Expert’s Rating
Pros
Cons
When the original iPhone arrived in June 2007 , it was greeted by massive hoopla and long bloodline at Apple and AT&T depot . But a fortune of people who were concerned in the iPhone held back , manoeuvre by a thoughtful and thrifty technological principle : “ Never bribe version 1.0 . ”
With the spillage of Apple ’s iPhone 3 G and its new iPhone 2.0 software package , the hype and the lines are back , but the era of iPhone 1.0 is officially over . Those who hold off for the second edition of the iPhone will apprise dramatically faster cellular datum approach and an telling software update include a muckle of third - political party programs . For original iPhone buyers , however , the iPhone 3 G is only a must - have upgrade for those who will take full advantage of the fast 3 G data point meshing .
Hardware
At a casual glimpse , the iPhone 3 G looks just like the original iPhone . Front and center is its lustrous , beautiful in high spirits - resolution 3.5 - inch sloping trace screen , offering a solvent of 480 - by-320 pixels . It ’s only when you look at both framework side by side that you notice the brass of the iPhone 3 thousand is somewhat wider , allowing a bit more black space between the sides of the screen and the chrome frame .
On the bottom , the calamitous speaker and mike lattice of previous have been replaced by two oval cut - out with sunken silver-tongued grille . Between the grillwork and the iPhone 3 G ’s dock connector are two recessed Philips screws . It ’s not every day that you find an Apple product , especially a slick consumer - electronics product , that ’s gotvisible screws .
At the top , the most obvious modification is the replacement of original iPhone ’s recessed headphone jack — which required the consumption of an adapter to confiscate most non - Apple headphones — with one that lie plane . That recess jack was one of the most ridiculous design decisions in the original iPhone , and it ’s great to see that Apple has addressed the problem and made the iPhone 3 guanine approachable to just about any exercise set of headphones in existence .
Times in seconds. Phones loaded cellular data simultaneously in the same location. They downloaded a 1 MB MP3 file using Safari, and then three webpages to completion. Test websites were macworld.com homepage, pcworld.com homepage, and altonbrown.com homepage.—MACWORLD TESTING BY JASON SNELL
The iPhone 3 GB ’s left side includes a volume rocker switch and a sliding switch to place the phone into silent / vibrate fashion , just like its harbinger . These clitoris , as well as the Sleep button on the phone ’s top , are now made of metal rather than pitch-black credit card . While they ’re a pretty silverish colouring material , the metal edge are also much sharper than the original iPhone ’s plastic single , and they crusade uncomfortably into my fingers as I ’m using them . I also found the iPhone 3 G ’s Vibrate electric switch to be more difficult to slide than the original model ’s , though that extra ohmic resistance does mean it ’s less likely that your phone will slip into or out of unsounded mode by fortuity .
Although it ’s more curving ( and therefore slender ) than the original iPhone at its edges , it ’s slightly thicker in the center . However , your hand arc to hold the phone ( unless you ’ve gotreallysmall hands ) , and that curve is where the extra heaviness is , making it undetectable . Apple truly designed the iPhone 3 G to feel identical to the original iPhone .
The iPhone 3 G ’s back is curved shining credit card ( available in black or , in the 16 GB model , black or snowy ) , rather than the flat matte aluminium of the original model . Whether that ’s better or bad is a personal , aesthetic option , although the plastic casing should n’t block radio signals as much as the aluminum did . However , the glazed plastic is much more adept at collecting fingermark and daub than the old textured Al .
The curving back does make the iPhone 3 G somewhat unsound when lay on a mat surface , but it only wobbles slightly , and I found it tolerably stable for typing and tapping . There ’s a spread between the sides of the iPhone ’s exhibit and the sharpness of the phone itself , making it unlikely that you ’d touch close enough the sharpness to get the phone to shimmy dramatically . The surplus width also makes typing on the iPhone with two thumbs slightly more comfortable by giving the thumbs a bit more room on which to drift . I do n’t have it away if my pollex typewriting was any more exact on the new phone , but it was for certain more comfortable to pollex - type on the iPhone 3 gramme than on the original modeling .
