Sadface. I am going to have to let you all down with a very short piece I am afraid. Sorry. Oh, why?

Well, as you all probably know, I am not paid to do this, nor do I have advertising to get you to click, or suchlike as some sites do. No, I do this for fun :-)

And the fact is, iPhone 4 has me totally at this point, hook, line and sinker. Antenna Gate, Smantenna Gate, I just love the whole thing, and nothing else is coming close.

Sorry Android folks, I do keep trying, and will doubtless lose money again when the Galaxy S goes on eBay soon, but I just can not do it. I am going to try to tell you why, but I doubt you will get it, I am not sure I get it myself to be honest.

So, I bought the Galaxy S while away for a few days, I needed a bit of tech and it was cheapish, only £329 on O2 and that included an (unwanted..bah) SIM card with £10 on it. Bonus was it is unlocked as well.

Back to my motorhome, and fire it up, screen is bloody lovely, really nice. Sign into Google, no need to activate it like iPhone, and no need to have  PC or Mac to do so. Good stuff. But setup is only a one time affair, so does it count for much, really.

First thing I need is Twitter, so off to get the official App from the Market Place, after all, the same dev on iPhone has the best Twitter client by miles, so this will be great right. Wrong. On Android its horrible, truly horrible, and I soon dump it and get the great Seesmic, the closest thing I can find on Android for now. 

But it is still not great. I use Twitter a lot now, a real lot, and on iPhone its so slick, read a tweet, hit the link, it opens in Tweetie 2 (its just Twitter now on iPhone but I will ALWAYS see it as Tweetie 2 :-), and I hit the little arrow icon, hit Read Later, which rather confusingly sends the article to InstaPaper, which, I can read at my own pace, online, offline, on the web, on my iPhone, or on my iPad. On my Android, nope, no Instapaper for me. Or you.

Of course, you will already be hitting comments, or emailing me to say there is an Instapaper clone for Android. Yeah, I know, but I don't want clone, I want original.

But hell, its only Twitter, lets move on to email. This has to be better than iPhone surely? 

Its damned easy to setup, give them that, but oddly, reading it via the Gmail client is not as good as you may think, first of all, if you want pictures, you appear to have to click each time, and if you want to go back to inbox, you have to use either menu and click a link, or use the back key. And if you want to read newer mail, again, you have to use the menu each time. OK, in 2.2 there is a forward and back icon on screen, but this is 2.1, with no fixed date for 2.2.

Can you imagine the fuss if Apple said tomorrow, "we are pleased to announce the iPhone XYZ, and it comes with iOS 3.1.3"  Can you? But Android suppliers from HTC to Samsung, to seem to do this over and over again, and think there is nothing wrong with that?

On iPhone, email is so easy, pictures always load, and no side to side scrolling required, WTF is that all about Goggle? A little up and down arrow for newer or older, and an arrow for back to Inbox, so simple, so slick.

What about Keyboards. If I really have to tell you how many light years ahead the iOS keyboard if from any Android keyboard, well, honestly, you have never used an iPhone keyboard for any length of time. The Galaxy S one is especially poor, and yes of course I know I have endless choice of keyboard on Android, unlike that nasty locked down iOS thing, but here is the whole point, one keyboard is plenty when it is as good as iPhone's keyboard.

OK, web browsing then, surely Galaxy S wins here? Nope. Look, its only Apple's webkit that allows your Androiders to have a pretty good web experience anyway, and don't you forget it!  I will call this one a draw, well until you need a bloody keyboard in the web browser.......oh, and still no Instapaper, which is like have Chips, without vinegar.

But please, I hear you cry, there must be something about Galaxy S that is better than iPhone, surely, please, just one thing? Maybe it holds signal better? As you all know by now, iPhone 4 can not make ANY calls, nor does it hold ANY signal once you get within 10 feet of the steel band........well OK, Gizmodo mode off......but no, sorry, in a weak signal area, the Galaxy S seems to fair a bit worse than iPhone 4 does on same network etc, and although I can not be arsed to join the world and his cat doing more death grip videos, I promise you the iPhone 4, does pretty damned well on my weak signal here.

