Possibly Audacious Semi-Speculation about 2G/3G iPhone

Apple’s acquisition of P.A. Semi Conductors had the MacBreak Weekly crew people guessing they intend to use these PowerPC based processors in the 3rd or 4th generation of the iPhone, or maybe the 1st version of a handheld Mac.  However, I’m halfway wondering if we’ll see this processor in the 2G/3G iPhone?  

David Ciccone reminded me in his latest Mobility Today podcast of how adamant Steve Jobs had been post 1G/2G release, that from a battery life perspective relative to the mobile device processors available, a HSDPA packing iPhone simply wouldn’t make sense.  Dave also then surmised that something “has to have changed” on this front since all indications point to a 3G iPhone’s release in the next few months.  

How are we to know Apple didn’t guess long before 6/29/2007 that improvements to the Samsung processor in the current iPhone weren’t going to get them there?  How are we to know they haven’t been working with P.A. Semiconductors as a customer all along and were so impressed by their engineering talent they bought it? 

Engadget recently reported the 3G iPhone is already in testing and “only slightly thicker” than the current gen model and will not only have a 3G radio, but also GPS.  That radio combo is a recipe for pitiful battery life unless you also pack in a thick battery, and that doesn’t sound like the strategy Apple took or would take (as they seem to like their designs thin you know).  

I think Ciccone was dead on and I can’t wait to see if we’re right.  However, even if we are right, and the 3G iPhone has fantastic battery life, and even with Exchange Active Sync embedded in the 2G OS, as R.I.M.’s co-CEO Mike Lazaridus recently opined, typing on glass still sucks.

And one more thing: I LIKE BIG FONTS

And I cannot lie….. When it comes to how my eye finds reading on the iPhone, I now can’t go back to the itty bitty fonts found on most other smartphones, except mine is no longer technically a smartphone since I ran the 1.1.2 update. The fonts still rock regardless….

After 150 days of the iPhone: what I still like

First and foremost: I still love the iPhone web browsing experience. I generally spend most of my time on the Google Reader, which was recently given  a more iPhone like interface (which I really like).  But, Safari mobile for all of Apple’s “real Internet” bravado essentially reverts to the same mobile version of Greader that any lesser browser would provide with 2 big differences, no 3 actually. First, the 320×480 screen renders the fonts exceptionally, making for a nicer reading experience (especially on the subscription list view). Second, scrolling and touching items of interest, marking items as read, and launching from links of non complete feed items is very efficiently done with the finger. Third, for those stories that require you go to the full blown website instead of the Googleized version, it’s pretty well documented how nicely Safari on the the iPhone handles that task, and with the aforementioned changes implemented by Google, the ability to just skip the Google “formatted for mobile phones” page and go straight to the source is a very nice option (as long as your connected to WiFi) I can truly attest to how won over to this style of web browsing I am by telling you I almost prefer it over the full Safari experience on my Macs. Of course, the supremely pleasing ergonomics of browsing with my fingers on the sleek surface of iPhone has a ton to do with that.  Also, the lack of flash support is much less of deal breaker than it might otherwise be in comparison to its grown up predecessor on the Mac, due to the inclusion of another Google (owned) app: You Tube.

You Tube over EDGE might drive you to the edge, but it’s passable. However, over YT over WiFi shines brilliantly and really utilizes the exceptional hardware in which it performs. I’m finding more and more videos via the web with links that when touched, launch the YT app on the iPhone.  If only searches on the YT iPhone app were sortable in some meaningful way……

Synchronization with Address Book, iCal, iPhoto and of course iTunes via iTunes works very, very reliably and is truly quite fast.  However, it hasn’t been perfect though I must that when it has had hiccups, it has been during my iPhone’s most hacked states.  And, speaking of hackability, for all the complaints of there being no ability to load 3rd party apps, we actually have the perfect ecosystem.  For those who are willing and capable, hacking the iPhone so as to load native applications is very possible and has for the most part been quite easy.  For those who don’t want to bother with it or don’t have a clue how, being forced to wait until next year to be able to legitimately do this is not something they likely even concern themeselves with, especially when new functionality slowly but surely gets rolled out by the other thing I love: updates easily rolled out by the OEM, not the cellphone carrier!

