Apple

iPhone 3G S buyers are still experiencing delays activating their new smartphones, but Apple apparently wants to make it up to them.

Apple began notifying affected customers via e-mail on Sunday that they may experience additional delays for another two days due to “system issues” and “high activation volumes,” according to readers in various blogs who claim to have received the e-mail.

The problems began immediately after the new iPhone’s launch Friday.

As a way of apology for the delays, the same e-mail said Apple plans to offer customers a $30 credit iTunes Store credit for “the inconvenience this delay has caused.”

Here’s the entire text of the e-mail:

Dear Apple Customer,

Thank you for your recent Apple Store order. We appreciate your patience and apologize for the inconvenience caused by the delay in your iPhone activation.

We are still resolving the issue that was encountered while activating your iPhone with AT&T. Unfortunately, due to system issues and continued high activation volumes, this could take us up to an additional 48 hours to complete.

On Monday, you’ll receive an email from Apple with an iTunes Store credit in the amount of $30. We hope you will enjoy this gift and accept our sincere apologies for the inconvenience this delay has caused.

Thank you for choosing Apple.

Sincerely,
Apple Online Store Team

Apple representatives did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

During last July’s iPhone launch as new customers tried to complete the required in-store activation process, overloaded AT&T activation servers slowed Apple Store lines to a crawl, and the servers eventually crashed altogether. Apple soon ditched the in-store activation and was simply “unbricking” phones, letting buyers activate them at home rather than hold up the line because of crashed servers.

In stark contrast to the frenzied first day sales of the original iPhone and last year’s iPhone 3G, Friday’s launch was marked by considerably smaller and quieter crowds for the smartphone’s debut.

One analyst expected Apple to sell 500,000 iPhones this weekend. That’s half as many phones as Apple sold when it launched the iPhone 3G, but Apple sold that phone in 21 countries on the first day. In comparison, the iPhone 3G S was sold in only eight countries on its first day.

Source:[cnet.com]

Apple’s customers have wasted no time scooping up its latest smartphone and operating system update.

More than 1 million iPhone 3G S smartphones have sold in the three days since the new model hit the stores Friday, Apple announced Monday. In addition, 6 million people have downloaded the new iPhone OS 3.0 update in the five days since its release.

The sales figure even prompted Apple CEO Steve Jobs to make his first public comment since going on medical leave early this year.

“Customers are voting and the Apple iPhone is winning,” Jobs said in a statement. “With over 50,000 applications available from Apple’s revolutionary App Store, iPhone momentum is stronger than ever.”

The 1 million mark outpaces the estimate of at least one analyst, Piper Jaffray’s Gene Munster, who predicted that 500,000 Apple iPhone 3G S phones would sell in the first weekend. The original iPhone sold about 270,000 units over its first weekend in June 2007, while the Apple iPhone 3G sold around 1 million when it launched in July 2008. (And while Apple sold the iPhone 3G in 21 countries in its first day last year, the 3G S was available in only eight countries at launch.)

The 3.0 update for the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch, which hit the iTunes store on Wednesday, has also found a wide audience among users who were awaiting new features, including copy and paste, landscape mode support for more applications, and the Spotlight search tool.

Despite the strong first-weekend sales, Apple is facing new competition in a crowded smartphone market. Palm recently debuted its new Pre, though it sold somewhere between 50,000 and 100,000 units in its first two days. And Research In Motion will unveil its new BlackBerry Tour later this summer.

Apple watchers are also awaiting the return of Jobs. Recent reports say the Apple CEO received a liver transplant two months ago.

Jobs is expected to return to Apple later this month but initially may just take on a part-time role.

Source:[cnet.com]

On Wednesday, Apple released the newest version of the software that powers the iPhone, sending hordes of users of the devices to their computers to upgrade. The iPhone OS 3.0 brings dozens of new features to the phone — and will be included with the new iPhone 3G S, which goes on sale today at Apple and AT&T stores. If you’re an owner of the older iPhone or iPhone 3G models, here are five things to try out as soon as you install the new software:

Copy or cut, then paste something. Copy-cut-paste is the probably the one feature that iPhone users have most clamored for, and no wonder — it’s essential on a modern-day computing device, and it’s something most other smart phones have had for years.

On the iPhone, Apple’s tied it to the same process used to move the cursor in text — press your finger on the screen where you want the copy block to start until the magnifier appears, then release. You’ll get a black bar that will let you copy and/or cut (depending on whether the text is editable), and paste if there’s data on the clipboard. To choose text, just put your finger on the delimiter at the end of the copy block and drag it where you want it.

