The Google Phone, at last

T-Mobile unveiled yesterday the world's first cell phone to run on Google's Android operating system, a modified version of the Linux operating system used on a small, but growing number of computers, set-top boxes, and other devices. Android's claim to fame is that its "open" architecture will encourage a broad community of software developers to create applications that run on the phone. We shall see.

The phone itself, called the T-Mobile G1 and made by HTC, will be available on October 22 at $179, including a 2-year contract. It's a touch-screen model that features a bright, 3.17-in display, a slide-out full QWERTY keyboard, built-in Wi-Fi, and a 3.2-megapixel camera. It's also one of the few phones that supports T-Mobile's fledgling 3G data network. Emphasizing Web connectivity, the phone comes preloaded with a full HTML version of the Safari Web browser and icons for launching—not surprisingly—Google Maps, YouTube, and easy access to Google Mail as well as other POP3 and IMAP e-mail services. You can easily flag, delete or move groups of messages and keep track of group conversations through threaded text messaging.

The phone (click on the image for a closer look) is a tad on the bulky side, measuring 4.60 in. x 2.16 in.  x 0.62 in.; it weighs a hefty 5.6 ounces. The claimed talk time is an unimpressive 5 hours. But the G1 does have an intriguing array of features, including a GPS-assisted internal compass that aligns Google Maps with the surrounding terrain, regardless of the phone's position. The G1 supports T-Mobile Hotspot @Home service that automatically switches the phone from the cell network to "free" VoIP service whenever it's in Wi-Fi range at home or when you're out.

iPhone 3G: Apple recalls faulty chargers

Apple announced a very important recall of the power adapters used to charge its new iPhone 3G. It seems that the metal blades or "prongs" may have a tendency to break off when the adapter is pulled out of the wall outlet, creating a potential electrical shock hazard.

According to Apple's official recall announcement, only some iPhone 3G adapters have this defect. The image above shows the adapters that are affected by this recall. If your adapter has a green dot (see image below), you're ok—there is no problem, and you can continue using the product. (Click on both images for closer looks.)

If you have one of the defective adapters, Apple advises that you immediately stop using the adapter. Apple will provide a new, redesigned adapter starting Oct. 10. You can request a replacement online (https://supportform.apple.com/200809/) or exchange a faulty adapter at any Apple retail store.

In the meantime, here’s how affected iPhone 3G owners can recharge their phones, according to Apple:

"...charge their iPhone 3G by connecting it to their computer with the USB cable that came with their iPhone or by using a standard-sized Apple USB Power Adapter (with fold up prongs) or with a third party adapter designed to work with the iPhone, such as a car charger."

This charger recall is the most recent problem affecting Apple's hot iPhone. Earlier this month, Apple announced a firmware upgrade for the iPhone to fix several issues, including dropped calls, e-mail reliability, and battery life.

Apple Spruces Up iPods, iTunes; Prunes prices, and fixes for iPhone 3G

Apple unveiled significant updates to iPods (Click on the image at right for a closer look) and the iTunes store at its "Let's Rock" event in San Francisco. These include a slimmer, greener Nano with a larger display, a slimmer Touch with a built-in speaker, and a revamped iTunes that adds a cool new music-search feature and the ability to download HD programming. There's also a firmware update for iPhone 3G users that promises to fix dropped calls and other problems reported by its users. Many of the products are available today; others will roll out over the next few weeks. We'll be reporting on these new models and features as they roll through our labs over the next few days. In the meantime, here's what we know now:

iTunes 8.0. With this update, iTunes' 65 million customers will be able to download and view high-definition programming on their computers and Apple TV. Shows in HD will cost $1 more than those in standard definition. What remains to be seen, besides the purported improvement in quality, is how long it will take to download such shows. Also new is Genius, a search feature that takes its cue from Internet radio stations by seeking out songs from similar-sounding artists. How it works: While you're listening to a song that you like on your iPod or iTunes, pushing the Genius button will send it scanning your library for  25 to 100 songs from like-sounding artists. Of course, Genius will also make recommendations from the iTunes store, as well. Genius is available to all iTunes and iPod users who install the free update.

