iPhone 2.0 OS on 1.0 Hardware

I’ve been playing with it since yesterday, and so far it’s a big meh.

Here’s a screen shot from my iPhone:

Super Monkey Ball is fun, but so far I haven’t seen anything in the app store that makes me excited.  I am excited about the potential for good stuff though and I think we’ll see a lot of specialized “can’t live without” apps once the dust settles.

But…

If you already have a 1st gen iPhone there is no reason to go stand in line for the 3G iPhone.

Reasons?   Yes, I have a few.

16 Gigs isn’t enough memory.  In fact there’s no real memory upgrade over the late first gen iPhones.  Let’s talk again when it’s 32 or 64 Gigs.  Or better yet add a memory slot.

AT&T’s 3G coverage sucks.

iPhone GPS doesn’t allow turn by turn directions.  That and GPS not working indoors anyway means that GPS based location sensing isn’t going to be nearly as useful as touted.

Still no user replaceable battery.  There’s just no excuse.

Crippled Bluetooth:  Still no wireless Stereo or BT DUN or anything else useful.

3G iPhone has the same crappy 2 MP camera the first gen had.

AT&T’s price plans for the 3G iPhone are worse than the 1st generation plans.

First gen iPhones get the 2.0 firmware anyway.

So the bottom line is that the only difference between a 2.5G and 3G iPhone is 3G speed when you can get it and GPS localization when you’re outside.    To me, that’s not enough to buy a new iPhone.

If I didn’t have an iPhone, then I’d buy one now because the initial price for the 3G iPhone is much cheaper than the first gen iPhone and the AT&T service plan is the same rip-off you get with any other smart phone on their network.

I expect to see a 3G iPhone in a few months with more memory.   Then, next year we’ll see a new version, hopefully with a better camera and more memory and a bluetooth stack that does something useful.