Here’s a full comparative review
That’s funny.
Anyone know when an unlocked/carrierless version is to be released in the States or North America?
Click there for a full mini tutorial on what is offered and how to use it.
It looks incredible to me. Anyone know when it will be available for sale and use here?
I might wait a year to get one with more storage space. 15 gig is enough for me.
[quote=“citizen k”]That’s funny.
Anyone know when an unlocked/carrierless version is to be released in the States or North America?[/quote]
AT&T has a 5 year contract with Apple to be the sole provider, so I wouldn’t hold my breath.
But there is hope: iPhone unlocked ‘within hours’, hackers say (I think it should actually read: “iPhone will be unlocked …”)
Argh, it seems the battery can only be charged 300 times and therefore needs annual replacement, something the user cannot do him/herself:
iPhone Class Action Suit Filed in Cook County
What was Apple thinking?
70 days on the market, 1 million sold YTD. (Apple figures)
Quick calculation : 14.285 pc per day or 595 per hour. Not bad for a thing they call a mobile phone. I will not jump in. Even not with the 200 USD discounted price they offer it now. Seems they quickly understood that their Toy is barely a 2007 High Tech phone.
For the lower price I might actually get one (I heard they now only sell the 8G version), you can buy new batteries for the next 2 years.
Then again the price in Taiwan will probably be times 66 instead of 33 …
Sept. 11 (Bloomberg) – At the end of an alley in Taiwan’s most violent city, a black Mercedes-Benz sedan blocks a sliding- glass door that opens only from within. Inside, technophiles can buy iPhone knockoffs for two-thirds the legitimate price.
With a touch-screen and Apple Inc.‘s logo on the back, the iClones'' look just like the real thing. Apple won't offer iPhones -- which combine a phone, music and video player with wireless Internet -- in Asia until 2008. The owner of the shop in Sanchung, a Taipei suburb, says he began selling aifungs’’ in December, six months before the iPhone went on sale in the U.S.
``We can’t ignore iPhone because it’s so hot,’’ says Ben, who spoke on condition he be identified only by his first name because selling pirated phones is illegal.
The clones show how fast Asian counterfeiters move. Ben says his company designed the fakes from pictures posted on the Internet before Apple Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone in January. Knockoffs cost the global economy $650 billion annually, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce estimates. Apple spokeswoman Jennifer Bowcock wouldn’t discuss how much the company loses as a result of phony products.
``The longer Apple delays, the more the pirates can rip the company off,’’ says Chialin Lu, an analyst at Yuanta Core Pacific Securities Co. in Taipei.
Jobs hasn’t explained the delay. Kevin Chang, an analyst at JPMorgan Chase & Co., says carriers need time to modify their networks for the iPhone’s technology.
Shenzhen Factory
Cupertino, California-based Apple, which predicts it will sell 1 million iPhones in the three months ending Sept. 30, intends to fight back.
``We are committed to pursuing counterfeiters and others who steal from us and deceive our customers,’’ Bowcock says. On its Web site, Apple asks consumers to report fake hardware to counterfeit@apple.com .
The knockoff phones are produced in batches of 1,000 at a factory in Shenzhen, China, across the border from Hong Kong, says Ben, 26. He advertises his phones on the Internet and sells them for NT$8,900 ($270). On Sept. 5, Jobs cut the price of the top iPhone to $399, a $200 reduction.
The guts aren't hard,'' Ben says. The hard part is the design and the exterior.’’
He says his operation has sold more than 10,000 clones in China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, Australia and the U.S.
In Shanghai, the knockoffs are kept under the counter of a cramped market stall on the sixth floor of a trash-strewn building near the railway station.
Ni, who spoke on condition he be identified only by his surname, says he started selling the knockoffs after reading a newspaper story on the iPhone hype.
`Chinese iPhone’
The phones go for 1,000 yuan ($133), and Ni says most of his sales are made over the Internet. He refused to identify his supplier, saying, ``That’s a trade secret.’’
What I'm selling is a Chinese iPhone,'' says Ni, 48. It’s not a fake iPhone. It works perfectly fine.’’
Shenzhen and the surrounding Pearl River Delta is the largest handset-making region in China.
Pirates buy components from local companies, then assemble the clones, says Yang Yuxing, an analyst at Beijing-based researcher BDA China Ltd. As many as 400 factories can be hired to do the work, he says.
Apple isn’t the only victim. Fakes come with labels such as Nokian,'' imitating the brand of Nokia Oyj, the world's biggest mobile phone maker, and Snog Ericsson,’’ a corruption of Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications Ltd.'s trademark, says Neil Mawston, a London-based analyst for Strategy Analytics Ltd.
``By some accounts, they may make up 5 percent to 10 percent of total volumes this year,’’ he said in an e-mail.
Protecting Secrets
Legitimate manufacturers such as Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., the world’s largest contract maker of electronics, including iPhones, say they don’t participate in the illicit trade.
Protecting the designs and intellectual property of our clients is one of the most important things we do,'' says Edmund Ding, a Hon Hai spokesman, when asked if parts are sold to other factories. If we find out any of our employees is doing that, we will fire them immediately.’’
Still, designs can be copied so quickly that South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co., Asia’s biggest handset maker, decided to reveal only the front of its new music and video phone at the Hong Kong trade show last year. Seoul-based LG Electronics Inc. showed customers its new handset behind closed doors.
In August, the U.S. asked the World Trade Organization to declare that China’s laws to safeguard patents and copyrights failed to meet international standards.
