Aramation Mobile

Bell has announced this morning that they will be selling Apple’s iPhone 3G and 3GS, ending Rogers’ exclusivity deal. Running on the brand new HSPA network that Bell and Telus jointly built, agreeing Apple to drop the exclusivity is a huge win for Bell. It is rumored that Telus also will be selling iPhones but no announcements have been made. Full (and short) press release:

MONTREAL, ON, Oct. 6 2009 — Bell and Apple have reached an
agreement to bring iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS to Canada this November.
To learn more about Bell’s new 3G network, please visit bell.ca/network
or bell.ca/reseau.

Bell is Canada’s largest communications company, providing consumers and
business with solutions to all their communications needs, including Bell
Mobility wireless, high-speed Bell Internet, Bell TV direct-to-home satellite
television, Bell Home phone local and long distance, and IP-broadband and
information and communications technology (ICT) services. Bell is proud to be
a Premier National Partner and the exclusive Telecommunications Partner to
the Vancouver 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games.
Bell is wholly owned by BCE Inc. (TSX, NYSE: BCE). For information on
Bell’s products and services, please visit bell.ca. For BCE corporate
information, please visit bce.ca.

iPhone (and its phoneless sibling iPod Touch) has seen its countless share of games and applications. Who knew a convenient marketplace would lead to such a development! Fieldrunners for the iPhone is a simple tower defence game where the goal is to prevent a group of nasties from reaching one end of the map by installing defence structures. The game gives you 6 types of structures: machine gun, goo that’ll slow down enemies, rocket and flamethrower with splash damage, lightning and heavy artillery. Each of these structures can be upgraded to increase the damage as well as area of effectiveness. Overall, it’s a standard gameplay with great art direction. Visuals are vibrant and the game runs pretty smoothly on your iPhone (although towards the latter stages with the map full of defensive structures, you will notice some dip in framerate.

The game’s simple nature and addictive proven gameplay of tower defence, it is no wonder that it made Time’s list of Top 10 videogames of 2008.

[Download Fieldrunners - opens in iTunes]

Now that I’ve been using the iPhone 3G for a few weeks, I’ve come to grips with its many positives such as large touchscreen, wealth of programs available in one convenient online store, and the best music player in the market. However Apple still does not have a perfect device and these are some of the problems with the phone.

Reliability Issues
It’s a bit odd to hear people claim Apple’s softwares aren’t buggy, unlike Windows counterparts. In my case, iTunes clearly demonstrates Apple has a long way to go to create reliable software on the Windows platform. iTunes itself is bloaded with unappealing visuals yet surprisingly high resource usage. Sometimes it doesn’t even want to start the application.

Coupling iTunes with iPhone 3G, it occasionally causes my Vista computer to display that dreaded blue screen of death (BSOD). For the record, iTunes is the only software I’ve ever used on my computer that crashed the entire OS.

AppStore can’t update apps
This is a peculiar problem I started having after updating to 2.1 firmware. If I access the AppStore on the iPhone 3G and update the applications, it fails giving me an error message that I should connect the phone to a computer and use the AppStore from iTunes. The problem is, iTunes does not recognize that the application is supposed to be installed on the phone. In the alternative, I try to update the applications directly from iTunes, and that fails as well. Installing, updating and uninstalling applications have to be reliable. I’ve had less issues on this front with my previous phone T-Mobile Shadow and that runs on the often-derided Windows Mobile.

General lag
It is frustrating when you try to use the touchscreen (for example to scroll through the contact list) and nothing happens. Contacts and e-mails can get unresponsive every now and then, preventing you from using the phone. Making matters worse is sometimes a lag is present when you try to answer the call. Apple’s design did not afford a hardware button to answer a call, which means a finger swipe is the only way to take the call. I’ve had several calls I intended to take go to voicemail just because the phone doesn’t recognize my finger swipe to answer the call.

Organizing the applications
This isn’t really a bug in the software but it is still very annoying that there is no easy way to organize applications’ order on your home screen. The only method is this primitive icon based approach where if you move one icon, everything gets moved to create space. Windows desktop may not be the most efficient, but it lets me place icons wherever I want to, in whatever order I desire. Even worse, there is no way to create hierarchy (like you can in the menus) so you can’t really put secondary or tertiary applications away from the main home screen.

As Apple continuously puts out iPhone updates, it is only time before these issues are address (maybe with the exception of new home screen).

PageOnce is an incredibly useful aggregator that’s available for free. What it does is it remembers your login information to various websites, ranging from e-mail such as Live Hotmail, utilities such as your cell phone provider and social networks. It can even keep track of pesky information such as your frequent flyer mileage, Starbucks cash card balance and your YouTube profile.

