Apple's iPhone: The Future is Here
by Anand Lal Shimpi on July 2, 2007 6:13 PM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Mobile
Using it as a Phone
Early on in what I'll call the camera-phone boom, someone clever came up with the complaint that there are no phones out there that just make phone calls well. They all have poor camera interfaces, are mediocre MP3 players and do a boatload of other things without having actually perfected making phone calls. As infuriating as it may sound, Apple's $500 iPhone actually fills the phone call niche quite well.
The only UI downside to using the iPhone as a phone is that you need to first click on the phone button at the bottom of the screen before you can access its ability to place phone calls. Obviously incoming calls can be received at any point, but if you actually want to dial out you have to hit that little green button first.
The iPhone is the perfect melding of your address book and a mobile phone. You have four options for dialing out on the iPhone, you can dial from a list of your favorite numbers, you can look at your call log, you can dial from your address book or do it the old fashioned way with the keypad.
If you're kickin' it old school, the keypad is absolutely enormous, something you don't find on the vast majority of mobile phones, and a true testament to Apple's idea of a morphing interface. In keypad mode, all you need on the screen is a gigantic keypad, having a virtual interface makes that possible.
Dialing from your address book is just as simple as playing an MP3 on the iPhone, flick your finger up or down to find the contact, click on it and click on the number you'd like to call (e.g. work, home or mobile). Admittedly the contact list took some getting used to (I'm still not totally comfortable with it) being that the names on the screen are so large compared to what I'm used to on the Blackberry. In a way it seems like I'm lost trying to find the person I'm looking for since I'm so used to using a scroll wheel or trackball to navigate through a huge list of much smaller fonts.
The recents view is your call log; it logs incoming, outgoing and missed calls. Missed calls are colored red, and you can also view them separately by tapping missed at the top of the screen. The interface doesn't distinguish between incoming and outgoing calls until you click the little blue arrow to the right of the call.
A call log done right
Multiple calls to/from the same person within close proximity in time are grouped together, with the number of calls placed in parentheses. Selecting additional details about any group of calls will tell you exactly when the calls took place. None of this data is unique to the iPhone, the Blackberry and Blackjack both offer it, but neither competitor presents it in such a clean and easily accessible way.
Your favorites are basically your speed dial numbers, for those contacts that you call/harass oh so frequently, it's just one touch to call from this list.
Steve Jobs' visual voicemail demo at Macworld was one of the things that really got me excited about the iPhone, it was voicemail done right. In practice, it works just like you'd expect it to.
When you get a voicemail your iPhone will vibrate and the phone icon at the home screen will get a little 1 next to it, indicating that you have one unchecked message of some sort (either a missed call, or in this case a voicemail).
The voicemail interface is super simple, you're presented with a list of people who have left you messages and you can listen to them in any order. No calling a weird number and dealing with an automated voicemail system; your voicemail is handled the way it is done on any VoIP platform, except this is on your cellphone.
Let's see what Anand left us!
You can even record your voicemail greeting from this interface.
Features like forwarding voicemail simply aren't available from the iPhone and I have no idea how visual voicemail works (or doesn't) if you're roaming on other networks. The iPhone doesn't let you select what GSM/Edge network you're on, so I couldn't force it to join a non AT&T network to see the impact on visual voicemail.
The device isn't ergonomically suited to being held up to your head for prolonged periods of time, if you're going to be having long conversations you'll want to invest in a bluetooth headset. The weight of the device contributes to it being uncomfortable while held up to your ear.
The earpiece gets really warm if you use the WiFi a lot, and putting it up to your ear while on the phone will result in profuse ear-sweats. It's not as hot as the bottom of the MacBook Pro for example; it's warm enough to notice, not to burn.
The speakerphone works well and voice quality is respectable, at least compared to the Blackjack and Blackberry Curve.
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zsdersw - Tuesday, July 3, 2007 - link
As a long-time Star Trek fan and someone who regards The Next Generation as the best of the series, I have to say I'm not at all interested in the iPhone.Two primary reasons:
- Price. For $500 and a 2yr contract, what it brings to the table above and beyond its competitors is less than compelling, IMO.
