Apple iPhone

...O2 would be stocking the Apple iPhone as of November the 9th. Not only was I looking for a new mobile contract, but also a replacement MP3 player so the Apple iPhone seemed ideal. I made plans to purchase the iPhone and on the evening of release made my way down to the nearest O2 store upon finishing work, bagging myself my very own iPhone at a price of £269. Although the price did seem a little steep, especially considering that I would be paying ...
.../> The design of the Apple iPhone was one of the first things that attracted me to it. I had previously been looking at the LG Prada phone which like this one is operated through touch sensitivity. This seemed an interesting concept to me, and having always used button based phones before I found that the absence of masses of buttons made the phone far more attractive than any I had owned in the past. Some would perhaps argue that the design of ... more

I had been waiting for this day for some time. My 18 month contract with T-Mobile is coming up for renewal next week, however having had problems gaining reception in my area I'd opted to look elsewhere for a new contract. A few weeks back my problems were solved when I was shopping around to try and find the best mobile contract, and discovered that O2 would be stocking the Apple iPhone as of November the 9th. Not only was I looking for a new mobile contract, but also a replacement MP3 player so the Apple iPhone seemed ideal. I made plans to purchase the iPhone and on the evening of release made my way down to the nearest O2 store upon finishing work, bagging myself my very own iPhone at a price of £269. Although the price did seem a little steep, especially considering that I would be paying out a further £35 a month for the contract also; I deemed this to be a worthwhile investment for what I would be getting for my money.

Since purchasing the phone it has definitely lived up to my expectations, and if anything it has in fact surpassed them. I've found it hard to put the phone down since I bought it, and the features that the phone beholds are astounding; a 2 Megapixel camera, full featured e-mail and web browsing, 8GB of on-board memory, and even Wi-Fi and EDGE connectivity for the ability to connect to the internet completely free of charge when you're in one of the many free Wi-Fi hotspots that are located all around the country. The phone itself is blessed with a 3.5 inch screen which is absolutely perfect for tasks such as browsing the internet and watching videos whilst on the move, and so far I have had no problems whatsoever with it.

Upon turning on the phone you will find the following icons laid out neatly across the upper two thirds of the screen; Text, Calendar, Photos, Camera, YouTube, Stocks, Maps, Weather, Clock, Calculator, Notes, Settings, and then a further four icons across the bottom of Phone, Mail, Safari, and iPod. Given that the phone is operated by touch it must therefore be taken for granted that the icons are probably going to be larger than on any phone you've used in the past; each icon is around a centimetre square and is plenty big enough to press with ease, but at the same time small enough not to look overly large. I feel that the four icons along the bottom will perhaps be the ones utilised most frequently by many, however Texting, use of the Camera and Photo Browsing will no doubt be equally as popular with large numbers of the phones users.

- The Design -

The design of the Apple iPhone was one of the first things that attracted me to it. I had previously been looking at the LG Prada phone which like this one is operated through touch sensitivity. This seemed an interesting concept to me, and having always used button based phones before I found that the absence of masses of buttons made the phone far more attractive than any I had owned in the past. Some would perhaps argue that the design of the iPhone is rather basic; it is essentially a 4.5 inch tall, 2.4 inch wide rectangle with a 3.5 inch screen at it's centre (the screen measurement is taken diagonally). It is somehow far more than this however, and once switched on is one of the most beautiful pieces of machinery I have ever clapped my eyes on. The phone possesses four physical buttons on its outer shell, these being 'Home', 'Volume', 'Mute', and 'Sleep'. The phone has a fantastic black metallic sheen about it and I have to say that it is absolutely stunning in its appearance.

- Battery Life -

Now given that this phone has multiple potentially power-absorbing uses, and with a massive in-built memory that puts it on a par with it's sister machine the Apple iTouch - the iPhone clearly needed to be provided with an excellent battery life, and this is something which is certainly apparent here. I have not put the machine down since buying it, however the battery is still standing strong, unlike my former phone the Nokia which could never have boasted of such power in the battery department. The battery life in the manual is actually quoted as follows; up to 8 hours call time, up to 250 hours standby time, up to 6 hours for internet use, up to 7 hours for video playback, and up to 24 hours for audio playback. I don't know quite what you think of these claims, but when I first read them, frankly I thought that they were completely unattainable. Having been using the phone however it would seem that these claims are completely true, making the iPhone an incredible piece of machinery which can provide hours upon hours of highly advanced entertainment excellence. I feel that the iPhone puts its phone world counterparts to shame in the battery department, an area that other companies need to now be weary of given the emergence of this latest release in the iGeneration.