Of those updates and their small functionality adds, I love the double click on the home button feature that either allows you to pause the currently running song or podcast whilst it overlays the wallpaper lock screen, or go directly to your phone favorites.  I also love being able to browse the iTunes music store and purchase songs directly from the device, and I’ve done plenty of it.

Last but not least, I still love how this thing looks.  It is simply a gorgeously designed piece of electronics, and I seemingly never tire of looking at it, but I do find myself daydreaming about actual buttons these days……

IMAP Gmail available and working flawlessly on my iPhone

Having discovered this glorious news via TUAW last night, I immediately linked to the the Google provided directions and had no issues setting up a new IMAP account on iPrecious.  I did find it curious upon reading other news accounts about this, that Matt Miller found his account wasn’t working yet due to how Google must be provisioning this rollout?  Another curious thing is that I skipped enabling IMAP in my gmail settings and yet it downloaded messages to my phone and is syncing my changes without a hiccup.

Another question to ask is this:  why would Google give me less need to actually manage my account from a full web browser where they can throw targeted ads in my field of vision?

111 days of iPhone dislikes

There is plenty to like about the iPhone 16 weeks after I purchased it, including some of the recent 1.1.1 software upgrade enhancements like the double click home button feature, as well as the super snappy and simple iTunes wifi app. But there are plenty of things that have frustrated me thus far, and are as follows by order of
annoyance level:

The keyboard is probably better than I feel like it is, but the lack of
tactile response and my fat fingers combine for a pretty awful thumb
typing experience. However, the text prediction just got me through
the preceding sentence (and all but one word in this one) without the
need to correct or even hit the backspace “button” once. I have to
admit that’s much better than I would have done on a real thumb
keyboard, but the typing experience is definitely the key sacrifice
you make for the screen size and the overall UI experience. It’s a
trade off that at most moments I am happy to make, but not all moments
to be sure.

The typing issue certainly affects the usefulness of the email
application, but even excluding that as a factor the email app needs a
lot of improvement. My chief complaint is the number of taps required
to move from one account to another. Also, full blown HTML messages
are nice but only really practical over wifi. If someone sends you a
note with large attachments forget about even being able to read the text in the note via EDGE. In fact, I received one such email from a
family member and attempting to open it completely locked the iPhone
up requiring a soft reset a la Windows Mobile. I saw this happen I
think 5 different times exactly the same way, so I’ m convinced as to
the cause. This was before the first software update (1.01, followed by 1.02, and then of course the 3rd party app killing 1.1.1) and I haven’t
seen this happen due to large attachment messages since, but the fury
this caused me still lingers….

One thing the aforementioned update seemed to have fixed was the flaky
crashes Safari mobile was quickly becoming infamous for. However, the
Apple and/or Google developers don’t seem to have cracked the code on
the same problem occurring regularly in the otherwise glorious Google
Maps app even now by the 3rd software update.

The only other issue with Google Maps on the iPhone is how much more
intuitive it would be with a back button. There are times where you
simply can’t (easily anyway) get back to what you just searched. The
email app has this button so why can’t GMaps?

One thing Gmaps and email have that the contacts portion of the phone application could
sorely use is Palmesque contact filtering. I am almost certain that
Apple is choosing not to make this option available due to UI
aesthetics though. They would prefer we scroll for our contacts and
it is very neat and minimally less efficient than filtering (and
depending on where you’re looking in your list sometimes more so), but
I would like the choice nonetheless.

With regard to the Jobs promise that the phone app would be the
killer app on this device, I have to say I largely agree. Aside from
the need for some way to speed dial more easily (double tap of the home button helps but an icon on the home screen would be perfect) it is otherwise a true
joy to use. Apple seems to have borrowed and beautified the phone
application from PalmOS largely, and I much prefer it over the phone
apps from any of the other mobile OSs. If only the call quality were
as good as the Nokia N70 I used for a few months, or the Treo 700p (when
it didn’t crash during a call of course), or the Blackberry 7100 I
borrowed from my wife regularly or even the many HTC Windows Mobile
devices I’ve used over the last few years, which though similarly
challenged in terms of call quality, were still a little better than the iPhone.

And one more gripe: lack of copy and paste functionality on a device
so capable of so many things makes it’s omission more frustrating than
it otherwise would be I think.

So what do I like? Gosh where to start is a dilemma because so much
about iPhone experience is so good. However since web browsing is
what I do most, I’ll start there, but in a another post….stay rss tuned.