This Tuesday well-known blogger John Gruber posted a note on his Daring Fireball blog, where he said that the upcoming tablet device from Dell called Streak will cost $550 (without a contract from AT&T) and that new iPod touch will have new features that Streak doesn't have.
"That's almost twice as much as a good iPod touch, and if you wait a few weeks to buy the Touch, you'll get one with a Retina Display and dual cameras. If Dell can't make an iPod touch competitor, who can?"
Though Gruber did not say whether he obtained this information from his sources or not, previous rumors confirm that the next-gen iPod touch will support FaceTime (which requires two cameras).
Today ChangeWave Research revealed the results of its survey on iPhone 4. 213 new handset owners were questioned in a few weeks after the launch of the latest Apple's smartphone, between July 19 and 28. Here is a list of facts that were revealed:
In June 6.3% of iPhone 3GS owners experienced dropped calls, in July only 5.2% of those who use iPhone 4 had dropped a call at least once. ChangeWave Research's vice president Paul Carton says that means that iPhone 4 is quiet better at making calls:
"Despite all of the issues surrounding the antenna, in actuality iPhone 4 owners reported experiencing fewer dropped calls on the average than iPhone 3GS owners".
After using two iPhones 4 for six weeks Wall Mossberg finally reviewed the newest Apple’s handset.
So, one phone was obtained by Mossberg personally, while the second was provided by Apple. Walt found that iPhone 4 works better than iPhone 3GS in those areas where there is a "strong AT&T coverage", but when it comes to weak coverage areas iPhone 3GS performs better, because it drops less calls and 'no service' status can be seen rarer. That became a reason for Mossberg to not recommend iPhone 4 with its limited AT&T data plans to people who "live, work or travel" in areas with poor reception signal.
Walt also found that the 'death-grip' issue is not a problem as it causes signal bars to fluctuate only and even to rise in some cases.
Jay Freeman, better known as Saurik, the creator of Cydia, was interviewed by the home radio Make It Work. He speaks about the history and the future of the iPhone jailbreak.
Saurik describes the origins of Jailbreak and Unlock for the very first model of the iPhone. Jay explains that initially there were two important things to do with the iPhone 2G - to use other carrier than AT&T and to install any application.
He continues discussing the main applications from Cydia. Cycorder was the first to allow video recording, and Winterboard was the only one that allowed users to change the graphical interface of the iPhone. He also speaks about Comex, the hacker who is currently working with the Dev Team for releasing and Unlock for the iPhone 4. According to Saurik the tool is still not ready to be released to the public due to severe bugs in the code. Here the second part:
Yesterday Steve Jobs told many interesting facts about antenna issues and iPhone 4. Those who doesn't want to watch the video from the event here, you can study the next list:
Over 3M iPhones 4 were sold since its release three weeks ago;
The antenna issue can be reproduced on any other phone. The details can be found here;
Apple has special testing rooms, which cost it $ 100 million. You can learn more about it on Apple's new webpage here;
Only 0.55% of all iPhone 4 users complain on antenna issue;
AT&T return rate with the iPhone 3GS was 6.0%, with the iPhone 4 - 1,7%;
The proximity sensor problem will be fixed in the next update;
White iPhone will be shipped at the end of July;
On July 30th iPhone sales will be launched in 17 more countries.
Apple has published an official public letter of response to concerns about the iPhone 4 signaling problems. Some would say this is very nice and great. Others would complain this is just a cop out. Well, at least we see that Apple is aware of users' problems. Apple claims, that it's just a software problem of calculating how many bars of signal strength to display. Apple says there is no hardware problem.
Here it the full letter:
Dear iPhone 4 Users,
The iPhone 4 has been the most successful product launch in Apple’s history. It has been judged by reviewers around the world to be the best smartphone ever, and users have told us that they love it. So we were surprised when we read reports of reception problems, and we immediately began investigating them. Here is what we have learned.
The prices for the iPhone 4, Droid Incredible, Evo 4G and Nexus One are very similar. But in this chart you can see how much you’ll have to spend on each of the devices during a 2-year period.
