Maybe you’ve heard, we now have an official section for the Phone different Native App Watch. We are keeping track of all the developers who are talking about creating software for the iPhone with the new SDK. We are going to keep it updated with the latest news as it arrives and adding (we hope never subtracting, but it’s possible) new companies as they pop up.

Know of a software company or piece of software that’s not on our handy-dandy table? Do tell!

This plus the App Wait-a-Thon means that if you want to slake your thirst for native app news in the run up to the June release, Phone different is the place to be. We’ll have another batch of Wait-a-Thon posts coming up this week, of course, giving you more chances to win a $100 iTunes Gift Card. In the meantime, congrats to last week’s winner, AnteL0pe!

Like our sister site, WMExperts, we’re looking for writers here at Phone different as well. You may have heard that Mike is now our “Editor Emeritus” during the Phone different Podcast and as a result things are getting awfully lonely around here. Come on, join us, give us some company.

Send an email to jobs@phonedifferent.com with the subject line “Writing for Phone different” and some info in the body:

• What sorts of writing you’re interested in. We need reviewers for accessories and software and also regular bloggers.
• A sample blog post or brief (less than 500 words) review (try to show that you can match our snarky-nerd-fanboy tone and/or can be objective in a review)
• Tell us how often you would be able to submit posts or articles

Please just send text email – no attachments or resumes or whatnot. Yes, we’re looking to pay you for your efforts and no, our great team of folks who have been posting reviews and blog posts aren’t going anywhere.

Thanks to this excellent how-to and a surprisingly little time with Photoshop, we now have our very own custom Home Screen Icon for the iPhone and the iPod Touch. If you’re here with your version 1.1.3 iPhone (or iPod Touch with the $20 upgrade), just click that “plus button” at the bottom and add us to your Home Screen. The iPhone’s bookmark tool is even smart enough to grab the first two words from our title – “iPhone News,” which seems like a pretty good indication of what you’ll find when you tappy tappy that little icon.

The only bummer that I can see is the iPhone is a little overly-aggressive in adding the “glass gradient” curve on the top of the icon, but we dealt with it as best we could.

Be a cool kid and add us to your Home Screen!

Update: Huzzah and hooray! Chat away!

All of our sister sites have put up the word so we may as well too — our forums have crashed just a tiny bit but we’re working hard to bring them back up. In the meantime, I’ll note that the amount of iPhone news to be had here at CES amounts to precisely bupkiss, and I’ve been looking. Like the Mac Pro announcement, I think this bodes well for iPhone news at Macworld next week!

Today’s podcast is a big one. We cover all of the new news with the upcoming O2 and T-Mobile launches, the Smartphone Round Robin sides of things, Google’s Android and whether it competes with Apple, plenty of iTunes news, and the final words from the community..



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• Download Directly
• Subscribe via iTunes

Phone Different Podcast Number Eight For Monday November 5 Tuesday November 6, 2007



I never start by saying there isn’t much news, and this week is no different.

iPhone Section




• the Smartphone Round Robin. Been a lot of fun, actually.


• Jennifer’s First Looks and Jennifer’s last looks on the iPhone at TreoCentral.


• My First Looks at the Curve. and my Last Looks at the Curve


• iPhone on O2 and T-Mobile on Friday. As they say, “Ab 9. November exklusiv bei T-Mobile.”





• jailbreaking: easiest method yet


• 1.1.2 firmware prevents TIFF jailbreak hack. if you want to jailbreak, skip 1.1.2 for now.


• iTunes 7.5 on the way very soon. maybe in tandem with iPhone update? it was the iTunes in use for the 1.1.2 firmware.


• Pontificate: Leopard iPhone update? Notes sync, etc.


• Developers eager to fill holes in iPhone functionality





• Apple dealing directly with show producers. Apple doesn’t have to deal with the networks (case in point, scrubs) in all cases. In many cases, they deal with not the network but the actual producer of a show.


