It’s finally here, the first phone to beat the iPhone. Or is it? The iPhone 3G is out, with high-speed data and GPS and Exchange support and a whole slew of new features due to the new 2.0 software. It’s been slightly redesigned, but remains 100% Apple. It now has an App Store, where developers can create applications for the device and distribute them through iTunes. Paired with Apple’s new MobileMe service the everyday user can get the wireless syncing benefits of an Exchange account. Best of all, the phone’s ridiculous price tag has been slashed by $200. The new software is available to original iPhone owners, however, so is it really worth the upgrade?
Included in the box you’ll find:
Headphones
USB data/charging cable
AC adaptor with USB plug
SIM removal tool
Design:
In a case the iPhone 3G looks nearly identical to the iPhone. It has the same chrome trim around the huge glass touchscreen. The circular indent of the home button still lies below the display, and above it is simply the earpiece. There are still only three buttons along the sides; at the top left is the switch to silence the phone, with the volume rocker just below it, and at the top on the far right side is the lock button. The dock connector, speaker and mic are at the bottom, and at the top left of the back is the small 2 megapixel camera.
There are differences though, most notably is the back housing. Gone is the metal with the black plastic bottom, replaced with glossy plastic in a black or white finish. The white is only available on the 16GB version; you can get black on both the 8 and 16GB models. With the silver finish gone, the side keys have been changed from black rubber to silver metal. It’s a small gripe, but the key edges are rough and while it won’t cut you, running your fingers over them isn’t a smooth experience. The speaker and mic at the bottom are much smaller, and like the earpiece are covered in silver metal mesh rather than the previous perforations.
Overall dimensions have actually increased, though the 0.5mm thickness difference is offset by the rounded edges of the 3G.
You can compare the Apple iPhone 3G with many other phones using ourSize Visualization Tool.
This beveling makes the phone feel more comfortable in the hand as compared to its predecessor, and we like the plastic casing more than we’d have thought. It is a high quality plastic, and not as slippery as we had expected, though to a small extent we miss the solid feel of the metal backing. The weight is virtually unchanged though; the 3G checks in at just 0.1oz lighter than the original.
Build quality is excellent, but then again you’d expect that from a company as design-obsessed as Apple. We can’t figure out why Apple hasn’t developed a fingerprint resistant material though, because you can’t think about the phone without covering it in fingerprints. We do have a quirk with ours though; on the right side of the phone near the 3 and 6 on the dialpad, where the chrome trim and glass display come together, there is a piece of plastic hanging out. It looks like it’s a piece of the protective film found on most new gadgets, like it had gotten stuck and ripped off. We’ve actually see this on first generation iPhones as well. It does not seem to be a wide-spread issue, but an issue none-the-less.
One thing we don’t like about the new design is the Apple logo, at least on our black unit. The shiny fruit stands out in stark contrast to the jet black background, and it’s a bit too flashy for our tastes. It’s less gaudy on the white, where the colors blend better. A grayed screen print, like iPhone text at the bottom, or even a brushed metal logo would have been more subtle. We realize most owners view the logo as a badge of honor, but to a non-believer it’s just another smug move by a company that is already plenty full of themselves.
The iPhone 3G is a superb piece of hardware. It’s beauty lies in its simplicity, and that all starts with the minimalistic design. Our plastic flap non-withstanding, the iPhone 3G picks up exactly where the iPhone left off, with the new plastic backing affording the phone a sleeker feel and appearance, despite the slight size increase. It is another fine piece of work by the designers over at Cupertino.
The UI is relatively unchanged on the iPhone 3G's 2.0 software, and it remains nearly perfect. The first time around the UI was as smooth as can be, but we (and others) are experiencing more issues this time around. Generally it’s excellent, but every now and again we will get some lag, or a lockup. It has even restarted on us a few times, never doing the same thing twice. The iPhone 3G definitely has some bugs, and we’d expect a software update from Apple pretty soon.
There are two additional menu options this time around: Contacts and App Store. Contacts seems to be a response to user feedback, though it’s a redundant item as it is the same exact contacts accessed via the tab in the phone app. We appreciate one-click access, but adding another icon to avoid two-click access seems pointless to us. It is a perfect example of why we wish we could hide icons.
The App Store means that there is the possibility to add many, many, many more icons to the menu, which in turn means it will swell to several pages. Owners of Jailbroken iPhones are used to this, but we would have preferred the ability to create folders to group applications and keep the interface a bit cleaner. Our theory has always been the less cluttering at the top level the better, and since the iPhone only has one level it’s bound to get pretty crowded.
Phonebook:
The big change here is the search functionality. Users can now pull up the keyboard to search through their contacts, and along the side is an alphabetical slider similar to the one found on the Instinct and Windows Mobile devices. We prefer its implementation in the latter devices though, where finger scrolling brings up a large letter on the display so we know where we are at in the list.
Other than that the interface remains unchanged. Adding and editing a contact is as easy as ever and the in-call screens are still simple to understand and use. We had no issues syncing with our Outlook contacts. Basically, it’s pretty much perfect.