The LG Decoy and Glimmer: Cell phones with a twist

When you cover the cell-phone market, an industry driven by imitation, it's uplifting to come across models that break from established design templates to make life easier. The LG Decoy and Glimmer, upcoming additions to our cell phone Ratings (available to subscribers), aren't game-changers like the iPhone. But they do have some unique characteristics that are bound to make some users happy. The details:

The LG Decoy, $150 from Verizon with a two-year contract, offers an innovative solution for hands-free users: It comes with its own Bluetooth headset, which conveniently snaps into the back of the phone when it's not in use. (Click on image at right for a closer look. The headset is the piece with the "Bluetooth" symbol.) The phone charges the headset, though only when it's plugged into the AC charger. The headset, which is a little over an inch long, earned good scores for listening and talking quality—comparable to many of the models we recently added to our Ratings of Bluetooth headsets (available to subscribers). Talk time was also relatively short at 2-1/2 hours. A replacement headset costs about $70.

The phone itself (Click on the image at left for a closer look) has an excellent mixture of controls and features for making and taking calls, and display and keypad are very easy to read under most lighting conditions. Voice quality is very good for talking, but only fair for listening—worse than most other CDMA phones. Talk time is an adequate 4-1/2 hours. You can download music and other content via Verizon's V-Cast service, and store that content on memory cards of up to 8GB.

Ratings: Bluetooth headsets for one and all (ears)

You see it more frequently now. That sharp-dressed man or woman walking down the street, talking, wildly gesturing and maybe even laughing hysterically—with seemingly no one around them.

Blame it on Bluetooth technology.

Wireless headsets are becoming much more affordable and shrinking in size so they're barely noticeable. But Bluetooth headsets are doing more than making cell phone users appear to be (apparently) talking to themselves. They're letting mobile music listeners cut the cord as well.

Consumer Reports has just posted updated Ratings of Bluetooth headsets (available to subscribers). Tested headsets ranged from $30 to more than $100 for the smaller, inconspicuous types. But among those 25 new models, four are stereo headsets for use with phones that have built-in music players.

They're usually heavier than mono headsets, but some of the stereo models (such as the Jabra BT3030, seen at right) feature a wireless remote control, eliminating the need to fumble with your cell phone's MP3 player buttons.

If you're in the market for a wireless headset, check out our latest Bluetooth headset Ratings report to see how mono and stereo wireless headsets fared in our tests. Our Quick Recommendations (available to subscribers) highlight our top picks.

And if you're new to the world of wireless walking and talking, be sure to read our wireless headset buying advice which will help you choose the right model for your needs.

Apple iPhone 3G vs. Samsung Instinct

Apple's latest iPhone is a winner, adding faster data-network access and GPS-assisted searching and mapping to the slick, innovative platform of its predecessor. Competing phone makers have taken their shots at iPhone's touch-screen design, but haven't made a dent.

That is, until recently.

Samsung's Instinct touch-screen phone, available exclusively from Sprint Nextel, has been flying off store shelves. In fact, Sprint stores have had a hard time keeping up with demand for this cool new phone, which has the unique ability to act on voice commands.

Does the Instinct have the chops to dethrone the iPhone? Watch our video to see how the Instinct and iPhone stack up against each other. (You can also view the video by clicking on the player at right if you have Flash software installed on your computer.)

To see how the iPhone 3G compares with other cell phones, check our Ratings of smart phones (available to subscribers).

—Paul Eng

iPhone 3G: More tests, more findings

Update, 7/18/08: We've completed our testing of the iPhone 3G. ConsumerReports.org subscribers can access our full Ratings of the iPhone 3G -- along with our take on more than a dozen other smart phones -- here.

* * *

We didn't expect to find many differences between the old and new iPhone beyond 3G network and GPS capability.

(Our colleagues over at the Cars blog are taking a closer look at the iPhone as a portable GPS navigation device. You can read their initial thoughts on the iPhone's GPS capabilities and watch our short video review of the iPhone 3G for more details.)

Both phones share the same brilliant, high-definition display, the same built-in 1.9 megapixel digital camera, and the same intuitive interface.

But our voice-quality tests turned up a pleasant surprise: Voice quality for talking—how you sound to others—was very good, compared with just good for the previous iPhone. That's especially welcome news considering that its listening quality—how incoming calls sound to you—was still only fair, the same as the old iPhone and most other GSM cell phones.

The iPhone 3G: Our initial findings

Here are our first impressions of Apple's new iPhone 3G, based on preliminary tests in our lab. Overall, the 3G is an improvement on its predecessor, though, as we found, there's still a lot of room left for improvement.  The details:

3G performance is fast. The new iPhone can use AT&T's faster 3G network, where available; the original iPhone could only trudge along on AT&T's creaky 2G EDGE network. In our tests, the new iPhone was about twice as fast when using the 3G network than the 2G. It took just 30 seconds to download the front page of the New York Times in our lab, compared with a minute to download the same page over the EDGE network. In fact, surfing the Web on the iPhone was even faster than on another high-profile phone that uses 3G: Verizon's LG Voyager. The phone allows you to select the EDGE network to conserve battery life. According to Apple, talk time in EDGE mode should be about 10 hours, compared with about 5 hours when iPhone is in 3G mode. We'll check both those claims early next week.