Although the physical changes to the earpiece are subtle — so subtle that if you have n’t drop a fate of clock time with an original iPhone , you ’d never notice them — they’re enough to prevent some old iPhone compositor’s case , bobtail , and other accessories that are cautiously tailor-make to the original example ’s dimension from working with this Modern model . If you bribe an iPhone 3 G to replace a first - propagation iPhone , you ’ll probably want to bequeath your cases and dock to your old iPhone ’s new owner and prepare to invest in fresh accouterment . ( However , some less exacting iPhone cases will fit the iPhone 3G. My Speck ToughSkin case fits the iPhone 3 G just fine . )
It ’s always concentrated to judge a brand - raw merchandise when it comes to payoff of durability , since we only have a few days to try the product and it ’s very hard to little - circle the test of time . However , our colleagues atPC Worldchose to sacrifice an iPhone 3 G so as to see how rugged the production was . AlthoughPC World’siPhone 3 gibibyte did cease up completely shatter , the editor who tortured it were powerful impressed with its lastingness . The iPhone 3 G survived several simulated trip-up through a sack full of keys and other shrewd object , withstood being dip in a bowl of cereal and Milk River , and even kept on ferment through a few drops on concrete from five feet up . The iPhone 3 G ’s glass blind cracked beyond repair on the fifth drop . The moral of this account : the iPhone 3 G is pretty tough , but do n’t employ it to wreak a game of catch in a parking heap .
Software
Although this brushup is say to focus on the iPhone 3 gibibyte as a hardware product , it ’s impossible to to the full divide it from the software system it runs .
The iPhone 3 GB ships with version 2.0 of the software package that powers both the iPhone and its non - phone cousin-german , the iPod feeling . This novel version sum up numerous feature not present in the previous iPhone until now , including livelihood for push electronic mail , link , and calendars via a corporate Microsoft Exchange server or Apple ’s newMobileMe service . The most telling characteristic of this new software is the App Store , which tolerate drug user to download program written by software package developers outside of Apple .
The 2.0 software is , in many ways , the most important characteristic of the iPhone 3G. And it ’s excellent . However , because that software is also usable for the original iPhone and ( as a $ 10 rising slope ) the iPod touch , we ’ve chosen to brush up it separately from the iPhone 3 G computer hardware — that review will appear on Macworld.com later this week .
Full speed ahead
What puts the iPhone 3 G head and shoulders above the original iPhone is the addition of support for 3 G networking . The third - generation wireless connection that gives the iPhone 3 gibibyte its name is much firm than the EDGE connection . If you ’re in an area with 3 G internet reporting , you ’ll find that the iPhone 3 G ’s net connectedness is quite fast .
In our examination , an iPhone 3 G on AT&T ’s 3 G connection downloaded media files and loaded Web pages between two and four times as fast as an original iPhone on AT&T ’s EDGE connection . Of course , not even the 3 G cellular connection can match up with utter Wi - Fi . For example , downloading a 1 MB MP3 data file take 87 seconds on EDGE , 21 seconds on 3 gigabyte , and only 8 seconds via Wi - Fi .
Download tests
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prison term in sec . telephone loaded cellular data simultaneously in the same location . They downloaded a 1 MB MP3 file using Safari , and then three webpages to completion . psychometric test websites were macworld.com home page , pcworld.com homepage , and altonbrown.com homepage.—MACWORLD examination BY JASON SNELL
More telling than the bare-assed download speeds is the fact that they enable Internet feature that merely were n’t practical on the slower EDGE electronic connection . I was capable to take the air through downtown San Francisco , listening to a radio station streamed over the 3 G connection by the complimentary AOL Radio program I download from the App Store . Similarly , I could watch Major League Baseball video recording highlights downloaded by theMLB At Bat software , also downloaded over the fast net .
speech sound on the 3 G cellular meshwork also have the capability to download data and make voice phone calls at the same time . On the old model of the iPhone , you could n’t talk on the headphone while download data over the phone ’s cellular data joining . But if the iPhone 3 M is on a 3 constant of gravitation web , you could talk and break Google Maps simultaneously without bother .
One downside of the 3 constant of gravitation mesh is that using it drains the iPhone 3 G ’s battery more than the slower EDGE net . However , if you ’re worried about guide out of juice , Apple has provided an option ( preferences - > General - > web - > Enable 3 gigabyte ) so that you may turn off 3 deoxyguanosine monophosphate networking . Once 3 M is disabled , the iPhone 3 G use the same 2 thousand web as its predecessor .
As far as I can tell , the iPhone 3 G is “ faster ” than the original iPhone solely because of the access it has to a faster cellular web . On Wi - Fi and EDGE connections the phones seem to be about the same speed , and taxing games such as FreeVerse ’s Wingnuts Moto Racer look to perform the same on both gadget .
Where am I?
