The iPhone

[matty2.0]

Hate to bust this love fest bubble, but , as one of the poor buggers who have to repair these pieces of cr@p, please , back up your data weekly. Replace a battery?, yeah great, but what happens after 12 months , and Apple wipe their hands off it? You are going to struggle. Replace a broken screen?, a lazy $300 thank you. What , the sofware has crashed and all your data is lost? , bad luck , it has NO external memory. I know few people who buy a second unit , they normally go back to the old brands.
Either this mob change their way of looking at customer wants , or they may fade out with the Sony Ericsson T28.
Pathetic camera? , poor call quality?, shocking reception?, don't worry , you will see this when the novelty wears off.
Please , I like the phone, but just be aware that it isn't the crown jewels of mobile phones that appear on this forum,and be VERY gentle when using this unit .
Cheers: 2twocents

Anyways, there are only two clear choices in my mind;
the Blackberry Storm or
the iPhone

if you drop or mishandle any of them they'll both shatter to pieces. What happens when you break a BB Storm's screen? same thing ... really.

Other than that, I'd take the iPhone as I browse heaps. Most of my calendars, email, and stuff is online with Google (gmail, google calendars) anyways, so I probably wouldn't even use the Blackberry built in email system that much, unless it was for work via MSFT exchange/enterprise.

By the way, for all iPhone users ... have you guys tried the new Quickoffice Suite app? It's the only app that is comparable to the Microsoft Office suite, and it's only available (in its best form) ... on the iPhone.

Gonna get one tomorrow or this week on either the Optus or Virgin 3G plans.
I heard the iPhone is exclusively tied to Vodaphone for 3G or something ... is this true?

 

[togs]

Nope, NextG on Telstra here.

 

[jono1887]

The iphone is an awesome piece of hardware, although its software is lacking, the new OS3 will solve a lot of problems, although some will still remain. The biggest one being it will still not be able to handle flash, also a lot of java based websites dont work well.

Another thing I would love is an easy to use pdf viewer and an easy way to drag and drop files onto it without having to use itunes.

Gets 'Files Lite' It allows drag and drop for pdf, doc, ppt, xls straight from your computer over wifi, its great... but it restricts it to only 200mb of data, but you can buy the full version 'Files' for ~$5 and it has unlimited storage - limited by your iphone/ipod touch capacity

 

[Blissbomb]

my wife bought me a second hand 8gig Iphone recently, I put my sim in it and everyone in the family had a turn of playing with it, I was prepaid and had $18 worth of credit on it. About an hour after I got it I checked the balance and it was $0. I freaked. We took it to the optus shop the next day and had the 3G switched off. whew
The question I have is which applications ( if any) can I put on the phone that wont drain my pre paid credit?

 

[jono1887]

my wife bought me a second hand 8gig Iphone recently, I put my sim in it and everyone in the family had a turn of playing with it, I was prepaid and had $18 worth of credit on it. About an hour after I got it I checked the balance and it was $0. I freaked. We took it to the optus shop the next day and had the 3G switched off. whew
The question I have is which applications ( if any) can I put on the phone that wont drain my pre paid credit?

Depends on which applications you are using... clearly data dependent applications such as maps, email, weather use up your credit, however, most games dont require any internet accesss... put up a list of the apps you use most

NB: if you were playing with it at home, you can go to settings and switch off the 3G and turn on wifi instead and you can still access the net without paying for downloads (this is if you have a router at your place)

 

[MrBurns]

Depends on which applications you are using... clearly data dependent applications such as maps, email, weather use up your credit, however, most games dont require any internet accesss... put up a list of the apps you use most

NB: if you were playing with it at home, you can go to settings and switch off the 3G and turn on wifi instead and you can still access the net without paying for downloads (this is if you have a router at your place)

I thought you just leave it on WiFi and when you're out of range it switches to 3G automatically ?

 

[jet328]

Turning 3G off won't stop cellular data usage, it will still allow data through on edge (ie. drain credit more slowly)

If you want to turn cellular data off
Settings > General > Network > Cellular data network
Then at the apn just change it slightly so that it can't get data ie. if your with telstra add a space between telstra. and iph , so that you can turn it back on later if you need some urgent data

However, think about going on a $10 data pack (which is plenty for most if you aren't watching videos or downloading songs) because its the data access anywhere that really makes the iphone IMO

 

[MrBurns]

Turning 3G off won't stop cellular data usage, it will still allow data through on edge (ie. drain credit more slowly)

If you want to turn cellular data off
Settings > General > Network > Cellular data network
Then at the apn just change it slightly so that it can't get data ie. if your with telstra add a space between telstra. and iph , so that you can turn it back on later if you need some urgent data

However, think about going on a $10 data pack (which is plenty for most if you aren't watching videos or downloading songs) because its the data access anywhere that really makes the iphone IMO

I agree thats what I've got , I can get data anywhere it's incredible.

