Fell off the grid for a bit... but got my new iPhone 3GS!!

Hey All,

Sorry I sort of fell off the grid for a bit. I've had a bunch of things going on that really didn't allow me to easily blog... but I've had things I've wanted to discuss. First of all, I got the new iPhone 3GS on June 19th!! WooHoo! I new this model was coming out before my first 30 days was up with AT&T, and I made sure I would be able to exchange my 3G for the 3GS when it came out. I only had to pay a $20 "restocking" fee to do it. I am EXTREMELY impatient, so I couldn't just sit it out and wait for the new model to release. I'm actually glad I did, because it allowed me to experience just HOW different and better the 3GS is to the 3G. I'm also glad that I upgraded my 3G to OS 3.0 before turning it back in. This allowed me to see that OS 3.0 most definitely had some performance improvements on the 3G, let alone the new feature set.

Most recently, I have been trying to find a solid task management system that I could use on both my iPhone and my PC (Windows, not Mac... but my wife has a Mac and I wanted something that was universal for the desktop). I'm pretty sure I finally found the right solution for this, so I will have a post on this specifically (hopefully over the weekend). In the meantime, there is a box on the top right of my main blog page that lists what I am using, with a link that has my referral number in it. If you decide to sign up for it, I'd sure appreciate you using my link so I get the benefits. ;-) I honestly would be happy paying for the service either way, so that should tell you how much I like it. I tried some others, and none of them had everything I was looking for, or were too expensive... or a combination of the two. I will discuss my findings and thoughts on these other services/apps in my review.

I want to get back to my app review series because I have found a lot of apps that are worth their price. So look for more in that area soon as well. Hopefully my Task Management System will help me along in this area! ;-D

iPhone OS 3.0 - Upgrade now or wait?

Not that I am extremely surprised, but my upgrade experience today on my iPhone 3G was less than flawless. This is classic Apple unfortunately, but we all (mostly) put up with it. I would actually guess that a bit of the problem truly stemmed from getting my phone re-activated by AT&T. However, downloading the update from Apple alone was somewhat trying. Both companies are to blame for lack of available bandwidth. Better planning could have certainly mitigated this stuttered experience for so many today.

Now, not everyone experienced the same issues as me, and by the looks of things, a ton of peoe were able to get the update quickly and apply it without issue. Good for them... Seriously.

My upgrade process started at approx. 1:15pm, and consisted of the 3.0 download timing out in iTunes about 4 times. When it finally finished and began to apply to my iPhone, the update failed leaving my 3G in "Recovery Mode"... Nice. Apple's web site suggested I look for iTunes updates, or reboot my pc if there weren't any. Hey, at least they routed me here upon failure, so good on them. So I rebooted.

After reboot, iTunes recognized my phone was in recovery mode and suggested I restore... Uh, yes please. This time it worked just fine, but it took a while to complete. After it installed the 3.0 OS, it had to deactivate my phone... Here's where it got exceedingly annoying. Over 12 times it timed out with a "communication error" trying to communicate with the "iTunes Store"... Seriously?!? I had NO problem browsing the store. I think this where AT&T came into play, and I wasn't alone as others twittered their frustration too. At one point, my phone was activated, but it was STILL trying to connect for some reason. It eventually finished whatever it was trying to do.

Once this completed, it asked if I wanted to restore from a backup... Uh, yeah... Duh!

The restore took quite a while, and I'm not sure what it did during this time, because I STILL had to sync all my shit back to it!! Literally, there was nothing but stock 3.0 shit pn there... WTF? so I tell it to sync... Now I was down to about 100MB free on my 8GB iPhone, so that's a lot of info to sync, but I can't even believe how long it took to sync. I even decided to drop a ton of apps to shorten the time it would take.

When all was said and done, it was 5:32pm!!! Are you kidding me? That was painful. That's 4 hours of my life I would like back. I guess that's what I get for wanting to get it ASAP. ;-)

I just hope it's not as painful when I get my 3G S!!

-- Post From My iPhone

FriendFeed has my attention

I just started using FriendFeed, and I think I like it better than Twitter at this point. For one thing, it can pull updates from other services, such as Twitter, and displays everything from everyone I am following in one place... that's efficient. Another thing I like about it is the easy conversation view... so you can actually see what other people are saying about something... I haven't found a great way to display conversations in Twitter yet (though I haven't invested a lot of time figuring it out either... but should I have too??).

I currently have it pulling in blogger, FaceBook and Twitter content from people I am following. I am now seeing content from these people that I wasn't seeing before... so A+ from me!

iPhone App Review Series

Being that I bought an iPhone recently (5/22/09 to be exact), I have been trying out and buying applications based on finding reviews from other various sites. I will attempt to share some of those sites as I determine them to be worth it (some I haven't found very helpful, or I disagree with the reviews).

This first post in this series will be a quick summary of some of the apps I've come to like/love. I hope to do much more in-depth reviews of specific apps as I use them and my phone more. So look for more in this series.

Games:
I want to lead this category by saying that I don't have a ton of time to game on my phone. Because of that, games that I find to be challenging and offer some life may not provide this to someone who has hours at a time to game on their phone. I've read some reviews from people saying they beat the game in 2 hours or whatever... If you are one of those people, my reviews may not be the best for you.

Real Racing, by Firemint (genre = Racing) - This came out a few days ago and looks to be the best racing sim game so far. I haven't had a chance to play it much yet, but the graphics and depth of the game appear to be second to none. I will review this in more depth at a later date.

Fieldrunners, by Subatomic Studios (genre = Tower Defense) - This is a more classic style Tower Defense gameplay model where there is a blank canvas for you to layout the path to force the AI to follow to their doom. ;-) This style of Tower Defense is a LOT of fun, and can play different based on how you lay out your towers. Tower Defense has become one of my favorite genres lately, and this game does NOT dissappoint. I started off on Medium and failed the first level. I like that, because it tells me it will challenge me and stay interesting! I should say that what I am calling level 1 has (I believe) 100 waves of "runners". These included helicopters that didn't have to follow my path of death, and it also included tanks which can take a LOT of firepower before dying. I got defeated by wave 40. Obviously, I need a better strategy for the choppers and tanks, since they are the only things that got through. One EXTREMELY nice feature of Fieldrunners is the ability to pause your game, even exit and resume a pauses game. This is a must have for any phone based game, but I don't believe most have it.

Star Defense, by Ngmoco (genre = Tower Defense) - This game has some beautiful graphics and great gameplay. You are at a 3D planet with a path that the alien invaders will follow, and in certain areas the path will loop and come near to the other side of it, so placing one tower can get both sides. I only played one world and on Easy, and I got through it easily... But I've been playing Tower Defense games for a bit and understand the strategy, so I should probably never play them on easy.

I think I'll stop here for my first post in this series. I will talk about other types of apps besides games... Like the app I'm using to post this to my blogger account, BlogPress. So far I really like it, but I want to use it more before reviewing it.

-- Post From My iPhone

Roku - STILL loving it to death!!! Honestly

I am still completely in love with my Roku player... maybe even MORE so than when I bought it! I literally use it almost every single day.

From what I can tell these days, the XBOX 360 is as good a player as the Roku, and actually will be better shortly as they release some better feature set for the 360 and Netflix... but I am hopeful they also bring this to the Roku player as well. The feature I am referring to is the ability to browse the Netflix instant play library and add to your queue DIRECTLY FROM THE 360!!! That's huge! I actually bought an app for my iPhone to be able to add to my queue without having to visit a PC... but I'd much rather do it from my device when I'm ready to watch.

At any rate, if you are looking for a device like this and do not already have an XBOX 360 in the room you want this feature, the Roku for $99.99 is a KILLER DEAL! I highly recommend it to anyone, and am very happy I spent the money on it.

Another - Palm Pre review (Engadget this time)

Palm Pre review:
"The Palm Pre. It's not just a phone, it's a myth, an idea, possibly a legacy... and a really, really long time coming."

I didn't read the entire review yet myself, so I may edit this post... just wanted to share.

Gizmodo - Palm Pre Review - Palm pre review

Gizmodo - Palm Pre Review - Palm pre review:
"It's here.

One last effort. A slow, but firm, shove of the chips. All in. Palm's only hope to save a company once synonymous with smart handheld devices: the Pre. Their eyebrow raised, daring you to call. They flip. Full house. Respectable. Decent. Impressive even. But not the highest hand.

That's not to say that the phone isn't good, because it is. The software has quite a few interesting innovations that push the concepts of what people can do with smartphones, like Google Android when it debuted—only better. The market needs this. The industry needs this. We need this. But the hardware? Cheap. Flimsy. Dangerous even."

Before the actual launch of the Pre, this is a WONDERFULLY complete review, I think. I also think the Pre will be a decent phone, especially in its next release of hardware, but I'm VERY glad I bought an iPhone instead.