• NBC Wanted iPod Cut. A cut of the iPod sales would cut Apple profit margins. Apple would never say yes to this. Plus, iPod market isn’t saturated yet. How much growth is looming for NBC?



• About iTunes 7.5 for Mac:
iTunes 7.5 features the ability to activate iPhone wherever service is offered and support for Phase, a new interactive music game designed exclusively for iPod nano (third generation), iPod classic, and iPod (fifth generation). This release also includes bug fixes to improve stability and performance.

  




• Lots of community sites in legal danger, not this one


• Refusing Cash for iPhones… stop 5 at a time unlockers?


• Leopard is out.


• GPhone / Android, Engadget Letter





• Finally have AT&T 3G at my house… nice to have the tilt around for testing. Part of AT&T’s core network upgrades (link again). mebbe some tilt chat.



Store



store dot phonedifferent dot com

Phones are staffed with our sales and support staff from 8AM eastern standard to 8PM eastern standard.

to call the store: 866 757 7752

to email the store: sales@phonedifferent dot com








Griffin California Roll ($19.95)






A lot of organizer cases try to be everything: a wallet, a business card dispenser, a change purse, you name it. What makes the Griffin California Roll excellent is that it doesn’t try to do everything. It just takes care of the stuff you want to carry with your iPod. Charging cable? Check. Headphones? Check. Spare Case? Sure, why not? The clever wrapping storage has 3 compartments with which you can use to store pretty much anything that’s smartphone-sized.









Spotwave Z1900 Indoor Wireless Coverage System ($299.95)






A bunch of iPhone customers came from AT&T from other carriers. If AT&T’s coverage isn’t up to snuff, it might be worth checking out the Spotwave Z1900. It boosts signals for many areas, and can also be used to boost signal penetration in a home or business. They even have a lookup site so you can see if the signal coverage in your area would be improved.









Belkin TuneTie Cord Keeper ($9.95)






This innovative little tie will change the way you use and stow headhones. Everyone knows that headphones get all jumbled up, twisted and turned into impossible knots that would confound anyone. Thankfully, there’s an excellent and inexpensive way to take care of this problem. The Belkin TuneTie Cord Keeper is very lightweight, and is as an excellent way to tie up all that excess headphone cable that you weren’t using. And it makes it very easy to stow headphones too!





Community

Contact Us!

To contact us, dial 866 757 7752 extension 222. or you can email us at podcast at phonedifferent dot com, it goes directly to both of us.

Highlights from the community:




• some users returning to the tilt. article tomorrow!


• Phone Different Forums for the Smartphone Round Robin. So much stuff there. only other place is CrackBerry.com. Contest aspect.



The BlackBerry Curve (8310)

For the first week of Smartphone Experts’ Smartphone Round Robin, I was assigned the BlackBerry Curve 8310. As I’ve indicated in the Crackberry forums, I’ve said some nasty things about BB in the past. Some of that is going to have to be put behind me this week; this BlackBerry 8810 isn’t going to use itself.

And don’t forget – a comment on this post counts as an entry in the Round Robin Contest!

Setup

I went about setup a little backwards; I didn’t go about setup the usual way. I probably should have set up the BlackBerry on my computer first, but I wanted to get a feel for the device as is. Plus, we weren’t allowed to post on the forums until yesterday. So, I set up my emails on the BlackBerry itself, and figured I’d set up other services later.

I’ve used some featurephones fairly recently (I used a Sony Ericson w810i as a cameraphone intermittently before my final love affair with the Treo 680), so a lot of the Java BlackBerry apps are pretty familiar — Opera Mini and Google Maps for Mobile specifically, and some more that I’m curious to see. Google Mail, Yahoo! Go, and Facebook are all in that camp. I was really pleased to see a good AIM client in Ramble; a lot of users suggested JiveTalk as a superior client, and I may yet give that a shot.

