iPhone. do you?

After nearly two years, I’ve finally broken down and gotten an iPhone. If ever there was a device that moved in and started a makeover, this is it.

First of all, I didn’t get it for the calls, or the Internet, or the embedded iPod, or the plethora of apps, or the coolness factor, or the price coming down (and discovering I could get a substantial discount).

Nope. I got it for the GPS. And I’ve got 26 more days to figure out if I want to keep it, so I’m doing a lot of testing.

If you’ve ever asked me for directions, you know why; I’m spatially dysphasic, i.e., I have a chronic inability to translate a 2D map or spoken direction into 3D space. Or, as a former boss once put it, “Cynthia can get lost going around her own block.”

I’m a prime candidate for a GPS system, but never bought one for the car because I traveled too much. My purse is crammed full of devices already and I refuse to get a bigger one to accommodate a GPS unit. (As I’ve mentioned before, my goal is to consolidate ALL devices into a single, tiny gizmo. A bit to my astonishment, the 3G comes pretty close.)

When Google Maps became available for my Verizon Treo, I was delighted…right up until last week, when the bridge it told me to cross was closed. Google’s “My Location” doesn’t work with the Treo, mostly because Verizon blocks it so it can charge for its own GPS offering, so I used about ten bucks worth of gas and was a half hour late finding my destination on my own.

That did it. I’d already been, er, eyeing the iPhone and was tickled by the notion that I could actually control my voicemail. (Verizon’s voicemail storage policy is antediluvian and has more than once gotten in the way of an emergency)

So I hit up an AT&T phone store, asked dozens of questions and probably drove the guys there nuts, but finally bought the 16 GB iPhone 3G, signed up for a two-year service plan, and named the thing Gigi.

So far, Gigi is proving to be a slick, stylish piece of electronics that I probably should have named Colette. She is remarkably powerful and easy to use…except when she’s not.

The great stuff (so far): GPS. Gigi doesn’t offer turn-by-turn voice command (yet), but the Google/iPhone pairing is otherwise all I could have hoped for. She locates me accurately on a marked satellite map, tells me what the traffic’s doing and draws out the route to my destination with very clear directions. If I don’t stop watching the little blue pin (Gigi, on the map) moving with my car, I’m going to have an accident.

Gigi’s video is absolutely sharp, sound is great and I’m watching it a lot more than I thought I would. Ditto for music and such, with the embedded iPod. I’ve transferred my iTunes playlist from Freddie to Gigi without incident (more about that later).

Talk quality is better than I’d been led to expect, although disappointingly, my favorite B&O headset will need an adapter before it’ll connect to Gigi. There is no built-in voice dialing (a must for hands-free car use), but I’m going to try several apps that add it and see which I like best.

Web, e-mail, anything connective is surprisingly fast, and even the Edge network isn’t all that slow. WiFi is also pretty good, although I’m told that it’ll chomp on my beloved GPS unless I turn it off.

Movies. I’ve been scoffing for years at the notion of watching a movie on a phone. This week I did just that, with my studio headset on, and really got a kick out of it. Of course, at a bit more than 1G per movie, I won’t exactly keep a library on Gigi, but still…

The not-so-great stuff: Data transfer. Freddie Mac can’t talk with iTunes servers right now, and for various reasons I can’t get Gigi to talk to them until Freddie is back online. That lets me out of all those useful apps, as well as transferring contact data and other details. And, quite frankly, that makes Gigi a whole lot less useful than I’d hoped. It’s going to take a trip to the repair shop to work this out (thank heavens for AppleCare), and now it has to happen sooner rather than later.

Headset. The included earbuds hurt my ears and, unless they’re already in place, take so long to insert and connect that I miss the call. There’s definitely a bluetooth headset (or something similar) in my future.

Overall interface. Gigi’s determined to do a makeover on me and assimilate me firmly into the iPhone camp. To truly use her (and understand where the heck she puts stuff) I have to think like Gigi (or maybe like Steve Jobs), and it’s up to me to learn her ways, not the other way ’round. Of course, that’s no different than any other computer interface (Windows being a famous example), but I think some of her UI “innovations” are actually there to be cool, not more usable. Which brings me to…

The really bad stuff: The keyboard. Yuck. Ick. Pfui. There’s that style thing again. The iPhone MUST be thin and sleek and cool-looking, which means EVERYthing is done through the screen. No control buttons (except for volume, lock and mute) and most especially no keyboard. Instead, you tap tiny little video keys on the touchscreen. Even with my tiny fingers, it’s easy to make mistakes.

Just now, typing “the keyboard sucks” came out “The kevboakr uxjas.” Apple compensates with predictive algorithms that propose the correct spelling based on stuff you’ve typed before (or their dictionary), and it’s easy enough to use. (the word is presented below your cursor and you press the video space bar to accept) However, it slows down your typing considerably. I suspect I’ll be texting and emailing a LOT less than I did with the Treo.

It’s less a problem there, though, than with searches and entering passwords, which pretty much means trouble when you use GPS, try to find a contact in your list, buy stuff, enter new contacts, etc., etc.

Gigi would have been bloody near perfect if she’d had a slide-out keyboard. She wants me to get over it and learn to love her as she is but at the moment I’m ISO a small portable USB keyboard.

(Addendum: So far no luck on the USB keyboard. An Apple Geniusperson pointed out, however, that a “soft” keyboard, unlike hardware keyboards, is upgradable and in fact was improved with the last iPhone OS change. Still, however upgradeable, this keyboard borders on unusable.)

That’s it for now; as I learn more about Gigi and her mysterious ways I’ll let you know.

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