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Hackers Finally Unlock iPhone 3G
nandemoari quotes a story at Infopackets:
"2009 has gotten off to a great start for a team of iPhone enthusiasts with little regard for Apple's licensing requirements. They've finally figured out a way to get the phone to work with any cell phone carrier (and not just AT&T). The iPhone Dev Team is best known for their work on 'jailbreaking;' the technique of altering an iPhone so that you can run any applications on it, not just those approved by Apple. Given the company's questionable vetting policy for entry to the official App store, it's not surprising many users approve of jailbreaking."
I can use Opera Mini on my iPhone.
I can't wait to put Windows Mobile on my 3G!
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has it's limits" - Albert Einstein
I've been thinking about one, but:
a)How do you get around activation at purchase time?
b)Does Apple break this later on, especially when I need it?
I could buy a legally unlocked iPhone from Hong Kong, but it costs $700+. In the unlocked countries, Apple prices it through the roof, I suppose. Although there has been talk about a prepaid version here for some time...
I'll summarize every comment on this story, which will be of two types:
1) OMG APPLE IS TEH EVILZ, SUPAR CLOSED. Information wants to be free!!1 All things apple fail, apple will close all business and lose EVARATHING coz I think they suxxor even though I would never try it!
2) Apple is heaven and they're just doing this for your own protection, it saves you and gives a you a better phone experience! Now suck on Stevies cock like a good little bitch.
Because it meets their requirements, and the manufacturer support and aftermarket accessory selection is second to none.
NetInfo connection failed for server 127.0.0.1/local
Because the iPhone happens to be an alternative to the iPhone alternatives.
... why people NEED to have an iPhone. There are alternatives in the market.
Few people NEED to have an iPhone. Many people WANT to have an iPhone. I won't buy an iPhone due to the operator locking-thingie/price, so I'd be happy to hear about the alternatives.
Please, somebody tell me why anyone should buy an iPhone.
It is a nice device. It reportedly works very well.
What the nerd community most often fail to realize is that all features aren't equal. A well implemented and well integrated feature in a convenient interface is worth way more than the same feature implemented crappy, or accessed through a annoying interface.
I haven't been following the iPhone Dev Team that closely, as I am on an official carrier - but I do know that in the upcoming months they were recommending heavily against upgrading to the 2.2 firmware because i would affect future unlocking potential. Nice new year present for all those who "accidentally" upgraded!
Why not link to http://blog.iphone-dev.org/ themselves ?
Oh wait ... this is /.
My Bad.
I cite two reasons why people are buying iPhones:
1) Built-in full iPod functionality, so you can play music and videos processed through [i]iTunes[/i].
2) The App Store has allowed for a lot of very interesting third-party applications that you don't see on other "smart phones."
My major gripe is that typing messages on an iPhone still leaves much to be desired, which keeps the iPhone from being a serious competitor to a Blackberry or Plam Treo phones. They really need to either a) integrates a real keyboard like the LG Voyager or b) integrates a haptic response touchscreen like the LG Incite including the ability to type in landscape display mode. Once Apple does either they will literally clean up the smart phone market among business users.
I always remembered to grab my iPod when I headed out the door. I almost always forgot my cellphone. When the iPhone was announced I knew that it was a solution to my problem. I haven't left the house once without my iPhone.
And there are some people, believe it or not, who actually like buying music and video through the iTMS.
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
In why DRM is retarded. As you say, this is some of the tightest security ever found. Yet, it has been broken by some very smart people. Such is the fate of any DRM that is sufficiently widespread that smart people care to go after it. You can be as clever as you like with your DRM scheme, you are going to find someone as clever as you will likely break it.
Also annoys me since I think some of these technologies are a good idea, if they weren't implemented in an assholish way. Code signing, for example. I really like the idea as a potential security measure for users/administrators. When I download Firefox, the fact that it is signed by Mozilla gives me a pretty high degree of certainty that it is legit, safe code. It's not 100%, of course, someone could break/steal their certificate, or someone inside could sign bad code, or my system could be compromised, but it is a good additional check. Also if anyone trys to break something like that, I'll say they are up to no good.
However when it is implemented in this "You may only run things we bless," well then you are being a jerk. People are going to break it because they want to be able to run their own stuff.