Sync

Syncing, at least on the Windows platform, was pretty much a non-issue. I’m pretty good at moving contacts to and fro between various online services and applications, and once I found out that I could pull information from a Yahoo! account, I just put all of my information into my Yahoo! mail. The closest thing the iPhone comes to real push is with Yahoo!, so that account has been getting a bit of love of late. Most of my experience in syncing has come from the Palm Desktop side of things, which leaves a bitter taste in my mouth; I’ve had my fair share of troubles with Palm conduits and iSync over the years.

My favorite sync method is obviously with the iPhone, since it’s built to be perfectly integrated into all of the Apple Mac apps like Mail.app, Address Book.app, and iCal.app, but that really shouldn’t surprise anyone. In fact, this entire paragraph is gratuitous.

I’ll probably wipe the Curve and see what it’s like from the Mac side of things on Wednesday or so; I want to give it some time on the Windows side first, since it appears that’s the overwhelming demographic using the BlackBerry.

What’s Awesome

Mail

By a longshot, the best part about the BlackBerry is the mail. I feel a bit like an idiot, since all of the people that use a blackberry obviously know that. I manage 4 accounts — 2 personal, 1 work, and one for an intermittently high-volume list, and the Curve is a monster in gobbling those emails up. Coming from the iPhone, that’s a new world all over again; the iPhone is a dog for managing a lot of mail. I would definitely be a happy camper if the iPhone suddenly slurped through email like the BlackBerry does.

Integrated GPS, Radio Signal

The GPS chip on the 8310 is amazing too. I have GPS pucks that won’t pick up a signal anywhere inside, and here the Curve was able to pick up a satellite signal in my kitchen. GSM radio reception was also excellent.

Form Quality

I was really impressed with the overall form-factor; it’s really an excellent refinement of the Treo form factor. The keyboard is pretty much the exact same shape and the response on it is really quite good. Nice and clickable, a lot like the high-tactile-response old-school IBM keyboards.

The Curve is quite slim compared to a Treo; not nearly as slim as the iPhone but much shorter, altogether a very pocketable device. No creaks when you try and move it. One of the keys to good design is if it looks like it should be expensive. And the curve does — it’s a pretty stylin’ device.

Stereo Bluetooth

I’m glad to see the A2DP, I have some bluetooth stereo headphones that have been patiently waiting for a purpose for about half a year. Today, they find their purpose: to listen to music streamed in stereo from Bluetooth A2DP-capable device.

What’s not awesome

The Browser

Coming from the iPhone, the browser is a real impediment for the Curve. Opera Mini has been out for quite a while now, and I really don’t understand why companies don’t tear down Opera’s door to make Opera Mini the default browser on their platform. This alone might be the biggest impediment to my productivity — I’m on the baby internet, the kinda sorta internet. Opera Mini goes a long way towards fixing that (and can even be used to sync bookmarks back to the desktop), but Opera won’t multitask and can’t be used for downloads.

It’s amazing how quickly I got spoiled with the iPhone. Just three months! It has double the pixels, and I can view the web in pretty much full glory. The iPhone almost passes the acid2 test. Opera Mini already runs on the BlackBerry. What’s the holdup? Why hasn’t RIM moved to secure a real browser? Expect this question to be asked on this site for the upcoming Treo and Windows Mobile Smartphone Round Robins.

The internet is about way more than just email. I feel that almost all of the handset companies, not just RIM, have blinders on in this regard. Nokia might be the only handset maker that really “gets it.” They install Opera Mobile on most of their phones, and have WebKit-based browsers on everything else. A decent browser is one of the big reasons that I jumped ship to the iPhone. The world wide web is what got the populace on the internet in the first place. Why ignore it in the mobile space?

User Interface

I have a lot of problems with the user interface. A lot of the icons are similar to each other, the icons don’t always have good contrast with the default background, the shadowed font effects don’t really lead to readability… I could go on. And given the chance, I often will. I was advised by Kevin to hide the icons for what I didn’t use, which is great advice, but I still had to slog through the apps to see what I’d use and what I wouldn’t, since the Curve ships with its own fair share of AT&T/Cingular-branded bloatware.

