iPhone 3G Review - Part 1

I want to preface this review with the fact that I am coming from T-Mobile where I had a BlackBerry Curve 8320. So much of my review will consist of comparisons because it's foremost in my mind. The devices are VERY different (in my mind) and I would say are directed at very different audiences. The BlackBerry models and software is more utilitarian and targets the enterprise user with a HEAVY focus on email, and in my opinion it is the best here hands down... no question. I don't think there is a close competitor for business type applications and usage.

With that said, the BlackBerry kind of sucks for internet and other personal goodness. Don't get me wrong, it is hanging in there with apps like Facebook and other things... and the Storm (as well as the Bold and Curve 8900 I believe) have a MUCH improved internet experience... but I don't think they are as good or as slick as the iPhone in this regard (or the Pre from the videos I've seen... the Pre is using the webkit, same as the iPhone, so the web experience should be identical... signal strength aside... more on that later). I had contemplated buying a NetBook or cheap laptop just to have around for web browsing so I had a larger screen, etc. I didn't really like this idea because I think I would eventually stop using it or it would become cumbersome (it CERTAINLY doesn't fit in your pocket).

My recent decision to go with an iPhone consisted of quite a bit of research that encompassed: AT&T as the carrier, so their signal strength in my area since that's where I am most of the time; The iPhone itself compared to other phones that I could buy (understanding a LARGE portion of what is getting fixed in the 3.0 software release for the iPhone and what that fixes); and finally the applications available to any phone I might purchase.

The Palm Pre:
The Pre shows promise because it has the ability to multi-task well (though it remains to be seen what the performance will be with multi-tasking... so let's assume it will be adequate... AND, there is rumor that Apple will be starting to utilize multi-tasking with the new model of iPhone because it will have a faster CPU and more RAM... but that's rumor at this point). Not only that, it is also using the WebKit for its browser (like the iPhone), and from what I can see the browser experience is pretty much identical to the iPhone (cellular carriers and signal strength aside). I, personally, like the idea of the slide out keyboard for several reasons: 1) I am coming from a line of keyboard phones (Palm Treo w/Palm OS, Palm Treo w/ Windows Mobile, finally BlackBerry), so I am more comfortable with a physical keyboard; 2) This allows the screen to display more info since it is not being filled with the keyboard on-screen (this is not a *huge* deal, but I personally think it would be nicer and have found the lack of screen real estate when the keyboard is up to be somewhat limiting on the iPhone... but not a big deal); 3) I always fear that the "touch" portion of the touchscreen will stop being responsive (this has happened to me on several touch only devices, some older Palm devices included). Some of the videos of its capabilities are impressive (here's a 26 minute video that provides GREAT coverage of it's features... at least what they'll tell us) ... but SO much is still unknown because Palm and Sprint are keeping very tight lips on capabilities, etc. They don't want any bad press before the launch is my guess. Not only that... this is a COMPLETELY new phone and operating system from the ground up, so it has NO proven track record (other than Palm's track record, and I've always been a fan of Palm). This also means that accessories and software (applications) for the OS will be very limited for quite a while I would think. Developers are going to have to get ramped up on this OS, and are they *really* going to spend on this phone/OS unless it takes off like gangbusters?? Me thinks not... not until it gets some presence in the market and proves it can hang with the iPhone. This finally brings me to Sprint. Sprint has some good things about it, but they are bleeding and the Pre is pretty much its last effort to gain back some ground in the market. So who knows what will happen to Sprint in the meantime... but I doubt they will be investing in new towers for a bit. And that brings me to the lack of coverage where I live. It's not EVERYWHERE around me that is a problem... but my house and the neighborhood I live in basically are not even on Sprint's coverage map (it's listed as "Roaming"). That pretty much clinched it for me... and the fact that AT&T's signal strength at my house is now stellar (as good as Verizon in my area, which is saying something).

As far as the iPhone goes, I am still struggling with getting all of my email accounts, calendars and contacts squared away. Don't get me wrong... if you have one email/calendar account and one set of contacts to sync up, you should be golden. I have several, and it seems you can't have them all doing updates at the same time... so I have to make some decisions on what to do. Don't worry, I will share my experience with everyone in case someone else is in the same boat. That will all be in Part 2 most likely, since that is currently my main focus.