Personally I think Apple should have gone the route of having store with signed code but allowing unsigned code. If you install a signed app from their store, it installs with no question. If it is another app you get a "Warning, this code is unsigned and could be unsafe," box with a button for more info. Ask for more info and it explains that Apple has looked at signed apps and decided they are ok and aren't going to mess up your phone. They haven't looked at unsigned apps so they don't know, and if it messes up your phone they can't really help you.
Yes, that would mean people could have apps that'll mess up your phone... You know just like every other smart phone out there. Doesn't seem to have killed that market, I don't think it'd kill the iPhone.
Fortunately, there are people like this that will break their DRM, so you can use it as you wish.
Because compared to the windows mobile device I had for three years previously, the iPhone's interface and tight integration of functionality feels like having a scented massage from a bikini-clad swedish pin-up girl.
Pretty much *everything* I wanted to be able to do previously is now possible in an elegant way, and I'm serendipitously finding that loads of oh-so-simple intuitive shortcuts have been quietly added and left to be discovered.
I won't bore you with details, but there is a good comparison to be made with open source - you sometimes need the BDFL to bring out the best in a project, simply to avoid the endless conflicts and design by committee which can lead to a product which does everything poorly, rather than doing a small number of things in a superbly polished way.
I have only bought an iPhone in the last three months, having held back since their launch on the grounds that slack-jawed fanboi drivel was not something to take seriously, but I've had to grudgingly admit that Apple have got something very right. Perhaps best summed up with Oliver Wendell Holmes' famous quote (take note, usability engineers!):
"I would not give a fig for the simplicity this side of complexity, but I would give my life for the simplicity on the other side of complexity."
Except it's still not the smart phone of choice for business users, due to its poor ability to type out messages. Apple needs to learn from two LG smart phones, the Voyager with its flip-open keyboard or the Incite with its haptic-response touchscreen; a third-generation iPhone with a haptic-response touchscreen (including the ability to type out messages when displaying in landscape mode) would make the iPhone a VERY serious competitor against the Blackberry or Palm Treo series of smart phones.
Well, I don't strictly NEED an iPhone, but what I wanted was a good interface for web browsing on a phone and plan I could afford - and until the iPhone, mobile internet here in Australia was pretty damn poor. It still is, but no more do I have to pay $15 for 5MB of data.
Oh sure, there are things like the HTC touch (with windows mobile... yerk) or blackberries, but I can't get any of them for anywhere near the same price because the iPhone was subsidised by Apple. I'm a poor student, I can't afford to spend nearly a thousand dollars on a phone. Plus, my carrier unlocked mine for free.
Ezekiel 23:20
"Because it meets their imagined requirements and is trendy and makes them look cool"
Fixed it for you
Trusted Computing used to be treated as one of the most evil things here on Slashdot:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgFbqSYdNK4
The appstore (where Steve decides what is trustworthy and what is not, to quote the video) sold the "I am rich"-app for cryin' out loud. Among a bunch of other crap. Other apps that are very useful are not given a chance and won't run.
Haptic response?
If that's the case, why do critics HATE the Blackberry storm and rumor has it that Verizon is dealing with a ton of returns?
Just get firemail for iPhone and type your emails in landscape mode
A good example; you're standing on Oxford Street and feeling hungry. You open maps, get it to pull down your current location. Then type 'Italian' into the search. You look at one of them, e.g. Carluccio's*. From there you can get to their webpage, get directions to it and call them, all with one press of a button. After you eat there, you decide you like the place. Pull out your search results and add it to your contacts. Whenever you want to find it again you can pull it out of your address book.
It's pretty smooth.
*This is not an endorsement or otherwise, I've never been to that particular Italian.
All intents and purposes. Not intensive purposes.
You're confusing jailbreaking with unlocking.
Jailbreaking=running third-party apps from sources other than the app store. Lots of people have jailbroken phones that are still SIM locked to AT&T. I used to have one until I sold it on eBay.
Unlocking=using a wireless carrier other than AT&T.
Government's idea of a balanced budget: take money from the right pocket to balance...oh who am I kidding?
Those are good reasons, but the most important reason I think is that the user interface just works so damn well. It does for me... I am no Apple fanboy (the only other Apple device I own is an iPod, the rest is all Windows stuff), but I bought one, despite
- no out-of-the-box todo lists
- no notepad that is actually useful (and syncs)
- no cut & paste (a major omission), and poor (if any) communication between apps
- crippled Bluetooth (only works with headsets, can't use it to hook up a Bluetooth keyboard or other peripherals).