In Sanchung, Ben’s clones carry a notice in fractured English that reads: ``Waring. It will break the law without authorized by Apple Inc., if you use `iPhone’ logo on any electronic pruducts.’’
While the knockoffs resemble iPhones, they don’t use Apple software. Ben says his phones have the advantage of working on any network, while iPhones connect only to AT&T Inc.'s system.
It's the exterior we are imitating,'' Ben says. If customers want functions, we can offer more and much better functions than the real phone.’’
To contact the reporters on this story: John Liu in Shanghai at csung4@bloomberg.net
So where exactly does Ben park?
[quote=“Rascal”]Argh, it seems the battery can only be charged 300 times and therefore needs annual replacement, something the user cannot do him/herself:
iPhone Class Action Suit Filed in Cook County
What was Apple thinking?[/quote]I wouldn’t worry about the battery thing too much. The big thing is that it’s non user-replaceable (though I’m sure you can actually do it yourself once the phone’s out of warranty). But this figure of “300 times” seems to have been over-hyped. Apparently Apple only said that it would start to lose performance after 300 charges. The current information is here:
It seems unlikely that anyone will be using the full charge every day. If you charge the phone every night, battery life should be reasonable. I’d guess a couple of years before it starts to be a nuisance.
The battery in my old Treo 600 is non-replaceable, and over two and a half years of fairly heavy use I didn’t notice any decline in battery capacity. Admittedly the battery is much larger than the one in the iPhone. But I still think the iPhone would be fine for quite a while.
You are right, around 300 full cycles is normal for a Li-Ion battery, after that it starts to loose capacity, it doesn’t just “drop dead”. This applies to any phone or other device that uses this type of battery, too.
I think the phrasing by Apple is a bit misleading as it says it needs to be replaced by then (see the link). Whoever wrote that paragraph probably regrets it now.
[quote=“Rascal”]I think the phrasing by Apple is a bit misleading as it says it needs to be replaced by then (see the link). Whoever wrote that paragraph probably regrets it now.[/quote]You mean the paragraph from the legal papers on your link? I don’t think that was written by Apple, but by the person suing them. I’m not sure Apple ever actually said that.
The whole paragraph on the official Apple site seems reasonable:
“A properly maintained iPhone battery is designed to retain up to 80% of its original capacity at 400 full charge and discharge cycles. You may choose to replace your battery when it no longer holds sufficient charge to meet your needs.”
You are right again, I thought it was a copy from the user manual. Never really looked at paragraph 12. 
[quote=“joesax”]The whole paragraph on the official Apple site seems reasonable:
“A properly maintained iPhone battery is designed to retain up to 80% of its original capacity at 400 full charge and discharge cycles. You may choose to replace your battery when it no longer holds sufficient charge to meet your needs.”[/quote]
Agree.
Looks like the guy is actually suing because he claims Apple didn’t disclose the battery replacement issue before it went on sale but the statement in paragraph 13. itself seems to be false then.
They’re here. In Taiwan. Fakes as the rest…
[quote]Buy fake iPhones in Taiwan’s most violent city
Sep 11, 2007 13:52
According to Bloomberg (the news wire, not the mayor of New York):
“At the end of an alley in Taiwan’s most violent city, a black Mercedes Benz sedan blocks a sliding-glass door that opens only from within. Inside, technophiles can buy iPhone knockoffs.” These are cutely nicknamed the “AiFung”.
This report out of Sanchong, way out in Taipei county (where 90 percent of all those office workers and waitresses in Taipei live), tells of our local place to pick up an iClone. Oh, if only I were so very brave to risk being hacked to bits by local gangsters to pick up a fake Shenzhen-made iPhone.
All I can say is “ha, ha, triple ha”! This is Taiwan, dude. “Most violent” is relative. We’re not talking South Central here. I have friends living out that way and they were surprised by this report. Maybe the stats are true, but let’s not get crazy. Sanchong is basically the suburbs.
Anyway, according to the analysts, it’s kinda Apple’s own fault these knockoffs are springing up. They say the longer the company waits to sell the iPhone here, the more opportunity it gives copycats to fill the vacuum with fakes.
Dude, this is Asia. The pirates don’t need any incentive to copy. They’ll copy anything: Toothpaste, LV bags, Renzo’s Benzo.
And EVERYONE else is copying the phone on the “legit”. Just look at HTC, Samsung, Nokia, etc.
Anyway, some estimates say 5-10 percent of all cell phones are copies. That’s a lot of business that LOTS of companies are losing.
I’m still satisfied to wait. We know brother Steve will bring us something good someday. Patience is a virtue. Besides, I won’t be cruising the Sanchong “hood” anytime soon. I don’t do suburbs.[/quote]
And now of course you can have your genuine iPhone working with any provider in Taiwan thanks to the unlocking software. Everything works except the visual sms of course.
I am tempted…
can u buy it here already?
No you can’t buy it here. It is only sold legaly in the US at this time.
but if you were to buy one over there, it would work with any SIM card from any provider here in Taiwan. At your own risk of course.
If music is a big deal to ya, do not forget that the latest SD Micro cards can carry 4 and 6 Gigabyte of storage.
I use a 4 gig card with my new HTC Tytn II (see "Is it now the time to buy a Dopod) and have much much more than an iPhone can offer.
Though, I understand that some people go for looks only, but do not forget that the iPhone lags behind in sofistication High tech etc