To AT&T’s credit I found their more simplistic default theme more usable than the standard BlackBerry icon view. And it has to be said that there are plenty of themes to choose from. I think it’s excellent that 4 out of 5 of the top-sellers are all iPhone lookalikes. 8 out of the top 10 are all iPhone lookalikes, and there are no other themes in the top 10.

Settings All Over

I had a hard time looking for all of the places that I’d use to change settings. As I mentioned in the forums, it seems that there’s a never-ending supply of places to look for where settings are stored. Ringtones and profile settings are stored in ‘Profiles’, a bulk of the settings are stored in ‘Options’, Bluetooth gets its own app AND has settings in ‘Options’, ‘Set Up Email Accounts’ has its own app… it’s not the most user-friendly system out there. I can see why they separated ‘profiles’ and ‘options,’ but the other stuff frankly mystifies me. But for profiles, all I really want is a vibrate switch.

Shroedinger’s Touchscreen: Simultaneously Awesome and Not-Awesome

I miss having a touchscreen. I can tell because there are absent-minded fingreprints all over the Curve’s screen right now. But, omitting toucscreens allows RIM to make their devices slimmer, and problem helps them last longer. It’s pretty much expected that they should have a slim device. And yet, the iPhone throws that conventional wisdom on its side.

But I have to say, there are enough keyboard shortcuts that it makes use pretty easy. Once you learn all of the keyboard shortcuts, that is. I’m also impressed by the one-handedness of it all, and that’s something that RIM probably wouldn’t have focused on so much if there was an ‘easy way out’ touchscreen available. I will miss the BlackBerry’s magnificent ‘N’ key when I return to the iPhone.

The Philosophy

I’ll admit that the Philosophy of BlackBerry is confounding to me: compete mainly in the centralized-management enterprise, be an email beast, be secure, and worry about everything else later. I don’t get that; I’ve got all this stuff that I want to carry around with me — I want to be able to carry media with me, sync playlists with the music app that I use, sync my bookmarks to and fro, store TV shows that I purchase online, the whole shebang. In using it, I don’t always feel like the BlackBerry got the convergence memo. And putting the SD card behind the battery… not the most convenient place. I don’t think they ever expect me to change SD cards once I get one in. That says a lot about what BlackBerry thinks the Curve should be.

But, I can also appreciate that the BlackBerry can constitute essentially bit of a mobile office-on-the-go for a lot of mobile workers. For a lot of employees, maybe that means using the BlackBerry as a DUN connection to their laptop for EDGE internet access anywhere. Maybe it means that email is one of the key features for them at work. For managing email, the BB is a champ.

I do worry about RIM in this space, though. Their philosophy is to push content that people want, be an email beast, and compete in the enterprise space. The reason that I worry about RIM is that they’re competing with Microsoft. I’ve said in our Treocasts that Microsoft is a vicious competitor, and they’re relentless in the areas that they want to focus on. Like Ballmer said at his CTIA conference, they just keep coming and coming and coming and coming at you. They don’t intend to stop, and the Microsoft System Center Mobile Device Manager 2008 is aimed squarely at BES. Microsoft is hungry to maintain and grow enterprise because the server and mobile spaces are the two spaces that they’re not a giant in — they’ve essentially got a lock on the desktop and office software. The purpose for MSCMDM08 is for Microsoft to wedge themselves into spots that RIM was wedging into, and that puts a pretty large onus on RIM… once MSCMDM08 comes out, that is.

Final Thoughts

So I respect the laser-honed focus on email, but that focus dulls the sheen a bit for someone more interested in a consumer device. Mobile accomplishers abound. Truth be told, the BlackBerry has been improving of late in this regard. I can take pictures now, I can play MP3s (and use them as ringtones, natch), I can even watch the errant video now. I was surprised to see the Roxio media sync there. The BlackBerry is maturing fast, and I’m going to have to keep a much closer eye on the platform than I ever did. In that respect, my use of the BlackBerry has been a real eye-opener.