The other major new piece of computer hardware in the iPhone 3 G is a GPS ( Global Positioning System ) receiver . GPS is a technology that lets machine work out out on the nose where they are by triangulating wireless sign from satellites in orbit . The iPhone 3 G uses Assisted GPS , which essentially mean that the phone ’s search for GPS information is assisted by figurer at cell - speech sound towers , improving speed and reliability . ( And if the iPhone 3 one thousand ca n’t get a GPS jam , it can habituate Wi - Fi and cell towboat info to guess at its office , just as the first - generation iPhone could . )
Several include applications on the iPhone take advantage of GPS , and numerous third - party App Store programs do as well . The built - in Maps covering employ GPS to track your current location , represent by a pulsating blue loony toons at the center of the map .
When I first tested this feature film , I was n’t very impressed . My placement was not display very accurately ( the blue Transportation was palisade by a very large down circle , representing the iPhone ’s uncertainty about where I was ) and the info seemed to jail behind my truthful location by as much as 30 second .
However , I consider my initial problems were mostly due to a want of a strong GPS signal : I was travel in a bus through streets full of marvelous buildings in San Francisco ’s Financial District , and as a issue , the iPhone was belike cut off from most GPS sign . Once I catch out into the wide-eyed - open spaces , the blue dit ’s accuracy improve greatly and there was much less meanwhile .
The iPhone ’s camera also use GPS to embed the precise parallel of latitude and longitude of every motion-picture show you take ( though you’re able to turn this feature article off ) , a cognitive process cognize as geotagging . The characteristic in the main worked as advertised , though I did discover a unknown microbe : copying a geotagged image out of iPhoto and into the Finder corrupted the embedded data and convinced Flickr ( a pic - sharing Web site that indorse geotagging ) that my backyard is located somewhere in China ’s Yellow Sea .
Of course , the killer app for a GPS - enable cell phone is probably twist - by - routine driving directions . The included Maps program will show you where you are in the context of repel counselling , but unlike consecrate GPS devices , it wo n’t utter to you when you need to flex , and if you ’re driving though an area with no cellular service of process , it wo n’t be able-bodied to download single-valued function datum from Google . A curriculum that can use the GPS datum to give you more precise directions and does n’t necessitate to rely on Google ’s map data would be a welcome addition . Here ’s hop it bump .
Loud and clear
If you tried to call me on my iPhone and just get my voice ring armor , I have a good self-justification : I probably wanted to talk to you , but just did n’t hear the earpiece ring . The original iPhone ’s speaker , you see , was a bitquiet , which made it easy to miss calls and a bit hard to practice the speakerphone . It was serviceable , but I found myself crank up the book to the maximum at all prison term , and wish well I could make it louder still .
The good news about the speaker on the iPhone 3 G , then , is that it ’s noticeably louder than the one on the original iPhone . That ’s an melioration because it ’s more hearable for speakerphone utilization . It also means that phone ringtones are much loud .
The speech sound ’s home loudspeaker , the one you press against your ear , sound well and is also a little bit louder . And when I call up mass on the two speech sound , they generally opt the sound of the iPhone 3G.
in the end , there ’s one path in which the iPhone 3 G meliorate the tone of all your other auditory sensation - producing devices : The frequencies used on the 3 G connection are , unlike those on the 2 G connection , not probable to give loud hum and buzz noises on every twist in your vicinity that has loudspeaker attached to it . I was able-bodied to set the iPhone 3 universal gravitational constant decent next to my clock radio , and never once see that noted “ GSM buzz . ” ( Of of course , if you live in an area that does n’t have 3 G service , you ’ll be on the old GSM meshing , and the buzz will be back ! )
Strange lapses
A year ago , when the original iPhone arrived , it was clearly lacking some fairly obvious and utilitarian features . At the clip it was easy to give Apple a bit of a straits , give that the iPhone was a brand - unexampled piece of ironware running on a brand - new operating system . However , now a year has passed and both the hardware and software have been completely retool — and yet some of thesefeature gaps still inexplicably remain .
The camera : For a Cartesian product as on the cutting edge as the iPhone , its built - in camera is an embarrassment . Like the camera on the original iPhone , it ’s got a canonical two - megapixel result , does n’t zoom , has no flash , does n’t bring well in downhearted light , and does n’t take video . With still subjects in well - lit expanse it make dainty results . In terms of quality , the consumer head - and - shoot digital camera I boughtseven eld agostill blows it away , and most of the iPhone ’s impertinent phone rival tender well cameras as well .
Bluetooth : And if you conceive you could just send that picture to your pal via Bluetooth , you ’re wrong there too . The iPhone ’s Bluetooth carrying out is rudimentary at best . Pairing headsets act upon fine , although Apple has removed the feature that let you heed to voicemail via the headset — a company spokesman read they ’re work on a replacement for that functionality . And the speech sound seems to pair with most in - railroad car Bluetooth systems , though we ’ve heard some reports of cars that have had trouble pair with the twist .
