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June 28, 2007

To i Or Not to i. Buying an iPhone is the Question.

By: The Dude on the Right
Normally I do a podcast on Thursday evening, but tonight I'm in a typing mood, so I thought I would hit you with a new blog to read since I haven't done one in a while.  From the title of this blog you can probably guess that this dude has a dilemma and that is simply "Do I buy an iPhone as soon as humanly possible, or do I wait?"  Fine, if I do opt to get one it won't be as soon as humanly possible because I won't be camping in line tonight to be "the first on my block" to get one.  I'm going on the theory that between the three AT&T stores around me, well, if the mood hits, I should be able to score one tomorrow evening when they go on sale.  If the iPhone is already sold out at all three stores, well, that might be the sign that I should wait a while, or head to the Apple store in last ditch desperation.  But...

Because sometimes I am partially nuts, and sometimes obsessive and compulsive, and since I have already, in my own bizarre way justified the expense (I need a new PDA since my Palm Pilot is about 5 years old and the battery won't last longer than a day;  Sure, I've got a 60 Gig iPod, but it's pre-video and I think the battery will need to be replaced soon;  My black RAZR isn't cool anymore.  Add them all together: A SmartPhone-$300, a new iPod-$350, and I'm already saving money by getting an iPhone), now the question comes down to do I want to be on the forefront of a cell phone revolution hoping there aren't too many bugs to get through, do I sit back, chill, and maybe wait for the technology to fix itself, or do I want to go on vacation to New Jersey later in the year?

You see along with the launch of the iPhone I've gotten hooked by the Apple commercials for the phone, have become almost intimately close with Bob, the "black shirt dude," while watching the Guided Tour video, the Activation and Synch video, and the iPhone Keyboard video (which shows how the iPhone will suggest the word "pizza" when you can't properly hit the virtual keys on keyboard with no keys), looked at all of the pictures in the gallery, ruled out visiting my local Apple store in favor of my trio of AT&T stores, and don't know who to really believe anymore because even some of the actual reviews that have come out in reputable print papers seem confusing, with the only thing linking them all together is the fact the iPhone will be limited to the AT&T EDGE network (which means slow) as of now, and yet the Wi-Fi option is great.

Along with obsessively checking the Apple site, I've also become obsessed with one of the best message boards about cell phones, namely Howard Forums, and all of the latest postings announcing mostly wrong information about the iPhone.  Lots of people keep posting that the iPhone actually has a 3G chip built in, just waiting for a software patch to "open it up" and that will be the final surprise announcement of the iPhone, but even I don't think that is true.  I do have a concern that I can't have a custom ringtone for all my friends so I know who is calling instantly (Right now on my RAZR Stu Gotz has a Beatles tune, Trash has some Jimmy Buffett, The Dude on the Left has a Harry Caray homerun call, and Mom has some Michael Stanley Band) because a lot of the posts say designing your own ringtones isn't an option, but then another post says this will be coming in the future with a later software update.  I do have a concern that my Shure headphones won't work with the thing because of a sort-of different/recessed headphone jack, but than another post says Shure is working on an adapter for the iPhone.  There's all kinds of blabbering about the Bluetooth capabilities of the phone, but I don't really use Bluetooth so what do I care.  And along with some information that seem legit and a lot of other that seems like crap, my favorite post, so far, deals with a future release of the iPhone, version 6.2, which will include an iPhaser, which one poster quickly states that "only if all the settings, work .. istun.. ikill.. if it only goes to istun and not ikill i will just wait for version 7.3".

And so I've got a little less than 24 hours from now, and three stores to visit, to see if I will be an iPhone owner, or if I might be going to New Jersey instead.

That's it for this one!  I'm The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

Posted by Rightdude at 7:54 PM | Comments (0)