Better GPS navigation. Our Cars colleagues have completed an initial, real-world session. While the team has only just begun its full, authoritative test, their initial impression is that the iPhone 3G does indeed improve over the previous iPhone in pinpointing your location. However, the navigation ability does not approach that of previously tested competing GPS-enabled cell phones nor dedicated navigation devices.

Still a great screen. The new iPhone's screen appears to be comparable to the old one. That is, readability of text was still excellent thanks to the large, high-resolution display, which had no trouble handling different font sizes, colors, and formats such as bold, italic, and underline.

Office documents: Look, but don't edit. We were able to view attachments such as MS Word and Excel files. But the 3G, like its predecessor, doesn't allow you to edit or create new documents, as you can with phones that run on Windows Mobile or Palm operating systems. We were also able to view PowerPoint files—a nice touch that the old iPhone lacked—though we couldn't view them as individual slides. Rather, those slides appear as a list that you have to scroll through. The iPhone can't open ZIP attachments, which many BlackBerry, Palm, and Windows Mobile smart phones can do. You also can't use the 3G as a mass storage device to shuttle files back and forth between home and the office, as you can with many smart phones and even Apple's own iPods.

Our initial take: What was, hands-down, the best multimedia smart phone on the market just got a heck of a lot better. But as a corporate instrument, the 3G may still need a little more polish.

—Mike Gikas

iPhone 3G: U.K. review, U.S. problems

The iPhone 3G went on sale in 22 countries today at 8:00 a.m. Several are being tested in our labs, and our first impressions will be posted later today. Meanwhile, our colleagues at Which?, the independent testing magazine in the United Kingdom, have used their 5-hour head start on buying the iPhone to complete their own review. Their impressions were favorable overall, though the 3G did get dinged for its inability to record videos or send multimedia text messages—a drawback it shares with the original iPhone.

Here in the States, iTunes' servers—critical for iPhone's activation—began slowing down and eventually conking out soon after stores opened, as Engadget's Nilay Patel reports. Many shoppers—including our own—waited 30 minutes to more than an hour after they reached the sales counter to complete the activation process. Other customers are being turned away or allowed to purchase inoperative iPhones they can activate later from home. It's not clear when "later" will be because the servers need to be up in order for you to upgrade iTunes on your computer to Version 7.7.

We were able to activate our new iPhones in just a few minutes, since we had performed the iTunes update earlier in the morning—a process that took over 2 hours because of the slow servers. As we reported earlier, you can upgrade your original iPhone's operating system to get many of the 3G's improvements, such as more sophisticated e-mail and PDA features as well as the ability to download a multitude of applications from Apple's new App Store. But it's critical that you first update iTunes on your computer to Version 7.7 and make sure you have a connection to the iTunes server before synching your iPhone with your laptop. Otherwise, as the Standard's Jordan Golson reports, you could end up in "upgrade limbo" with an iPhone that won't work.

Our advice on upgrades: Wait a few days for this server congestion to clear up.

—Mike Gikas

Apple's iPhone 3G: How it's shaping up

In less than a day, Apple's new iPhone 3G (click on image at right) will be available to iFans in North America. Since Consumer Reports doesn't accept free review units from manufacturers, our secret shoppers will be up bright and early—perhaps, even standing in line next to some of you—to buy the new iPhone.

We expect to post our first impressions of the device on Friday and will continue to weigh in more firmly and regularly as we complete our tests and reviews of Apple's latest cell phone.

However, looking closely at Apple's official iPhone 3G features list, spec sheet and early online reviews from major publications, here are some of our observations of the iPhone's likely strengths and weaknesses:

• GPS, but not innovative GPS. The new iPhone uses space-based GPS satellites which should provide more accurate positioning information than the old iPhone's Wi-Fi and cellular-based navigation scheme. But out-of-box, the iPhone 3G's navigation won't be as innovative as other cell phones with GPS, such as the Samsung Instinct's "voice-activated" GPS navigation.

The iPhone comes to Canada, with complaints

Canada, home to more than 100,000 subscribers to ConsumerReports.org, will be getting the iPhone for the first time when Apple launches the iPhone 3G later this week.