So, that is it, sorry if I upset anyone, it is only MY opinion, and remember the old proverb, "opinions are like arseholes, everybody has got one"

:-)

Kev

Just this week on PSC, I called the whole thing a non issue for me, and it is fair to say I only use the phone side a few seconds each day, some days, no calls at all, and even SMS is pretty low for me, maybe 3 a day.

I hope I have never said or implied others were not having the issue, and for at least the last two PSC shows, I have said, "if you want a phone first and foremost, get a Nokia"

That is more than a throwaway line, I just actually do believe that most Nokia phones, with a couple of notable exceptions, are much better at holding a signal that most Apple and Android phones.

My take on Steve today was that he did what he had to do, and did it well. The whole point about today was not about the technical side of things, but it was a PR issue, and it was Steve wanting to take the story back, and not let scum bags like Gizmodo set the agenda as some sort of childish revenge for the whole stolen phone row.

In the US, much like the UK, there is a whole sub class of sneering people now, who pop up on all sorts of subjects, and just have to knock successful people, or indeed companies. A class of people who somehow seem to have to mock and disrespect others in some silly attempt to cover up their own boring lives!

I think what we saw today will clearly be viewed in several different ways, but broadly speaking, you will have my view which is that Steve did pretty well, seemed human, sincere, and seemed to genuinely want to explain things to people, and to give it a sense of perspective. I was starting to get a little pissed off with Apple for the responses they had given, but in the main, Steve has my trust and respect back.

The other view from the haters, will be easy to spot, look out for words like Apple Fanboy (ironic as almost always written by Android FB's), iSheep, Sheeple, and crApple. These will be the people who are, right as I write this, tweeting and re-tweeting the old "Apple held their Press Conference the wrong way" jokes. I have no idea what these people would be happy with regards Apple, although they all seem to forget that without the iPhone, the fantastic Android devices they now enjoyed would simply not exist, and would look like a poor Blackberry clone!

Oh, and it was not the offer of a free case, I really am not bothered about it, and unless I can actually get a Bumper, I will likely pass on the offer. I think the most important fact today was the 3 million sales data. We are getting used to some stunning figures from Apple these days, but come on, one phone, one model, and premium priced at that, and they are shifting 137,000 phones a day, and only getting returns of 1.7% for ALL reasons. When you add in that they could probably sell twice as many if they had stock.....

And that brings us to the main point really, surely, with that many phones out there, there would be a huge number of returns if this issue was half as serious as the web would have you believe? 

The only negative for me was the showing of the other smartphones, but I think they had little choice with all the iPhone ones out there (including mine!) and I think they were pretty fair in model choice, certainly in my experience they could have shown far worse signal loss with Nexus One, but I think they decided to not upset Google any further, now is not the time for a war with Google. 

Just got the new version, £49.95 and if you tell them you have the old one they don't make you top up £10.

Now, if you want, you can use Topcashback to get £12 cash back on one of these, or if you don't want to, use this link and I will get the £12 :-)

So, how is it? The main advantage over the old one is no messing about having to press loads of buttons to get this working. I just starting charging it via USB, and turned it on. That was it (I have the 12GB 3 SIM already remember)

It also has a nice little display, as you can see in the photo above, and as you will also see, it is not the strongest signal in the world but it does have H (High Speed). The other indicators are telling you that you have two text messages, and 1 device is connected to the Mi-Fi, and also a little display of how much data has been used.

So, speeds? Well, I averaged out Speedtest.Net over 3 tests, and got 2.06 mbps Down, and 0.46 Up, Ping of 197ms

My home BT 8MB ADSL gave me 3.88 Down, 0.38 Upload, and Ping 66ms

All in all, I think for £50, (or £70 with 3GB/3 months of Data) this has to be the deal of the summer!

More photos.

Yes, the iPhone 4 has been out for less than 20 days, and has now sold what, 3 million? More? Come on, what other single product can you name that has sold that many units in 18 days? I saw some tweets today, one said that Samsung had sold 300k Galaxy S in the same period, probably a whole lot of them were free with a contract, and lets be fair, that phone is getting some serious promotion at the moment.

I was prompted to write this after reading this blog post HERE although to pick this one out is probably unfair as there are so many of them. One of the things I find frustrating about the internet these days is that it is hard to sort out the wheat from the chaff, so many of these websites are so plastered in advertising, it is hard not to conclude that these stories are simply linkbait, and what better subject to get people to your website than having a go at Apple? Of course, the argument could be made that I am doing the same here, but as the site does not really have adverts......

