The Iphone Hype/Treo 700p

To all of those who braved the elements to be the first ones to have this
phone in your possession, bravo! But...was it really worth it? I have to
admit that I myself was caught up in the hype of the iphone. It looks great
and the internet looked like it would be miles better than any other phone.
But then...I had to think a few things through.

1. I own a Treo 700p and it's the best phone I have ever had. Sprint works
rather well on this phone and I have no issues at all when it comes to this
phone. Of all the smartphones out there, I think this one is the very best
one. If I were to get an Iphone, that would mean that I would have to submit
to the AT@T/ Cingular service for 2 years. Aren't they the absolute worst
when it comes to customer service? And also, the Iphone isn't even gonna get
the EVDO!! So my phone will be faster.

2. Everyone likes the way the Iphone looks. I do too. Everyone likes those
widgets. I do too. Everyone likes those Iphone widgets that come with the
phone. I do too. I liked them so much that I went ahead and put them on my
Treo 700p. Don't ask, just know that it looks great on my phone and it works
rather well. LOL!!

3. Battery life. The Iphone claims to have an 8 hour battery life. That is
awesome. My phone can do 4 hours. But hold on, I have a new extended battery
very capable of doing 8 hours and without a noticeable difference in size of
the battery cover. About 2 mm difference.

4. Ipod on the phone. Very nice looking. But isn't there something wrong
here? The Iphone comes in a 4 or 8 gb model. Although it's enough to put a
lot of music on it, it's nothing like the 40 or 80gb models out there. So
how much could you put into one of those puppies? The answer is: About as
much as I can put into mine. And I can play more different types of movie
files than the Iphone can. DivX and such. I have a 4gb sd card and it's
enough for me to store whatever I want.

5. The Iphone went out of their way to show that apps like Google Maps and
YouTube work really well with their phone. Guess what? It works well with
mine. Google Maps is a great app and I use it a lot for my job. YouTube is
great also when you ant to unwind and watch some funny videos.

6. I have a ton of apps and games that I can use on my phone for just about
any situation. I am sure that in a year's time, Iphone will have lots of
amazing apps. I'm just glad to be far ahead of the game.

7. Now I hear that the Iphone will have a glass cover so that it won't
scratch as easy and it will have better finger recognition. This made me
wonder what would happen if I ever dropped the Iphone on concrete by
accident. I can tell you that I have dropped my Treo 700p 5 times on
concrete and it survived everytime. Sure I've scratched it a little and
dinged it here and there but it works as well as it did when I first got it.
So I know that my phone is quite tough. I hope the Iphone is just as tough.

8. Photos look great on the Iphone and I love that you could resize by
pinching the screen. I love that. But do I really need that? No. My pics
look great too.

9. The Iphone camera is 2mp. Mine is 1.3mp. Not too much of a difference and
my shots look great. My videos look ok too. I wonder how the video for the
Iphone will be like?

10. I love the way the Iphone looks. But I can make mine look great as well.
I can fully customize just about anything.


I could probably go on and on. If I did, I would probably convince you that
the Treo 700p is a great phone. I have had it since Christmas of last year
and it's the best phone I ever had. I will own it for a long time. Do I want
an Iphone? After everything I just wrote? I don't think so. I'm not saying
the Iphone is bad. I am happy to see Apple in this market and very
interested to find out from other people how their Iphones work for them.
But if you want a phone that can do as much, get a Treo 700p. You won't
regret it.

Julio Batista wrote:
> To all of those who braved the elements to be the first ones to have this
> phone in your possession, bravo! But...was it really worth it? I have to
> admit that I myself was caught up in the hype of the iphone. It looks great
> and the internet looked like it would be miles better than any other phone.
> But then...I had to think a few things through.
>

This morning my wife asked me about the Iphone hype and what it was. I
answered that it did what my 700P has been doing for the last year but
had a snazzy design. She then asked me what all the fuss was about, I
answered "Because it's Apple".