But any jubilation among Mac fans north of the border is being dampened by anger at Rogers Wireless, the 3G's exclusive Canadian carrier. A post yesterday to an impressive protest site, iphoneincanada.ca, "Where Canadian iPhone Users Unite!," summarizes the mood:

iPhone 3G is coming on Friday! It's kind of bittersweet isn't it? Fantastic phone but disappointing data plans! Anyone going to boycott?

Fury is focused on the cost of Rogers' iPhone plans compared with those of AT&T, the exclusive U.S. carrier. For example, the $60 (Canadian) Rogers plan offers 150 minutes of talk time and 400 MB of data, compared with the 450 minutes of talk time and unlimited data access offered by AT&T for $70 (U.S.).

In addition to inspiring at least one online petition of complaint, protest T-shirts (see above), an editorial cartoon by Canada's pre-eminent cartoonist and a video featuring a puppet chastising Rogers' chairman Ted Rogers, the plans have also raised the profile of a bill in Canada's federal parliament, protesting what Liberal Member of Parliament David McGuinty says are inordinately higher cellphone costs in Canada compared with the U.S.

Fellow Canadians (I'm from Ottawa): Let us know your iMood as the debut of the iPhone in Canada approaches.

—Paul Reynolds

The New iPhone: 5 reasons to wait

We praised and recommended the original iPhone (available to subscribers). And we have no reason to think the new iPhone 3G, available this Friday, will be any less compelling to buy—especially at prices that start at $199, half or less what the original version cost.

That said, unless you're bent on buying the iPhone 3G (Click on the image at right for a closer look) the moment it's available, here are some reasons not to join the iStampede, at least in its earliest days:

Compelling competitors. In the past year since the original iPhone launched, other worthy phones with a touch screen, keyboard, and Web surfing have hit the market. These include the LG Voyager and Samsung Glyde on Verizon, among the best carriers in our Ratings of cell-service providers (available to subscribers). There's also the Samsung Instinct from Sprint Nextel and the upcoming Blackberry Thunder, the first Blackberry to feature a touch screen instead of a keyboard.

Samsung Instinct: A budget iPhone alternative

Since it's little more than a week before the upgraded iPhone hits stores, it's hard not to measure the Samsung Instinct, a new Sprint-Nextel phone with multimedia features and a touch screen, against Apple's second-generation multimedia, touch-screen smartphone. (Click on the images for closer looks at the Instinct.)

Some comparisons are impossible until we actually get the iPhone 3G. In initial tests, though, the Instinct appears to be an impressive performer. It costs less than the 3G—$130 vs. $199, with a two-year contract—and it has some features, like voice activation, that we expect even the new iPhone won't have. It's a little narrower, and thus more palm-friendly. However, it lacks iPhone features like WiFi access and the ability to handle Office-type documents. It's also offered by a carrier that's fared worse in our recent cellphone service Ratings (available to subscribers) than even AT&T, the exclusive iPhone carrier, which has been middling in subscriber satisfaction.

As we reported earlier this year, the Instinct has an iPhone-like 3.2-in. (diag.) touch-screen display with a virtual QWERTY keyboard.  In our labs, the display was responsive and easy to read under most lighting conditions and the virtual keys proved to be well-spaced and, with the aid of vibration feedback, easy to hit with minimal errors.

Old to new iPhone: AT&T upgrade policies

AT&T will be offering various breaks to current iPhone owners to induce them to upgrade to the new iPhone 3G, which debuts July 11.

The new models will cost $200 less than comparable first-generation iPhones—potentially leaving those who recently bought the older model stuck with a fairly new, already outmoded phone.

Anyone who bought the original iPhone on or after May 27 will be able to return it and receive a refund on the price difference between comparable new and old iPhones, minus a 10 percent restocking fee.

"We just want to be fair to customers who were very, very late purchasers of the 2G iPhone," said AT&T spokesman Mark Siegel in an interview. Anyone who merely bought earlier—including merely "very late"—will be out of luck on the returning their iRelic and receiving a refund on its price difference with the new model.

Refund or not, anyone who upgrades from original to 3G iPhone will have to sign a new 2-year contract that begins when they take possession of the new phone. And, as we previously reported, they'll have to pay $10 more per month for the data plan. Those who hold on to their old iPhones won't see a data-plan increase—even when they renew their contracts, according to Siegel.

AT&T is taking a quiet approach to publicizing these policies. Siegel maintains they've been in effect since the new iPhone was introduced. Yet there's no mention of them in the iPhone press release or on AT&T's Web site.

—Mike Gikas

New iPhone: Lower price, higher cost

The new iPhone 3G, announced yesterday and available next month, costs $200 less to buy than its predecessor. But the new version (click on the image for a closer look) will actually cost a little more to buy and use in the long run than its predecessor, due to higher service costs.