Havent got my first bil yet but they SMS you if you're near your limit of 150mb a month.

 

[Glen48]

Phffff The next toy is the Kindle it Downloads books in 1 minute newspapers, and every thing else you need to read. If you can't read it while driving it will talk to you. Check it out on Amazon .com.
If you hold your Blue tooth GSP to your ear while driving is that the same as talking on a mobile?/

 

[matty2.0]

Phffff The next toy is the Kindle it Downloads books in 1 minute newspapers, and every thing else you need to read. If you can't read it while driving it will talk to you. Check it out on Amazon .com.
If you hold your Blue tooth GSP to your ear while driving is that the same as talking on a mobile?/

I think smartphones will make the kindle obsolete in near future.

Anyways, my main question:

I'm about to go for the Virgin $70 plan over the Optus $59 plan.

Main reasons:
- Virgin = can make international calls
- Virgin plan is great value = 500 worth of calls, + 1GB of data
- optus = can't make international calls, and on the $59 (or $60 bascially) plan you have to pay for the phone as well like $2 or something so it's really like $62-$65 dollars.

Question:
Is anyone on Optus and can you make international calls with Optus or Telstra ... or is Virgin full of BS when they say "international calls". And would there be any difference in coverage if one were to go with Virgin? They're all on the same network arent they? i.e. Telstra's ...

Thanks.

 

[poguemahone]

What does the BB do that the iPhone doesnt ?

Align with Company policy for a start....

Otherwise the Qwerty Keyboard is bloody good..better on the Blackberry

 

[matty2.0]

Ah stuff it.
Just gonna go for the optus $59 plan.

Just learnt that Virgin is basically part of the Optus network, so if they're advertising international its probably BS.

Besides, you can just pick up a pre-paid international calling card for $10 or so.

And Optus have this special deal for the 8GB iPhone where you don't have to pay for the handset if you go on the $59 plan.

So that's that.

 

[matty2.0]

Align with Company policy for a start....

Otherwise the Qwerty Keyboard is bloody good..better on the Blackberry

Yeah ... but I'm sure the company can align their policies to fit your phone.

Mine can anyways. You can do MSFT exchange and enterprise server on an iPhone too.

If you get on the BB platform you miss out on heaps of business apps, like QuickOffice which is the only comparable MSFT style office suite on a smart phone. It's the same reason why Commsec chose the iPhone platform.

With regards to the QWERTY keyboard ... I think it might help if you have big fingers - bigger fingers tend to make more mistakes on an iPHone. But I have small fingers and typing on a touch screen is faster. iPhone is QWERTY too but just touch screen.

You choose.

 

[poguemahone]

Ah stuff it.
Just gonna go for the optus $59 plan.

Just learnt that Virgin is basically part of the Optus network, so if they're advertising international its probably BS.

Besides, you can just pick up a pre-paid international calling card for $10 or so.

And Optus have this special deal for the 8GB iPhone where you don't have to pay for the handset if you go on the $59 plan.

So that's that.

The Telstra Nxt G service is pretty good..I am Rural so I need it.. Optus and Voda are ****house outside of a City,Highway use..

 

[matty2.0]

The Telstra Nxt G service is pretty good..I am Rural so I need it.. Optus and Voda are ****house outside of a City,Highway use..

Well ... I'm in the city. I've never been to the country.
So that's that.

 

[matty2.0]

K ... bought an iPhone today with Optus ... 16GB white back ... the white ones are only available on 16GB, so that was unique.

Unboxing it right now.

 

[CapnBirdseye]

I haven't had time to trawl through all of the posts, but its worth checking out the bloomberg app... quite neat imo

 

[MrBurns]

Mail problems -

I have 2 accounts one works fine the other is a domain of mine.

It wont retrieve email, always says the username or password is wrong and it isnt

If I turn SSL off it seems to connect but doesnt download any mail if I leave it on it tries to connect but just hangs.

Anyone who can fix this gets a big kiss from robots

 

[matty2.0]

Mail problems -

I have 2 accounts one works fine the other is a domain of mine.

It wont retrieve email, always says the username or password is wrong and it isnt

If I turn SSL off it seems to connect but doesnt download any mail if I leave it on it tries to connect but just hangs.

Anyone who can fix this gets a big kiss from robots

Mate ... now you tell me you got problems ... after all those mouth watering posts about how good the iphone is ... then when i'm unboxing it you shell out the bad news ...

 

[MrBurns]

Mate ... now you tell me you got problems ... after all those mouth watering posts about how good the iphone is ... then when i'm unboxing it you shell out the bad news ...

I wasnt even going to use it for email but thought I'd give it a go, it will be something simple, I might even get an app that will make the whole thing easier, the other account works like a dream, dont worry you will love this thing.