We are now launching the cool project we were hinting at in the last podcast: the Smartphone Round Robin. For the next 2 or three weeks, all of the editors of the various Smartphone Experts sites will be using one of the “other” smartphones out there.

For me, this week, it means using a BlackBerry 8310. For Dieter of WMExperts, it means using a Treo 680. for Jennifer of TreoCentral, it means using her iPhone. And for Kevin of CrackBerry.com, it means using the AT&T Tilt. There are rules that we’ve all got to follow — we all have to give the device a full shakedown. I’ll be posting an article later today about my first few days with the Curve, and then a full article on Friday.

This week, I’ll be posting a few articles about the strengths and weaknesses of using a BlackBerry. I’ve already got a few posts in at CrackBerry.com.

So what’s in it for you? Well, there’s a chance to win a prize: a smartphone of your choice and plenty of coupons to spend at the store associated with it. Just leave a comment in any Round Robin thread in the forums. Four sites, four chances to win per day. Just head on over to the Smartphone Round Robin update page for the deets.

Shocking you with a day early this time instead of a day late. For podcast 7 we talk about CTIAthe iPhone on Orange, possible unlock rumors, a product red version possibly coming, an SDK in february plus some widget speculation, some leopard speculation, webapps, and a brief hacking segment. And then, a bit on the iTunes plus price cut, Greenpeace, new Apple ads, and att.com making changes. And of course the usual chat about the community.

No less chock full of stuff than last week, but I managed to shave off a few minutes and keep us under 50 minutes. How did I do it? By shaving off the talks about Apple vs. gateway / acer / packard bell. Sharp listeners, look for the “I’m going to cut this” and Dieter being sad. I’ll post it up later today.

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News

Phone Different Podcast #7 for late (?) Friday October 19, 2007

Since we’ll be in San Francisco for CTIA on Monday, and I’ll be in the air during the time I’d usually be editing the podcast, we’re going to release this podcast on a friday. Who knows, if we like it, we just might stick with it. In other news, we’re going to CTIA.

iPhone Section

• finally confirmed iphone in france on orange. there are unlocked rumors, they’re called rumors for a reason. My french is not so great, but my understanding is that it must be sold ‘nu’, or ‘naked’, as in sans contract. not unlocked. That’s belgium and finland that have the unlocked law, maybe some other euro countries? I’m willing to have egg on my face if I’m wrong.
• more work for Apple legal. another iphone dispute might delay iPhone on Rogers in Canada.
• product (red) iphone in the works?

Apps section

• native apps in february is the big news here. whither widgets? So many rumors right now. part of me still expects widgets before an SDK. older rumors that apple was incorporating a google gears-like feature.
• some new functionality coming with leopard?. doubters should note the cagey language.
• Apple posts webapp directory, not designed for browsing on iPhone. huh?
• hacking bits
  • firmware decrypted, all that stuff. iPod touch too.
  • 1.1.1 jailbreaked, now pretty easy. works with the tiff image viewing vulnerability. oh hey, be careful viewing tiff files. expect a patch, oh, maybe the day leopard comes out, since iphone updates have been rolling in on thursdays recently.
  • AnySim, free unlock, works with 1.1.1.
  • since there’s no easy “virginizer” for bricked 1.1.1 iphones from free unlock, best bet currently is to buy IPSF to fix the radio.
  • as always, let some other poor dumb b*d die for his country. I mean brick his or her iPhone. wait a few days after the next update to see where the fire is.

iTunes Section

the download market is changing, and rapidly

• universal,
• iTunes price cut. iTunes plus tracks now 99¢ instead of 129¢. dang I love unicode. [this script was written a day before Gruber wrote this. ZORM]

Apple Section

• Greenpeace is not happy with the iPhone. I’m pretty green, but let’s call a spade a spade: attention whore! Too much PVC, BFR, phthalates. Apple’s response is pretty classy, but they still face yet another lawsuit over disclosure of those phthalates.
• new ads for the iPhone. 2nd set too.