- locked down OS (can't replace the standard keyboard with a custom one, for instance).
- rumours of poor battery life and poor reception (I haven't noticed any of these. Tip to increase battery life: turn off location services; the GPS chip is power hungry... like it is on any other cell phone).
So why are people buying despite all this? I don't think having a built-in iPod and some amusing apps make up for this. The following, however, does:
- Form factor. It's small. And I thank Apple for not putting a damn physical keybord inside, which would make it considerably bulkier.
- Ease of use. The UI is simple and responsive certainly compared to WME.
- The multi-touch screen: brilliant not because of the cute "pinch" zoom gesture, but because I can operate it with my fat fingers. Whereas my other smart phones required me to use a fingernail or the stylus, I can operate the iPhone 1-handed using my thumb.
Typing messages is actually pretty good on the iPhone. As you'd expect, typing speed is somewhere between the on-screen keyboard & stylus of WME phones, and phones with a physical keyboard. But that's not what Apple needs to work on to capture the business market. Apple needs to address security by offering a mandatory PIN login that cannot be disabled by the user, and a remote wipe function. Without those two, you can forget about corporations allowing these things to VPN in and access the Exchange server.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
The 3rd type is the comment about other peoples stereotypical comments.
There's no place like 127.0.0.1
There's no place like localhost?
Wouldn't "There's no place like ~/" be better?
You are right. Anyways, it is time for me to change my sig to another lousy pun :P
--
I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that I don't know the answer.
Because it meets their requirements, and the manufacturer support and aftermarket accessory selection is second to none.
It also has one of the best UIs on any mobile device. How many other phone makers actually show off their OS in their commercials?
It is a nice device. It reportedly works very well.
It's just like every other device out there... It has its good points and it has its really bad points. What it does really well is viewing webpages as they were meant to be seen and playing music/video. These things are second to none on any device I have used.
What it doesn't do well are too numerous to list. Do I own one? Yes. Why? Because I ride the bus every day to work and I wanted music/video as well as good web surfing. Unfortunately what it doesn't do is type with ease, which I am used to from the 4 years I used a Sidekick, and run applications in the background. Seriously, that is the hardest thing for me to get used to (what do you mean I don't have IM running all the time?)
If T-mobile didn't suck so hard and the Sidekick wasn't marketed to douchebags, I'd probably go back to owning one in a heartbeat over the iPhone. But for now, it does most of what I want it to and I'm about 50/50 with the device.
Luckily there are apps for a jailbroken iphone that build on the functions of the default apps. iRealSMS is a brilliant messaging app for the iphone, of course it will never be avaliable on the appstore as it competes with their rubbish sms app. Its got real inboxes outboxes and sent messages templates drafts landscape typing.
This is why un-jailbroken iphones arent as good. If an apple official app sucks, well thats just too bad.
Argh! I didn't want to post anon :(
Your evaluation period for Productivity 1.0 has ended. Please purchase more coffee to continue using this product.
http://zippiweb.blogspot.com/2008/09/iphone-3g-crack.html
This is dated September 2008 :-)
WM has complete configurability for all sounds. Want it to play an mp3 every time it registers a click? Not a problem. I've set my text alert to be only vibrate, even when the phone has sounds enabled, but it's quite loud with some of the built in alarm sounds. Of course, your mileage may vary due to carrier lockdown. *cough verizon
--why?
Because the apps in the iPhone are integrated. On other smartphones - not so much.
The remote wipe was added with the 2.0 software. From the Apple website:
IT administrators can securely manage any iPhone that contains confidential company information using remote wipe and enforced security and password policies. These device configuration and remote management capabilities allow IT departments to quickly and seamlessly deploy iPhone throughout their companies.
This may also answer your concern for mandatory password/PIN protection.
Government's idea of a balanced budget: take money from the right pocket to balance...oh who am I kidding?
I read the Dev Team blog entry about this and didn't see any mention about which carrier was supported. I assumed it would only work on other carriers which used SIMs (ie T-Mobile). If it will work with non-SIM based carriers this needs to be clarified.
If we don't protect the freedom of speech how will we know who the assholes are?
Mod Parent Up. I'm debating between a iPod Touch 2G and a Nokia N8X0.
