THE iPHONE

Following the success of iPod, Apple announced the iPhone in January 2007. The announcement was preceded by rumors and speculations that circulated for several months. The iPhone was introduced, first in the United States on June 29, 2007 with much media frenzy and then in the United Kingdom, Germany and France in November 2007. It was named Time magazine’s Invention of the Year in 2007. A new version of Apple’s iPhone was introduced in 2008 that is capable of operating on faster 3G cellular networks.

In 2010, a new generation of iPhone was introduced, the 4G. Since it’s release the 3G prices have taken a drastic reduction, making it more affordable to the average consumer. Many argue that other than an unnoticed increase in speed, the 4G offers little in benefit over the 3G to justify the expense of obtaining the latest generation of iPhone.

History

The genesis of the iPhone began with Apple CEO Steve Jobs’ direction that Apple engineers investigate touch-screens. At the time he had been considering having Apple work on tablet PCs.
Comments made by Jobs in April 2003 at the “D: All Things Digital” executive conference expressed his belief that tablet PCs and traditional PDAs were not good choices as high-demand markets for Apple to enter, despite many requests made to him that Apple create another PDA. He did believe that cell phones were going to become important devices for portable information access.
On January 9, 2007, Jobs announced the iPhone at the Macworld convention, receiving substantial media attention, and on June 11, 2007 announced at the Apple’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference that the iPhone would support third-party applications using the Safari engine on the device. Third-parties would create the Web 2.0 applications and users would access them via the Internet. On October 17, 2007 Apple announced that an iPhone software development kit would be made available in February 2008, allowing developers to create native applications that take full advantage of the iPhone’s application programming interface.
On July 25, 2007 Apple announced in their 2007 Q3 sales report and conference call that they sold 270,000 iPhones in the first 30 hours on launch weekend. AT&T reported 146,000 iPhones activated in the same time period. Apple anticipated selling their millionth iPhone in the first full quarter of availability, and anticipates selling 10 million iPhones by the end of their 2008 fiscal year. On September 10, 2007, Apple announced sales of 1 million iPhones. This was followed by Apple’s 2007 fourth quarter earnings announcement on October 22, 2007 which put total iPhone sales at 1.39 million with 1.12 million sold that quarter.
On November 21, 2007, T-Mobile announced it would sell the phone “unlocked” and without a T-Mobile contract, caused by a preliminary injunction against T-Mobile put in place by their competitor Vodafone. In Germany, a company is not allowed to lock the SIM card to itself. On December 4, 2007, a German court decided to grant T-Mobile exclusive rights to sell the iPhone with the SIM card locked, overturning the temporary injunction. In addition, T-Mobile will unlock the iPhone at the termination of a customer’s contract.
The iPhone normally prevents access to its media player and web features unless it has also been activated as a phone with an authorized carrier. On July 3, 2007, Jon Lech Johansen reported on his blog that he had successfully bypassed this requirement and unlocked the iPhone’s other features with a combination of custom software and modification of the iTunes binary. He published the software and offsets for others to use.

Specifications
The specifications as listed on Apple’s website are:
Screen size: 8.9 cm (3.5 in)
Screen resolution: 320×480 pixels at 160 ppi
Input method: Multi-touch screen interface (the “Home” button is the iPhone’s only physical front panel button)
Operating System: OS X
Storage: 8 GB flash memory (originally: 4 or 8 GB choice)
Quad Band GSM (GSM 850, GSM 900, GSM 1800, GSM 1900)
Wi-Fi (802.11g), EDGE and Bluetooth 2.0 with EDR
2 megapixel camera
Built-in rechargeable, non-removable battery with up to 8 hours of talk, 6 hours of Internet use, 7 hours of video playback, and up to 24 hours of audio playback, lasting over 250 hours on standby.
Size: 115×61×11.6 mm (4.5×2.4×0.46 in)
Weight: 135 g (4.8 oz)
Digital SAR of 0.974 W/kg
An analysis of the iPhone’s firmware has revealed that the main Samsung chip (designated S5L8900) contains an ARM 1176 processor, together with a PowerVR MBX 3D graphics co-processor.

Web connectivity

The iPhone is able to access the World Wide Web via a modified version of the Safari web browser when connected to a Wi-Fi or an EDGE network. It is not able to utilize AT&T’s 3G or AT&T’s HSDPA network in the U.S.. Steve Jobs has stated 3G would need to become more widespread and much more energy efficient before it’s included in the iPhone. By default, the iPhone will ask to join newly discovered Wi-Fi networks and prompt for the password when required, while also supporting manually joining closed Wi-Fi networks. When Wi-Fi is active, it will automatically switch from the EDGE network to any nearby previously approved Wi-Fi network.
Before the launch, some reviewers found the EDGE network “excruciatingly slow,” with the iPhone taking as long as 100 seconds to download the Yahoo! home page for the first time. Immediately before the launch the observed speed of the network increased to almost 200 kbit/s. This is probably due to the new “Fine EDGE” upgrades AT&T had been making to their network prior to the launch.
The EDGE network benefits iPhone users by providing greater availability than 3G, as 3G continues its expansion to most major cities in the United States. Most countries outside the United States have very little EDGE infrastructure in place. For example, the United Kingdom’s EDGE infrastructure amounts to less than 30 percent. As a result, many users outside major cities will have to browse the Internet on GPRS, a much slower protocol.
The web browser displays full web pages as opposed to simplified pages as on most non-smartphones. The iPhone does not support Flash or Java technology. Web pages may be viewed in portrait or landscape mode and supports automatic zooming by pinching together or spreading apart fingertips on the screen, or by double-tapping text or images.
Apple developed an iPhone application for accessing Google’s maps service in map or satellite form, a list of search results, or directions between two locations, while providing optional real-time traffic information. During the product’s announcement, Jobs demonstrated this feature by searching for nearby Starbucks locations and then placing a prank call to one with a single tap. Apple also developed a separate application to view YouTube videos on the iPhone. Since these first applications, an entire Apps industry was soon launched by Apple and private developers.