Will the iPhone change my life? - 1

I've been very happy with my Samsung Blackjack II phone with WinMobile 6.0. However, as I attended more and more Tweetups, I realized that I was missing the ease of a touch device. I heard that the iPhone does this the best right now and it made me curious. Now that I am able to borrow one for a couple of months, we'll see what's with all the chatter over this Apple device. I really like the Shuffle, but I could care less about an iPod...my Zune was free and I really really like it. So that aside, I've had the iPhone activated on my account for about 30 hours and here are my first impressions. Let me caveat all this with my top needs in a smart phone. NOTE: I am a business user primarially but also use my phone for daily social tasks:

• phone works as a phone...is easy to use
• does calendaring well
• handles my contacts list
• allows easy access to my various email accounts
• browser/ability to connect to Twitter, Facebook, get directions, get traffic info, ability to look up locations/restaurants

I know that moving to a new brand of OS always comes with a learning curve so these are just my first thoughts...

AT&T needs to get it's act together. I already have an account. I just wanted to activate the iPhone onto my account...why does it take 20 minutes (with very minimal interaction between me and the rep) including having the rep go to the back with my phone 3 times? And if you're going to take that long, 3 reps (2 horrifically slow at their jobs) on a Friday nigth at the mall is NOT enough. Heck 5 in the early evening on a Saturday night was still not enough...almost enough, but not quite. Also, what the heck, why can't I send multimedia (at the least photos) through my text messages?

Syncing sucks. I know this is par for the course with any new phone, but it takes a long time and iTunes doesn't really give me much feedback on what's going on. The moving bar with nothing else in the app responding isn't very helpful. Everytime I sync, it takes longer than I think it should, but I have all my info, so I'm good to go.

I'm liking touch. I'm making a couple mistakes along the way, but navigating in some of the apps such as Tweetdeck is very nice. I really like how Youtube videos that I activate on websites just play right. I like how it takes over the screen instead of playing in the browser like in Skyfire on my Blackjack II. That works too, but this is better. I'm liking going through photos and being able to zoom in and out so easily. The interface is pretty good, but rather than minute movements being very precise, I need to learn how Apple has put in work arounds to handle the smaller movements, such as the magnifier that shows me where my cursor is laying, short cut keys, and spelling correction. I prefer it just being more precise, but it's really close and I can't think of anything better other than just being more precise. I do miss my little mini mouse on the Blackjack II. I like have right/left arrows and up and down arrows. I have faith that more use with the Apple features will result in better typing and higher correctness stats so I expect my impressions will improve.

I like how quick it is to add apps. However, it is difficult to find the cool apps that are applicable to me that are free...or so awesome that I'll pay $0.99 (I paid for Typing Genius emoji...cause I'm Asian and I had to). For this I'll rely on my good friends in the community of iPhone users...but right now I miss my LiveSearch app. It had search, local gas prices, view of traffic, local movies, maps, and directions. It looks like I now need a separate app for each of these. I'm not that happy with that, but I'll learn to deal. I am a little annoyed that each app must have focus to process and if you pick up a call or change the view, it stops processing. Apple please put background processing on your list for your next rev. This is especially frustrating me with my email. If it's updating and my view changes, it stops. I get a LOT of email so...hmmm....Also, battery life...come on now...I'm going to have to charge this phone up a lot. My other phone needed to be plugged in every evening and on occassion during the work day, but right now it looks like the battery life on my BJ II with WinMobile is winning.

I think it's interesting that iPhone requires one extra click when I have my BlueAnt ear bud connected. I'm not sure how I feel about this yet. I use my ear bud in the car all the time so I'll either grow to like it or hate it.

Also, here are things that I want to do, but I don't know how...

• How do I add contacts to speed dial? - my bluetooth ear bud accepts voice commands for this, but I need to set it up on the phone
• Is there a universal go back to the last view button or something?
• What's the best Twitter app? I was loving Twikini for my WinMobile phone.
• Is there a free traffic view app? Gas prices app? Seattle area specific is good.
• How do I set Bing as my default search? I got a request to change it from Google to Yahoo, but how do I change it to Bing?
• What other apps do I NEED to have?

More impressions in the next couple of weeks.

Tell me what you like/don't like about your iPhone. What phone is better and why?