- Built-In Sensors -

The Apple iPhone is actually blessed with what is known as an accelerometer. Now I know that there will probably be many of you out there wondering just what exactly this is, and what it essentially means is that when you change the orientation of the phone (from landscape to portrait), the phone senses that you have done so and alters the screen accordingly. This is a great feature, one which I have found especially useful for web browsing.

Another supreme sensor the phone beholds is an ambient light sensor; a useful little feature that automatically adjusts the brightness of the screen to fit with the appropriate level of ambient light and thus saving massively on battery power. I feel that this is perhaps one of the key secrets to the phones long battery life, and is perhaps a feature that phone manufacturers will try to implement more freely in future.

A third and final sensor of the phone is that of the proximity sensor. This particular sensor acknowledges when the phone is brought near the face, switching off the display and touch screen again in order to save on battery. In the past I have frequently had problems with my phones whereby I all too often end calls accidentally through my ear brushing the 'End Call' button and my phone calls thus being prematurely terminated. This is no longer a problem I have to face with the iPhone, and will no doubt benefit me greatly as I no longer have to make embarrassing callbacks explaining why the call was ended so abruptly.

- The Keyboard -

Given that the phone is completely touch screen operated, you may well be wondering how on earth the keyboard is operated in order to input numbers, letters and symbols as and when required. The simple answer is that the iPhone incorporates a full QWERTY keyboard that can be brought up on screen in order to enable you to easily send all of your text messages, e-mails etc. The QWERTY keyboard is that which you will be familiar with from having used your personal laptop/home computer, and is extremely simple to operate. The iPhone incorporates automatic spell checking and correction, a dictionary that is capable of learning new words, and strong predictive text capabilities.

One problem I have personally experienced with the QWERTY keyboard is that the letters are too close together and you therefore frequently have the issue of touching not only the key that you are after, but nearby keys also. Although this is a pain at first and will perhaps slow you down a fair amount when you first begin using your phone; after a while you will find that if you type quickly and don't worry about inaccuracies you are making then a lot of the time the phone will actually correct them for you anyway and it is therefore not at all an issue.

- Messaging -

Text messaging will be never as you've seen it before with the iPhone (well, it was certainly never as I had seen it before anyway). When you open up the Text section of the phone you are shown your list of contacts and their phone numbers, and underneath each is a preview of the last sent/received message exchanged with that person. If you click on a contact then you can bring up a list of all messages exchanged with that person, and you can edit this as you please; or even delete a whole thread of messages exchanged with any particular contact if you so desire it. The SMS function is simple to use, and creating a new text message is as simple a process as any with all the icons laid out clearly on the main Text screen in order to easily compose a new text message as and when you desire.

- MP3 Capabilities -

As stated earlier on, the memory built in to this particular machine is a massive 8GB so this makes it perfect for MP3 playback and for video playback alike. It is incredibly simple to play your favourite tracks on the iPhone, and if you've had a whirl on the recently released MP3 player the Apple iTouch then you'll notice the MP3 functionality here is very much the same as it is there. If you're used to the more traditional layout of the standard iPod however then you're probably going to be in for a bit of a shock.

To access the MP3 element of the phone is a painless process whereby all you need do is touch the icon marked 'iPod' in the bottom right hand corner and you are thus transferred to a page where you have five options to select from; Playlists, Artists, Songs, Videos and More. Once more these options are laid out simply for you on screen and all you need to do is touch the icon on screen which represents the option you're wishing to click through to. If you select 'More' then you are transferred to a page where you're given the icons of Albums, Audiobooks, Complilations, Composers, Genres and Podcasts. I feel that the MP3 player is easy to navigate, and strolling through the categories is a process that takes little getting used to. One nice touch about the player is that when you turn the iPhone on its side you can now use 'Cover Flow' which is a fantastic little feature whereby you can browse through your music collection with album cover images coming up on screen that can easily be flicked through allowing for an album of choice to be picked out.

When you actually play tracks using the MP3 player I feel that the sound quality is more than acceptable. I have used several MP3 players in the past; some have had good sound quality, some bad, but the iPhone definitely ranks up there with the best of them and quite frankly you'd expect nothing less from the company that has enjoyed such great success from its iPod range.