Search for something. While copy-paste may be the most desired feature, Spotlight Search is likely to be the most useful, particularly if you live your life in your smart phone. Search lets you find things in any area on the phone, combing through contacts, songs, bookmarks, notes, e-mail and more.

To get to the search screen, hit the Home button from the first Home screen, or just swipe that first screen to the right. There also are search boxes placed atop various apps, including e-mail.

Save your passwords. At long last, the Mobile Safari Web browser will now save passwords for Web sites with log-ins. Just enter the sign-in and password, and Safari asks if you want to save the login information.

There are some who would consider this feature a security risk. If your phone is stolen, someone could access your Web accounts. Fortunately, you can turn this feature off in Safari’s settings.

Type an e-mail in landscape mode. Most iPhone owners have a love/hate relationship with the device’s virtual keyboard. I’ve made peace with it, but using it can still be frustrating. But in the new version of the OS, the landscape keyboard that was available in only a few places is now more widespread, including mail.

Turn the phone sideways in any composition window to switch to landscape typing.

Copy/paste multiple images. In the older iPhone OS, sending more than one image via e-mail required multiple, separate e-mails. Now you can select multiple photos to send via a single e-mail.

In the photo album, tap the arrow icon in the lower-left corner of the screen. Then tap the photos you want to e-mail. Tap the Share button, then E-mail. The mail application will open with your photos embedded in a composition window.

You can also choose Copy and then paste images into other applications that support it. And, of course, you can now gang-delete images from the photo album this way as well.

Owners of both the original iPhone and iPhone 3G can install this through iTunes, and they’ll find it will breathe new life into their phones. It will also be available to owners of the iPod Touch, though they’ll have to pay $10 to get it.

Source:[chron.com]

Reports are surfacing that customers who ordered the new iPhone 3GS online may have delayed gratification. Consumers checking their package tracking status were shocked to discover that the delivery date, originally scheduled for Wednesday, was quietly shifted to Friday or even Monday.

A few unlucky souls were left with no shipping date but an ambiguous message: “the receiver requested a hold for a future delivery date” or “the package is being held for a future delivery date.”

According to UPS’s “package progress” feed, “The receiver [i.e., Apple] requested a hold for a future delivery date. UPS will attempt delivery on date requested.”

Meantime, Apple has released the iPhone OS 3.0 software update as expected. And AT&T, the exclusive U.S. carrier for the iPhone, on Wednesday decided to let more customers buy the iPhone 3GS at the fully subsidized price. That price was originally only for new customers or those who qualified for an upgrade a year after buying the iPhone 3G, but the company said those who would qualify in July through September will be able to buy the 16GB iPhone 3GS for $199 and the 32GB iPhone 3GS for $299.

Minor Glitch

Michael Gartenberg, a vice president at Interpret, said Apple’s request to UPS was not a sign of production difficulties, but simply an effort to better regulate deliveries.

“I don’t think we’re seeing delays as much as an effort to make sure devices don’t ship before they’re supposed to,” Gartenberg said. “In terms of demand, we’ve seen pre-orders sell out, it seems, from AT&T, so it appears that consumers are appreciating the performance enhancements along with the new features.”

While noting that Apple has occasionally had production issues in the past, analyst Greg Sterling, founding principal of Sterling Market Intelligence, agreed that the delays are a minor issue. The bigger story, he said, is the tremendous interest in the upgrade to the iPhone OS.

“People are so hungry for the update,” Sterling said. “There’s a huge demand for new stuff related to the iPhone.”

Although a few people in the Twitterverse reported some minor glitches, Sterling praised Apple for handling the demand so smoothly. “It’s a dramatic contrast to the most recent Windows Mobile update,” he said. “I had to take physically take my phone to the Sprint store and leave it there for a couple of hours. By and large, the iPhone OS upgrade is plug and play.”

Sterling agreed that the hardware upgrades announced by Apple in the new iPhone 3GS aren’t dramatic, but will still appeal to consumers.

‘A Lot of Cleanup’

“I think that there’s a lot of cleanup going on in the 3GS release,” he said. “There’s nothing dramatic, apart from the price drop, but a lot of wish list/deficiencies were fixed.” In particular, Sterling said, video (which Gartenberg praised as well) will appeal to consumers.