So, what has kicked all of this off again? Consumer Reports, an American testing organisation very similar to "Which" here in the UK. Now, it gets a little confusing at this point, as if you take a read of this HERE blog post, it seems that the iPhone 4 wins the latest round of comparisions, and then the same organisation says "we can not recommend it" 

Just to confuse the whole thing, Consumer Reports, just like our own Which Reports, have one main aim in life, and that is to get you to subscribe to read the reports, so maybe the more confusing, the better for signups?

OK, so to the point of this, the Signal Issue. I have been using the iPhone 4 for all of 18 days now, and can tell you without doubt that it is better than the 3GS, and about the same as a Nexus One for signal holding.  You only have to look at the chap above who keeps changing his mind to see how confusing this whole thing is, and the main thing to remember is that the whole issue is so hard to pin down, even from the same location, on different days, you may be on a different tower, you may be on the same tower with a lot more traffic, and a whole slew of other factors.

The other thing I keep reading is "oh, it has Phone in its name and you can't even make a call with it" and "people need this thing to operate as a Phone, that is its main use" 

I know I am not the only person who makes and gets very few calls, and does not care so much how great it is as a phone, but what amazes me is why people have to be either for or against Apple so strongly on this issue, and that is why I try and tread the middle ground if possible, and say look, if you really rely on a PHONE to do business, get a Nokia, and if you want the best all round device available today, get the iPhone 4!

Wow, take a look at this little lot folks, they are all the PRIVATE and PERSONAL property of one person, and no, that person is not a reviewer, nor is he (or she?) a mobile industry mogul. No, just like you and me, he (or she?) is just into phones, in a rather big way, and these are all purchased by him (or her) , either Sim Free, or with a contract, of which he (or she?)  does have err.....more than a  couple shall we say!

Now, all of these are for sale, and I have nabbed one, as has Tim, but if you are interested in any of them, let me know, and I will see if my mystery friend will let me put you in touch with him (or her:-)

UPDATE: A few of these have now gone, and I will cross them out below, also a few of them are not actually for sale as the owner is keeping them, and is only selling them to make some space to buy more :-)

Now, I can not reveal his (or her) identity (yet!) as they are a little shy, and are for some reason embarrased by this collection :-) Now i am trying to get him (or her) to do a little spot on the Phones Show.......watch this space....

So, what have we got here? Deep breath......

Blackberry:

8520
9000
9700      (Not for sale)
9520

Nokia

6021
6120
E71
N95 8GB
N97
N86 8GB   (Not for sale)
N900        (on eBay)

Sony Ericsson

Satio        (Not for sale)
C905        (On eBay)
Z320i

Samsung

i8510     (Not for sale)

i8910 

HTC

Desire

Actually, that is 16, and he (or she?) has also just found a Nokia 6021 and a Nokia 5230

Awesome, just awesome!

Yo, Steve, hope you are well, and recovering from all the BS coverage over the signal issue, which to be fair, your Letter was part of creating, I mean, come on, you guys were "stunned" to find out you had been cheating on the bars for more than 3 years?

Please, that is an insult to our intelligence, but, whatever, keep
making stuff like iPad and iPhone 4 and I will keep buying them, they still beat everything else out there faults an all -:)

Right, to the point of this email, you are forcing me to Jailbreak my
brand new iPhone 4!

OK, you gave us a pretty decent multitasking, so I don't need to JB
for that, cool. You also gave us a neat folders thing, another reason down.

But I just want my SMS tone to be "You have a new message" and I want my Email tone to be "You have new Email" I am fed up hearing 6 different iPhones poxy glass sound every time one of us at work gets a bloody message, come on dude, this is pretty bloody simple stuff isn't it?

I think this is more important than making the first 3 bars taller
Steve, I really do.

Hey, let me do that, and I promise i will not JB ever again, and if
you'd like, you can even record those little snippets for me, in fact,
I think you had better do just that, else I am gonna get Steve Balmer to do em, and think how embarrassing that would be!

Cheers Steve, have a great day, looking forward to your reply, and the attached ringtones, and schedule for the software update so I can use em.

