Been reading throughout the day and haven't had a chance to say: ZANG!!!

Looks like Leo Laporte owes Brian Lam that apology back.

I wonder what the standby time is for this sucker.

I know the Wi-Fi feature is hardly a new thing, but I bet web surfing without having to log onto your cell-provider's network will be the "aha" feature for a lot of new users.

I'm excited about this. Plain and simple.

no umts? :/
I hope they add 3g/umts for the europe release :)

The user interface is beautiful.

Guess that sizemodo needs to be overhauled, eh?

The price may indeed leave many bewildered, but stepping through the Quicktime demos at http://www.apple.com/iphone evokes jaw-dropping awe at the interface's simplicity, features, and hip-factor.

4 or 8 gig?

Pfft...

So I still need to have my ipod...

jaw-dropping is the best way to explain it - but im finding it hard to even believe the pricing scheme - for those of you who arent yet in the know:

for the 4 gig model:
- the cost is one arm

for the 8 gig model:
- one arm and one leg

(both require a 2-year commitment agreement with cingular, of course)...

your leg is only worth $100? It's costs only 20% of an arm? What a deal!

"(both require a 2-year commitment agreement with cingular, of course)..."
- this will also cost you one soul

my questions:

1.) when you are online- does it default to wifi unless theres nothing in range- or is it only through EDGE or whatever its called?

2.) does the screen look like its prone to scratches? I am picturing 6 month old iphones with barely legible screens due to constant touching/rubbing/scratching

3.) Does it have ichat/AIM? The SMS looks like the iChat interface but I didn't see any reference to it.

4.) what is the battery life for video play?

5.) Can it sync to your comupter wirelessly or through wifi? Can it go to the iTMS on its own?

6.)Does it work with existing ipod peripherals (speakers etc)

7.)How much of that 4GB or 8GB is taken up by the OS?

insanely great.
did the ipod seem this overpriced when it was introduced?
ps rose, you were dead, dead wrong

Yeah..I think I will wait for the next one with 3G/UMTS. I am going one step back in mobile technology. I have Wifi already!

Nokia N95 is next in line for me.

I gotta hand it to apple- this is what I've thought about for years when thinking about "the phone of the future" - right down to the shiny-ness.

No mention of recording video with it. OSX is almost a must-buy in and of itself though.

S'gonna get all smudged, scratched and greasy. I been tryna tell folks. Remember the Nano? Every other scratch-tastic apple device. This one is new an improved. It's all new, this time complete with sumdges and finger/face grease.

Mmmmm, bitch!

Its more or less similar in size and shape to that of the Samsung Blackjack smart phone. Wish it was a tad bit smaller. OS system looks sweet, but I remember how annoying my old touch screen Motorola PDA / Phone was back in the days. Cool nonetheless!

I can't believe it. All these comments so far and nobody has accused anyone of being an Apple fanboy. Hmph.

Regardless, I love Apple, I love its products, and, of course, this phone. Pricey, but my lord, it's got it all. Finally a product (that's cutting edge and pricey) that my wife -wants-, rather than one I have to talk her into letting ME buy it. Woohoo.

Someone call me a fanboy.

I love everything about it except the name. It should have been "iJustreinventedthephone."

Oh, and the price.

Sweet_Toof is a Fanboy.

802.11n woulda been nice since Airport Extreme now supports it.

Maybe someone will hack a mirror for the camera so you can use it with iChat.

I wonder how much of OSX is going into the device? It would be totally awesome to have a terminal window and a VPN client on the iPhone.

Are you sure it's only 4.5" long? I thought I saw over 6" somewhere, which would be quite bulky.

I am wondering if we will be able to buy it without a phone contract.

Personally it is a bit big for me to use as a phone and the features I am most interested in don't require the phone (Safari, iPhoto, Google Maps). I would be happy to use it as a WiFi "PDA". With more and more cities getting WiFi clouds I would love to have one as a sales tool with my photo and video portfolio and to have a device that can surf the "real" web instead of some WAP web would be cool.

What are the chances??? Not good I am sure but I can wish.

It's an awesome phone! Too bad it's with Cingular. I travel alot and have never gotten great service from them at all.

UMTS isn't widespread enough to justify the cost of adding it to the phone. EDGE is found in a lot more coverage areas, so it makes sense to start out with that and add faster downloads in the future when the coverage is better.

Impressive at first glance. But as ibelli said it's going to get smudged and scratched to hell unless they come up with some new screen material.

Plus the battery life and storage space are leave a lot to be desired.

Pass until the 2nd or 3rd gen comes out. Hopefully the battery life and storage size will be better by then.

Anybody remember that Kevin Rose interview where he talked about how this phone was "small as shit"? It's greatlookin and all and I love it already but it certainly aint small as shit.

Unless ofcourse, Mr Rose has a habit of layin down dinosaur-sized poopy piles.

@kesh

planned obsolesce. way to go apple. I'll continue to surf the internet from my laptop using my 3g phone as a modem while people are fiddling with their scratched to hell iphones.

did i miss the expantion slot

I'm surprised no one has brought this up... an MicroSD card slot would be REALLY nice.

Is it 100% confirmed that isn't going to be one?

Am I the only one who wants an 'ultimate gadget' device such as this to also include GPS and an AM/FM radio? I'd be sold then....

anyone else concerned that the screen resolution sucks. for all you zune haters commenting about how a bigger screen with the same ipod resolution is terrible, where are you now? i love that no one is commenting on the doctored photos.

and notice there's no prototype. real convenient.