The new phone is $200 in its 8-GB version and $300 in its 16-GB version, compared with $400 and $500 for the older iPhones of the same capacity. An unlimited data plan with the new device is $30, $10 a month more than with the old iPhone. (The least-expensive voice plan, with 450 minutes a month, is the same price as with the old iPhone, at $39.99 a month.) Multiply the $10-a-month extra data cost times the required 24-month contract period and you're on the hook for $240 in additional charges for owning the new iPhone rather than its predecessor.

The hike in fees may be rooted in a change in the business arrangements between AT&T and Apple for the new iPhone. With the original iPhone, subscribers paid full price for the device, even though a two-year contract commitment was required—an unusual arrangement. The new version reverts to a more traditional business model for the industry. That is, AT&T will buy the phones from Apple and sell them to customers for less than they paid. Then they'll devote a part of subscribers' bills every month to reimbursing themselves for that subsidy.

So customers will pay a little more to buy and use the new device as the old, but they'll pay that slightly higher cost more slowly. The lower upfront cost likely will, as Apple's Steve Jobs predicts, allow some people to buy the device who couldn't swallow the $400 price tag for its predecessor. And, at $200 the iPhone 3G will be very competitively priced, given that plenty of plain cell phones that lack the iPhone's versatility cost that much or more. Also, new iPhone owners are getting a faster, more capable 3G network, rather than the slower AT&T EDGE (2G) network used by the older iPhones (the data plan for which will remain priced at $20 a month, according to AT&T).

All that said, the headlines proclaiming the new phone as cheaper than the old don't quite tell the whole story.

If you're looking for other money-saving tips, see our recent post, "Cell plan extra charges: Why and what you can do." Additional information on ConsumerReports.org will also help you find the best cell phone deals as well as other ways to cut your cell phone bill (available to subscribers only).

—Paul Reynolds

The new iPhone: Some pluses, some questions

Well, we got some of our wishes, at least. The new iPhone 3G, announced today at Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference in San Francisco, will indeed use a connection to a high-speed 3G network, one of the attributes on our top 5 wish list for the new phone, posted a few days ago. Apple chairman Steve Jobs even claimed performance would be faster than other 3G smartphones. The new phone boasts slighter thinner edges than the original, but retains a close family resemblance. (Click on the image at right for a closer look at the iPhone 3G.)

The new phone, which goes on sale on July 11 at $200 (for an 8-GB version) and $300 (for a 16-GB version) will also boast true, satellite-based GPS, another of our wish-list items, rather than the earth-based location technology of the current iPhone. (Click on image at left for a closer look at the original iPhone.)

On the other hand, the new phone will not add stereo Bluetooth capability, a feature we sought that would allow it to be used with pricey Bluetooth stereo headsets. But Apple has at least banished the old iPhone's much-derided recessed headphone jack, which demanded use of a third-party adapter to be used with any but the headphones supplied with the phone.

Less clear is whether the remaining two items on our list will be addressed. That is whether iPhone 3G will have voice command, a feature that's all-but-standard even on less pricey phones, or a last-number one-button redial. Neither feature was mentioned at the presentation or included in the online list of specifications for the device.

It's also unclear whether the phone will offer the option to operate solely on the slower AT&T EDGE (2G) network used by the current iPhone. The specifications for the iPhone 3G list talk-time figures for both 3G and 2G operation. That unusual differentiation seems to raise the possibility of being able to select 2G operation to conserve battery life, instead of the phone automatically selecting 3G operation where it's available, as is customary.

The new phone will add some other welcome features as a result of an upgrade to the iPhone's operating system. The upgrade will also be available free to owners of the original iPhone, and for $10 to owners of the iPod Touch, the iPhone-like music player. The enhancements from the new iPhone 2.0 operating system include:

• Support for Microsoft Office. For the first time, iPhone users will be able to open and edit documents in Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and more.
• Better e-mail management. This includes the ability to move, delete, or reorganize a large group of e-mails.

As usual with such announcements, much remains unclear or up in the air. Among the points we'll be watching: What, if anything, Apple or AT&T, the exclusive iPhone carrier, may do to accommodate those who want a new iPhone and are in the middle of the mandatory two-year service commitment for an old iPhone.

—Mike Gikas

iPhone 2.0? Things we'd like to see.

With the one-year anniversary of the iPhone nearly upon us, rumors of a refresh for Apple's category-defining smartphone are swirling through the blogosphere. Apple is mum, as usual, but the bloggers' best intel suggests a new model will debut this Monday at the Apple Developers Conference in San Francisco.