Bonus AT&T Section

AT&T making changes to avoid regulation, won’t look directly in the senate’s eye. first change is to prorate the contract cancellation fee, usually $150 to $200. I expect more in the future; hail Sauron.

Store

store dot phonedifferent dot com
Phones are staffed with our sales and support staff from 8AM eastern standard to 8PM eastern standard.
to call the store: 866 757 7752
to email the store: sales@phonedifferent dot com

Smartphone Experts Metal Cover ($19.95)
The Metal Cover is fully reversable — if you want the iPhone’s screen to be protected, you can place the iPhone in the Metal Cover face in. The inside of the Metal Cover is cushioned with soft velvet, ensuring that your screen won’t scratch when the cover is on. When you need to use it, you just flip the cover to the back side, and all of the buttons are available at your fingertips. It’s available in three glossy metal finishes: Black, Silver, and hot Pink.

Jabra BT3010 Bluetooth Headset ($39.95)
If you get tired of looking at the same Bluetooth headset every day, then maybe the Jabra BT3010 is the headset for you. You can change the look of the headset by popping out a plastic cover and putting in a paper design sheet. The BT3010 ships with 33 designs to suit any individual aesthetic, and you can make more at Jabra’s website. Best of all, the headset can be used in-ear our over-the-ear and has 8 hours of talk time!

Smartphone Experts UltraSlim Holster ($29.95)The Smartphone Experts UltraSlim Holster is a simple, excellent looking vertical pouch case, with a tough steel belt clip in the back. The case is 100% leather, so you know that it’s built to last. It’s available in 5 eye-catching colors: black, brown, copper, crimson, and arctic white.

Community

Contact Us!
To contact us, dial 866 757 7752 extension 222. or you can email us at podcast at phonedifferent dot com, it goes directly to both of us.

Highlights from the community:

• Nokia finally adds touch screen support to S60. degenerated into a touchscreen efficiency discussion, mostly about the iphone. good usability points there.
• iphone by papichu. sparked some good discussion about iphone vs. palmos
• apple oks 3rd party iphone applications by cellmatrix. some responses, a lot of hesitation about signed apps and delivery mechanisms. there’s definitely some want for free apps.

It’s an even bigger podcast than last week, coming in at almost an hour. We talk about some of the ins and outs of the new firmware, the danger to unlockers, rumors of iPhones abroad in Canada and France, the recent rumors of 2nd party apps, widgets and human interface guidelines, and of course the hacked apps. Then, we talk about Jobs and his reality distortion field, and some of the Apple lawsuits out there. And of course, the community gets the final words.

• Our podcast feed
• Download Directly
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News

Phone Different Podcast #6 for late October 8, 2007

Introduction. Talking about our recent audio woes that have delayed the last two podcasts. We’ve both had some problems with Audacity, which is probably overkill for just recording wav/aiff. I’d love to use audio recorder, but performance on PowerPC isn’t as good on intel, and our recording tracks get out of sync. We’d be using it with an M-Audio FastTrack type kit. Any suggestions, send us an email, call, or anything.

iPhone Section

• New iPhone Firmware v1.1.1
  • my impressions of the 1.1.1 update.
  • features of 1.1.1
  • 1.1.1 Update released. Bricks unlocked iPhones. Lots of trouble with it
  • unlockers: don’t update. There needs to be a way to invisibly re-lock your firmware before you try to update to 1.1.1 if you’ve unlocked your phone and want to move to 1.1.1. Best thing is to wait until there’s a reliable way to relock firmware, or just get used to 1.0.2 and don’t update.
• iPhone in Canada in 2 weeks? Just a rumor? Rogers is still mum, doing much better than before.
• Also, Apple and Orange in France may be having some trouble.

