Loving the new iPhone

I didn’t have a previous version so I aren’t comparing the new iPhone 3GS I got yesterday to the previous iPhone’s, I am comparing it to the Blackberries I have used for the last few years (latest one being the Bold) and my prior mobile phones, most of which have been Sony Ericsson handsets.

I really rated the Blackberry Bold, it did pretty much everything I wanted to do in a mobile device and the phone quality was top notch, the screen on it was a fantastic high resolution screen but a little bit n the small side, definitely fnding the larger screen on the iPhone more useful for online stuff.

Ive been an iPhone user for less than 48 hours but here are a few of my initial likes and dislikes.

Likes

Touch Interface – Ive used touch interfaces on other devices previously and not really liked them but on the iPhone it just works so well, its very intuitive and easy to use, overall I am just loving the whole experience, Apple really do know how to design interfaces well!

Pre-Loaded Apps – The apple Apps that come pre-loaded on the iPhone are getting some serious use from me and I am liking what I see on most of them. The mail app was very simple to setup and has worked well so far on 3G and WiFi, Photos is a great way of carrying round a little mobile portfolio of our work. Clock with the time zones is a nice quick way of determining whether I can ring that wedding album supplier half way round the world. Contacts is playing nicely with my Outlook contacts. MMS messaging (once 02 had sorted it) has worked very well. I haven’t had chance to play with the camera yet but expect to see some pics from that in the next few weeks.

iTunes – I hadn’t really used it before the iPhone arrived and it definitely takes a little bit of getting used to but on the whole I think its a great way of updating and backing up the iPhone and I have even bought a few Apps through it already so ease of use definitely helps people part with cash!

Dislikes

O2 Tethering Cost - Tethering is the ability to use the iPhone as a data modem to access the internet on another device, for example a laptop. The iPhone has the ability to share its internet connection (as do many other mobile phones that have web browsing) and occasionally when working remotely on a laptop where WiFi isn’t available this would be very useful. Unfortunately its a lot less useful when O2 demand an extra £15 a month for the ability to do this on top of the minimum £30 per month contract for an iPhone.  It’s  a price that just doesn’t make any sense at all, its the same price you would pay for a completely seperate mobile browsing package, by default the phone can do this so its just pure greed on 02’s part slapping this premium on.

My Current Fave Apps

I have some friends who have been iPhone users for quite some time now so I canvassed them to find out what the most useful apps were and based on their recommendations and a bit of looking around for myself this is what I have been finding useful.

Google Mobile App for iPhone – (free) If you use a lot of Google apps like I do and use google for search then this is a must have, voice activated searches is very cool and a place to launch all the other Google apps from means I have been using this a lot. Google mail on the Blackberry was good but its even better on the iPhone.

Facebook for iPhone – (free) Much more usable on the iPhone than the Blackberry version I had been using previously.

Tweetie – (paid app) Great little app for Twittering, very full featured and easy to use.

Wordpress for iPhone – (free) A must have for anyone who blogs using Wordpress.

Shazam - (free) I wasn’t sure I would use this when I downloaded it but we used it on the drive up to the North East today and its great for settling arguments about songs that you hear or just getting a bit more info when you hear something you haven’t heard before. It seems very quick and accurate at determining the song your listening to but also has bolt ons for recording location, twittering it or even viewing a YouTube video of it, it may not be the most productive app but its interesting at least.

Anyway these are just some of my initial thoughts after less than 48 hours of ownership, please feel free to comment on your own experiences and I am particularly interested to hear what apps everyone is finding most useful!