"4 or 8 gig?

Pfft...

So I still need to have my ipod..."

hmm most popular ipod.. most popular ipod... what's the best selling ipod... Oh, 4gb nano, that would explain why we're seeing 4 and 8 gb sizes, that and a hd would make it twice as thick.

I've got a 40gb and i never carry it because i dislike carrying it and my 7370, thus, i'll be buying one... not because of the ipod functionality to be honest, but because the interface is the kind of interface i've been yearning for in a cell phone for four years.

Looks like it's a bit larger than my Nokia 6682 but also thinner. The largeness might be hard to get used to at first; the Nokia itself is a tad bulky. I can get rid of my PDA, Nano, and Nokia AND have OS X! Sorry, but I'm excited as hell.

The UI is absolutely (Zune) killer, it blows me away. Very, very nice. Evertime I thought about Microsoft today I laughed my ass off.

I'll be trading in, 2-year contract or no. And why are people whining about the lack of support for other providers? I recently asked Cingular to provide the unlock code for my GSM Nokia, which they did. (I thought there was a recent law about this). So once you get your iPhone, just do the same.

ello All, from what I've read, for the most part, everyone is cool with the phone and what it does. I am cool with it as well, but I've not seen when there is going to be a Central America release of this monster. I love the idea, but can we afford it? The idea of a two year contract, scares me. Some good questions as to how much of the OS and all the other stuff will take of your 4G or 8G... In an hour ride to work I think that you can at least entertain yourself to aliviate the impending stress that awaits you.

ello All, from what I've read, for the most part, everyone is cool with the phone and what it does. I am cool with it as well, but I've not seen when there is going to be a Central America release of this monster. I love the idea, but can we afford it? The idea of a two year contract, scares me. Some good questions as to how much of the OS and all the other stuff will take of your 4G or 8G... In an hour ride to work I think that you can at least entertain yourself to aliviate the impending stress that awaits you.

MacRumorsLive said it knows where you are. Google maps doesn't seem much use without GPS or cell based location services. Any new on these?

Did anybody else just see the Nokia N800 crash and burn? I feel like the iPhone does everything it does and more (for more cash of course).

Oh, and curiouscomputer, it's possible that this has [somewhat crippled] GPS by triangulating cellular towers. Additionally, it probably has the ability to stream internet radio, at least with EDGE/Wifi.

Damn, now if only this got released for Sprint with EV-DO (or just imagine... WiMax!) I guess I'll stick to my year-old 3G Samsung A900.

I guess I'm one of those folks that has to pooh-pooh on this just a little bit. Sure, this is one of the most innovative interfaces the telephone has ever seen but, Why can't AAPL throw in a GPS chip? And why not 3G? With those 2 things, I would happily shell out $800.
Why not have a "PRO" version with these features?
I can't justify switching when there'll be plenty of nice WM5 phones with those features.
This phone is playing in the corporate power user space price wise, yet it is catering to the 18-25 demographic. This demographic will NOT buy 10 million $500-$600 phones.

It will be fun to watch the likes of HTC and Motorola scramble to counter this thing. :)

This already has GPRS and a SD slot. You actually don't need to touch the screen for this to work just get close to it. That is why after 2 hours of Jobs using it the screen didn't looked smudged at all.

mkrygeri: I think you are absolutely right. The MP3-player industry has been playing catch-up with the iPod for years, and now Apple they just broke head-first into a the world of cell phones. HTC and Motorola are in deep doo doo.

On the plus side, this competition is bound to ensure that there are going to be phones with similarly great features and styling at a lower price within a year or so.

I wasn't an apple fanboy although I can feel myself sliding towards it. This has everything apart from gps, I wish it were coming to the UK sooner, I was flexing my credit card earlier today in hope!

I was impressed when the nano was announced but not enough to buy one. Having just bought a macbook I want one of these badly. Last thing Steve, PLEASE let it play back OGG or be able to add that functionality or this will finally be the things that forces me to transcode over 60GB of OGG to AAC.

can it do google docs?

The one question I haven't seen asked or answered is: what the hell processor does it have in it?

ARM? TransMeta? VIA? How the heck are they running full (or even partial) OSX on a thing that small? Or are they playing with words and running a cut down Aqua shell on a cut down linux?

Yet another overpriced device, honestly.

It doesn't matter how slick the interface is, the american market just won't bear cell phones this expensive. It's a great win for cingular and getting apple exclusives for at least 2 years, but I am more than a little concerned about the pricing.

$500 for a 4gb/EDGE phone? For $300 (after rebate) I can have a blackjack with 2 gb card and UMTS/HDSPA.

This device needs to be a couple hundred dollars cheaper.

ZOMG, awesome despite some flaws.

Is the $599 (8gb) with or without a 2-year contract?

Will it act as a FrontRow remote?

Does it charge over USB?

Interesting that it requires USB; what kinds of file transfer/sync/iTunes can it do over WiFi and Bluetooth?

It's "Mac OS X", but what does that mean? What kind of apps will it run? Does it have full OS X with Inkwell support so it can run anything (very unlikely)?

I've said for years that there's no reason why a music player and a phone can share a housing without compromises. Apple did more than I expected, they advanced the phone side, a lot. Re-re-read the press release!

Nothing new here. Just better packaging. On my phone I currently do music, Google maps, and email.

Then the next big question I have is: Can you install 3rd party applications? Can you run Java applications? Will there be a Skype client? Cingular is probably stopping that!

Also, can it stream radio and video?

But it will be cool to flash in front of friends ;-)