Apps section

apple taketh away, and apple giveth. more taketh a lot than I’d like or expect.

• Are widgets on the way?
• Apple posts human interface guidelines for web apps. This same set of HIG would apply to Widgets too…
• Are actual apple-blessed apps on the way? Lord I hope so. The NES emulator is nice, but touch/tap gameplay is pretty awkward. Would be nice to see the office / productivity apps swell too. Something to replace notes high on my list.
• 1.1.1 firmware jailbreak, meaning that we’ll get 3rd party applications back again soon enough. Note: When I’m talking about ABIs and APIs here, ignore me, I’m woefully wrong. Apple changed the frameworks; that’s why third party apps need the recompile.

iTunes Section

3rd party ringtones still broken. Apple deliberately hosing everyone else.

• Amazon MP3. Woot!
• Radiohead: In Rainbows. whatever you want to pay plus a 90¢ administrative fee? something like that. A label’s nightmare.
• zunes. Even if they’re an also-ran, they’re a dangerous also-ran in the event that Microsoft decides to dump money behind it. Get Dieter to open up about Windows Mobile some here. Make him own up to improper use of the word “iphone killer”
• using the word competitor fast and loose here. Plays for sure indeed.

Apple Section

lots of negative press recently

• Contradictory Jobs quotes short circuit his reality distortion field
• Pull 1.1.1? I kind of wish they would have. Not the greatest of updates; the hubbub behind it indicates to me that the price cut and early adopter rebate was a carefully scripted event.
• Class Action Lawsuit. Dongmei Lee, who wants to be a millionaire. Like the Wash. Judge that sued his dry cleaners over their ruining his pants.

Store

store dot phonedifferent dot com
Phones are staffed with our sales and support staff from 8AM eastern standard to 8PM eastern standard.
to call the store: 866 757 7752
to email the store: sales@phonedifferent dot com

XtremeMac TuffWrap Case ($19.95)
The XtremeMac TuffWrap Case is a svelte silicone skin case that affords optimal protection for your iPhone. It features ridges along the side to aid in gripping your iPhone, so you’re much less prone to drop it. Best of all, the TuffWrap includes a built-in screen protector, so unlike many other skin cases, you don’t have to purchase both a case and a screen protector.

Samsung WEP 500 ($79.95)
Samsung makes some of the best small in-ear BlueTooth headsets in the world; they proved that with their diminuitive WEP-200. I’m happy to report that the WEP 500 continues with that fine tradition. The WEP-500 is ridiculously small, and yet delivers pleasing sound quality with noise reduction and echo cancellation, and still delivers similar talk time. It even includes a tiny charger case, so you don’t have to worry about damaging the headset in your car, pocket or purse.

v-moda Vibe In-Ear Headphones for Apple iPhone ($99.95)
The v-moda Vibe Headset is a premium quality wired headset. Though the standard iPhone headphones are nice, they’re not the best for active lifestyles, and they let a lot of environmental sound bleed through the audio. The Vibe headset addresses that with 3 sizes of silicon eargels, a very low weight, The Vibe headset offers optimized acoustics and a supreme musical experience aimed squarely at both music afficionados and active iPhone owners.

Community

Contact Us!
To contact us, dial 866 757 7752 extension 222. or you can email us at podcast at phonedifferent dot com, it goes directly to both of us.

Highlights from the community:

• possibly something to come in a future update — Chadman noticed a little discrepancy in the clock icon.
• splashid: a challenger appears. Did you know that you can comment on our articles directly from the forum?
• What do you want to see in the phone different podcast? We’re still new at this, and it’s your chance to change the format. We aim to please. Leave a comment in the thread associated with the podcast show notes, email, or call.

In podcast number five, we discuss the crazy amount of news from the previous two weeks. The main topics are sales volume, iPhone in Europe, ringtones, iTunes and firmware updates, GUI unlocking and the risk it brings, and 3G iPhone rumors. And, as always, we discuss some of the best bits from the community.