If and when a new iPhone arrives, we'll of course buy and test it immediately and post the results soonest. Meantime, though we like and recommend the current iPhone, it's far from perfect. (If you are a ConsumerReports.org subscriber, you can see our complete review of the current iPhone as well as Consumer Reports' recommendations of cell phones online.)

So Mr. Jobs, if you're listening, here are our top five requests for a new iPhone:

1. Use a faster network. Web browsing on the iPhone's full HTML Web browser is plenty speedy over a Wi-Fi connection at home or at Starbucks. But doing so via AT&T's sluggish EDGE network—which you'll likely use more of the time—can be a real drag, especially when streaming videos or downloading graphics-heavy pages. Let's hope this new model takes advantage of the much faster HSDPA, a so-called "3G" network that AT&T is building. Note: Though AT&T has been middling in our Ratings of cellphone service (available to subscribers), we aren't putting "change carriers" on our wish list to Steve Jobs, since that's out of the question. (AT&T still has four years to run as the exclusive U.S. carrier of the iPhone.)


2. Add GPS. The current iPhone has useful Google maps and directions, with live traffic. But the device figures out where you are by triangulating with cellphone towers and Wi-Fi hotspots, and is notably less accurate than the satellite-based technology used by true GPS navigation units. Also, unlike GPS, it doesn' t provide the real-time, turn-by-turn, voice-assisted directions. Many phones, including some AT&T models, have GPS navigation. Let's hope the new iPhone adds it.


3. Enable Bluetooth stereo. A growing number of cell phones support wireless Bluetooth stereo headphones for tangle-free listening. Yet the current iPhone requires an inelegant $40 attachment to do so, a real disconnect for a phone that purports to be a multimedia powerhouse.


4. Add voice command. Another all-but-standard feature that's glaringly absent from the iPhone. This feature allows you dial numbers from your phone book by speaking the name or by pronouncing the digits—a must for hands-free users.


5. Add last-number, one-button redial. On even the simplest cell phones, tapping one button will put you in touch with those you speak to most. But not the iPhone. True, the iPhone lists recent callers and you can tap any of them to make a call. But if you're not already in that menu, finding that list can end up being a multi-step process. A simple software update could add speed dial to the virtual keypad.

We could go on—to suggest the likes of an unrecessed headphone jack (the current one requires purchase of an adapter to use standard headphones) and more. But tell us what else you'd like to see in your next iPhone.

—Mike Gikas 

Send in the iClones

Last week at CTIA 2008, the biggest tradeshow in the U.S. devoted to cell phones and other things wireless, key manufacturers Samsung, LG, and Sony Ericsson didn't even try to deny that the upcoming models they eagerly trotted before us bore a strong resemblance to the iPhone.

The newcomers unabashedly borrowed from Apple's hit multimedia smartphone in looks and ergonomic design. Like the iPhone, the Samsung Instinct, the Sony Ericsson X1 (click on the image at right for a closer look), and the LG Vu have a large, dark touch screen (about 3-in. measured diagonally) framed by a shiny metallic edge. Their interfaces, though distinct, all provide a quick way to jump in and out of their many functions, from phone calling and text messaging to media playback and Web browsing. And like the iPhone, if you select the wrong application icon, pushing a home key brings you right back to the main menu.

Pending our thorough tests of these pending pretenders, we can't say how well they stack up against their inspiration. But used briefly on the tradeshow floor, their performances seemed quite impressive, and some even add useful features the iPhone lacks.  Here are my first impressions:

Apple doubles the capacity of iPhone, Touch

Expanded capabilities, expanded capacity. New versions of Apple iPhone and Touch (the iPhone-without-the-phone), available today, have doubled the maximum storage capacity of these big-screen multimedia devices. They provide 16 and 32 gigabytes (GB) of storage, respectively; both cost $500.  Still available are the 8GB iPhone, $400, and 8GB and 16GB Touches, $300 and $400, respectively.

The storage boost comes just weeks after the software upgrades announced at the MacWorld trade show in San Francisco, which added GPS-like tracking on Google Maps, rented-movie playback, and customizable menus to these Wi-Fi-enabled products. In September, when the Touch debuted, another software update enabled both products to download iTunes content directly over their Wi-Fi connections.

These content options further challenge the capacities of these flash-memory digital media players. For example, just one movie rental alone can eat up 1.5GB to 2GB of storage. Add to this the ever-growing library of TV shows and free video podcasts and an iOwner could face a content overflow. That may explain why Apple discontinued the 4GB iPhone just two months after its June 30th debut.

