iPhone Lover

Laughing Squid posted these yummy, adorable, and prize-winning iPhone cupcakes. The cupcakes, created by Nick and Danielle Bilton, swept the Cupcake Decorating Championship at Ignite NYC II.

I love the phone badge and the timer’s tiny details but can’t help but feel that the stocks cupcake somehow is missing a bit of white frosting. Also, the calendar date was wrong for the time of the championships, but I suspect that the judges wouldn’t notice that.

via http://www.tuaw.com/2008/09/18/icupcakes-take-the-cake/

While we’d heard of brand new iPhones coming with photos from the factory, we weren’t ever sure what to make of them.

Forum user markm49uk found something more remarkable. Photos of one of the factory workers on his brand new iPhone::

Not sure if this is or is not the ‘norm’ but I just received my brand new iPhone here in the UK and once it had been activated on iTunes I found that the home screen (the screen you can personalise with a photo) already had a photo set against it !!!!

It would appear that someone on the production line was having a bit of fun.

via http://www.macrumors.com/iphone/2008/08/20/iphone-factory-worker-photos-found-on-new-iphone/

With all the new cases flourishing for the second-generation iPhone, a website called AppleTell is not giving away cases for the original iPhone for free. There are no rules, no age limits, or whatsoever. All you need to have is a little funny or crazy imagination. They just want to bring back the love that the first-generation iPhone had since the spotlight for case manufacturers are now on the second-generation iPhone.

AppleTell will be giving away four first-generation iPhone cases such as the Griffin Wave (in color blue), Griffin ClearBoost, Speck SeeThru (a clear case), and the Speck TechStyle Classic (in color black).

All of the said units had already been opened.

However, the cases were never used. So the person who gets to win any of these cases can expect the case delivered in its original box.

The only thing that you must do is to type in a few words in their comment box and tell them the reason why do you need the case and what are the dangerous elements that might harm your iPhone. AppleTell will choose the deserving iPhone user to win the case. But you have to hurry! The contest will end at August 10, midnight.

If you want to get the first-generation iPhone cases or simply curious about the crazy posted answers, visit

http://www.appletell.com/apple/comment/appletell-giveaway-speck-and-griffin-cases-for-the-original-iphone/.

 Mmm, how I’ve missed my system tray alerts and e-mail previews on the unlock screen! That’s right, folks, Intelliscreen (review here) is back on the iPhone and works on 2.0. There are still a couple of bugs here and there (I have a heck of a time re-sizing the windows!) but it seems to be in pretty decent working order. Just add the source: http://intelliborn.com/cydia to Cydia and enjoy!

Btw, is it just me or is IntelliDial a bit faster now? Maybe it’s because my contacts aren’t set up with pictures yet..’

via http://justanotheriphoneblog.com/wordpress/2008/08/05/intelliscreen-is-out-on-20/

iPhones have always had a tendency to get a little on the warm side when they’re working hard or trying to get a signal, but can they actually hurt you? According to one unfortunate iPhone 3G owner on the MacRumors forums, yes it can, and it isn’t fun. He says that he fell asleep with his 3G in his pocket, and woke up to a sharp pain on his leg.

When he pulled his iPhone 3G out of his pocket, it was burning hot, and had burned his leg. It had even melted the back plastic, and had even damaged the dock connector port. Surprisingly it was still functional (except for the port, of course), meaning that the internal components are largely intact, though it is still useless since it can’t be synced or charged. Fortunately he called Apple support and they will be replacing it for him.

We’re not aware of any other incidents of this kind with the iPhone 3G, but we certainly are concerned. He only had it in his pocket while sleeping on the couch, and even had 3G turned off, which sounds like normal phone use to us.

via http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=534738

Everyone knows that it’s hard to get your hands on an iPhone 3G these days. But that’s to be understood. After all, with a worldwide release, the iPhone is in serious demand, pulling Apple stock a bit thin. Even so, the 16GB model is running out much quicker than all other models.

My basic assumption is that people are merely going after the largest capacity possible because they know the iPhone 3G cannot be updated. Even though it costs more, gadget hungry consumers are definitely favoring the 16GB model, as per the iPhone availability tool. 

If you haven’t gotten an iPhone 3G of your very own yet, sit tight. Keep your eye on the availability tool and you’ll get one, especially with Apple’s new ticket system. 

1.Terrible Battery life

The iPhone 3G’s life is pretty meager, lasting only about 200 minutes when web browsing with 3-G, according to testing by AnandTech. To save battery life, turn off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth when they’re not in use, calibrate the battery in its first week, carry around extra chargers and be conservative with surfing on 3-G.

2. No Bluetooth Data Transfer
You can’t transfer files over Bluetooth with iPhone. Lame.

3. No Full Outlook Sync Support
Though iPhone 3G syncs with your Outlook contacts and calendar events, it doesn’t sync notes or to-do lists.