If you watch the video, you'd see the only reason they're able to break it is because the bootrom (initially run by the hardware) is modifiable yet not signature checked. I suppose that's because they want to be able to upgrade the bootrom but signature checking is only implemented in software and not hardware. All the NOR and NAND flash memory and the processor is built inside an integrated chip, so it is possible that future revisions of the chip will also integrate a TPM to verify the signature of bootrom. Let's suppose Apple will do that. You will then have a completely working DRM framework on the iPhone.
TPM doesn't work on PC because you always have access to hardware without TPM, allowing you to run whatever you want and patch the software that requires TPM such as the hackintosh Mac OS X. However, for the iPhone, you can only buy the hardware from Apple that always has TPM on it (or settle for a previous generation iPhone without TPM). The whole point of iPhone craze is that you want to buy iPhone made by Apple, and all the restrictions follow from that, including choice of carrier and applications you can run.
Do you have any means to verify that Firefox certificate is signed by someone you could trust? I could generate a certificate that looks like it's issued by Mozilla, and then sign a tempered copy of Firefox with it. Even if you can verify the mozilla.org certificate, the chain of trust ultimately leads to a root certificate that you must trust. Are you really sure that VeriSign or Thawte or other certificate issuing institutions cannot be compromised? I remember a past Slashdot story about one of the root issuer happily generating certificate for any domain name without verification.
If you have to use Apple's iPhone, your freedom is already automatically compromised, if not now, sooner or later.
I once had a signature.
Try doing that with the G1, and you'll also get a Google Streetview view of the area, integrated with the compass so you see in the phone what you should be able to see on the street.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
So it is great for avoiding communication with people and works remarkable as brain replacement. Sounds like a device everyone on /. should own.
yeah i want the ipod touch 2g to be jailbroken too so I can add songs without itunes. and I suppose run non app store apps potentially.
PCWorld.com has a brief write-up detailing methods to ensure the unlock works. Additionally, they link to a chart on the yellowsn0w website which lists "supported" carriers. This answers my previous question/post.
If we don't protect the freedom of speech how will we know who the assholes are?
http://www.iphonealley.com/tips has a lot of them, but the example given above by jabithew is a good one - a couple of taps and everything is exactly where you need it to be for the next logical task.
Searching on google maps brings up a load of pins with results. Tapping on one shows a screen ready to take you to whichever task you next need e.g. email this location to someone, look at the homepage for the cinema you just found, call them, add the address to your contacts etc.
Other phones will do all this, but not with such effortless simplicity. Which is why I love it.
My first thought was, "Great! Maybe this will pave the way for somehow getting music onto my phone from Linux!" I am currently trying to get the XP side of my dual-boot machine running again, after 6 months of inactivity since I switched to Ubuntu, just so that I can run iTunes and load some music onto my iPhone!!
I have had luck with Wine for other things, but current itunes has status of "Garbage" at winedev, and even in the comments for the older versions I can find no testimony of successful xfer of music to ipod under wine. Good thing I didn't wipe that XP partition....
Well, you could buy a G1 Dev Phone. That way you get an iPhone like device but you can do a lot of stuff to it - including reflashing the entire OS with a custom build (there is no locking of any kind).
Is it as good as an iPhone? Eh, no, not really. I have one beside me. On the other hand, is it better than other phones I've used? Yes I think so. I never used a BlackBerry so I can't compare to that, but I've used feature phones and WinMo phones and Symbian phones, and I'm pretty sure that right now the worlds best smartphone OSs are (1) iPhone (2) Android in that order.
That said, the differences just aren't that big, and the potential is clearly there. If I were Apple I'd be looking at Android as the most likely major competitor for 2009. Right now it's sort of buggy/flaky in some areas, but these problems can be fixed via over the air OS updates. The G1 hardware really isn't as bad as people make out, especially if (like me) you find the iPhone keyboard irritating. I ran a typing race with my iPhone owning brother and I was faster by about 8-10 seconds on the quick brown fox.
Basically, although the G1 [Dev] Phone isn't quite competitive with the iPhone today, I'm pretty sure by the end of 2009 there'll be at one handset that gives it a really strong run for its money.