The biggest remaining feature to be added, he suggested, is one that Palm is touting heavily for the Pre: The ability to run more than one app at a time.

“There must be a very specific reason why multiple apps won’t run on the iPhone,” Sterling said. “Apple’s made a very distinct choice in not allowing it so far.”

Source:[Yahoo News]

It’s the “most powerful, fastest iPhone we’ve ever made,” says Apple SVP Phil Schiller of the 3G S, now with an upgraded three-megapixel camera, voice commands, and picture messaging—all due on June 19. Also: The 8GB version of the iPhone 3G is now just $99.

The news came during Monday’s keynote of Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco, and the announcements pretty much fell in line with earlier predictions, including a new digital compass, better battery life, laptop tethering, and MMS—although the latter two won’t be supported on AT&T just yet, news that was followed by a chorus of groans in the audience.

Also, those hoping for a cameo by the recovering Steve Jobs left the keynote disappointed.

So, without further ado, on with the details …

Price and availability
Look for the iPhone 3G S to arrive in stores June 19, two days after iPhone Software update 3.0 (which adds features such as picture messaging, cut-and-paste support, and stereo Bluetooth) arrives on iTunes. Available in both black and white, the 16GB version of the 3G S will sell for $199 (the same initial price as the old 8GB iPhone 3G), while a 32GB model will go for $299. Meanwhile, we’re finally getting a $99 iPhone—the old 8GB 3G, as it turns out.

Look and feel
The iPhone 3G S comes with an impressive set of new features, but you wouldn’t know it from looking at the new handset, which looks exactly the same as last year’s iPhone 3G.

Better camera
The iPhone’s old 2-megapixel camera gets a bump up to three megapixels, at last, along with an auto-focus lens, auto exposure, improved low-light sensitivity, and—here’s the big one—video recording, including on-the-fly touch editing and the ability to send video clips via MMS (more on the iPhone’s picture messaging features in a moment). Still no LED flash, though.

Speedier performance
Apple claims that the 3G S runs faster than the iPhone 3G—up to twice as fast, in fact, which means speedier app launching and Web browsing.

Voice commands
In a first for the iPhone, the 3G S will finally be able to make voice-activated calls, as well as play songs and playlists at your command—not bad, although voice commands have long been standard issue on many other existing cell phones.

Improved battery life
Poor battery life has been the bane of many an iPhone owner’s existence, but Apple promises that the 3G S will get you three more hours of Web browsing (over Wi-Fi) and six more hours of audio, although talk time on AT&T’s 3G network remains five hours.

Digital compass
Finding your way on Google Maps for iPhone can be a chore if you don’t know what direction you’re facing, but the new 3G S should fix that with it’s new digital compass, which will give you your longitude, latitude, and precise direction (not to mention better controls on games that rely on the iPhone’s accelerometers).

Picture messaging
As announced back in March, both the iPhone 3G S and the iPhone 3G will finally support MMS—one of the biggest missing features on the iPhone—via the iPhone Software 3.0 update, due to hit iTunes on June 17. That’s the good news; the bad news is that AT&T won’t support MMS on the iPhone until “later this summer.” Ugh.

Laptop tethering
Also included in the iPhone Software 3.0 update: Laptop tethering, which will let you share the iPhone’s 3G data connection with your laptop (via USB or Bluetooth) while you’re out and about. Pretty cool … but while tethering will be available for iPhone users on several worldwide carriers, we won’t be able to tether on AT&T, or at least not for now. Double-ugh.

Other upcoming features in iPhone Software 3.0
Get ready for direct downloads of TV shows and movie rentals/purchases on the iPhone (perfect for grabbing some videos before boarding a flight), stability and speed enhancements for the mobile version of Safari, and a “Find My iPhone” feature (which tracks down your lost iPhone, provided you’re subscribed to Apple’s MobileMe service).

What we didn’t get:
No Steve Jobs, although he’s said to be “on track” to return to Apple by the end of the month. No talk of discounted iPhone service plans, as has been rumored. No Mac tablet (although many believe that we will see one before the year is out). No front-facing camera for video conferencing. And for AT&T subscribers, no MMS until later this summer, and no laptop tethering until … who knows?

So, what do you think: Impressed by the 3G S? Feeling underwhelmed? Plan to trade in your iPhone 3G (or original iPhone) for the new one? Do you think the iPhone 3G S beats the Palm Pre, or vice versa?