I love my iPhone, but....

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I honestly think my iPhone is the best phone I've ever had, but I do have a few niggles with it....

1) Can Apple not be a little more generous with the amount of cable they give you with the USB / charger cable? That way, I could actually use the phone whilst it's plugged into the wall! Or even better, how about a short AND a long lead.....

2) A real button for the camera, located in a similar position as the volume keys. Or even use the volume as the zoom when in camera mode, and make the sliding silent switch a pressable button to take the picture with? Sometimes, and depending on the type of picture and angle you're taking it from, a touch sensitive thing on the screen doesn't really work.

3) Why can't the clock icon tell the right time, like the calendar icon displays the right day?

4) Some way of displaying my current volume level. I'm forever missing calls when I'm outside with the phone in my pocket, as I turn it down once indoors and the phone gets left on a table or something. If I had a visual reminder, then I'd turn the phone up before I left.


That said, I wouldn't have any other phone, even a free HTC phone on a low talk plan wasn't enough to persuade me away. It was still a better option for me to buy a SIM free 3GS and stick to my SIM only 30 day contract. The regular talk plans were all a bit pricey and I don't like the idea of a 24 month contract anyway! Far too much commitment.....

I know I'm being highly critical, but these are my thoughts so I thought I'd share them! And anyway, it's more like constructive criticism which is never a bad thing. Maybe there's an Apple bod reading this who's gonna go away and build some of this into the iPhone5, or future software updates?!



What about you guys? Any thoughts of things you'd like to see / improvements you think Apple could make?
 
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Well, the length of cable and visual volume I can't help you with, but your # 2 and 3 are both easily attainable with apps from Cydia.
 
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I wouldn't have an iPhone if not for the jailbreak tweaks I have on it.

A couple are necessities for me, but most are, like you said, little niggles.


SMS Quick Reply so that any time I get a text it pops up on top of whatever else I'm doing and lets me reply then and there and get back to what I was doing (very important for watching video etc)

Folder Enhancer tweaks so that the folder closes after you select someting out of it (and lets you put mutiple pages of apps in a folder)

No Lock Screen, because I just like to be able to hit the home button and be in business. I'm not worried about accidentally activating my phone.

My3G, so I can take the WiFi restriction off any apps by default *Download large apps over the air, FaceTime on 3G etc)


The ability to make my phone into a WiFi hotspot (For free) is invaluable to me (MyWi from Cydia)
 
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Well, the length of cable and visual volume I can't help you with, but your # 2 and 3 are both easily attainable with apps from Cydia.

The time thing isn't a big deal, it would be nice, but at the end of the day you do get the little numeric readout at the top, and a big numeric display when it's locked and you hit the home key.

The camera button bit interests me though, how does that work then? I've said before I like to keep things the way they're meant to be (ie not jailbroken) - but then it's two months out of warranty now, so just how much support would I get from Apple anyway? I'm fairly sure with any problem I have now, the 'cure' from them would be a gentle persuasion to an iPhone 4 upgrade!

From what I've learnt here about the whole jailbreak / cydia thing, I'm quite surprised that the volume display thing isn't an option though?
 
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the length of the cables was very disappointing for me as well.

there are 3rd party supplers that have great power cords and adapters that are longer than what apple supplies. I have used Apple iPhone Accessories, Apple Accessory
many times and the prices cant be beat and the quality is fair. I got the much longer travel charger and the much longer car charger cable.

their products do ship from China, so it takes about a week to get what you ordered. but when you only pay 12 for 3 products.... its worth the wait. shipping is not much either
 
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Becoming interested in a Jailbreak, I found this article: Jailbreaking your iPhone: The pros and cons | Mobile | iOS Central | Macworld

Seems pretty unbiased to me, and not being techy at all, it does deter me a bit....


I'll check out that article and get back to you with my opinion of it as someone who's been jailbreaking for 3 years on 4 different models of iPhone.

As for the camera thing, there's an app called activator, and you can assign things like tapping the volume button to instantly launch camera and take a picture and stuff like that....
 