Jailbreak has been around for a while to run non-App Store apps. But a lot of the reasons to run non-App store apps is gone as a lot of originally free pre-Apple iPhone SDK apps are now on the App store as "legitimate" apps. And those that were not were often available anyway. Jailbreak to run non-Apple apps was pretty quick. What "unlock" is all about is to use an alternative carrier. The prior 3G choice was buy an overseas (if you're in the US) unlocked iPhone, a hack SIM overlay card which messes with the registration numbers the network sees for your phone and the ones the phone sees, and which is illegal in most places, or wait for the iPhone Dev Team as most other hackers have fled the scene. Geohot seems to have once more been a quiet hero and provided a key exploit to allow the Dev Team the insertion vector.
So just running unapproved apps is not the reason for the unlock. The reason is so one can take their locked phone and use a different carrier. A great example is so I can use Kyivstar in Ukraine while traveling (or any other GSM/GPRS provider) and not pay thousands of dollars to roam from ATT while in Europe. Instead pay 50-60 USD and buy a local prepaid SIM. BTW. They sell at most airports. So if traveling, research first before you pay 75 dollars to have a 10-15 dollar SIM card kit mailed to you in the US.
And as this is BETA software, be patient while the bugs are worked out. Me especially as a Ukraine user reported Kyivstar was not playing nice yet.
- Tjp
I am in wallow with my inner money grubbing capitalistic pig. ... Oink!
Street View and directions with public transportation and walking were added on firmware revision 2.2.
I could not unlock 3G one to work on T-Mobile :( awaiting further releases.
o_O
The 4th type is the comment about people's stereotypes of other comments.
Change is inevitable, except from a vending machine -- Robert C. Gallagher
Except it's still not the smart phone of choice for business users
At the last large company I was at, I saw a number of the highest level executives with iPhones.
It's not that much slower than a keyboard to type out a message once you get used to it, and for business communications the predictive text would work optimally.
It's also appealing for some companies to get away from having to send email through a third party server, and serious companies can have their own App Store.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
run applications in the background
Jailbreak and install backgrounder - it's a nice little app (you can either add a plist containing a list of applications for which you want backgrounding enabled) or just hold down the home button until it alerts you that backgrounding has been enabled. I use it with pandora, siax (a voip app) and im apps. Very handy, and having several background processes running (with the exception of pandora, playing music) has little to no noticeable impact on my battery life.
The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources. - Albert Einstein
You have to remember haptic touch response is still in its infancy and as such the Blackberry Storm and LG Incite may have limitations in terms of usability. But once we understand how to improve haptic touch response, I'd like to see Apple incorporate this technology into the third-generation iPhone, because with reasonably fast typing the iPhone can become a true competitor to the Blackberry and Palm Treo devices so commonly used by business customers.
So where's that "defective by design" tag - isn't this a story about DRM and its negative effects?
Oh, but this is Apple. Nevermind...
Now that it's broken, can you finally do SMS on it?
Despite living in a WiMax city, I'm holding out for the N900; I just hope it's here sooner than Q3.
At the rate things are going, I may tell the organization which has purchased it for me to hold out for that instead.
If we don't protect the freedom of speech how will we know who the assholes are?
so I'd be happy to hear about the alternatives.
This is the crux of the problem - that we don't hear about the alternatives, because Slashdot gives so much attention to this one single particular model of phone.
It is a nice device. It reportedly works very well.
I should hope it does work, else I'd be taking it back. My several year old £90 phone is nice, and works very well, but I don't see weekly Slashdot stories about it (a Motorola V980).
What the nerd community most often fail to realize is that all features aren't equal. A well implemented and well integrated feature in a convenient interface is worth way more than the same feature implemented crappy, or accessed through a annoying interface.
What the nerd community most often fail to realize is that phones have been doing these things well for years, long before Apple entered the market. What the nerd community most often fail to realize is that most people just want to get on and use a phone, and not have to wait until one with an Apple sticker comes along.
Thanks for the suggestion. Unfortunately I've been there and done that to no avail:
1. Jailbreaking causes applications on my iPhone to randomly stop working. Once one goes south, eventually all the applications on the phone do -- one at a time. The only option is to continuously reinstall the applications that stopped working -- except when it gets to something like your contacts or phone. Then you're more or less fucked. Removing the jailbreak stopped this.
2. I tried the backgrounder and while you had no noticeable impact, I surely did. Not only in battery life but in processor life. Applications that were backgrounded were grinding the phone to an absolute halt and we're only talking about stuff like Pandora and AIM. I was spending more time killing the backgrounded applications or restarting the phone entirely than I was using it. Not such a great solution.
