Well, 5.0 installed in under an hour – and another hour later I had all of my apps and restored .. running the latest and greatest! I must say, RIM slipped some really nice improvements in – and it certainly runs much better than 4.7. I’m very pleased. The phone is not crashing anymore, seems to be holding its RAM better, and is definitely more responsive.

Some of the niceties -

• loads thumbnails faster
• improved camera software – can enable ‘macro’ mode, and have many options for sending (sizes)
• shows Upload progress when sending photos via email
• overall look and feel is much cleaner, smoother. almost.. modern!
• threaded SMS (not that i care, I use Google Voice for free SMS if needed)
• nice new ‘boot’ screen status bar

Not so great:

• my signal is still garbage
• reboots are still excessively slow
• when phone wakes up from ‘idle’, there is a strange black screen, pause, then it ‘wakes up’.
• Gmaps totally hangs the phone still.. seems to be a Google issue now though

Overall I am much happier with the phone. It is stable, which is quite comforting.  It still has the god awful long boot time – which isnt a big deal anymore since the phone has stopped rebooting itself – and the signal is still very ‘flighty’ – as I sit on the couch I can watch it go from full 1XEV down to no bars on 1X.. and back again. Running Google Maps is still painful – I am thinking now that it has to do with the Latitude feature – but very irritating when it hangs the phone with a ’stop watch’ icon.. making the whole thing unusable.

Sure, it looks great, takes very good pictures, and has an amazing display.. but my Tour is becoming increasingly unstable and laggy. Both of these situations have a simple fix – reboot – which sadly takes 7+ minutes on the device. Yeah – SEVEN minutes – sometimes creeping up to TEN. Its absolutely unbelievable, considering how “powerful” it is supposed to be – lots of memory and a fast processor – yet it can’t load its own OS nearly as fast as Blackberries with much lesser stats? Huh? My old Pearl (see the earliest posts) could out-boot the Tour by 5 minutes, easily.

Stability wise, its great, as long as I don’t use any 3rd party apps. The latest version of Facebook has a nice bug that literally reboots the device when I exit the app. What? I guess we’ll call that “memory cleaning” or something. Ridic. Running Google Maps works quite well.. as long as you have alot of time. My lovely Tour has a little hourglass problem.. where nearly everytime I try to USE Gmaps, it loads quickly, then hangs for a solid 30 seconds. The phone is completely unusable during this period. And it likely will repeat this behavior several times during the Gmaps session.

Signal quality is abysmal. I am still dropping out of 1XEV constantly, down to 1X, and sometimes losing signal altogether. Its not Verizon’s issue, as I’ve mentioned before – its this goddamn phone. Kim’s old Curve is still a champ at holding a signal. Fortunately this signal crap does not drop too many calls.. but it still does now and then – though not as many as the good old iPhone.

It’s been said, since this phone came out, that the new “OS5.0″ would be coming out “soon”. 5 months later, its still not out, thanks to Verizon.. however there are some leaks out there. I hope I hope I hope the new OS will fix the issues I list above.. namely the booting and signal quality issues. I suspect any “fresh install” of an OS will fix some of the instabilities .. much like any device. I am not banking on the new OS to come out anytime soon, however – nor do I really expect it to actually fix the issues. I am almost certain, in fact – especially since the Tour2 is coming out (with features like Wifi, trackpad and a truthfully faster processor). If the Tour(1) were so great – would there be any need to build a better version of it immediately after release? Nope.

So.. as I sort of suspected some time ago.. the Tour is simply my “right now” phone. Thinking about day-to-day frustration, it is still less (but not much less!) infuriating than my iPhone experience- probably because the camera is relatively awesome, and it still does a great job at email.

Now that Motorola released the Droid, and  Google has its Nexus One out (soon to be on Verizon).. I’m starting to get more interested in Android – but I am going to wait it out a bit longer.

My GPS craps out. Alot. So much that nearly every time I want to use it (for awesome apps like GPSlogger), I have to reboot the phone to get the GPS chip to wake up. Not cool. It takes ages to reboot, too – like 7 minutes or more. My old Pearl did it in half the time..

Further GPS crap – even when it is working.. it occasionally reports INSANE data. You can see it in action in these images.. two are from a round of golf I logged, where I apparently broke the sound barrier, and another is from a run – where I broke 80mph on foot. Right.