- AT&T only. Screw that. I'm never buying a phone with which only one carrier is available.
tuteja1986 - Tuesday, July 3, 2007 - link
alot of features are missing :!Bluetooth is crippled
Virtual keyboard onlys works good with Web browser since its horizontal. keyboard sucks
Does not have 3G
battery life is 4hrs talk time.. unable to change battery. black berry 8800 can do 10hrs+
Digital camera is very basic compared to high quality camera used in phone like Nokia N95.
No support for 3rd party application
Its has edge connection which sucks
no support for HDSPA
No GPS
No IM program
No widget support
Not able to abstract the image anywhere.. sending image through email reduces it low res which sucks :(
The only awesome thing about iphone i think its interface , the screen and the ipod video/music feature which works. The phone is certinaly not worth $600 and can be sold for $350 and apple can still make a decent profit.
plinden - Tuesday, July 3, 2007 - link
Where is 4 hour talk time mentioned. Anand didn't mention talk time, did he? He did get 6-7 hours with wifi.
Just about every other reviewer got 7 hours or more talk time, close to what Apple claims.
tuteja1986 - Wednesday, July 4, 2007 - link
Comfired by latest TWIT episode :! TWIT networks has the biggest apple fanboys ever :)http://www.twit.tv/TWiT">http://www.twit.tv/TWiT
but I sorry to burst you bubble but read the review by mobile phone professionals.
http://www.wirelessinfo.com/content/Apple-iPhone-C...">http://www.wirelessinfo.com/content/App...one-Cell...
Also ain't a anti apple but people buying it for so many reason as its calling the revolutionary phone which is not in tech wise , features but is revolution in only in UI design.
sviola - Tuesday, July 3, 2007 - link
YEah, the Nokia N95 is an excelent phone, here are some of it's features.In-built GPS and Navigation Program (over 100+ countries maps)
5 MP Camera with Zeiss Lens and Optical Zoom, and Video Recording
Symbian OS
Plays MP3, video, etc
Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, USB, TV out
Quadriband GSM/WCDMA (3G)
MicroSD Card Reader
I would like to see an anand review on it and a comparative against the iPhone.
vectersmith - Monday, July 2, 2007 - link
I have enjoyed the iPhone thoroughly and agree that while it is not perfect, for what it does do it does better far and above anything else.Edge speed is slow, but bearable (barely). Wi-Fi is must better, although I still have sites that just hang and I have to hit the X button and reload.
The UI is breathtaking, earth shattering, and will revolutionize the smartphone industry. It has too, once you use the iPhone everything else seems like fruitcake for Christmas (no offense intended to those that enjoy fruitcake on Christmas). I find myself just taking it out of my pocket to slide the unlock and see if anything is new :)
Also I will agree with Anand about the SMS, you really have to watch out what you are doing as having a conversation is just painless which causes those SMS message count the fly up :)
kilkennycat - Monday, July 2, 2007 - link
....how long did you take to compose the review and how much sleep did you get in the process? Did you work from a pre-written plan?Anand Lal Shimpi - Tuesday, July 3, 2007 - link
Thanks :)I wrote the whole thing in about 24 hours, but the testing took a lot longer obviously. As with all my articles I have a very high level outline, but what ended up being written was significantly larger than even I expected it to be. My initial outline had something around 10 - 15 pages long, then by 3AM Monday morning I estimated it would be around 20 pages and by the time it published I realized it was going to be just shy of 30.
I had to cut out a lot of additional material from the review just in the interest of time, and I took another 6 or 7 hours working on it to try and make sure I was keeping the attention of the reader throughout the piece (hopefully it worked :)...). There's enough extra content that I didn't use for at least two more articles, but I'm not sure what the demand will be for that so who knows if it'll ever get used.
As far as sleep goes, I don't sleep much in general when I'm working but the iPhone weekend was ridiculous. I went to bed Saturday night, woke up Sunday and didn't get to bed again until 4AM Tuesday morning. Needless to say, sleeping last night was the most amazing thing ever.
Take care,
Anand
oopyseohs - Thursday, July 5, 2007 - link
This is definitely the best article I have ever read on AnandTech or on anything technology related in general. Also, it is nice to see that someone else exhibits the same behavior I do when writing major articles!DerekWilson - Monday, July 2, 2007 - link
I'm sure Anand is finally getting some sleep after a grueling weekend with the iPhone, taking only the occasional nap so as not to die.And a pre-written plan? naah, Anand's just that good :-)