Perhaps I'm missing something but so far I have to agree with your
assessment.

g

"g" wrote:
> Julio Batista wrote:
>> To all of those who braved the elements to be the first ones to have this
>> phone in your possession, bravo! But...was it really worth it? I have to
>> admit that I myself was caught up in the hype of the iphone. It looks
>> great and the internet looked like it would be miles better than any
>> other phone. But then...I had to think a few things through.
>>
>
> This morning my wife asked me about the Iphone hype and what it was. I
> answered that it did what my 700P has been doing for the last year but had
> a snazzy design. She then asked me what all the fuss was about, I answered
> "Because it's Apple".
>
> Perhaps I'm missing something but so far I have to agree with your
> assessment.

Nope, don't think you are missing anything. A Treo user who actually uses
the thing would for all intents and purposes be downgrading by going with an
iPhone.

And I really did want an iPhone initially.

But too many deal-killers:
1.) No to-do list.

2.) No memos synced from Outlook, nor anywhere else.

3.) No games. While I wouldn't call myself a die-hard gamer I do have quite
a bunch loaded on my Treo. They come in handy when waiting in line, sitting
in dentist office (or chair) etc.

5.) No stylus support at all (jotting/drawing apps, games, selecting text,
etc.). Granted I don't always need the stylus with my Treo, but it's nice to
have nonetheless.

6.) No editing of Office docs.

7.) Misc apps that I use on my Treo (terminal server client, news reader,
etc.) that I don't want to lose.

Also was not pleased at the number of steps required to make a simple phone
call. Swipe this, flick this, scroll this, and so on. Call me crazy but the
d-pad on my Treo seems easier. No voice dialing on the iPhone either.

Then there are little things that I could really see being gotchas (like no
copy-and-paste or global find). And no removable battery (I have a spare for
my Treo and it has come in handy a few times).

Most "reviews" (the pre-release reviews read more like ad copy) claim the
keyboard is OK but I certainly can't see it being better than the Treo's.

On the plus side the screen is vibrant and the apps that are included seem
to work well. Auto rotate seems to work well too. WiFi is definitely a plus.
The visual voice mail is cool (for me not cool enough to make up for the
other shortcomings).


--
Mike

At 30 Jun 2007 01:17:57 -0700 Tinman wrote:

> The visual voice mail is cool...


Then get it- Callwave.com offers it to anyone for free. You just need
Call Forwarding (to divert your voicemail to their number) and push e-
mail (to receive the voicemails "instantly" as wave files.)

Works slick- I've been using it a few months.

On Sat, 30 Jun 2007 08:16:47 -0400, Todd Allcock
<elecconnec@AmericaOnLine.com> wrote:

>At 30 Jun 2007 01:17:57 -0700 Tinman wrote:
>
>> The visual voice mail is cool...
>
>
>Then get it- Callwave.com offers it to anyone for free. You just need
>Call Forwarding (to divert your voicemail to their number) and push e-
>mail (to receive the voicemails "instantly" as wave files.)
>
>Works slick- I've been using it a few months.


Nice to see someone that has done their homework and not fall into the
trap that most of the sheeples have fallen into and running out and
waiting in line for the neatest new toy. Two week from now you can
walk into any Apple store and buy one of the things if you want to.

People are so stupid, wasting all that time and energy, not to mention
money on a toy that a year from now will be ancient history and
replaced by something better. All that camping out and media coverage
for a frigging phone that lets you see pretty pictures. Most of the
people that are going ga ga over the iphone have an IQ that won't
reach the high for the day and no common sense.

<arat43@juno.com> wrote:
>
> Nice to see someone that has done their homework and not fall into the
> trap that most of the sheeples have fallen into and running out and
> waiting in line for the neatest new toy. Two week from now you can
> walk into any Apple store and buy one of the things if you want to.
>

Uh, you can pretty much do that now. Or even yesterday. Many of the long
waits didn't pan out, in some cases amusingly so.


--
Mike

There is a very comprehensive comparison of several phones here:

<http://www.wirelessinfo.com/content/Apple-iPhone-Cell-Phone-Review.htm>

It includes the Treo 750, so might be interesting to you (I don't know
how different the 700 is from the 750).