Just ordered a less-than-maximum-capacity iPhone or iPod you don’t want? Call and cancel the order. If it's already shipped, Apple says, you can refuse the delivery and call the company to order one of the new, large-capacity models.

—Mike Gikas

Macworld 2008: Add to your iPhone; handsfree talk

Besides printers, scanners, and networked storage solutions, which you always expect to find at Macworld, the focus this year seemed to have shifted towards new 3rd-party peripherals revolving around iPhone. Dozens of new headset, headphones, and docking options have recently become available to support Apple's new flagship product.

Macally, a long time provider of Mac peripherals, offered Tune Pro and FlexTune. Designed for the iPod, TunePro is an audio minisystem with a flat-panel appearance and includes an alarm clock—perfect for the nightstand; FlexTune is a small but very versatile charger and speaker set for both iPod and iPhone. What was interesting about the latter was the way the speakers could slide laterally so the iPhone could be rotated to landscape mode for video viewing, to minimize the device's footprint on an office desk.

Skullcandy offers creative designs that appeal most to a younger crowd. They recently introduced the iPhone FMJ headset. They also offer full-featured wireless headphones. Most of their prices are under $100, except for the high-end phones, which retail for $169.95.

Ultimate Ears offered four models of high-quality headsets for iPods and iPhones: the Custom, the Triple.fi, the Super.fi, and the Metro.fi for the style conscious.

I briefly stopped by Xtreme Mac as well, and saw a wide variety of good-sounding, aesthetically-pleasing docking stations, speakers, and clock radios, most notably the Luna X2 and the Tango X2. They also offered nearly a dozen varieties of cases, pouches and protective covers for iPods and iPhones.

One of the more interesting presentations I attended was from Altec Lansing, who said their new T612 iPhone dock and speaker system (Click on the image at left for a closer look.) is the first to be "Apple certified", meaning Apple agrees to sell them in Apple stores. Apparently such certification is difficult to attain, as Apple has very tight engineering standards regarding specific emissions and GSM shielding. Capable of both desk and wall mount, the sound is very rich and clean. It is also backward compatible with dockable iPods.

Macworld 2008: Preview

Apple goes into Macworld Expo, the annual party, love fest, and religious revival for the Cult of Mac, which opened today in San Francisco, following a year that's had a few fizzles (Apple TV, the first release of OS X Leopard, 10.5), one big hit (the iPhone) and under-the-radar sales growth of 40% for Mac desktops and laptops. The one adjective that no longer describes Apple is "beleaguered."

While analysts don’t see the same kind of explosive growth for Apple this year, they still hope a few compelling new products and services will keep the company on a growth track.

I do believe Apple will deliver. My first clue was this week's pre-event announcement of a new MacPro tower and XServe, powered by 8-core Intel Xeon processors, offering 2.3 times the speed and raw horsepower as the dual, quad-core 3.0 Ghz machines being sold only a month ago. If they couldn't wait one week to announce this, it often indicates they have so many other things to show us, there simply wasn't room in the Keynote program to hold it all.

Below is a distillation of predictions, hopes, and wishes from the amassed Mac pundits and bloggers for Keynote 2008:

Movie rentals in iTunes—Fox and Disney are reported as already signed on and almost everybody wants the "One More Thing" to be—at long last—the entire Beatles collection, made available at the iTunes Music Store (iTMS). (If that happens, no one will be crying over the loss of Universal.)

Improvements to iPhone: A 16GB, 3G model, with no limits on cell service provider—we can certainly dream, can't we? Also rumored is an iPhone SDK (software development kit), which would mean that there would be a market for third-party software. We might even see a demo of 3rd-party apps—something developers were clamoring for most of last year.

Office 2008—slam-dunk #2, as Amazon is already taking pre-orders. I expect someone from Microsoft will make the official announcement during the Keynote. (I'll write more on Office later in the week, when I get to see it for real.)

Leopard 10.5.2—this is almost a slam-dunk, as the Developers Cut is already making the rounds. There are at least 75 fixes and feature additions in the works, and this would be a perfect time to announce their deployment.

New Cinema displays with touch-screen and built-in webcam—possibly 24-, 27- and 30-inch models, an upgrade that is long overdue.

Blu-ray drives in some Macs—a rumor that is growing some legs, now that Blu-Ray seems to be winning the format war, and there is going to be a growing need to handle HD content.

Ultraslim notebook/touch tablet—this is the biggest rumor to make the rounds, and highly likely: Apple fills out its laptop line with an ultra-thin notebook, running on flash memory instead of a hard drive, sporting a 12-13 inch touch screen, which could possibly fold over to become a tablet Mac.