Kev

Sent from my iPad

OK, so all along, I was fairly sure that the new iPhone 4 antenna issues were more a case of false bar readings, after all, I think we all knew that the 3GS was not as good as a phone as many Nokia handsets, even if they did often show 5 bars on both phones.

Until there is a worldwide agreement on the use of the bars (i.e never), a Nokia handset with 1 signal could be holding exactly the same signal as an iPhone with 2, and likely is doing just that!

But the thing that has me annoyed tonight is this little bit of the Apple Open Letter released today.

"Upon investigation, we were stunned to find that the formula we use to calculate how many bars of signal strength to display is totally wrong. Our formula, in many instances, mistakenly displays 2 more bars than it should for a given signal strength. For example, we sometimes display 4 bars when we should be displaying as few as 2 bars. Users observing a drop of several bars when they grip their iPhone in a certain way are most likely in an area with very weak signal strength, but they don’t know it because we are erroneously displaying 4 or 5 bars. Their big drop in bars is because their high bars were never real in the first place"

OK, the key bit is "we were stunned to find that the formula we use to calculate how many bars of signal strength to display is totally wrong"

Come on Apple, you are treating us like idiots if you expect us to believe this!  Surely this can not be true, and is as simple as the fact that you knew the original iPhone was pretty poor signal wise in relation to the other mobiles of the time, mostly Nokia, so you decided to just fake the bars?

All of this time you have been blaming AT&T in the US, but I am now more tempted to believe that all along you knew about this and covered it up. 

You know, there really is very little logic to Apple sticking with AT&T if they really are that bad, but what if Apple and AT&T share this great secret, which AT&T will happily keep as long as they keep getting the massive income from iPhone?

As I write this, I realise there is a bit of an X-Files theme creeping in, but what do you think?

Just one last thought, on June 23rd 2010, Apple placed several job adverts for mobile antenna positions, and one requirement was a minimum of 10 years experience.

After all is said and done, could it really be the case that Apple is as stunned as we are in all of this???

Kev

Take a good look at that bar photo above. it pretty much explains the whole issue with iPhone 4 antenna situation.

Its taken from this fantastic article http://bit.ly/cckojR and does a far better job of answering this issue than EVERYTHING else I read in the last 5 days!

What it effectively shows is that on iPhone 4, you can lose 39dB of signal, and stay on 5 bars, but lose just 14dB more, and you drop to just 1 bar!! 

UPDATE: 2/7/10  Apple just released this LETTER which to my mind is still written a little bit defensively, and will doubtless set off those people who don't own an iPhone 4, or live in such a strong signal area they will never notice it.

OK, first off, a couple of myths to deal with, IMHO.

1. There are "good" iPhone 4's and "bad" iPhone 4's

I do not believe this at all, in the mass produced world of these things, I believe all iPhone 4's have this issue. It is explained however by "there are good signal areas, and there are bad signal areas"

It is also explained by the photo above, the BARS are completely wrongly scaled to make it look like oyu have stronger signal than your really do.

2. If you wiggle/remove/reinsert/put tape around/mess about with/wait 20 mins/ your SIM card this will solve your issue.

Again, sorry, do not believe it at all. When you do all of the above, your are either reconnecting with the tower, or indeed contacting a better tower. 

So what is going on?

One of the strangest things about this whole situation is that many people were claiming that they simply did not have this issue at all, and even some popular podcasts this week were saying it was a non issue.

I had always said it was real, but that on the other hand, this iPhone 4 gave me better signal in some places than other phones, and from reading the above letter, I can now see that in actual fact, that may not be true at all, when this fix is pushed out, it may turn out that I have no signal at home, just like my old 3GS.

However, and this is the crux of the matter really, I don't think that is the case, as I can at least pick the iPhone 4 up at home and make a call using O2, which I could not do with the 3GS, nor can I do so with the Nexus One.

What is quite shocking about the letter to me though is the admission that for 3 years, Apple has faked the Bars on the phone to make it look like you had more signal, or more accurately, as much signal as your old Nokia! I have always maintained that you can not beat Nokia for pure phone signal, and I think its fair to say even Nokia have made some phones lately that do not carry on the tradition and earlier phones.

Anyway, with the new information today, and my use for over a week now, I am changing my advice on buying an iPhone 4

Case A: You live in a good or excellent signal area, and rarely use your phone outside of this area.