To ice this cake, the signal reception has issues as well. I can be sitting on the couch here and watch the signal drop from full 1XEV to no bars, to just 1X (which I think is like ATT Edge vs 3G).. then lose data connectivity altogether.. then it bounces right back. Meanwhile, Kim’s Curve, also on VZW, right next to my phone, maintains a strong signal consistently.  WTF, RIM?

So this Tour is over – going to swap for a new one at the VZW store. And apparently, the newer “batches” of Tours are much better built, so say other folks on the internets. So I’ve got that going for me, which is nice. We’ll see. So far I am not happy – at all – about these shortcomings.

Update.. timed a reboot: 6.5 minutes before it was “awake” and then almost another minute before it was useable. and… it is on 1X vs 1XEV – unreal. I’ve had enough of this. And today’s lesson for CDMA networks:
1X: Connected to the cellular network on 1xRTT as well as connected to RIM’s servers
1XEV: Connected to the cellular network on EVDO as well as connected to RIM’s servers

So compared to GSM, 1X is like EDGE, 1XEV is like 3G.

So far, the Tour is fantastic.. except the GPS is very flakey on mine. The GPS chip seems to stop responding very often, which appears to only happen to me.. can’t find anyone else with these issues. More to come on that – may have to get the unit replaced.

Its very fast, both hardware-wise and network-wise.. though I do find some funky slowdowns at home (seems I live right between two towers or something). I’ve downloaded a bunch of apps and it runs everything without a hitch – except when the GPS craps out of course. Even Google Maps runs just as well as it did on the iPhone – without the giant screen of course. Latitude is nice to have again, and of course my chat clients – Goog Talk and BBM.

The web browser is good – better than any other BB I have used. Still doesn’t handle Javascript well, but overall displays most content quite well. I suspect once Skyfire is released, that will solve any issue.

Camera – auto focus is REALLY good. Flash is insanely bright, however the device is smart enough to lower the flash output as it needs to, based on the auto focus. Video camera is pretty good, too.

The switch from ATT to Verizon went well. Got the phone activated immediately, and am now signed onto a cheaper plan.

More to come.. but so far, I’m a happy camper.

I gave ATT a few days to get my contract and stuff back to normal – ie, back to before I got the iPhone. After 4 days, my account is still claiming I have the iPhone contract.. yet is aware that I am using my old BB. MMhmmm.. about that iPhone contract – shouldn’t it like.. NOT WORK with my BB? That’s how ATT seems to sell it – as if it is some separate beast..

Figuring it would be a quick fix, I called ATT last night before heading to the Verizon store. Funnily, the ATT stores close at 7pm, yet Verizon stores are open till 9pm. I talk to Regina for a bit and explain the situation. She has to talk to her manager.  This goes on for a while – she can’t do anything without her manager. Sure, fine, she seems new, no problem. After a good 10 minutes of awkward questions (“did you eat dinner yet?”) she finally announces that ATT cannot help me over the phone, that the store has complete control over this issue – as it is an error on their behalf. Fine, just another nail in the coffin, ATT.

I hang up and go check out the Verizon store. Busy place even after 8pm on a Tuesday. The Tour is a popular item. I played with it a bit – and yup, its a 100% mashup of the Bold keyboard in a Curve sized body. Its a really nice looking device. Typing is different, but good. I checked out the Storm, and ugh what a mess that thing is. Not a fan, could never deal with it. Touchscreen just is not for me. Also played with the Pearl Flip – nice device.. much faster than my 8100 but not as nice as the Tour, etc. The size is kinda funny – oddly large when its opened – but its lightweight and has Suretype (which I do enjoy). Went back to the Tour – tested out some web action, camera, and other toys. Its a powerful phone. I figure I could get used to the keys and be happy. Not wanting to “take a number” to talk to a rep, esp since my ATT account is in limbo, I left, content.

Swung by ATT today. Talk to the doood who sold me the phone initially. Apparently my contract was already in their sites – was sitting on a desk – and he pulled it right up and acknowledged the error. “Didn’t you get a new Blackberry or something?” he asks. “No.. you could not give me my upgrade price due to the iPhone contract.. and I still can’t get that”, I calmly added. Further explaining that “I need to know what my pricing will be before I buy a phone.”