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While it appears unbiased at first glance, it doesn't do a good job of listing pros and the cons are generally non issiues, to wit:
In his first CON, 'who do you trust' he plainly admits that he's had no problem and has heard of no problem like he lists, yet he still lists it.
In the second 'open to attack' he specifically mentions enabling SSH, which most users should not do. Its not like it happens automatically, its a concious decision by the user.
Battery life and stability issues again come down to what is put on the phone, its not like they happen just from jailbreaking, again the packages must be installed that cause these problems
It is a valid point about the updates, however there is really no need to update every time Apple releases one. I'm still running 4.0.1, and the "security fixes" that Apple has released were availible to me from Cydia before Apple even addressed the update.


Basically, think of a jailbroken iPhone like a Windows computer.
You have to be mindful of what software you put on it. Would you just go to a porn website and download whatever pops up in the Flash dialoge on the screen? Of course not. You have to take some responsibility. Know what you're downloading, and what it will do to your computer.
Same with your iDevice.
Too many people just put anything and everything on there, including conflicting programs and apps that it says right in the description are unstable.

Don't be an idiot and you should be fine.

I've run 4 iPhones, all of them jailbroken.
I currently have an iPhone 4 and its jailbroken. While I like the customizable tweaks (some of which I listed earlier), things like SBSettings and MyWi are MUST HAVES for me to really feel I'm getting the most out of my iPhone. There's literally nothing that an Android phone can do that I can't with my iPhone, and you definitely can't say that about a stock iPhone
 
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I've been using a standard USB extension cable inline between the apple cable and the power adapter at work for over a year with no ill effects. I haven't tried syncing that way but USB is USB and I don't think there would be any issues.

-Mike
 
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Basically, think of a jailbroken iPhone like a Windows computer.

Don't be an idiot and you should be fine.


I don't want to worry about what I'm doing with the phone, as I am sometimes an idiot! I want it to just work, with no real consideration.

I think I'll stick to what Mr Jobs will allow me to do....!

But thanks though Weiser, you obviously know your stuff. I really appreciate your time and thoughts, it's made the whole debate much clearer in my mind.
 
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the length of the cables was very disappointing for me as well.

there are 3rd party supplers that have great power cords and adapters that are longer than what apple supplies. I have used Apple iPhone Accessories, Apple Accessory
many times and the prices cant be beat and the quality is fair. I got the much longer travel charger and the much longer car charger cable.

their products do ship from China, so it takes about a week to get what you ordered. but when you only pay 12 for 3 products.... its worth the wait. shipping is not much either


I've been using a standard USB extension cable inline between the apple cable and the power adapter at work for over a year with no ill effects. I haven't tried syncing that way but USB is USB and I don't think there would be any issues.

-Mike



Both good solutions, thanks guys!

I still think Apple should stop being so tight, and give us a long and short cable in the box though.......!
 
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I have several USB extension cables for all my chargers. Makes life so much easier as I can have my iPad/iPhone in front of me while it's plugged into the wall several feet away.

I got my cables from Monoprice. Ridiculously cheap and you can pick which length you want. I got the 3' cables and they seemed to work for me.
 

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+1 on the 3' USB extension cable. I went into the Apple store in St Louis looking for a longer power adapter cable and one of the Apple reps recommended I go that route. Works great and relatively cheap.
I also ordered a 6' USB extension (we have 2 iPads and 2 iPhones) but so far have kept it partly coiled up so the 3' length looks to be ideal for my use.
 
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I'm gonna resurrect this thread with my latest thoughts on improving the iPhone:

1) When I'm on a call, I want it to not screech in my ear when I get a text message or notification. If there's a way to change that, then Apple have hidden it well! A discreet beep is all that's needed here...

2) Some form of batch settings (similar to 'Profiles' on the Nokia phones I used to own) For example, I only use Facebook for personal stuff, so I'm not interested in that beeping away all day at work. I prefer the phone to be as quiet as possible when it's on the coffee table in front of me, but as loud as possible when I'm out and about. I'd say two short clicks on the power button to bring up a list of customisable batch settings.

3) I'm forever putting a small 'a' in front of a word I want to capitalise, it would be nice if the phone could recognise that I meant to capitalise that word, and suggest the correction as it does for spelling mistakes.

4) Still on the auto correct thing, when the same word has a different ending like say 'bluff, bluffed, bluffing etc. Why can't the phone suggest that list instead of just one word? It's more relevant on longer words, but my minds gone blank and I can't think of an example right now! It's no big deal, but it would make that sort of thing simpler.



What do you guys think? Have you got any other niggles you'd like to see changed?
 

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