4. No Cut-and-paste
No explanation necessary. (However, this may be implemented soon).

5. Camera Needs Pimping
The iPhone sports a crappy 2-megapixel camera. The least it could include is a flash.

6. No Packaged Data Download Manager
This isn’t applicable to U.S. iPhone owners, but in Australia, Aranez was required to purchase an additional, limited data package. He wishes there were a download manager to tell him how much he was downloading.

7. No Voice Dialing
Nope — as high-tech as iPhone is, there’s still no voice dialing (although it could be coming soon).

8. No Front-face Camera
This would be useful for video conferencing (although this would probably make the battery life even worse.)

9. Lack of Handwriting Recognition
If the iPhone is controlled with a touch screen, why not include handwriting recognition? (It’s available for Chinese, so maybe an English version will come eventually? )

10. No Turn-by-turn GPS Software
IPhone 3G’s GPS is a 2D map that spits out textual directions; it isn’t true turn-to-turn navigation like most GPS devices today. (Although this may be changed soon ).

       
And here are Gadget Lab’s additions to the list:

1. Still Can’t Type Horizontally for Non-web Apps
You still can’t type in landscape mode in applications other than Safari. At least incorporate that into e-mail and text messaging…

2. No Multimedia Text Messaging
One of the oddest omissions on a device as sophisticated as iPhone. Seriously, what gives?

3. IPhone 2.0 Is Buggy as Hell
Out of all the bugs, the most annoying is general lagginess when doing a lot of things — like writing a text message or loading the App Store. Argh.

And the rest of our list would overlap with the complaints about meager battery life and lack of copying and pasting/voice dialing.

via http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2008/07/cheat-sheet-mr.html

If this is real (and it probably isn’t) a lot of you can relate to the pains of tech support with less than knowledgeable parents. For a few minutes, you know what it is like to be John Mayer…meh.

The fact that my wife and I both have iPhones is a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing because well… we both have iPhones. But it’s also a curse. It has become another gadget to upgrade, to pimp up and gulp- to depreciate quickly . We were both going to get the 2nd generation iPhones but after weighting in the fact that the original ones are upgradable via software, it became hard to justify the cost of a whole new phone. Sorry, 2 new phones. So we opted for the software update, which gave us in a lot of ways a new phone. The upgrade was free, but the mostly inexpensive apps add up. This got me thinking about Fairplay, Apple’s DRM technology used throughout the iTunes store for music and now applications as well. Fairplay allows you to register up to 5 computers and unlimited iPods/iPhones synced to those computers. So… it should be easy for my wife and I to share iPhone apps with each other as long as both our iTunes are authorized to use them. All we need to do is authorize both accounts in both computers and re-download the apps. This could work in Windows, but why would I right?

Here’s a step by step tutorial on how to do it.

Scenario

I have 2 Macs, 2 iPhones, 2 iTunes accounts.

I used one account to buy a game, and another account to buy another one. The goal is to have both games playable on both phones legally with no hacks.

Solution

Have each computer be authorized for both accounts. Re-download apps on 2nd computer with 1st computer iTunes account.

Step 1: Authorize Computers

I step into my wife’s mac, launch iTunes, log out of her iTunes Store account and log in with mine. 

Step 1: Log Out and In

Still inside iTunes,  I go to the app store and click the Buy App button on the application I had bought in my computer.

     

Step 2: re-download

iTunes knows I already paid for this and just let’s be re-download it without charging me again.

Step 2: Confirm

The app then begins to download.

    

Step 2: downloading

Once the download is complete, it now shows in the Applications section of iTunes. 

    

Step 2: downloaded

I can now log out of my iTunes Store account and log her’s back in.

Step 1: Log out and in

Step 3: Sync & Play

I can plug her phone in now and sync.

Step 3: sync

The app should transfer without any fuss.

Step 3: syncing

Once synced, it shows on her phone ready for playing.

Step 3: play

And now both our kids can take over our phones and drain those batteries out. 

Step 3: playing

Enjoy.

via http://allforces.com/2008/07/22/share-apps-between-iphones/

Gartner and IDC just released their most recent numbers on PC Marketshare and Apple, as expected, climbed up the ranks again.  Depending who you ask they are either slightly ahead or slightly behind the Acer/Gateway/Packard Bell mashup which puts them around tied for third place.  The interesting thing is iPod touches and iPhones aren’t counted as computer sales.  Should they be?

• iPhones have the same specs as laptops had about 5 years ago.
• They can do most of the things a full computer can
• They are as functional as UMPCs which are tallied in the total.
• They are used in much the same way as computers, replacing computers much of the time for people on the move
• Unsubsidized cost?  I’d venture to bet 50% of Dell and HP machines are less expensive that unsubidized iPhones
• Some pretty smart people say they are computers

If you do count iPhones and iPod touches…you get a whole new ball game.  That three million computer lead that HP and Dell have on Apple starts to shrink.  Apple sold a million iPhones last week.  iPods are also flying off the shelves and with the 2.0 software, they do Exchange, Cisco VPN, Office apps, IM,  and have 1000 3rd party apps waiting for them.  That is a pretty good computer platform if you ask us!

via http://www.9to5mac.com/iphones-ipods-are-computers