After much speculation and rumor build up for the last couple months, anal overlord of the world, Steve Jobs, finally broke the silence and announced the next version of the iPhone — the 3G version!
The news of the 3G iPhone is definitely cool. The EDGE network sucks for loading web pages… and that happens to be one of my primary uses for the phone (I actually ran the install for a wordpress blog through my iPhone — sure I had to upload it via normal means, but still!).
The cool stuff:
- Price: $199 for 8GB, $299 for 16GB
- Color: Available in Black or White (only 16GB)
- Speed: USES 3G!!!!
- GPS: Has GPS… and integrates with Google Maps. Yes! Wheee!
- Headphone Jack: Non recessed! Apple learns from a very dumb mistake in V1.0.
- Business: Exchange and push email support. Move over RIM, here comes Apple trying to take your slice of the pie!
The bad stuff:
- Price: My old iPhone is now almost worthless with very little resale value. $399+ down the drain, but I guess it will make a nice gift for a non iPhone fanatic.
- Release Date: July 11th is too far away. I want to play with a new toy. Damn it.
- Other Details: Not many other details are available yet. I’m hoping for some other cool features being improved like MMS capabilities, better camera, video recording, etc.
Apple pushes the cell phone market one step closer to full on data capabilities and a real web browsing experience. This should help usher in an improved era of phone+web devices.
I’ll bet that RIM and Blackberry are pretty concerned right now.
