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Fuzzy Logic Expect strong iPhone sales in UK and Europe
Fuzzy Logic Expect strong iPhone sales in UK and Europe | Expect strong iPhone sales in UK and Europe |
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| by Alex Zaharov-Reutt | |
| Wednesday, 19 September 2007 | |
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Page 2 of 2 On the topic of battery power, Steve Jobs is right in saying that 3G phones chew through too much of it – my own Nokia N95, which is otherwise one of the best iPhone competitors out there, chews through battery power when you use it for anything besides the standard phone and SMS capabilities. Featured Whitepaper
5 Best Practices for Smartphone Support
Just as multimedia taxes computers far more than simple wordprocessing does, multimedia places a greater performance requirement from your phone’s processor, memory, 3.5G wireless (or Wi-Fi) connection, GPS connection, camera and flash and everything else you are doing. If you are going to make use of all the N95’s features, you either need more batteries (always a hassle to carry and charge) or you will need to carry a power adapter so you can easily recharge almost anywhere you are. I have adapters in different locations and one in the car so I don’t run out of charge! There’s no denying that this is an extra hassle, and a limitation of small batteries and the power demands of 3G and 3.5G network. The iPhone simply has a much better battery than the N95 in size and in being able to cope with EDGE speeds, offering day long audio, and between 5 and 7 hours if you are constantly surfing the web, constantly watching video or constantly using a combination of all the iPhone’s features. That’s certainly considerably longer than the N95 which can have it battery drained much faster with heavy use. Nokia have even addressed this with a reported larger battery in the new N95 8GB model, a nice tweak from Nokia to add some extra competitive spice to the seductive Apple iPhone, although I wish they hadn’t removed the MicroSD socket – they should have included an SDHC compliant MicroSD socket as well! No doubt it’ll be in the next Nokia model with 16GB of memory and more. So, while the iPhone doesn’t have 3G, most phones don’t use their glorious 3G connections anywhere near as efficiently as the iPhone uses it’s EDGE – and Wi-Fi – connections. The iPhone simply must be looked at as the entire package, and the fact that it’s slower than 3G or 3.5G phones at bringing up web pages, email, downloading YouTube videos or a song from the forthcoming wireless iTunes music store, or accessing Google Maps on the go, and slower than when you are connected to a Wi-Fi hotspot is largely completely irrelevant – even though you wish it was faster. Trying to quickly get the same kind of information on most other phones through the inbuilt basic web browser is a button clicking mini nightmare. Granted, some phones are much easier, especially today – the HTC Touch is a great example at delivering an onscreen weather button, giving you instant access to useful data at a touch – but that’s just one of the iPhone’s many capabilities, with much more panache at that than the HTC Touch delivers. The iPhone, at slower EDGE or much faster Wi-Fi speeds really nails the mobile communications and information experience, seamlessly merged with digital media and other handheld computing capabilities, especially those added by unofficial third party software developers, letting you run a Nintendo emulator, play with an Etch-a-Sketch, play Yahtzee, play simple accelerator games, greatly improve the iPhone main menu and interface with a ‘springboard’ that holds more than 16 programs, and plenty more – whether you’ve unlocked your iPhone or not. The iPhone offers a complete experience that is, to date, unmatched on any other mobile communications device. Yes, it should be 3G and faster, and it will be. Wait for the 3G model if you want, and persevere with your existing phone. Or just get an iPhone now, and when the 3G model comes out, a grateful family member will undoubtedly happily take the original iPhone off your hands. And aside from the fact the upcoming iPod touch is available in a 16GB model, the initial batch of iPod touch models are coming in with different, dark screens, that are clearly inferior to the iPhone’s brilliant screen, a hobbled calendar entry system, no email, no weather and no stocks besides being Wi-Fi capable, some of which can be fixed by a firmware update, although probably not the screen, the iPhone is vastly superior in every single way to the iPod touch, making it the ultimate Apple gadget at the moment, to be superseded only by the iPhone’s successor. I’ve no idea how many will sell in the UK alone, but we do know over 1 million iPhones have been sold in the US so far, most at the original US $599 price point. With the iPhone so good right now, and an even better model probably coming around this time next year, Apple’s 10 million iPhone sales worldwide are assured. One great upside is that all other cell phone companies are on notice to deliver easier to use, yet more incredibly advanced devices than ever before as each seeks to outdo the other. Each new generation of phone will be issuing its own siren call. As with today’s iPhone – will you be able to resist? |
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