Hands-On Report--iPhones Still Available in Apple Retail Stores

Fortunately, we were on a flight during Friday's magic 6:00 pm hour that kicked off Apple's iPhone sales so we were not tempted to stand in line. We had planned to buy one via Apple's online store to avoid the expected crowds and lines. But when we were able to do so late Friday night, the shipping time was an astounding 2-4 weeks, yikes! Then, we checked the iPhone availability chart for the Apple retail stores in San Diego County and all were green--actually all throughout the U.S. were green.

This morning we called the San Diego Fashion Valley Apple Store to be sure and they said they had plenty. Twenty minutes later we had our 8GB iPhone in hand. There were three people ahead of us buying iPhones when we arrived and about ten behind us when we left about 10:00 am PT.

When we asked about the store's stock, all the staff would say is that they had a good supply. When we asked whether the 4GB or 8GB model seemed to be the favorite, the answer was both were favorites. That could be true because two of the three in front of us bought 4GB models and one bought an 8GB model like us.

Unlike the horror stories we read elsewhere about activation problems and quality issues, we had neither. Activation via iTunes 7.3 was straight forward. We already have an AT&T family plan with two Motorola RAZR's and we wanted to add the iPhone rather than replace an existing phone. The activation software offered us that option contrary to AT&T's FAQ that states we have to go to an AT&T store to do so. The cost was only $29.99--$9.99 to add a third line to our family plan which includes 550 anytime shared minutes and $20 for the unlimited data option to support the iPhone. That's much better than we had expected.

Our iPhone has been working fine for several hours now as we are getting to know it. We've sync'd it with our contacts, calendars, email accounts, our iPod's "Favorites" playlist of 200 songs, the last 12 months of photos, numerous podcasts and all of our TV/movie videos. We still have over 5GB left unfilled for growth.

We'll post a longer term report on Monday's edition. Oh, one last thing...we don't find EDGE to be too slow for Web browsing. It is slow, much like a dial-up connection, but it is quite useable and doesn't take "minutes" to load a Web page as many have claimed. We think you'll love the iPhone. [Bill Fox]