I’ve needed a new cell phone for a couple months now. My 2+ year old windows mobile device was starting to die and I was way over-paying Verizon for a plan that didn’t exist any more. I’ve been hearing how great the iPhone is and since I couldn’t find any other phone I really liked, I thought I would give it a try. This would mean I’d have to switch carriers to AT&T though, and I wasn’t sure if I would actually get a signal at my house. As it was, I barely got a signal with my Verizon phone and usually had to go outside to make a call. (That was super fun last winter with all the snow.) By chance, a friend was over a couple weeks ago and able to make a call, with their AT&T phone, from my kitchen! So that was it, I went to an AT&T store and ordered an iPhone.
I just picked it up a couple days ago and I haven’t played with all the functionality yet, but so far I like it. Of course besides just being a phone it is a music & video player, it syncs with most email clients, has text messaging, full internet, a built in camera and more. Here’s what stands out the most so far.
What’s great:
The GPS and map feature - One click will show your location on a road or satellite map. Real time traffic information is available in some areas and for major highways. You can search for things like “sushi” or “motel” and it will show what’s in your area, or where ever you are going. There will also be a link to the business’s website, if available, and their phone number. I wish I had this a couple years ago when driving through western NY at 2am on a cross country trip. The gas gage was way below E and every station around was closed. Ended up waiting at the pump for a place to open only to find out just around the corner was a 24 hour gas station.
The other thing I really like is all the extra applications you can install on it. There are various apps that interface with different social networks, apps for tracking sports, weather, and flights, calorie counters, language translators, and of course games. In fact, if there is some application that doesn’t exist right now, it probably will soon.
I also really like when you are talking on the phone, the screen goes dark, but when you take the phone away from your head, to press “1″ for English or something, the screen lights up and the key pad is readily available. Sounds like an obvious thing that the phone should do, but my old one did not. This usually resulted in wrong numbers being pressed or accidental hang ups.
What’s so-so:
The keyboard - I have pretty small hands so someone with big fat fingers must have a really hard time typing on this device. My old phone had an even smaller keyboard with a stylus and a larger keyboard that slid out the side. The stylus was a pain, but I’m proud that I never lost it, and the slide out keyboard was awkward. I haven’t found a really good keyboard on a small device yet.
This is really an issue with AT&T, not the iPhone… I don’t get a good signal, if any, in my house. As soon as I step outside it’s great, but not inside. I had this problem before so I’m used to dealing with it and there aren’t any other carriers in the area that are better. Price you have to pay to live in the country. AT&T is however building several new towers in my area, so I’m expecting an improvement by the end of the year.
The one thing that makes up for this, is when I do step inside my house, the phone automatically connects to my wireless router so I have all the functionality, except for the phone part. My old phone was a quite pain to connect to wifi.
What’s really awful:
Having to use iTunes to sync the phone to your computer. Enough said.
Over all I do like this phone a lot and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a device like this. It certainly not perfect, but it has to be one of the best availalble today.
I am a freelance web developer and graphic designer currently living in 
