Earlier today at Apple’s Worldwide Web Developers Conference, Steve Jobs officially announced what we already knew existed, the iPhone 4. As these things go, nothing announced really surprised me about the new version of the iPhone such as video chat, HD video recording, longer battery life, etc. However, there is one “feature” conspicuously missing that will hurt the iPhone 4 in the long run, 4G connectivity.
This new version was being called the “iPhone 4G” for quite awhile in the blogosphere. Speculation existed that this meant there would be a new 4G network in the works. While AT&T is probably working on developing it, the iPhone 4 announced today is meant for the 3G network and “4″ means fourth generation. The network is largely out of Apple’s control, however, I still am somewhat puzzled by why Apple has not aggressively pursued other service providers.
So, in short, I’m not going to upgrade just yet. We are on the verge of a shift towards 4G data networks, and by not offering this ahead of the game, they may have just put themselves behind. But if that Verizon iPhone comes out, I’ll be there in a heart beat.
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3 Comments
Comments
Great point Ryan. Plus I never recommend getting the first model of anything right away. There needs to be time to work out the bugs.
I don’t think I would call this the first model.
Sexting just got an upgrade.
Are there even any 4G networks over there? Lol.
I’ll probably upgrade because i skipped the 3Gs.
I’m surprised the Apple is only linked with one network in the US. The iPhone is currently available on at least 3 networks in the UK so it isn’t beyond the whit of man (Steve??) to get it sorted!
Mark
I’ve heard that the exclusivity agreement with AT&T is possibly up in 2012, but according to the Mayans, so is earth’s agreement with life.
Its kind of frustrating. We get very poor reception on our street. Would love nothing more than to see the iPhone available in ANY other service. It would be great to be able to place a call from my cell phone in my home!
I have the exact same problem over in Logan Square.
I read you can only have a video call to another phone via wlan. Also it still does not have free navigation like Android and Nokia’s Symbian.
Surely, you’ve heard of the free Waze or MotionX GPS Lite iPhone apps that give you turn by turn navigation right? Look for it in the iTunes App Store. There may be more free nav apps in there. The free nav in Android still requires 3G connection to download map data. Surely, you are aware of that right?
Uh, hello. Of course there’s not widespread 4G yet. And the 4G that Sprint is touting is WiMax, not the LTE standard that Verizon and AT&T will be pushing for in the next couple of years. Sprint WiMax is in very very minuscule parts of the country. CDMA iPhone doesn’t make sense right now since you can’t even make a phone call and use the internet at the same time. It’s like the iPhone going backwards.
Uh, Hi! LOL, I personally could care less about the ability to be on the internet and phone simultaneously. As it is now, just being able to make a phone call with AT&T that isn’t dropped is a miracle.
The feature is trivial, and the fact that AT&T plays this up as why they have such a great network is laughable. A CDMA iPhone wouldn’t be going backwards, it would be the iPhone going RELIABLE.