With the launch of the iTunes App Store, PageOnce has released its free application for the iPhone, and it works as intended. Once you set up your information on PageOnce.com, it will be available on your iPhone. Setting up is easy (as all you have to do is enter the PageOnce.com login information), and looking at the data is simplistic. The program feels sluggish when it comes to downloading your account information, but it still beats having to login to every one of those sites individually.

In short, if you’re already using PageOnce, getting your data mobile is an easy step when you have an iPhone or iPod Touch. After all, this mobile version is free as well.

[Read my review of PageOnce.com here | Visit PageOnce.com and create your account]

Today is July 11th 2008, and that means iPhone 3G is finally launching in Canada on Fido and Rogers. Reviews are slowly trickling in and most of it is positive, as the iPhone 3G improves upon the regular iPhone in both hardware and software deparments.

All Things Digital: “If you’ve been waiting to buy an iPhone until it dropped in price, or ran on faster cell networks, you might want to take the plunge”

Engadget: “For our money, you’re going to have a hard time finding a better device for two hundred bucks – or maybe even for any price.”

USA Today: “Still not perfect, but really close”

According to insider rumors, Apple has decided not to carry the iPhone 3G when it launches in just a few days. Instead, people will have to try Rogers and Fido stores if they want it. This is in an apparent spat over Rogers’ exorbitant monthly service fees that require 3 year contract. Apple has also apparently diverted a lot of the stock originally intended for the Canadian market.

Rogers has finally unveiled what it will charge you for monthly use of the iPhone 3G. Unlike previously rumored, unlimited data is not part of the deal.

All plans include unlimited evenings and weekends for voice, unlimited received text messages and unlimited visual voicemail. Also Rogers is throwing in unlimited access to Fido and Rogers branded Wi-Fi hotspots. Additional options are $15 value pack including Caller ID, Who Called, Caller Ring Trax, 2500 sent text messages and 2500 call forwarding minutes, and $20 value pack that adds 7500 additional sent text messages as well as early evenings (starting at 6PM).

Well the rumors were correct after all… Apple just unveiled the updated iPhone to be release on July 11 in 22 markets (including United States, of course). Big news is the price which is $199 for 8GB model, and $299 for the 16GB model. For the first time, there will be a second color available as the 8GB model has black back and 16GB model will have a white back.

Apart from inclusion of 3G network access, it will also feature built in GPS.

Sprint announced its iPhone-killer Samsung Instinct. Featuring 3.1 inch touchscreen, it bests Apple’s iPhone in several areas including EV-DO Rev A, GPS, haptic feedback, customizable home screen, expandable memory and even GPS navigation.

SPECIFICATIONS
• Dimensions: 2.17 x 4.57 x 0.49 inches; 4.4 ounces
• Display: 3.1″ TFT (240 x 432 pixels and 262K vibrant colors)
• Standard Lithium (LiIon) battery: up to 5.75 hours continuous talk time

ENTERTAINMENT/PERSONALIZATION
• Sprint TV® with an extensive selection of live and on-demand programming including Sprint Exclusive Entertainment (SEE), the industry’s only made-for-mobile sports and entertainment video
programming network
• Sprint Music StoreSM allowing users to wirelessly download full-length songs directly to their phone for just 99 cents each
• More than a dozen streaming-radio applications, including Sprint Radio with more than 150 channels
• Sprint Media Manager PC to phone transfer application
• Background music mode allowing the user to play music while text messaging, playing games or surfing the Internet
• Customizable Favorites menu

PRODUCTIVITY
• Sprint Navigation with GPS-enabled audio and visual turn-by-turn driving directions, one-click traffic rerouting and more than 10 million local listings
• Live Search for Sprint, powered by Microsoft, provides easy access to directory information, integrated GPS-enabled directions, interactive maps and one-touch click to call access
• Voice to Action button providing many functions using voice activation including call, text, picture messaging, traffic, movie, sports, news and search.
• HTML Web browsing
• Visual Voicemail allowing users to listen to messages in their order of preference and manage them with a tap of the screen
• 2.0 megapixel camera with 2x digital zoom and video camcorder
• Advanced Stereo Bluetooth® Wireless Technology with audio caller ID
• Access to corporate and consumer (POP3) email including AOL, Gmail and Yahoo!
• Threaded text messaging provides a view of the full conversation
• Mobile Sync to restore contact information if the device is lost, stolen or damaged
• Phone as Modem connects the phone with a computer for Internet and email access

Apple just announced and made available 16GB iPhone, doubling the storage of existing model. Priced at $499.00 USD, the new model doesn’t seem to contain any other updates.

Press release after the jump:

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