Final Cut Studio update—not likely, but definitely overdue, considering the plethora of new digital camcorders that have hit the market

Apple TV "2.0"—look for a "reboot" of this product, with new features, more storage, and built-in compatibility with iTMS movie-rental.

If you are not attending this year, here is a link to sites offering live blogging of the Keynote (SFW). Stay tuned!

—Thomas A. Olson

Thomas Olson, the Publishing Systems Administrator for Consumer Reports' Editorial, Design, Production and Pre-Press groups, has been a Mac enthusiast since 1984.

 

CES 2008: Wireless innovations for portable devices

Most of the buzz about wirelessness at the Consumer Electronics Show has been generated by products and technologies that seek to liberate HDTVs and other components that are usually connected by cables. But there have also been interesting announcements in traditionally unwired product categories. Here are three examples, from cameras, music players, and cellphones respectively:

Eye-Fi SD memory card. Some newer cameras have built-in Wi-Fi connections that enable them to wirelessly upload their photos to PCs, Macs and online photo and social networking sites over a home network. Now, any camera that accepts an SD memory card can have that convenience with the $100 Eye-Fi, a 2gigabyte SD memory card with a built-in Wi-Fi radio. (Click on image at right for a closer look.)

To receive photos in this mode, your computer must be turned on and running the Eye-Fi Manager software, a simple download from www.eye-fi.com. The card and software also allow any Eye-Fi-enabled camera to upload photos directly to 17 online sites, including KODAK Gallery, Shutterfly, Wal-Mart, Snapfish, Photobucket, Facebook, Webshots, Picasa Web Albums, SmugMug, Flickr, Fotki, TypePad, VOX, dotPhoto, Phanfare and Sharpcast. Eye-Fi is available now at Amazon.com, Buy.com, Walmart.com and other retailers.

Sennheiser MX W1 wireless stereo headphones. Even wireless stereo Bluetooth headphones have wires—the ones that connect the left and right speakers. Not the MX W1. (Click on image at left for a closer look.) The two-piece MX W1 uses a new wireless technology called Kleer, which, unlike Bluetooth, permits left and right speakers to link wirelessly. The headphones' twist-to-fit design keeps them securely and comfortably in the ear. Another advantage Kleer has over Bluetooth is that it transmits lossless 16-bit, 44KHz-sampled digital audio, the same quality that is recorded on a CD. Bluetooth, on the other hand, compresses audio prior to transmission, which degrades sound quality.

The MX W1 includes a small Kleer transmitter, about the size of a matchbox, which plugs into the headphone jack of your music source. The transmitter also allows you to link a second set of MXW1 headphones to share your tunes with a friend. The MX W1 also comes with a carrying case that doubles as a charger for the earphones and transmitter, allowing you to recharge the headphones up to three times without plugging it into a wall outlet. Sennheiser says playback time on a single charge is about three to four hours. The MX W1 will be available in May 2008 for a whopping $599.

Iqua Sun bluetooth headset. In what may be a first in mobile electronics, there's now a portable device that draws on the sun for power. The Iqua Sun BHS-603 (Click on image at right for a closer look) is a solar-powered Bluetooth wireless headset that will be available later in January for $100. About two inches in length and weighing under an ounce, the headset incorporates a photovoltaic cell that Iqua claims will use any available light, indoors or out, to charge its battery. The company claims the Sun delivers up to 12 hours of talk time, depending on available light; standby time, it says, can be infinite. In case your life isn't sunny enough, the device does come with a wall charger and the option to recharge via your computer's USB port.

—Mike Gikas and Paul Reynolds

LG Voyager Cell Phone: First impressions

If a new cell phone is on your holiday wish list, wireless service providers and phone makers are more than happy to flood you with dozens of new models that offer a slew of new features and other goodies.

To be sure, one of the hottest wireless phones for holiday shoppers is Apple's iPhone. But if you're a Verizon customer and are hesitant to switch over to the AT&T service, there's good news. The wireless carrier now offers the LG Voyager, a cell phone that closely mimics the iPhone's touch-screen and other capabilities. (Click on the image at right for a closer look.)

On ConsumerReports.org, we've taken a closer look at this iPhone competitor as well as Verizon's other heavily-promoted phones, the LG Venus and Samsung Juke. Check out our free report all three phones.

The report also has an online video which shows the LG Voyager in action. Click on the player below or go to our most recent cell phones Ratings report on ConsumerReports.org to see the video. (You must have Macromedia Flash software installed to watch our free online videos.)