But that ’s about it . you could pair an iPhone to a Mac , for example , but there are n’t any configurable services available — for example , a warm Bluetooth exchange of exposure . And despite the fact that the iPhone 3 G has a very fast connection to the Internet , there ’s no way to share that connection with your Mac . The iPhone 3 G also does n’t support stereoscopic photograph bluetooth earpiece , so you ca n’t listen to music wirelessly .
Select , copy , and paste : There ’s still no way to pick up text from one berth on the iPhone and drop it down somewhere else . Say someone emails you an address where they want you to get together them . There ’s no way to extract that data and , say , commit it in the Maps program or add it to their contact incoming . I ’ve utter to numerous iPhone user who have done what I ’ve done in that situation — find a piece of report , write the address down , switch apps on the iPhone , and typewrite it back in .
Perhaps the sure-enough background data processor metaphor of cut , copy , and paste is not appropriate for the iPhone . I ’m sure Apple ’s iPhone interface ace have given it a heap of thinking . But the fact remain , transferring arbitrary entropy from one spot to another is a necessity on a equipment like the iPhone , and after a year , the phone still ca n’t do it .
amaze horizontal : The built - in applications on the iPhone are still largely tied to a portrait orientation , despite the iPhone ’s ability to operate in landscape painting mode . In many fount , landscape fashion is a much more appropriate format — especially if you ’re doing a hatful of typing . And yet primal Apple programme such as Mail and Notes simply do n’t work horizontally . At a clip when young developer are come to the iPhone and look to Apple ’s programs for cues about how to develop a full iPhone app , it ’s a shame that Apple ca n’t put up more examples of support for both portrait and landscape preference .
Multimedia messagingThe iPhone has no financial support for MMS ( Multimedia Messaging Service ) , a way to send picture and videos between prison cell phones that even my ancient Treo 650 offered old age ago . Yes , you may station photos via email and upload them to the Web , but if you take a pic and quickly want to institutionalize it over to your buddy ’s MMS - capable phone , forget it .
incorporate inboxApple has addressed several of the biggest drawbacks of its Mail program , most notably by making it possible to delete or file several messages at one metre . regrettably , one glower job remains : the inability to view all novel messages in a single , unified inbox . you may do it in Apple ’s own Mail software on the Mac , and you view all your calendars together on the iPhone , but if you ’ve got four unlike mail accounts on your iPhone , you have to see them all one by one .
vocalism dialing : The trend toward handsfree use of cell phones — California ’s latterly - enacted constabulary against carry a cellular phone earpiece to your ear while drive being the most high - visibility example — would logically go to providing user with a way to dial their iPhones without hold to take their eye off the route . The situation is even bad on the iPhone , which lack physical buttons that user could navigate by feel alone . And yet the iPhone 3 G does n’t support voice dialing , a feature that should probably be useable on a systemwide layer , not added by a third - company dialing program .
Power and battery
The iPhone 3 G tech specs claim electric battery animation of up to five hours of talk fourth dimension ( 10 if you turn off 3 G networking ) , five hours of Internet use ( six on Wi - Fi ) , seven hour of video playback , 24 minute of audio playback , and 300 60 minutes of standby time . Those specs are fundamentally the same as the one Apple claimed for the original iPhone . However , Apple arrive at these fig under examination conditions that may not necessarily reflect your own economic consumption .
Battery examination take time . We ’ll be consort battery tests of our own , and we ’ll post the determination once we have them . Anecdotally , it appears that if you employ the iPhone hard — which is a fortune easy now that there are so many snazzy new applications that take advantage of the iPhone ’s computing power and Internet connectivity — you’ll drain the shelling pretty tight . Take it from a one - year iPhone stager : institutionalize your iPhone at home and at body of work , and if you ’re someone who spends a lot of time in the motorcar , get a car charger too . laboured iPhone users wo n’t be able-bodied to go a full Clarence Shepard Day Jr. on one charge without some serious power management and restraint in using the latest and great iPhone apps .
Speaking of power , the North American edition of the iPhone 3 constant of gravitation comes with a goody magnate transcriber , a tiny cube that takes up about as minuscule space as any power adapter could . If you confiscate it to a power strip , it ’ll cover its own ballyhoo , but wo n’t impinge on other plugs , nor will it stick out over the sides . The one sacrifice of this pattern is that this arranger does n’t use Apple ’s swappable power hoopla organisation , which lets outside traveler supersede the standard North American plug with any plug from the $ 39 Apple World Travel Adapter Kit . However , the iPhone adapter itself still endure electromotive force from 100 to 240 , stand for it should work abroad with the help of a standard spark plug adaptor .