The results for the iPhone 4 are quite encouraging, especially in the Minimum Plan Total Cost category. However, you should remember that nowadays AT&T is the only carrier that offers tiered data. This means that for $2,000 you can only enjoy 200 MB a month, which doesn’t exactly compare to the unlimited plans of the other 3 devices. With the “unlimited” plan you’ll be able to use 2GB, which is enough in most cases. If it isn’t, be ready to spill out an extra $10 per 1GB each month.
Still, the performances of all the 4 devices are really very close, so you can do some research while waiting for the iPhone 4 to come into the market.
If your iPhone 4 is pre-ordered – congratulations to you! You will be probably getting it very very soon. However, if you didn’t preorder, you’ll have to wait 6 more days, till June 29, to buy your iPhone at AT&T.
It’s no wonder that the date has been delayed, what with the mess the pre-ordering system was in and the fact that all the devices were sold out in less than one day. The pre-order sales of the iPhone 4 began on June 15 and they were 10 times as high as those for the iPhone 3GS last year on its first day. The company reports that they are happy to see the excitement around the new device and they are trying to help as many buyers as quickly as possible. As it was announced last week, the priority is to fulfill the pre-orders first.
AT&T is now in the middle of delivering iPhone 4 to those who preordered it on June 15. Here are some guidelines for the buyers getting iPhone 4 from AT&T:
Yesterday AT&T suddenly entirely stopped accepting iPhone 4 preorders. The company said that it was the busiest online sales day in its history.
Meanwhile AT&T's site started to show old information on iPhone 3GS prices, that was actual before iPhone 4 was announced. Some people also claimed they were shown info that wasn't theirs on AT&T's and Apple's site (the latter sometimes pulls information from AT&T's site to verify shipping address). Read the rest of this entry »
Today Apple released a new application for the iPod touch, iPhone and iPad that allows customers to find the company's local stores, purchase its products, read customer reviews and so on. It's called simply an Apple Store and it’s free. The app requires the device running iOS 3.0 or later and has only English interface.
So today is the day when iPhone 4 becomes available for preorder in the U.S., Germany, France, Japan and the U.K.
The Apple's site reveals that the white model is currently unavailable, which was explained by yesterday's AT&T memo, where it is said that supplies may be scarce at launch. The AT&T site reveals that white iPhone 4 is "coming soon", though it is disclosed in the memo that the company's stores will actually take reservations for white model, but it will be shipped later this summer.
Anyway, black iPhone 4 and 8GB iPhone 3GS may be freely preordered, and then picked up in stores or shipped directly to your home on June 24.
The price for iPhone 4 with a two-year contract with AT&T in the USA is $199 for 16GB model and $299 for 32GB model.
The price for unlocked iPhone is €629 for 16GB model and €739 for 32GB model in France, the prices for U.K. customers were revealed earlier.
Today Best Buy announced that as of Tuesday, June 15, every customer will have an ability to visit one of its retail stores (including Best Buy Mobile standalone stores) to make an order for a new iPhone 4 and then take it on June 24. Both 16GB and 32GB models will be available for reserve.
President of Best Buy Mobile Shawn Score is glad to propose customers pre-order feature:
- Adding the iPhone 4 to our stores alongside other great smartphones like the HTC EVO from Sprint and HTC Incredible on Verizon, gives customers a great opportunity to view each side-by-side and get the mobile phone that works best for them.
Best Buy will become the second iPhone 4 retailer after Radioshack, which confirmed last week that it was authorized by Apple too.
As we wrote before, on June 24 iPhone 4 will also be available at Wal-Mart locations, but the company will not take pre-orders on the device.
AT&T, which will also sell new handsets, didn’t give any information on taking pre-orders.
A group of hackers found a security flaw on the web servers of AT&T and after obtaining users’ 3G iPad SIM addresses (also known as ICC ID) from the web made an automated script attack to receive their email addresses.
According to Gawker report, now hacked users may "be vulnerable to spam marketing and malicious hacking". SIM addresses are easy enough to obtain, because many people have already posted their ICC ID numbers in photos published on Flickr for instance. But most of them have their e-mails published too, so it is likely that they have already received such spam. Read the rest of this entry »
We know how the new iPhone 4 compares to the iPhone 3GS. Now it is time to size it against its fiercest competitors from all the major platforms. Take a look at the results against the HTC EVO 4G, Nokia N8, Palm Pre Plus and HTC HD2: