Comments on: Chad's Take: iPhone 3GS

By: Reloading Presses

Reloading Presses — Fri, 21 May 2010 00:44:08 +0000

Wow, nice story. I just now stumbled on your blog and am already a fan.

By: Tmizzle

Tmizzle — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 02:56:59 +0000

Love the phone hate the battery

By: Cheap iPhones

Cheap iPhones — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 18:20:04 +0000

I haven't picked up a 3GS yet, mainly because I think the prices are just insane. I have T-Mobile so I'll have to crack & jailbreak it anyway, which is no big deal because I have my 1st gen iphone running the 3.0 update. I hear the speed of the 3GS is probably the biggest improvement.

By: Judy

Judy — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 07:01:16 +0000

Got a new 3gs the other day. In settings I've set it to access Favorites when the home button is double clicked. But it doesn't work. It will only access search on a single click. No double click function.

By: lain asri

lain asri — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 13:14:06 +0000

Apple iPhone 3G S 32GB Unlocked Manufacturer: Apple Condition: New Price:$300usd

EMAILS : marketplaceinc@ymail.com Tel:+447035965778 IN GOD WE TRUST

By: Terrypirate

Terrypirate — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 05:10:50 +0000

With my razor I can control the phone with my bluetooth headset. How can I do that with a GS? In the Apple store that I can't. I have to pick up the phone and say my commands to it?

By: pizzafan

pizzafan — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 15:18:23 +0000

I mainly use my iPhone for playing games, it's the best gaming machine ever imo.

By: Zeagus

Zeagus — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 11:41:59 +0000

First timer here also and the vendors far outweigh the the few shortcomings. This device is a pleasue to use and doesn't require hacks to make it do what I need it to. It's truly the closest thing to what I've been hoping for since cell phones have existed. It's a little pocket computer that makes calls. Great for email and web and so much more - I was in one of our cars the other day installing a dash mount for a new GPS and was able to doublecheck how part of the dash came off without going back inside by hitting up a forum post and watching a video. Can't wait to see what devs will do with new capabilities of the 3G S,

By: Vickie

Vickie — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 07:37:03 +0000

This is my first ever iPhone and pretty much agree with what you've said Chad - you sum it up well so thanks for the review.

I love that it's the first mobile I've ever had that I've not had to refer to any instructions to setup/use. I love the app's. I love the iPod, especially the voice control. I love (almost) everything about it!

What I don't love? The bundled ear phones don't stay in my ears!!! ...anyone else have that problem?

Also having had Nokia's and an HTC Touch 2 I miss having a better camera as the pictures I've taken so far have had a lot of noise in low light and even a bit of photoshop magic can't really fix them. Also with only one camera you can't do video calls.

But hey, the benefits way exceed the shortcomings and the time saved in messing around trying to get things working is such a refreshing change.

Anyone else a first time iPhone user? What do you think?

By: Justin

Justin — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 03:55:33 +0000

yeah the "clip" has been around for awhile... it was on the headphones from my old black and white screen, 20GB ipod... the one side of it didn't detach though, since it didn't have to navigate around the mic/vol.ctrl...

By: PhxBlue

PhxBlue — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 03:21:45 +0000

@Budwizer

There's a lil white piece at the base of the wire where it first separates into two wires. Its notched on one side so you can unclip it and move it up to the ear pieces and reattach it to the wire.

By: Budwizer

Budwizer — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 02:24:34 +0000

@PhxBlue - Where is the clip? I am not able to figure this out.

By: athynz

athynz — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 02:17:48 +0000

Sounds like Apple put some work into it - still not enough to coax the cash from my wallet to pay almost full price for a 3GS... I'll stick with my 3G running 3.0 w/ JB and see what Jobs and Co do with it next year.

By: VJ

VJ — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 02:13:12 +0000

when do you think there will be unlock solution for this new 3G-S model ?

By: PhxBlue

PhxBlue — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 23:26:38 +0000

Oh there it is! Figured it out, DUH moment ended.

By: PhxBlue

PhxBlue — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 23:23:03 +0000

Daniel you don't run the site or pay the fees it costs to keep it going, they DO. That infact entitles them to control it as they please without out your permission, consent, or feelings in mind. Now stop wasting bandwidth and get over it.

Back to more important news. Where is this friggin clip??

By: Zeagus

Zeagus — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 22:05:35 +0000

Video may work on the regular 3G, but it's not as smooth or at as good of a framerate and it stutters... at least from the video that I saw of jailbroken 3G video.

By: jtz5

jtz5 — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 21:48:43 +0000

When I did a video clip and then tried to email it to a friend, it compressed the video and my friend's PC couldn't open it with Quicktime (it said it was missing the compressor file). Any suggestions? The clip was only 10-15 seconds, so it wasn't very large.

Thanks.

By: Rene Ritchie

Rene Ritchie — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 21:36:31 +0000

@Fassy we posted a video on that here that shows, yes indeed, more pages stay in memory longer. We had 3 open, ran Star Defense, came back, and all three were still in memory -- no reload!

By: fassy

fassy — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 21:36:30 +0000

@Joe McG Ah yes...thanks. I had stopped that video during the games section.