Visual Voicemail remains unchanged. Apple and AT&T may have been the first to market with this, and it’s still pretty great, but the Instinct has better implementation due to more options such as sending a text or replying via voicemail.
Organizer:
The calendar remains unchanged, as does the notepad. When we first set up the iPhone 3G we were asked if we wanted to sync calendar and contacts with Outlook. Like our contacts, our calendar synced without issue, though notes do not transfer as they do with Windows Mobile. The calendar is very easy to use, and highly functional. With the iPhone’s new Exchange support, as well as Apple’s new MobileMe product, customers have the ability to sync their calendar and contacts over the air in real time.
The calculator is the one functionality that has been updated. In portrait mode it is the same basic one found on the original iPhone, but now rotating the phone brings up a scientific calculator. It’s a handy feature, though we would have rather seen more useful items such as a tip calculator or currency and unit converters.
Messaging:
The iPhone 3G has the same threaded interface for text messages, and still doesn’t support MMS. The keyboard still needs some work. First and foremost, we cannot fathom why Apple doesn’t default typing of any sort to landscape. As it stands, the only time you can even access the keyboard in landscape mode is if you’re browsing the web and already in that view; if you bring it up in portrait you will have to close it, switch orientation and bring it up again. In landscape mode the keyboard is fairly accurate. We made some mistakes, but most of the time Apple’s fantastic auto-correction software fixed it. In portrait mode, however, it is just too cramped. The software did its best, but it can’t make up for poor design. Apple needs to a) give the user the option of messaging in landscape or portrait and b) change the portrait keypad to a predictive text such as SureType or T9, rather than full QWERTY.
The email has been slightly improved, and users can now move or delete multiple emails at a time. Also new is iWork and PowerPoint attachment support. As we mentioned earlier, the new software supports Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync, so those with an Exchange account will get their email pushed to them. MobileMe users will get push from Mail for Mac users or Outlook for PC users. Yahoo still offers push email to the iPhone as well, but interestingly Gmail does not. For accounts that don’t have push you can set it to fetch at different intervals, or manually pull them.
Connectivity and Data:
As the name would imply, the iPhone 3G now features 3G cellular data. Despite its Wi-Fi support, lack of 3G was one of the biggest complaints against the original. This time around Apple has added a tri-band HSDPA 3.6 radio to go along with the quad-band GSM/EDGE one. Apple claims that this doubles the speed, and indeed the iPhone 3G is snappier. The problem is that AT&T’s 3G coverage lags sorely behind 3G EVDO networks. Furthermore, their claimed coverage is not an accurate reflection of true coverage; our neighborhood is listed as a 3G area with AT&T’s “Best” coverage, yet we were unable to pull a 3G signal (inside or out) and as we will discuss later we had reception issues overall.
Lack of network coverage isn’t the phone’s fault, and when we did find a 3G signal web pages loaded quickly and smoothly. We used our Wi-Fi network at home, which was easy to set up. Mobile Safari is as great as ever, and the large, multi-touch display makes browsing the web a truly enjoyable experience. Flash is not supported, but Mobile Safari recognizes a YouTube video and the user can click to watch the video via the YouTube app. In a photo finish, we have to give Opera Mobile 9.5 the edge overall though.
Bluetooth is all but pointless on the iPhone. It only supports the HSP, HFP 1.5 and PBA profiles, which basically means it can only sync with a mono headset or a car’s Bluetooth system. We were able to pair our Samsung WEP500 without issue, but with no voice-dialing software “hands-free” is a misnomer. Despite having Bluetooth 2.0 with EDR (enhanced data rate,) the iPhone 3G can’t actually transfer files or be used as a modem via Bluetooth. It still does not support stereo headsets, an egregious exclusion for a multi-media phone. Apple has opened the phone to an extent, but is still employing their strong-arm tactics in many areas.
Camera:
The iPhone 3G seems to use the same 2 megapixel camera as found in the original. There are no options, and the user cannot record video. Pictures turned out above average; under artificial light there was graining and in bright sunlight some of our photos had a blue tint to them, but overall color representation was good and lines were well defined.
Multimedia:
Again, the iPhone 3G remains unchanged. The iPhone is of course also an iPod, and it still has the incredible interface found on the first generation iPhone as well as the iPod Touch. Album art looks gorgeous, and Cover Flow is still pretty darn cool (as long as your music is properly tagged with art.) Videos look amazing on the iPhone’s large, high-resolution display. Everything just works, and while we have a video codec support gripe with Apple in general, the iPhone is still the undisputed king of multimedia phones.
The YouTube app is still present, and allows the user to view top videos, mark favorites and search for any video. It was groundbreaking on the original, but is merely another feature in today’s market. This is a great example of how the iPhone changed the mobile industry.