He seems to understand, however.. he could not FIX my contract error without his manager, who was.. “out”, possibly back in 20 minutes. Ugh. He says they will take care of it and will let me know. Ok.. so I go and play with the phones a bit more. Bold – still the best keyboard of all. Really awesome. Unfortunately the phone is a really gigantic. Sure feels nice, but way too big. Curve 8900 – typed a bit and came to decide that I’d be happier with the Tour keyboard. I made less errors in less time, so figured that’s sign enough. I did test out Youtube on the 8900 and it worked just fine.. though I am not sure if that was via edge or wifi. As I am playing, the sales guy goes up to my cancellation guy and tells him he screwed up. Yeah, rub it in, smart guy, but no one’s fixing my issue..

I left after about 10 minutes and have decided to give them a whole day to fix this. No call yet, and the store is now closed as its after 7. Tomorrow afternoon I will give them one final chance to give me my old contract back.. and then it will get ugly. Little does ATT know.. that as soon as they fix this, I am cancelling them and moving over to VZW. This stupid debacle has sealed it.

Now that I am back on my BB, there are some things I must give the iPhone credit for. The GPS/Gmaps integration is terrific. Being able to delete/read my junk mail via IMAP in Gmail – awesome. Very good call quality, as well. I don’t have any regrets, however.

Sure, my Pearl barely can run Gmaps anymore and uses cell tower triangulation. Sure, it doesn’t want to use IMAP w/Gmail.. and yeah, calls aren’t great. But most of these are going to be fixed with probably any new device, so I will make do in the short term. Oh, and yeah I was back to a crappy camera. Oh wait, I there was no change in crappiness, except now I had a flash again, and could upload photos directly to FB again after taking a shot – or send right to Google Talk, or BBM, or even Twitter, if I gave a crap about Twitter.

What’s next?

I went into ATT with the intention to change from the iPhone to the Curve 8900, and if that didn’t work for me, I could return it in a month. Well ATT wanted $300 for the device in store – which I laughed at – and left without. Last I checked my 2 years of servitude would provide me the 8900 for $99 according to their website. However, it seems I don’t have any upgrade eligibility after signing the iPhone contract that is now nullified. Hmm. ATT might be getting a phone call very soon. It shouldn’t take 4 days to revert me to my old “free agent” status.

So for the moment, the 8900 cannot be had at a price I am willing to pay. That leaves me no choice but to strongly consider the BB Tour, over on Verizon – which was released the day after I reverted to my Pearl. As it turns out, as well, I could get my service for $70 on VZW too – instead of the $85ish I pay at ATT.  That’s a good chunk of savings.

That decision is still pending. For now, I have my “connection” back and can stop using SMS again.

3 whole weeks have gone by – the honeymoon is over folks! Latest obsevations..

• Touch screen has some trouble in humidity.  Getting into the car on a rainy nasty day, the screen barely responds to my fingers.
• 3G SUCKS in some areas, even with “full signal”. Its a funny thing – you expect broadband speed because the phone says 3G.. yet at times (especially north of Boston) it feels much slower than EDGE.
• When this thing’s memory is chewed up, it does not tell you, does not show you, and has VERY irritating behavior. For instance.. you cannot compose, or reply to an email. You click on stuff and it simply does nothing. At least TELL me there’s a problem, Apple. I don’t mind rebooting (I used a Blackberry for years, remember) – so don’t pretend everything’s fine and simply ignore my requests.  And when apps crash – how about an error message?? I have seen most of my apps crash – some repeatedly – but with no explanation. WTF, Apple? You think my not having a clunky error message, your phone is more user friendly? Tell me what the hell is wrong, so I know how to fix it. Is there “an app for that”?
• Camera – still garbage unless perfectly still, in bright sunlight. Now there’s all this talk of adding cameras to ipods and whatnot – oy. From a photo nerd, this is a sad, sad thing. I am still shocked at the camera’s deficiencies (have to use the touch screen, slow to load, slow to shoot, tendency to warp photos, horrid low-light performance)
• AT&T’s own iPhone app, “myWireless” – you know, the one to access your account and everything you need from your fancy phone? It has not worked for over a week. Simply sits there saying “loading”. Thanks ATT. Nice work. Really.
• App Updates – two things here. When you have several updates from the App Store, you can only run one at a time. So.. you go to App Store, hit Updates, and pick an app to update. Then you exit the App Store so it can load the new app. Then you have to load up the App Store all over again, and repeat. This is assinine. Why isn’t there an “update all”??? Found out there is, but only via iTunes – and if you are trying to use this as a laptop replacement, uh, yeah, fail.
• A word on Safari. Its a great browser, when it stays open. Have experienced several crashes, because all of its “tabs” apparently can consume a pile of memory. Why not have a “close all windows” option for me? Hmm? Cause if I exit to do something else, you keep my last web page in memory – I don’t need that.
• The IM issue. In my last post, I mentioned that I could buy an IM client that used Push notification to kind of be “online”. It occurred to me later that Apple gets a chunk of that money. So I am essentially paying Apple to keep their phones crippled? Oh, HELL no.  So shortly after that, a free chat client has come out, that could potentially give me “live” IM access to Google Talk, via Push notifications. YAY, right? I installed it and came very close to “signing in” when it occurred to me – my precious email login credentials are suddenly about to be stored on some server that I know nothing about. I don’t even know who’s running it, or how secure it is! I am not OK with sharing my personal information with random 3rd parties. Sorry, Apple.
• About that hardware.. It crushes my old Blackberry – I don’t contest that. However.. it is not so “magical”, I am finding. Using anything that tries to ‘autofill’ is mind bogglingly annoying. The thing chews up all of its cycles trying to guess what you are typing, to the degree that it stops accepting input from your typing. Using Google Search is a joke.. takes forever to type your terms, and have the time it falsely submits your query without asking. It is painful. Sending a photo over email – same thing, things get amazingly sluggish as you try to select your recipients.