You don't say?
Actually..I think the Tivo has been opened for a LONG time...
Do some reading on this forum, best one out for tivo hack stuff.
Just googling a bit..found this too: a related article for DRM off the tivo
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
The apps, nobody has as good a selection of useful apps as the iPhone. WinMo has been out for years, and has a selection that simply pales in comparison to Apple's 6 months on the scene.
understand how to improve haptic touch response
buttons?
(ducks)
(Not a pissing contest I promise) I've been doing this (and more) on my N95 with Garmin mobile XT for as long as the phone has been on the market, though it takes several button presses, as does the iPhone. Your 'one press of a button' line is in error.
The key difference though is that I can also use google maps, route 66, tomtom, and a myriad of other mapping applications that are entirely lacking on the iPhone, which just sucks really. Like you say, teh smooth is good, but there are more feature complete systems out in the world that already do this.
Clearly, your two option portrayal doesn't cover the actual depth of intellectual /. discussion typically found in an iPhone story.
I notice that your new sig is not a pun. I suggest one of the following:
I love to watch the hackers go as much as anyone. But the main thing about jailbreaking was that it was important in the early days, before the App Store. I would be nice if I didn't have to sign a deal with AT&T, but it would be nicest if all the cell networks were looped together in one big Internet thingie, too. AT&T is a crummy company, but so what? They're all just conspiring to take my money and screw me over.
99% of people will buy an iPhone, take out the deal with AT&T, and load it up on the App Store. Not bad. Once this generation of phone is old stuff, you'll see it working with every carrier but CDMA Verizon, unless they want to subsidize the chip switch and get along with Steve.
And AT&T, or the highest bidder, will have iPhone 3.2, which will work in 3D.
Our FIFTH type of comment... No, AMONGST our types of comments... I'll come in again.
ehintz
I'll ask one more time: where is the evidence for "It also has one of the best UIs on any mobile device."
That any questioning is modded down rather than answered suggest this evidence clearly doesn't exist.
(Hint to abusive mods - discussing the Iphone on an Iphone article is not off-topic.)
A classic - this proves my point:
I see moderation on Apple stories is back on form - if anyone else slagged off a product using terms such as "patheticly ugly, clunky" rather than using evidence, and then threw ad-hominems of "troll", they'd be modded down in an instant.
Since arguing pro-Iphone posts with "Grumpy Featurism" is +4 Insightful, but arguing with pro-Motorola V980 posts as "Grumpy Featurism" is apparently Flamebait:
I get so tired of the grumpy "featurism" of Slashdot posters. The Iphone might do everything and more than what my current phone does... on paper. In truth, that doesn't mean that these things work as well, I can't copy and paste when I'm editing, every time I installed a Java program it didn't work, and even though it had a 2 megapixel camera, it doesn't even have a flash, nor could I work out how to record a video with it.
"Flamebait" is not "I disagree with this post".
Don't laugh. Apple may conclude that haptic touch response touchscreens have too many issues and could go to a true keyboard anyway, probably a slide-out unit.
The only market Apple hasn't conquered for smart phones is the business market, and once the iPhone gets a decent keyboard entry system they will clean up against the Blackberry and Palm Treo crowd.
Prior to the Storm coming out, I wouldn't have agreed with that. There's just too much that RIM got right. Push email out of the box, w/o having to buy MobileMe (which was terrible for a long time). Also, like you say, the keyboard. It's prohibitively difficult to use the iPhone one-handed for typing. The predictive typing is terrible, IMO, only gets in the way. Whereas the Blackberry's "just works". The enterprise support is more granular than Apple's, and even desktop syncing is more malleable.
I love my iPhone (esp. after jailbreaking) but seeing people in the office trying to switch has taught me why people call them Crackberries. The Pearl struck a great balance between phone and PDA.
I've only used the Storm a little bit but my quick impression was that it's the worst of both worlds...no keyboard, plus the numerous and verbose contextual menus that come standard with the BB. I doubt that the larger screen improved the situation with third-party apps being compatible with some BBs and not others.
Umm, what?
- Dan
Amen to that. Buying into Apple's 'way of life' has all but eliminated the constant stresses I used to face managing my computing life. As a developer I'm trained in a multitude of platforms, yet with the quality of products I've since switched over to from Apple, there's been no learning curve, everything does as advertised; "It just works."
- Dan