--
--Tim Smith

All this discussion seems a little too self-congratulatory.

Look, I'm a 650 user myself, and gave my wife pretty much the same
answer, i.e., that I have zero interest in getting an iPhone, 'cause it
doesn't do anything new for me (THAT I NEED) that I can't already do on
my Treo with Sprint, for a lot less money.

However...

There are definitely some very good and cool things about the iPhone.
The web browser appears to be MUCH better. The processor on the device
seems to run rings around what's onboard the Treo.

And the user interface sure appears to be much cleaner (albeit less
efficient in a few cases).

There's no need for sour grapes. It's a different phone, that's all.
It has good points and bad ones.

"rlsusenet@NOSPAMPUHLEEZschnapp.org" wrote:
>
> All this discussion seems a little too self-congratulatory.
>

Uh, no. I *wanted* an iPhone from its first announcement.

I can't blame myself because it cannot edit Office docs, can't be used as a
modem, doesn't have a dedicated to-do list, and can't sync Notes.

Moreover, I went to a store to buy one. Played around with one for over an
hour. Still didn't buy it.

In addition to the items I already knew it didn't have I was shocked to find
out the on-screen keyboard has no punctuation keys. Good Lord I couldn't
believe it. I wasn't expecting it to work as good as my Treo with KeyCaps
installed, but certainly the ability to enter an apostrophe without
switching keyboards.

Figured the preliminary reviews had to be wrong about no games at all. But
alas there isn't a single one. (Yes I expect that to change, but without
buttons or a stylus they might be limited.)

In addition, way too many steps for my liking to do simple things.

And don't dismiss the no-button thing as petty. Simple things like ending a
call, if you've changed screens, requires bringing the phone screen back up
to end the call.


> However...
>
> There are definitely some very good and cool things about the iPhone. The
> web browser appears to be MUCH better.

Besides the vivid display that's about the only thing I liked about it, and
even then its value diminishes greatly when not using WiFi. And I found
little things that I couldn't believe were not present (as basic as
cut-and-paste).


>
> And the user interface sure appears to be much cleaner (albeit less
> efficient in a few cases).

Have you used one? Try it and then see how efficient it is for just making
phone calls (compared to the Treo, or most any cellphone for that matter).


>
> There's no need for sour grapes. It's a different phone, that's all. It
> has good points and bad ones.

For me far more bad points than good. If some of the deficiencies are
addressed I might feel differently. Though to be frank, the iPhone seems to
be getting a free pass as far as deficiencies go. Many reviews seem to gloss
over them, often speculating that a future version will address them (that
actually makes me less inclined to buy _this_ version).

And I don't have sour grapes. I have a 2+ year-old Treo 650 that I'm looking
to replace. I had hoped that replacement would be an iPhone. Right now that
replacement looks like it will be a Treo 755, a Blackberry, or--bringing up
the rear--a Winmob phone (Winmob Treo is out since I am not going with a
240x240 display). I'd like that replacement to have BT A2DP profile so that
I can use a stereo headset (another thing I just assumed the iPhone would
support).

There is also one negative iPhone point, that I've read in most reviews,
that I disagree with: the recessed headset jack. I think that was a *great*
idea. I believe this was done to take stress off of the plug/jack, which on
some phones is a weak point (like on my Treo).

If I had to guess I'd say the best market for the iPhone--besides the early
adopters and SJ fans that will buy anything with an Apple or Pixar logo on
it--might be the bought-a-smart-phone-but-don't-really-know-how-to-use-it
crowd. I've run into a bunch of Treo owners like this: haven't synced it,
haven't installed any apps on it, but love the full keyboard!


--
Mike

What I want to know is, can the iPhone be set up for a Dvorak keyboard
layout? I'd never buy a Treo, Blackberry, or the like with their
hard-wired keys. It's always baffled me as to why these miniature
devices wouldn't seize the benefit of a more efficient keyboard layout,
since you can't actually type on them anyway.

B