- Video Playback -

Much like the playing of music, running videos on this phone is a simple process that will not take you long to get used to. When you watch a video, the only way of playing it is to watch it in landscape mode which is of course no problem as it gives the video a wide screen cinematic style experience. Tapping the screen twice brings up the standard playing options of Pause, Back, and Forward, and also more advanced options such as an ability to zoom in and out, and a slide bar for seeking out a particular moment in the video that you are watching. I feel that the video options are excellent for this machine, and the actually quality of the video when it plays is sublime. I have experienced no problems with frame rate so far, and have found the playback of my videos to have been silky smooth.

- Web Browsing -

To search the web on the Apple iPhone is an area in which the phone shines supremely. Many phones in this day and age will have a web browser of some description, however the one that the iPhone possesses I feel is exceptional. Pages can be viewed in their full glory through the phone's Safari Browser, and you can zoom in and out of the screen as you please. I personally use the internet a lot, and have found having such incredible internet available on my phone greatly rewarding. Already I have taken full advantage of having the internet readily available at my fingertips, and prizing me away from my browsing has proven to be quite a nightmare. I use trains on a daily basis to travel to and from work as I'm sure many others do also, and instead of reading the newspaper on my travels I will now be taking full advantage of my new found easy internet use.

- E-Mail -

If you're wishing to use your iPhone for viewing or sending E-Mail then this is not at all going to prove to be a problem. With the iPhone you can easily and happily configure the device in order to make several different mail accounts available if you so require. The E-Mail function is easy to use, and will no doubt prove to be an invaluable tool if you happen to be someone that is required to send out a lot of important E-Mail's as you can easily do so on the move. If you're a busy person then that's great as on the way from one place to the next you can not be wasting any time, and now making sure that everything is mailed in record time. The phone can even fetch your E-Mail for you whilst you're doing other tasks such as listening to music or searching the web, so you can happily download your E-mail in the background whilst you do so.

- Camera -

The camera function of phones is something that I myself use very little. It's always nice to have for capturing that odd shot however, and with the iPhone the shots you do take will always be of a decent quality. The iPhone actually possesses a 2 Megapixel camera, and the pictures I have taken with it I have actually been incredibly impressed with. My previous phone had always taken reasonably strong pictures also, however the pictures I have taken with my iPhone put my old phone to shame in this department. Picture quality is crisp, and the photos taken could easily be passed off as having been taken using a decent digital camera. The process of using the camera is superbly simple, and during the camera process you are presented with a mere two options from which you can not go far wrong; to take the photo, or to view photos you have previously taken.

Although I myself was impressed with the quality of the pictures I have taken with the phone; the truth is that the camera is not the strongest you'll find, and with some phones out there on the market now boasting of 5 Megapixels and beyond, if you're someone that uses the camera on your phone a lot then you will perhaps not be overly impressed with the camera that the iPhone possesses. This is only a small issue I believe as even though the camera is 2 Megapixels which to some will sound quite low, I have as I say been extremely happy with the pictures I have taken and do not see this factor as a reason to put people off. The fact there is even a camera at all is to me just an added bonus that furthers the incredible appeal of the Apple iPhone.

My Final Thoughts

I am massively impressed with my purchase of the iPhone, and although when I bought it I did have slight reservations with the factor of the sorry state of affairs it left me with in my bank balance; I would say that it was completely worth every penny. The phone can do so many things that the price tag is entirely justified, and if anything you are actually getting quite a bargain for your money. The internet function is incredible, the slick design unsurpassable, and the battery life unbelievable. All in all, every function of the phone is near on perfect and I fail to see how any phone is going to compete when I come to renewing my contract in 18 months time.

When talk of the iPhone first started to circulate, it was not something that immediately captured my interest as in the computer world I have never had an Apple, and have never owned one of their MP3 players either. I am completely new to owning Apple products, but after my experience with this phone I will no doubt be further investing my cash in products of theirs in the not too distant future. For any of you out there currently considering buying an Apple iPhone then I personally would say 'Go for it!' The iPhone is a slick piece of machinery, and when you purchase it will no doubt become the envy of all your friends. If like me, you're someone that is going to be taking full advantage of all the features the phone beholds then it is no doubt a worthwhile investment, if on the other hand you're somewhat technically inept then perhaps the iPhone isn't quite the phone for you. 

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