• Our podcast feed
• Download Directly
• Subscribe via iTunes

Phone Different Podcast #5 for Monday, September 24 2007

News

• iPhone Section

it’s silly to have an iphone section of an iphone podcast, and yet here it is. the iphone iphonecast section.

• Apple sold a million iPhones, and they’re practically doubling production for 4Q. And their price cut has tripled sales for the time being.
• 3G iphone: rumor won’t go away in spite of itself. What shows up in the next iPhone anyway? Improved software is what I want.
• $100 early adopters is live. Personally torn between Leopard ($129) and fancy headphones ($100).

The iPhone coming to Europe. All these links plus the scandinavia news make this section a smörgåsbord. I recently changed the encoding on our server to unicode so we can get the cool letter bits to look right. O2 in the UK, T-Mobile in Germany, Zut Alors! Orange in France, Maybe TeliaSonera and Telenor in Scandinavia, Vodaphone wants a 2nd chance

Lastly, is Apple repeating their strategy with the iPod? Secure the high-end of the market, then spread lower-cost derivatives throughout the market (like with the iPod mini, iPod Nano, etc)

Store Section

Reviews, really briefly

• the marware sidewinder holster, plus Dieter’s monday review. get it cheap with the ‘SIDEWINDER’ coupon code nets 30% off of $24.95, almost $7 1/2 bucks off. not bad.

store dot phonedifferent dot com
Phones are staffed with our sales and support staff from 8AM eastern standard to 8PM eastern standard.
to call the store: 866 757 7752
to email the store: sales@phonedifferent dot com

Community

Contact Us!
To contact us, dial 866 757 7752 extension 222. or you can email us at podcast at phonedifferent dot com, it goes directly to both of us.

Highlights from the community:

• verbal request: how to encode video for iPhone / iPod Touch for Windows and Mac from Brent P. I was sick this week, should be up next week. Promises, Promises. Knew you’d never keep…
• treo switchers by alanmushnick still going strong with experiences. will likely continue to be a relevant thread for a long time.
• Treo to iPhone by scouter075, especially notable for the splashdata for iphone request found by JesseNYC.
• itunes 7.4.2 out by cmaier, broken ringtones and reboots, general “shout out” for him being way on top of things and for developing a bunch of web games for the iPhone. check it out.

In podcast number four, we talk at length about the implications of Apple’s price cut, the $100 apple store coupon, ringtones, other news from “the Beat Goes On,” unlocking news or lack thereof, and much, much more. Plus, our usual looks to the community.

• Our podcast feed
• Download Directly
• Subscribe via iTunes

Phone Different iPhone iPhonecast Podcast #4

Phone Different Podcast for Monday September 10, 2007

banter

News

• Apple’s Crazy Media Event!
  • $200 price drop!
  • makes original adopters unhappy
  • but now they get $100.

Phone Different Store

Reviews, really briefly

• Aquapac Case Review: shameless self-promotion!
• Smartphone Experts Adapter: what makes this item good?

contact the store:
store dot phonedifferent dot com
866 757 7752

contact us:
866 757 7752 extension 222
or podcast at phonedifferent dot com

Community

• Wow, the iPhone just drop $200 in price by Whatever7
• iPhone users crying for refunds already by Crimson

Our third podcast. Plenty of stuff to talk about, even without the last 5 minutes of the track at the end. We cover the new hardware unlock, the inevitable software unlock, the new ease of hacking the iphone, AT&T, and as we are wont to do, cover the forums a wee spot.

• Our podcast feed
• Download Directly
• Subscribe via iTunes

As usual, our show notes are after the break.

Our second podcast. Plenty of stuff to talk about, even without the last 5 minutes of the track at the end. We cover some iPhone game news, hacking news, Fake Steve Jobs, and as we are wont to do, cover the forums a wee spot.

• Our podcast feed
• Download Directly
• Subscribe via iTunes