto USB drive", only with 50% extra free irritation and wasted time. You can't download web links onto it and you can't upload attachments to emails.

It's so nearly so good; the display is fantastic and the UI is apple's usual festival of attention to detail, but as a device? What an extravagant waste of space. The phones, I understand, are exactly the same thing with a GSM modem, and are presumably exactly as much of a chocolate teapot.

iThings - potentially brilliant, but hobbled at birth, railway-sleeper-and-mallet, "Misery" style, by ridiculous software decisions.

 

You can get the phones heavily discounted or free. Just get to the end of your contract, then phone the provider and say you want to leave.

Simples.

 

Joe, if you all think that the iPhone is too expensive, why do most of your colleagues own one? It's clearly expensive, but it's not TOO expensive. I think the iPhone is expensive, but worth it, unlike one of those diamond-encrusted phones by Armani or whoever, which are just expensive.

As an existing iPhone owner due an upgrade on O2, I'm interested to see if I'll get any kind of discount on the 3GS over what it would cost to establish a brand new contract. I doubt it, though. O2 don't seem to understand the spirit of the "upgrade", unlike competitors like T-Mobile, who have always been very kind to me.

 

iPhone cost me £99 one off fee and then the monthly contract.

Maybe those that are crying about the expense of PAYG need to downgrade their hopes to something more affordable from Nokia or whoever.