One quick thing I found that bugs me. You can't create an appointment and invite someone else to it. This is what prompted my current project to get me and my wife on the same calendar and also simplify my workflow... more later.

HOWTO - Use MobileMe with Your Own Domain! - macosx.com

HOWTO - Use MobileMe with Your Own Domain! - macosx.com:

****UPDATE****
I have since decided (I think) that I am NOT going to go with MobileMe (unless they release some serious enhancements and reasons to keep me) and am going to figure out a way to utilize Google for free (GoogleSync for the iPhone). I will post more on my solution as I figure it out.
****/UPDATE****

I actually figured this out on my own by playing around a bit, but then I found this post that confirmed my findings.

What this allows is all of the MobileMe push/sync goodness while still allowing you to send replies as a different domain email account. The Sent items become a bit scattered, but at least it's something.

Here's the post:

"HOWTO - Use MobileMe with Your Own Domain!
I really want to use MobileMe with my own domain and with a new feature in iPhone 2.0 I have managed to pull it off.

1) Setup your MobileMe account with all the push and syncing features so that life is good and jolly.

2) Setup your own mail account and setup, just as you normally would until your satisfied with it.

3) Go into Settings and Fetch Settings and turn your 'non-mobileme' account to manual. Go in and read any emails you need too to get your new emails down to ZERO.

4) Forward your emails from your primary domain account to your MobileMe service, most email providers provide this type of feature. Worst case, setup MobileMe to POP your mail account, but that won't be 'instant' like forwarding is.

5) When you get a new email in to MobileMe and reply to it, if it's an email you want to come from your own domain, just select the 'from' field, and a new feature allows you to choose which account to send the email FROM. Select the other domain account and send it.

Your SENT items will appear in your personal domain email account Sent folders, not MobileMe.

While it's not a PERFECT solution, its better than nothing."

Hell froze over...

I'm still in shock, but I actually went and got an iPhone 3G 8GB from my local AT&T shop.

This wasn't an easy decision, and I *DO* have 30 days to return it, but some of the key features it has were just too compelling. AND, one of the biggest deciding factors of going with AT&T over Sprint was signal strength in my area. The other phone I was *seriously* considering was the Palm Pre, which I think looks like a great phone, and even has some better features than the iPhone... but the AppStore and the apps for the iPhone trump the Pre. I mean... they have a frickin' Kindle app for the iPhone!! So you get access to all the Kindle library and pricing!!!! That's killer! I used to read books on my BlackBerry (read Angels & Demons on it) and found it to be great... but the library was limited and pricing was nearly identical to physical books.

So, back to Sprint and the Palm Pre... my wife and kids are on Sprint for their phones, so I was thinking maybe it would be better to all be on the same account... and the Palm Pre was about to be released and it looks like a really slick phone. However, I've known for a long time that Sprint hasn't been very good where we live, and T-Mobile was in the same boat... but at least with T-Mobile and the ability to use WiFi for my phone was pretty killer. AT&T was never great in my area in the past... but that's a long time ago that I had them, so I decided to compare AT&T with Sprint as far as coverage. AT&T was showing full strength signal and 3G in my area, and Sprint was showing *Roaming*... seriously... not even 1 bar in the surrounding area of where we live... roaming.

There was NO way I could deal with that, and I think it may actually get the rest of my family out of their contracts without paying the fees to cancel (this is what got me out of T-Mobile and they were at least showing 1-3 bars for my area.

So, between the signal strength (and it IS good for me, by the way) and the iPhone AppStore... it won. I'm sure I will find things I dislike and can't work around... but I think I'm finally okay with that. And with the 3.0 update right around the corner (June 8th, 2009) which fixes a LOT of my initial complaints, I think I will be happy.

Roku Digital Video Player: First Impressions (Review)

My Roku Digital Video Player arrived via FedEx yesterday (on a Saturday no less)! I have to say I am VERY impressed with this pint sized device. It is VERY small (as you can see by the picture of a hand holding it), contains output for HDMI, Component, S-Video and even composite. For audio out, it has HDMI, optical and plain old RCA R+L.