So.. I have one more week with this thing, before I head back to the ATT store to see about a return. I have some concerns from the “drop” as the shitty plastic backing got a bit chewed up. Could someone tell me why that isnt rubberized still? Oh yeah, it wouldnt be as sexy.

Using this phone very often leaves me as irritated and frustrated as my old run-down Blackberry did. That is not acceptable.

Other news.. the batter is suddenly better. It lasted a full day at work and only lost about 20% of its life – unlike the whole of last week where it drained about 60% during the workday – without any use. I don’t know how/why this change is happening, as I havent changed my use of it since last week. Maybe its not switching networks as often this week? AT&T is a bit fishy here at my desk. As I mentioned before, it even dropped one of the first calls I’ve received on it, while sitting at my desk.

OS 3.0 has the big promise of “push” – which basically means the phone can notify me of alerts from 3rd party applications – instead of just email/SMS. The big thing here is that IM clients like AIM or Gtalk might be able to “stay alive” now – instead of this whole “sign off when the phone goes to sleep” thing which is so vexing. Since I don’t use AIM outside of work – I don’t plan to install that app, despite it being free. The only way to really get Google Talk is via an app called BeeJive, which is raved about. unaminously. The new version is finally out, and supports “push” – meaning I might be able to have a full conversation on Google Talk again. The app is $10 – which pisses me off. IM is free and I already have this pricey data plan – its really irritating to have to pay more to get access. This phone could really be a money pit for unwise people.

The camera still sucks. I tried to take a picture this morning as my car hit 55,555 miles.. I was 0 for 6. No flash makes it impossible for the camera to take a “fast” picture – so it tries to keep its shutter open longer for more light. Well, that causes blurry photos – especially in the car. Annoying. This camera has annoyed me on many occasions, though its nice that it finally has something of a “quick launch”.

Another test of the iPhone’s “superiority” came up this morning – an internet sensation – the legendary Woot Off. Woot.com holds these now and then, essentially a massive barrage of one-deal-after-another – and you never know what’s next. The goal is to get the fabled “Bag of Crap” – which, for a couple bucks, could land you a big screen TV, or quite literally a bag of useless crap. Its always a fun gamble though. Anyway, the iPhone has some “deal trackers” – that could alert me of a new item. Its something I always wanted to see on the Blackberry.. but does not exist. So – does it work?

In a word – no. Again, no background apps allowed, so the “tracker” shuts down when the phone does. No alerts while the phone is sleeping – and like so many other things, you have to re-load it once you wake up the phone. The more promising of the couple apps actually crashes everytime I wake up the phone and reload it. Lovely. If I did happen to see something I wanted, the “purchase” experience would likely be pretty decent via the Safari browser.. but the chances of seeing something are pretty slim, due to this stupid “disconnect” situation that the phone surrounds itself in.

Why did I get one?

To put it plainly, my (several year) old Blackberry Pearl is not cutting the mustard anymore. I needed a new device. While I am a big fan of the ideals behind my Blackberry, I need something modern that can handle heavier duty tasks than my 8100.

