The Truth (about the iPhone) is Coming Out!

A month of use, and iPhone's not as cool
By DWIGHT SILVERMANCopyright 2007 Houston Chronicle

Even before you could buy one, the word on the iPhone was that it might be the Holy Grail of wireless devices. It was so highly praised that some took to calling it the "Jesus Phone."
The early reviews were almost fawning. Oh sure, they said, the iPhone has a few flaws, but hey! Look at the big, button-free screen! The cool Google Maps application! See how Web pages look like they should on it! And how, when you turn it sideways, pictures and Web pages rotate! And how you can use touch to move from photo to photo! And it's a great iPod, too!

Yeah, those other reviews were pretty breathless. Well, it's time to get a grip, kids, because this is not going to be one of those reviews.

The iPhone is a very different device, and when you first start working with it, there's definitely an OMG! effect. Its most in-your-face feature is its Cool Factor, which is what you'd expect, since this is from Apple. I wrote about this in an earlier column about Apple's brilliant marketing of the iPhone.

Yet there's quite a difference between being wowed by previously unseen features and using and relying on a device like the iPhone day to day. For some folks, its core features — which are slick on the surface — may be adequate. But if you're someone who relies heavily on a portable device for business e-mail and even creation of content, you're going to be frustrated.

I lived with the iPhone for about a month, and as an experiment, I carried both it and my Samsung BlackJack, my own PDA. My goal was to see which device I preferred for which tasks. For example, when I wanted to access the Web online, or check e-mail, which would I reach for first?

I started out using the iPhone more, because using it was an adventure. But by the end of my experiment, I was back to using the BlackJack for most serious tasks.

While the iPhone is indeed a very cool device, and there's a lot about it to like, I think its shortcomings are major.

Here's where I think the iPhone falls down:

• E-mail. If your company uses Microsoft Exchange for its e-mail (and many do), you can forget about using the iPhone to get your business mail unless your systems folks are willing to turn on an older e-mail feature called IMAP. Many system administrators won't do this (including those at the Chronicle), leaving users in the lurch. I had to use the Web-based version, but the iPhone's Safari browser didn't get along with it (more on that later). And even if I had been able to get business e-mail, the iPhone's e-mail application is pretty to look at but frustrating to use. You can't batch-delete e-mails. The iPhone has no cut/paste capability, which makes sending examples of things found on the Web impossible. And its e-mail isn't of the "push" variety, that comes at you in near real-time. It checks e-mail every 15 minutes or so and has no easy way to alert you of something new.

• Web browsing. The iPhone's Safari browser is one of its strengths, but it's also a big weakness. Yes, it displays most Web pages better than any other hand-held device browser. But Safari is notorious among Web developers for its glitches in the way it handles coding such as Javascript. For example, I was unable to edit or compose in chron.com's blogging software — Movable Type, a popular platform — because scroll bars for the composition windows were missing. When I tried to write an e-mail in our Outlook Web Access page, I saw the text, but it was often blank for recipients.

Web pages must be designed a certain way for Safari's cool zoom feature to work properly, but many out there aren't. As a result, when I zoomed in, I often had to do a lot of side scrolling to read it, or use the iPhone's two-fingered "pinch" motion to reduce the size of the page. That got old quickly.

• Connectivity. The iPhone can connect to the Internet two ways: using Wi-Fi or AT&T's Edge data network. If you can get to Wi-Fi with the iPhone, you'll want to do it, even if you have to beg, borrow or steal, because the Edge network is incredibly slow. I gave up on trying to look at most Web pages when Wi-Fi wasn't available; it was too painful.

In addition, the iPhone has Bluetooth capabilities for connecting other devices wirelessly, but there's only one thing that it will pair with — a headset for hands-free talking. I've got a Bluetooth Apple keyboard, which would help with the next issue on my list of gripes, but the iPhone wouldn't see it.

• Virtual keyboard. One of the iPhone's most vaunted features is its virtual onscreen keyboard. It's also been its most criticized. As you tap letters on the screen, the keys enlarge, helping you to hit them more accurately ... at least, in theory. While I got a little better over time, I never could get as fast on it as I am on my BlackJack. And the iPhone's feature that predicts what word you're trying to type is nowhere near as good as the T9 found in most other smart phones.

• Memory. The iPhone comes with two memory capacities: 4 and 8 gigabytes. That's not a lot of memory for a $500 or $600 device, respectively. My video iPod has a 20-GB hard drive, and I've got about 14 GB of music on it. If I want to bring my complete music collection with me, I've got to tote both my iPhone and my iPod. Sorry, but for $600, I should be able to cram it all in one device.

There are other deficiencies, from the ability to use your own music as custom ringtones (you can't even buy new ringtones) to its recessed headphone jack that won't work with most car adapters and non-Apple headsets; to its sealed, send-it-in-to-Apple-for-replacement battery.
Some shortcomings could be fixed by software upgrades, but the key word there is "could." I'm not sure I'd want to spend $600 betting on the outcome.

If you weren't one of the early possessors, but you're considering buying one, wait for the next version. The iPhone has a lot of potential, and it will surely influence what other phone manufacturers do. But for now, you're better off using something else if you're serious about getting your data on the go.

dwight.silverman@chron.com