The TV that I hooked it up to is only an SDTV, so no HDMI for me yet. In fact, the TV is quite old (all things considered) and doesn't even have component inputs. Thankfully, it at least has S-Video input, so I went with that. The picture, I would say, is at least as good as my DVD player, and there are even HD videos through Netflix that look better than DVD (trust me, even though it's an SDTV, you *can* see a difference... even if it is slight. I first noticed the difference when playing HD channels from my Verizon FiOS TV set-top-box).

The Roku Digital Video Player was designed to work with a Netflix account and it's digital streaming videos. I've been a member of Netflix for a VERY long time, and have been a huge fan of the delivery model (mail-order video rentals; you pay a monthly fee and can have a certain number of videos out at a time; turn-around for exchanging videos has been 2 days for me). I hate having to leave the house, or worry about returning a video on time. The streaming video service from Netflix wasn't stellar at first, in my opinion, but since it's startup it has gotten MUCH better. And with faster home-based internet connections, and I'm sure storage costs coming down considerably since it's launch, the quality that I am experiencing is VERY good. I have Verizon FiOS internet at 15mbps down, 2mbps up. I test my connection fairly regularly and I get a pertty consistent 12+mbps. It all depends on where you are testing against, and the available throughput of the routes you take... but my connection has been very good.

The device has wireless built-in!! I actually wasn't even thinking about this when I bought it because I have network cable to many different areas of my house... but I set it up using the wireless and have to say that it is providing excellent quality with absolutely no stutter or apparent latency issues. So, for now anyway, I am skipping the wire.

The remote it comes with is very simplistic, and works just fine. I may be getting a Logitech Harmony 550 refurbished to control everything... but for now I'll use multiple remotes. Again, I am really impressed with the fit and finish of this device.

Once I hooked it up and turned it on, it starts up with a setup wizard that is VERY easy to follow and use. Once I got it hooked up to my wireless network, it downloaded and applied a firmware update (very quickly too). This update provides the ability to play Amazon Video On-Demand. I haven't messed with this yet, but from what I can tell, this provides you the ability to either rent or buy movies to be watched "on-demand" via the Roku player or your PC/Mac. This is a neat idea, and I could see renting a movie from here that isn't available via Netflix streaming, or that is a "long wait" through Netflix DVD, but I'm not sure I would "buy" a movie from this format... at least, not yet. Rental prices seem to be $1.99, however I'm not sure at this point what that gives you (e.g., do you only get to watch the movie once? Do you get to watch it as many times as you can over a 3 day period? etc).

All in all, I have to say this device is killer for me and my usage and only costs $99.99. A quick tip for you folks looking to buy one: If you go to Roku's web site and click "Buy Now", it will take you to an order page where there is a "Shipping Cost" listed. What I realized in discussing this with my friend is that this "cost" is not a static cost. For instance, mine was showing up as $14.99 for shipping, but his was showing up as $4.99 for shipping! At first I couldn't believe it... I thought he was messing with my head, but he sent me a screenshot of it. Then he gave me the idea of clearing my cache and cookies in my browser and trying again. I then started to see different shipping costs each time. The first time I did it, it came up as $9.99, then finally it came up as $0.00!!!! I stopped on that one and actually bought it! So, I paid $99.99, with no tax and paid nothing for shipping! They use FedEx and it actually arrived on Saturday around 1:30pm (shipped from California, and I live in PA... almost as far as you can get from CA. So, if you live closer, I imagine it would arrive sooner than 5 days).

For me, the ability to watch all kinds of classic TV shows and a bunch of movies, all without having to change discs in my DVD player, AND the fact that you get to see the box art as well as a description is pretty killer. I have a 400 disc DVD changer, but I have to say that it became more of a pain in the ass than beneficial. In fact, I've resorted to using my XBOX 360 as my DVD player in that room, and have a single DVD player in my other main TV room. Part of the problem with that beast is that any DVD movie data you put into it gets lost if there is a power loss (I didn't know this up front). So, originally, I thought it was great... there is a menu to browse your DVDs, and I hooked up a keyboard and spent hours inputting the movie titles and actors, genres, etc... then we lost power and all of that hard work was gone. I was furious and never did it again... so I had to keep a separate notebook of what DVD was in what slot. Needless to say, it didn't turn out to be all that it was cracked up to be. :-(

The Roku, on the other hand, gets all that data from Netflix and pulls info from my account. I only wish it could stream music and videos from my PC on TOP of Netflix and Amazon... but I'm okay with it not doing that.