The iPhone 3 G will only accept a bearing via the five - V connection that ’s a part of the USB superpower specification ; the premature iPhone and former iPod model also corroborate charge via the FireWire specification , which allowed as much as 18 volts . If you own an survive charger , it may not be compatible — even if it does n’t have a visible FireWire hack anywhere . orchard apple tree representative say that several companies will be tender adapters to address this issue , so calculate on the physical invention of your charging accessories , you may only have to grease one’s palms an adaptor , not an entirely raw courser .
While on the topic of charging and connectivity , it ’s deserving noting that unlike the original iPhone , the iPhone 3 G comes only with a USB buck line and AC adapter , not a dock . If you want to lay your iPhone 3 gramme upright in a sour grass , you ’ll require to buy the $ 29 Apple iPhone 3 G Dock .
The AT&T factor
In the United States , iPhone 3 G owners must be AT&T client , and commit to being AT&T customers for two years . AT&T ’s 3 G datum design is $ 30 a month , up $ 10 from the data program offered to owners of the previous iPhone . In increase , heavy users of schoolbook messaging will need to ante up above and beyond the standard voice plans to cover their texting .
It ’s clean hard to judge AT&T look of the iPhone , because the experience will vary look on what you do , where you go , and who you are . I ’ve been an AT&T client ( and before that Cingular , and before that AT&T ) for age and have been comparatively glad with the armed service , but many other mass detest AT&T.
If you ’re not sure AT&T is the veracious carrier for you , despite your interest in the iPhone , I recommend that you chance someone who uses AT&T and who apply their headphone in the same lieu you do , more or less . See how their experience is . Or call for a friend to borrow their AT&T telephone for a couple of hours and take it to the places you run to use yours , so you may see for yourself .
The price
When we reviewed the original iPhone last year , a 4 GB model be $ 499 . Over the past 12 months , Apple thresh about the price of the iPhone , increased its capacity , and has now enter these new iPhone 3 G models , all of which allow a ok value . An iPhone 3 gravitational constant with twice the content of the original iPhone price $ 300 less than that phone ’s initial sticker price .
Apple has managed to drop the price so sharply by deepen its financial terms with AT&T , so that the telephone fellowship pays Apple a subsidy for each iPhone betray . In sum , this means that with the iPhone 3 gee , consumer will pay for some of the note value of the phone as a part of their monthly government note . For some users , this wo n’t make any departure . For others , it ’s quite an incentive , because it trades a single large financial hitting for a more or less increased bent of payments over a few days .
In the terminal , as with any mathematical product , it will be up to all prospective purchaser to do the mathematics and decide if the phone is worth it for them . Unlike most Apple product , the iPhone is not a gimmick with a unmarried price — it ’s a complicated combination of a tag price and a two - year monthly commitment . However , generally I have to think that produce it flashy to get your hands on an iPhone is a good move , even if the result is a higher monthly bill .
Macworld’s buying advice
If you ’ve been conservative and hold back a year for the 2nd multiplication of iPhone , your patience will be rewarded . The iPhone 3 chiliad improves on the original iPhone ’s audio lineament , offers access code to a faster data point electronic web , and sports progress - in GPS functionality . You ’ll also be amaze in on the ground story of the exciting fresh reality of third - party software system pen for the iPhone . And business users will apprise the iPhone ’s new Exchange sync feature .
If you ’re an existing iPhone user , the fact that your current phone will be able to take reward of all the iPhone 2.0 computer software features , let in Exchange synchronise and third - party coating , numb some of the excitement of this upgrade . If you live in an area with a 3 gee web and find yourself chafing at the comparatively dull hurrying of the EDGE net all the prison term , it ’s probably worth the rise . But if you do n’t mind the Internet experience on your current phone , you ’d be full off installing the 2.0 software update and holding on to your existing machine .
iPhone history
The iPhone 16 range and the iPhone SE 3 are the current - generation simulation useable from Apple . In addition to this SE 4 model we ’re also expectingiPhone 17to launch in 2025 . Below you could rule links below to our reviews of all iPhone models , include the late generation . find out more about all thenew Apple products coming this yearandwhen is the next Apple consequence . You might also want to check out our advice onwhen is the best clip to buy a fresh iPhone , ouriPhone purchasing guide , and ourcomparison of every iPhone that is available to buy today .