Why try the iPhone? Simply put – between RIM, AT&T and Verizon, none of these asshats can release a decent device! Until very recently, the only “new” or “next gen” Blackberries available were the Storm on VZW and Bold on ATT. Everything else was old. ATT finally got their act together and released the Curve 8900 (after a 8 month delay or so) – which is the only Blackberry that fits the bill. Good CPU/RAM, GPS and Wifi. Still has that awful BB browser though.

Bold is too damn big and ATT wants too much money for it. Storm is.. well, its already getting replaced this year, which shows what a failure it is. Sure, several more are “coming” – but I’ve been waiting since the beginning of this year (note, we’re in June), and NOTHING has happened.

So – the iPhone had to be tried. And the 8gb 3G is priced at only $99 – the same price I’d pay for a “new” 8900. With ATT’s 30 day return policy – I figure if I don’t like it in that time, I can return the iPhone for 10% restocking and go back to my Pearl and wait another ____ months.

Initial impressions..after 3 days

Technology – it is fantastic. Would take this over a ‘netbook’ anyday as a internet device. Its really powerful and the visual effects what I’d expect on a high end PC. Touch is really cool for some stuff.. typing I do not like though I am getting better at it. I don’t like how easy it is to hit the wrong “button” since its not physical. You have to be soo dainty with your fingers. I don’t blame Apple here, so its not really a fault n my book. I will say – the incredible user experience is not something I will ever expect to see on a Blackberry.

This phone is totally “disconnected”. This is really kind of annoying.. I don’t like having to check Gmail and Facebook to see nothing has changed – its a waste of time.. esp since you have to keep loading separate apps. The “Fetch” feature was set as “manual” instead of on a time interval (15 minutes is the fastest available). Email works nicely – if it notified me faster, I’d be much happier. I like that it has my Gmail labels/folders right there.

Not having Gtalk (or any messenger) running in the background is totally unacceptable. Whats the point of this cool, high tech device if its not “connected”? I really, really don’t like this aspect. The only thing that seems to be “on” is SMS messages. I have moved on from SMS – IM and email are what a real smartphone should use.

3G is not as fast as I thought. Wifi is really nice – 3G is fast for downloading apps, but the web is not earth-shattering.

Itunes remote is the best app evar. Apps are cool, esp those that use the GPS – showing how great the tech is on this thing. 99% of the App Store is garbage. Total garbage. Needs more filtering – I don’t like opening up the App Store.

Its big – and heavy - i don’t like having it in my pocket. And talking on the phone is actually pretty uncomfortable – the edges are awful on your ear. Call quality is really good though.

Day 4 – some updates

Fetch is helping the email situation, but is not instant.. and honestly – no external message indicator? Seriously, Apple? Not even a tiny little blinking anything? So if I miss the “ding”, I will have to wake the phone up anyway? Seriously?

Battery – so far it hasn’t made it through a full day. I barely used it at work all day yesterday, and by the time I got home it was close to 30% left. Eesh!

A new gripe – no ‘quick launch’ buttons! One thing I love on the Blackberry is the side buttons to get to your camera, FAST. Iphone – no such luck. You have to do the slider-unlock, scroll to find your camera app icon, then wait for it to load. This requires 2 hands and ALOT of attention vs being able to click a button, have camera load, and be able to take a picture all without EVER looking.

One handed operation – ouch. Not feasible. When walking the dog, especially, its nice to have IM or email or something going for some ‘catch up’.. but you can’t do it here. Typing on the touchscreen with one hand – not doable. Some apps you can get around – however, anything interactive, nope.

Played with some Youtube last night – the screen is fantastic – videos are crisp, clear, and perform VERY well.

Day 5 -

Camera talk – no flash.. sure, the LED flash isn’t that great on the Blackberry, but man it is handy in a dark room.. where otherwise you can’t get any photo at all. No zoom? Not that big of a deal but still annoying. Its nice to have zoom when you email something to a friend, etc, to crop out other parts of a shot. Every photo I take on the iPhone is big and uncomposed. Further, there is no way to view a photo and directly upload to Facebook or anything else – wtf? So if I want to add to Facebook, I have to exit the camera, load Facebook, and upload from there.

Battery life – it is flat out bad. I am down to under 1/2 charge with barely any use.

Google Maps – might be the best thing going on this device. Awesomely easy to use, and the traffic info is great.