No more rumors. This is the real deal. Apple has officially announced the iPhone and it's truly a revolutionary mobile device!
Here's a quick run down on the specs:
- a svelte 11.6 millimeters thick
- 3.5-inch wide touchscreen display
- proximity sensor to turn off the sensor when it's close to your face
- 2 megapixel camera
- available in 4GB or 8 GB models
- Bluetooth (EDR and A2DP)
- iTunes
- WiFi
- Quadband GSM
- EDGE high-speed data
- Mac OSX operating system
- POP3, IMAP push email support (free with Yahoo)
Available exclusively in the US through Cingular in June. $499 for the 4GB on a two-year contract and $599 for the 8GB. No word yet on a Canadian release date.
More pictures and information is available on Apple's website.
What The Critics Are Saying
As you might expect, bloggers and press are going mad for the iPhone. The blogosphere is abuzz! Here's a round up of some of the comments:
- Eric Bernatchez says the Apple Phone "is a new kind of phone that beat expectations."
- The Boy Genius crys "Damn you Steve Jobs!", calls the iPhone "amazing" and asks "Zune who?"
- Lev Grossman thinks "Apple's new iPhone could do to the cell phone market what the iPod did to the portable music player market: crush it pitilessly beneath the weight of its own superiority. This is unfortunate for anybody else who makes cell phones, but it's good news for those of us who use them."
- Rafat Ali describes it as "the fantasy world of millions of Apple fanboys come true."
- David Ciccone says "lookout Windows Mobile here comes Apple iPhone."
- Brad Kellett thinks Apple has "done what it does best: deliver a new, innovative, and exciting product, showing features that are completely unique on the market."
- MobileTracker notes: "something that doesn't come through by reading a spec sheet is the very unique operating system. The UI is like nothing we have seen on a mobile device before.
- Noah Robischon of Gizmodo: "Apple stock up $6 and rising. Short Motorola, and everyone else."
Is Everyone Raving About It? Nope.
- Carlo Longino is critical of the iPhone, calling it just an "advanced iPod with a phone bolted on" and suggesting that for "the vast majority of people whose primary interest is in having just a phone, it's overkill -- particularly when it's going to cost them at least $500."
Lev Grossman spots some weaknesses: "You can't download songs directly onto it from the iTunes store, you have to export them from a computer. And even though it's got WiFi and Bluetooth on it, you can't sync iPhone with a computer wirelessly. And there should be games on it. And you're required to use it as a phone—you can't use it without signing up for cellular service. Boo."
Best iPhone Quote
And the best Apple quote of the day goes to Aidan Henry who wisely admits: "Yes, it is sexy as hell, but I’d still take Jessica Alba any day."