Software:
The App Store marks a fundamental change in Apple’s iPhone philosophy. The original iPhone was a closed system, but it didn’t take hackers long to crack the code and not only unlock the phone but also start developing apps that utilized the potential of the device and its OS. With the iPhone 2.0 software comes the App Store, an official channel where developers can sell (or give away) applications. They can be downloaded either via iTunes or directly over the air, though there are size restrictions for OTA downloads. Apple saw the millions in lost revenue, and while developers will keep 70% of the profits Apple still gets a 30% cut for doing basically nothing other than hosting the apps.
At launch there were hundreds of applications available, but we downloaded a few of the most popular ones to see how they worked. First up was AIM, which finally gave us a first party instant messaging solution for the iPhone. In theory it’s a good application, but in practice was buggy at best. The MLB At Bat app was better, offering scores and video highlights for each game. The information was near real-time, and videos of scoring plays and defensive gems were usually up within ten minutes or so. The only thing it was missing was an alert system; we’d like to be able to customize our favorite teams and get scoring alerts instead of having to manually pull the information. Sports Tap is a good fee app for comprehensive sports scores and news. It not only covers the major US leagues, but others such as F1, English Premier League, AFL and more. The AP and New York Times each have a free news app that delivers the latest headlines to your handset. The AP Mobile News App is more comprehensive, offering not only national headlines but also local news, sports and showbiz info.
Super Monkey Ball is an app that will no doubt popular, and does a great job of harnessing the power of the iPhone. It’s similar to the console versions, where you guide a monkey in a bubble through various stages while collecting bananas and avoiding falling off the edge. On the iPhone you control the ball by tilting the device, taking advantage of the accelerometer. Once we got past the first few levels the difficulty increased greatly, and it felt like it was in part due to the accelerometer. During gameplay it was usually good, but not quite as responsive as the Tilt game we loved so much on the Touch Diamond, and there are times when our monkey got turned around. It could be attributed to the game’s software, but we have a feeling SEGA knows what they’re doing and we had some accelerometer issues outside of SMB as well. While web browsing the orientation will at times turn on you when the phone is stationary (we even had it do it once while the phone was sitting on a table, and hadn’t been moved) or won’t turn at all. This is something we’ve experienced on the original, and are disappointed that Apple hasn’t fixed it. Overall we wish the accelerometer was used more often in the UI.
Apple prides themselves on their simple to use, rock solid software. To our surprise the iPhone 3G wobbles here. 98% of the time it runs smoothly, but as noted earlier we’ve had the phone lag on us here and there, and downright reset a few times. It’s not as laggy as Windows Mobile can be, but it has not been as solid as the original. A major gripe we have is with syncing. Every time you plug the phone in it backs up your data, which is to be expected, but the process can take upwards of 10 minutes. There is no good reason for this, and our Windows Mobile phones can completely sync usually in under two minutes.
On launch day iTunes servers crashed, creating even longer lines, customer headaches and bricked phones. Throw in continued MobileMe issues and Apple seemed more like Microsoft on July 11th. And speaking of which, for as much as they bash Vista and its constant security pop-ups, we’re getting pretty darn frustrated with being asked if apps can access our location and entering our iTunes password every time we go back to the App Store and download something.
Performance:
Reception is a concern on the iPhone 3G. During our battery testing it took a few attempts to complete the call, and it did drop once. Its bars jump frequently from 1-4, and while we realize bars don’t always accurately reflect signal strength, there were other times when calls took longer to connect than they should. Callers on the other end said we sounded “good” and volume was not an issue, but that we were somewhat “digital and tinny.” Bluetooth performance was even worse, with voice quality degrading further and echoes becoming a problem. It was much better on our end, however, and callers sounded very natural and clear even over Bluetooth.
The battery is rated at 10 hours of 2G talk time, but we were only able to achieve 8 hours and 40 minutes. It is rated for 5 hours or 3G talk time, but since we couldn’t get a 3G signal at home we were unable to test it. From other reports battery life is a concern all around, with many users falling short on talk time and media playback. Overall we were fairly disappointed with the iPhone’s phone performance.
Conclusion:
The iPhone 3G is a multimedia powerhouse, with a gorgeous design and an interface that remains the standard. If you don’t already own one, the iPhone 3G is well worth the $200-300 it will set you back, but what about if you do already have one? Honestly, we’d have a hard time recommending it, unless you really needed 3G or GPS. Apple’s fundamental business mistake here is that the iPhone 2.0 software is available to current iPhone owners, meaning they get just about every benefit of the new device without having to shell out a few hundred dollars. Coupled with AT&T’s poor 3G coverage and the issues users have been running into, the 3G just isn’t a compelling upgrade. Furthermore, manufacturers have had a year to catch up to Apple and some are doing a pretty good job.
The original iPhone is still an amazing phone, and can utilize the benefits of the new 2.0 software. When it comes down to it, the new iPhone simply plays catch-up with other devices that have been running 3G and GPS for years. This was an opportunity for Apple to once again raise the bar, but instead they dropped the ball.
The new software can be buggy, and lacks the normal Apple refinement
There is a lack of wow this time around, Apple simply brought the features up to par with other offerings rather than giving the customer something completely new
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