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Apple OS X Smartphone
Description
With the launch of the iPhone 3G a few months back, we have decided to add our own video review to give you some idea of how the device looks and handles, especially now that several firmware updates have been introduced to make the platform a little bit more stable.
Box Contents
Once again like the previous iPhone your purchase arrives in an uber stylish box, which is smart on the outside and even more so on the inside - as everything is neatly presented and easy to get to.
Box contents remains similar to, with the exception of the removal of the USB docking station for iTunes. However you still get a small guide showing you how to use your device, a propriety USB cable, Mains charger and a pair of 3.5mm headphones.
Specification
- Capacity: 8GB or 16GB flash drive
- Display: 3.5-inch (diagonal) widescreen Multi-Touch display, 480-by-320-pixel resolution
- Operating system: MAC OS X
- 3G (HSDPA) 3.6MBPS - 850 / 1900 / 2100
- GSM: Quad-band (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz)
- Wireless data: Wi-Fi (802.11b/g), EDGE, Bluetooth 2.0+EDR
- Camera: 2.0 megapixels
- Headphone Port: 3.5mm
- Tv-Out
- Measures: 115.5 x 62.1 x 12.3 mm
- Weight : 135g
- Power and battery: Talk time: Up to 10 hours, Standby time: Up to 300 hours
Video Part 1
Video Part 2
Video Part 3
GPS Receiver
As mentioned in the videos the iPhone3G does lack proper dedicated 3rd party navigation solutions (though this is set to change), so all you have to go with from the off is the pre-installed Google Maps for testing.
Essentially when you first fire up Google Maps it will start to download the base map (as it does on all smartphone versions) and then it will pinpoint your position - based on GSM data - on the screen with a large flashing blue circle, after a while it will pinpoint your exact location by displaying a smaller blue circle on the map.
Location acquisition indoors does take a while to lock on, but with the Assisted GPS onboard subsequent locks are much quicker.
Delving into the software you can then search for POI or input postcodes, house number/street/city names for navigation.
We found that the maps (standard, satellite, hybrid) themselves were pretty sharp, with street names appearing frequently. However whilst driving the street names were a bit harder to view (even when zooming in).
When it comes to navigating, you can plot an A-to-B destination and then GoogleMaps places a start/stop pin on the map, alongside a coloured route path which highlights your chosen route.
Manual step-by-step instructions can be gleamed at this stage or you can even view itinerary lists.
There are no voice guidance commands to be found and if you stray off your chosen path it won’t intelligently re-route you back onto it either. Plus as you drive along the software is using your data connection to download the maps on the fly, which does have a large impact into battery life.
However we were pleased that it could keep track of our position and the large 3.5” screen copes well in bright conditions.
So overall there is a lot of positives to be taken from the GPS, when the likes of TomTom or Garmin get onboard – we hope – the iPhone3G will cope pretty nicely.
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"yes helpful. Can my iphone (02) 8GB from London works in Cyprus with a new simcard? Thanks"
The simple answer is no, mainly because the iPhone3G is locked to the O2 network so you would not be able to put another sim in it.
CB