By: Ves

Ves — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 21:11:46 +0000

And don't forget it's water resistant: http://www.iphoned.nl/video-iphone-3gs-waterbestendig-blijkbaar-wel/11353

By: fassy

fassy — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 21:07:45 +0000

@sting7k

Thanks -- I use bylines, though I find myself more and more just reading inside Safari instead, except when I know I am going to be in an area with no signal.

By: Ron

Ron — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:54:27 +0000

I agree that the difference between the 3G and 3GS devices alone is not that much. More memory, faster, magnetometer, screen. Apple provided some software improvements with 3.0, but I think they're betting developers will deliver the killer apps.

By: Joe McG

Joe McG — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:47:35 +0000

@Chad

Nice review of things I haven't seen other reviews mention...

@Fassy

Rene posted a video comparison earlier this week showing how the 3GS cached pages when the 3G did not. It was towards the end of the application speed comparison video.

By: Omari James

Omari James — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:43:23 +0000

I love my 3G S a lot. I'm happy I got it. However, with the whole " what song is this " via voice control , ( if you have it enabled ) you can just double press the home button and it gives you the iPod shortcut. However, I think the advantage is that you have something tell it to your instead of having to look at it your self.

The camera looks a tiny bit better and much better depending on the circumstances.

By: Lillian

Lillian — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:36:37 +0000

I love real world user reviews, personally. So I enjoyed this. I have owned every iPhone since version 1. I was one of the sit on the concrete and wait enthusiasts. I do however feel that the jump from 3G to 3GS is not very significant. Am I happy to have the 3GS? You bet! I love the option of video at a moment's notice without having to carry an extra device like a point and shoot. I love the compass with Google maps. The greatest improvement though to me is simply the 3.0 software. That's a more substantial jump than the hardware in my opinion.

By: Chad Garrett

Chad Garrett — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:12:59 +0000

I like ByLine for syncing with Google Reader.

By: sting7k

sting7k — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:08:49 +0000

@Fassy, one more thing. Have you tried an RSS reader app that syncs with Google Reader? iNews is what I have been using and it is pretty sweet, there are many of them. No more reloading just to get back, only updates when you want.

By: sting7k

sting7k — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 20:06:31 +0000

@Fassy, I don't know if it was here or not. But the results was yes Safari does have a larger cache. The video had 3 sites open on both devices and all 3 sites cached. Then they closed Safari and opened Star Defense. Then went back. The iPhone 3GS did not need to reload any of the pages, the iPhone 3G had to reload 2 of them.

I wanna see video of side-by-side use. Not just launching apps, but go into messages type some, open safari browse to a page, jump to a third party app, go back to messages or some thing else and do stuff quick. That sort of stuff, probably need 2 people...

By: Jeff S

Jeff S — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:55:30 +0000

I LOVE my 3GS!!!! Whooooooah!

By: fassy

fassy — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:53:16 +0000

Rene:

If you still have a 3G and 3GS to run side-by-side tests, I would be very interested in confirmation of Waidt's suggestion that the 3GS has a bigger browser cache (that pages reload less often). The constant full reloading of an ajax-based page (e.g. Google Reader) when returning to its tab has always been an annoyance for me.

By: Jojo10040

Jojo10040 — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:46:02 +0000

Yea what headphone clip????

By: Mohammad

Mohammad — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:38:00 +0000

Double Home Button always shows iPod playback controls when in iPod mode (even if you have it assigned to something different in settings). So that would've been better since it also does not block the whole screen as Voice Control does.

By: JaY

JaY — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:37:45 +0000

Excellent review thank you

By: Unfair

Unfair — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:36:57 +0000

Ever since the iPod Nano came out with the volume controls on there headphones their headphones..

I don't know why isn't anybody speaking about the fact that Apple left 3G owners hanging by not giving them a Video Camera (giving you more reasons to jailbreak) and voice control? I mean it's not like we need an extra special hardware for both of those things!

I can't wait for some nice programmer to backport both of those things into 3G so I can 'in-your-face' Apple and tell them that they are pushing me to a corner to jailbreak! Backport! Backport! Backport!

By: Chad Garrett

Chad Garrett — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:36:06 +0000

@PhxBlue

There is a clip on the headphones that allows you to "snap" them together in the hopes of preventing less tangles; it's a nice addition!

To the other grumpy commentators: My bet is that the other "sites" haven't mentioned that

By: PhxBlue

PhxBlue — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:18:21 +0000

Clip? What clip?

By: Waidt

Waidt — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:17:09 +0000

@Daniel Dude, get a life! Under your twisted logic, only unique reviews are helpful, and it is up to the readers to find that single review. On the contrary, the more times reviews agree with each other, the more those claims are substantiated.

My experience with the 3GS is very much like the author's. It grows on you. I'm more and more impressed with it's snappiness and resposiveness with each passing day. I love the fact that with more RAM, web pages do not need to reload nearly as often, and when they do, they do so ever more quickly. A double whammy!

By: charlie t

charlie t — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:16:58 +0000

I didn't know that there was a way of taking sceenshots of any application on OS3.0 by simply holding down the "power" and "home" buttons for about 1-2 seconds. Anybody else ?

By: BRE BRE

BRE BRE — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:01:44 +0000

i juts like the whole fone lol