Walt Mossberg- 3G iPhone in 60 days
Walt Mossberg has stated on record that a 3G iPhone will be released in 60 days. This timeframe fits what many have believed but it’s nice to hear someone who is well in the loop confirm it. I am very anxious to see how many iPhone owners will upgrade to the next gen model. Steve Jobs is probably not very happy that Mossberg spilled the beans so don’t be surprised if he tries to shut the WSJ down. :)
(vis Gizmodo)
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3G alone won’t get me to upgrade. The HSDPA coverage in my area is hit or miss at the moment. Might be different if my local area coverage were better and you could tether the phone to use as a 3G modem, but it’s just not compelling to me personally. I expect we’ll see some additional features: there’s talk of a better camera solution with video-recording capabilities for example. Still not enough to get more of money just yet.
I could see many folks that held off from buying a 1st gen model jump on this, assuming they live in a solid 3G coverage area.
Here in the UK I think it will be a bigger deal Kevin. 3G networks here are pretty mature, albeit it’ll be locked to O2 unless jailbroken. I think the 3G model will be more of a success here than the current gen model due to this.
I don’t know what 3G is like in NYC area. EDGE is almost as fast as WiFi here, though.
Another rumor is an OLED screen.
Now if the $$$ comes to buy an iPhone, I wouldn’t know what to do: get the EDGE or wait for 3G.
Mike, you must have terrible WiFi connectivity in NYC then ;)
What I’m interested in is seeing how Steve deals with what he said before concerning why 3G sucks (battery life, etc.). Battery tech hasn’t improved much since last year, so unless the chipsets have gotten a lot better, or the other hardware in the new iPhone have had some damn good efficiency upgrades, he’ll have some explaining to do.
On second thought, I bet he (and a lot of Apple fans) will just pretend that he never said it, just like how the PowerPC architecture would always be better than x86, or that nobody wants to watch video on the go.
The one thing about my iPhone that gets me is the EDGE speeds. When I had my 8525, I could pull up just about any webpage fast enough that it was very useful when hanging out with friends and looking stuff up.
I recently needed to settle something on a car trip (not a bet!) and it took me a good 3 to 5 minutes just to load up AT&T’s webpage and surf it to answer the person’s question!
I think the iPhone shuts its EDGE connection down when it’s not using it, which might explain the delays with first connecting. I presume that the HSDPA one would do the same thing? I’m pretty sure all devices do that, though….
>>>Mike, you must have terrible WiFi connectivity in NYC then ;)
It’s b, not g. You techies forget what the real world is like, spoiled by your mostly SINGLE-USER home hotspots. Get out there and try sharing a b connection with others! Ha!
@bluemonq: Why should Jobs explain anything? He crapped on Flash MP3 players before releasing one. That’s his style.
http://mikecane2008.wordpress.com/2008/01/16/steve-jobs-is-up-to-something-probably-big/
The 3g model of iphone is a logical and necessary evolution of apple, because in more countries of Europe and Asia, like Japan the actual technology is HSDPA/HSUPA.
In my case, i´m spaniard from the city of Gijón in the state of Asturias, on the norh of Spain, and all of the cellular phones company have 3g, in UMTS simply or HSDPA or HSUPA version, only in a few zones only have gprs, and a company like Movistar here offers 3 megas of download speed (at this point of view the edge is ridiculous).
3g iphone is neccesary.
P.D.: sorry for my bad english.