New 3g Iphone

[miniwai]

Apple have just announce the new 3G iphone and it's gonna be $199 for the 8g version. See here or watch the full keynotes announcement here.

The good news:

Available 11th of July.

3G.

GPS.

8 or 16 gig.

$199 or 99 quid (free on contract in UK, although a heafty one)

2.0 firmware (which has some really good features)

Black or white versions of 16g model.

Flush headphone socket (use any headphones)

The bad news:

Although the new iphone will be release and supported in 70 countries Thailand isn't one of them! Available in Macau though!?!

Oh and still no official MMS, video or copy and paste, but this may be addressed with the SDK.

Crap camera still.

But it looks like upgrade time for me, anyone want a 2nd hand iphone 7000bt?

The good news for me: I'm back in England next week....... Every cloud has a silver lining, or so they say.

[sbk]

Not available until July 11 and at least in the US, must be bought at an AT&T store where, presumably, they will make you sign a contract.

[cophen]

Confined to the O2 network in the UK with a £30 a month contract as a minimum. Full UK pricing details here.

[miniwai]

True it is still locked to carriers in the US and UK but, at the keynotes announcement the price was stated as $199 anywhere in the world for the 8gig and in the UK at least you can get it on O2 pay as you go, granted they haven't announced the price for this yet but I’m hoping it's still gonna be 99 quid. Optimistic I know

[Ratsima]

According to Time magazine:

... AT&T and other international carriers will now be providing a subsidy—supposedly about $200 a phone — to make the device affordable enough for the masses.

[monty]

Yep, expect the iphone to be on the 400$-500$ mark without a contract (grey market)...

[moo9]

And version 2.0 is still not cracked and it seems to be more difficult to crack than the 1.x.x software.

Anyway, I am still happy with my IPhone, however over the time, I probably will buy a Nokia again as replacement.

[HDRIDER]

Buy a real phone.

http://asia.cnet.com/reviews/handhelds/0,3...3574746p,00.htm

[nikster]

The $199 price is a joke. We will just have to wait and see how and where the iPhone 3G will be available without contract. Whether it can be hacked, and whether it needs to be.

The USA seems to be hopeless - you can't even buy one without signing a 2 year agreement so there is no way grey market can continue to work like it has for the old version. So in the USA, you can activate at home - but you are going to sign a 2 year contract with AT&T in the store of they won't sell you one. No more mail ordering.

Now I don't think that's legal in several European countries, and we will just have to wait and see if the iPhone will be available there and for how much. I have heard from the U.K. that it will be possible to get one on a prepaid card - makes sense since most ppl use prepaid.

The iPhone is the best phone I have ever owned, by far. But somehow, Apple manages to create only unworkable ways to purchase it for me. Sell me the goddamn phone for a fair price, how hard can that be? Maybe we will need to wait for version 3 before they say "oh well let's just sell it like any other phone on the planet is sold". There should be an option to buy it unlocked.

[Veazer]

I'm waiting to seeing if the Meizu M8 actually makes it to production. Very impressive specs.

[slackula]

But somehow, Apple manages to create only unworkable ways to purchase it for me. Sell me the goddamn phone for a fair price, how hard can that be? Maybe we will need to wait for version 3 before they say "oh well let's just sell it like any other phone on the planet is sold". There should be an option to buy it unlocked.

Quoted for truth. Come on Apple, just sell us the da!mned thing already, stop mucking about!

[girlx]

How much do you think it will run unlocked in Hong Kong? I have a friend going over on July 17th and may have her pick me up one!

[nikster]

I'm waiting to seeing if the Meizu M8 actually makes it to production. Very impressive specs.

Meizu is impressive only for their shamelessness in ripping off Apple designs. I don't know what's so great about that, I really fail to see it. Their knock-offs are also hopelessly bad... it's like gluing a Lexus sticker on a Fortuner...

[LivinLOS]

So lets see..

Still a crappy camera (way behind other industry leaders)..

Still no flash..

Restrictive SDK and distribution of apps..

MMS ??

Copy and paste ??

Video calling ??

The only surprise is its cheap !!! But then that hinges on apples usual restrictive conditions and demands to do it apples way only.

[Prakanong]

True it is still locked to carriers in the US and UK but, at the keynotes announcement the price was stated as $199 anywhere in the world for the 8gig and in the UK at least you can get it on O2 pay as you go, granted they haven't announced the price for this yet but I'm hoping it's still gonna be 99 quid. Optimistic I know

How much will an unlocked one in the Apple Store in the UK? - the first version was about 300 GBP but it stated you could only have it serviced in coutry where you bought it.

[Veazer]

I'm waiting to seeing if the Meizu M8 actually makes it to production. Very impressive specs.

Meizu is impressive only for their shamelessness in ripping off Apple designs. I don't know what's so great about that, I really fail to see it. Their knock-offs are also hopelessly bad... it's like gluing a Lexus sticker on a Fortuner...

Meizu is hardly the only company copying the iphone concept. I think if they can deliver a reliable phone with the specs they are advertising than it could be a great phone.

A few things that attract me to the Meizu:

• I don't like the fact that Apple feels they should decide which applications are allowed, but the Meizu runs a Windows CE 6 OS and anyone can write apps for that without needing permission from some higher authority.
  
• The Meizu's screen resolution is 720x480, more than double the resolution of the iPhone, and can support 30 fps h.264 video at that resolution. Web browsing could be very usuable on this phone.
  

It appears to me they've put a fair amount of effort into creating an attractive GUI that isn't a complete rip off of the iphone.

Considering that Meizu hasn't released any phones yet, it's interesting that you've already determined that the quality is hopelessly bad. I'm waiting until i've had a chance to use it and hear reviews from others before i decide

[palm]

. it's like gluing a Lexus sticker on a Fortuner...

A distinct possibility since Lexus and Fortuner are from the same company.