Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-06-28

June 28th, 2009

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iPhone: 5 days in

June 22nd, 2009

I got my new iPhone 3Gs on friday June 19.  I had ordered on monday  the 15th and wasn’t really expecting it because supposedly all the pre-orders were sold out that day. Supposedly there would be a week. So score 1 for AT&T

However it would be Friday before I could use it… Why? because online activation didn’t work. after going through the process in the quick start guide my AT&T account said that all my phones were upgraded already. I go to my online account and still see my Palm Treo 680 listed. Score -1 for AT&T

I get on the phone with CS, expecting long wait times because of the fuster cluck that is usually associated with Apple and AT&T releases.  I was on the phone a total of an hour but nothing got resolved. According to them i had no phone associated with my number but i still had service. Uh Oh. the rep named Juan from Decatur, IL was really helpful, but he and supposedly his support couldn’t find out what was wrong.  Apple support closed at 8pm PST. So since I still had service we all agreed to wait till morning to sort it out. Score -1 for AT&T -2 for Apple for closing early and +2 for Juan.

Saturday morning i get a call promptly at the agreed upon time. Imagine my shock. Apparently things got sorted out over night and now Juan could manually activate my phone.  Something he couldn’t do Friday night because the system was so bogged down. +2 For AT&T Customer Service rep Juan from Decatur.

Sub Score +1 (if I added correctly)

Now on to the phone. Interesting peice of kit. I’m looking forward to jailbreaking it in a few weeks.

Annoyances:

  • Apple wont allow programs to run in the background.
  • Not able to load music or other files onto the device I would like to avoid iTunes since I run linux on most of my computers.
  • not able to download files (mp3) from the web or email. once again this is probably because there’s no way of getting them off.
  • Tethering not enabled yet
  • App store. I understand their reasoning for it, but I don’t like it.
  • Battery life. though it’s about the same as my Treo 680.
  • I would like the option of replacing the battery myself. This is something I just don’t understand
  • File Format limitations, I have a lot of movie files that I could use but I have to convert them if I want to use them.

most of these can be fixed with jailbreaking apparently but I’ll wait for a while because they aren’t crucial.

Things I like:

  • I was able without too much trouble import all my contacts and calendar items From my Palm through Google and Windows Address book. In fact my calendars, which are all synced via Google Calendar now, sync up better.
  • I was able to duplicate all the apps I used on my Treo without too much hassle. Which shouldn’t be a surprise since my Treo was 3 years old.
  • though I would prefer a tactile keyboard. the onscreen one isn’t that bad. i’m getting used to it. Funny, this was going to be one of my biggest complaints.
  • the display is very good. Automatic rotation is nice.
  • Call quality is actually better than the Treo. i always thought it sucked. And it doesn’t seem to hang when a call is coming in while playing music like the treo did at times.

Overall I’m not as disapointed as I thought I would be. I was running out of options. My Treo was starting to act funky. the only 3G smartphon i could get from AT&T was a blackberry. Whiled I’m not tied to AT&T for any sentimental reason, it does provide the best coverage for the area we live in and travel to.

I would have like to try the Pal Pre, but I seriously think that this is Palm’s Last hurrah. Maybe in a few years these things will settle down an customizing your phone to fit your needs wont be a hassle. I was looking forward to the Android but once again exclusivity with carriers canned that dream.

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-06-21

June 21st, 2009

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-06-21

June 21st, 2009

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-06-14

June 14th, 2009

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-06-07

June 7th, 2009

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Sonism’s: the TV edition

June 2nd, 2009

8 year olds are funny. they are just starting to realize things. some of them pretty out there.
Upon finishing a viewing of the TOS Ep The Corbomite Maneuver: “Dad, did they use up all the good music for Star Wars?”
Upon watching a few minutes of the Land of the Lost tv show from the 70’s he pipes up: “Dad, those dinosaurs look like toys. not real at all. did they run out of money?”

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-05-31

May 31st, 2009

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-05-24

May 24th, 2009

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-05-17

May 17th, 2009

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