I would say go right ahead and get an iPhone 4. Get it from Apple with a 14 day return clause and see how you get on.

Case B: You use the phone in a known area of weak signal.

I would now say that if you hold your phone in your left hand, you need to take a good look at the pictures of iPhone 4, and assure yourself that you could hold it without bridging the little black line on the left corner of the phone. Again, no real risk if you get it from Apple, check first if you are buying on contract that you have a returns period. There are various catches, such as with T-Mobile, if you use Streetcheck before you order, you can return it, if you don't, you can't, although UK law always allows 7 days under the Distance Selling Regs.

O2 are taking this DSR thing away from you if you buy out your current iPhone contract and update early, on the basis that they are not selling you a new item but extending service contract which does fall outside of DSR. FWIW I think they are acting illegally here, but be aware of it.

Case C: You are me

First of all, well done. I only make and receive 2/3 calls a day, and am on Wi-Fi apart from 25 mins each day. 

This issue does not affect Wi-Fi, and I do like the other features of the iPhone 4. 

I am perfectly capable of holding the phone in such a way as to not touch the 1cm spot in question.

You also have to remember that I have the Nexus One, and it is not perfect, but today I found out for the first time that while I can always repeat the Apple issue WITH A WEAK SIGNAL, I can not always repeat it with the same SIM in the N1. The signal does drop away when I hold it, but it usually comes back after a few seconds, unlike the iPhone 4 which stays away until you let go of the join.

Having said all of this, getting hold of an iPhone 4 is still a challenge in the UK, with O2 and Apple Stores being the best bet at this time. 

Kev

Well, I said I would not have one, but you all knew that was rubbish I guess. I managed to pre order my iPhone 4 around 1pm on Tuesday the 15th, and it arrived today, (24th) just like Apple said it would. As I write this, I feel it is important to be open and honest about the phone, I think I am a bit of a fanboy, but will try to remain objective. I also want to keep this first look fairly brief, mainly as I have not really played with it very much.

I had my 3GS 32GB for just over a year, and in that time, it was quite simply the best smartphone I had ever owned. Looking back, at least part of that was due to being able to jailbreak the phone, something I will not be doing this time I have decided. My main reason to jailbreak was to install two very simple MP3 files, one said "You have Mail", the other "You have Message", and they were the simplest and best way I found of being able to hear a tone. It seems amazing to me, with some of the other stuff Apple has done, that in 2010 you still can not change an Email, or SMS tone to a file of your choice. But, that said, I am still not going to jailbreak. So onto the new phone.

The redesign is to my mind much nicer looking than the 3GS, the squarer edges make holding the phone easier, and it seems less likely to slip from the hand compared to the 3GS or indeed, the Nexus One. I use all my phones naked...that is the phone, not me! Just on that point, I have tried out a case which Mobile Fun LINK sent over for me to test, its a simple clean design, which firmly fits over the back only of the phone, and it does work quite well, although personally, I prefer to use it without such covering, and just use a Marware slip case.

Now, although I like the look of the new one better, I have to say, on only a few hours use, I prefer the feel of the 3GS, the new one feels somehow sharper in the had, which as I say, gives a feeling of good grip, but is not quite as comfortable as the 3GS, or again, the N1. I think I will get used to it though, its more of a surprise than anything.

The iPhone 4 is thinner than the 3GS, but to my mind, the difference is not really relevant, and not worthy of great comment. Weight feels exactly the same to me.

DISPLAY

So much has been written about this, where to start? Well, it is lovely and clear, bright, and smooth, and it without question is a good strong improvement on the 3GS, but despite this, I am not convinced at this point that the difference is as massive as Apple would have us think. I have been struck more by how much better it is than the Nexus One, rather than by how much better it is than the 3GS, but you will recall I have always rated Apple's displays, rather highly, due to contrast ratio rather than pixel density.

Update: At the end of the second full day using this, the screen is impressing me more and more. Really nice, and quite a jump from the 3GS, despite what I wrote yesterday.

There is no evidence on my display of the Yellow staining being reported on some websites today, it is very even white, and very bright. Several people at work today have 3GS, and looking at the Home Screen on each, it is clearly better and smoother, but the 3GS still just has the edge outside, albeit by a smaller margin than I thought might be the case. I was worried about outdoor use, as the Nexus One is truly terrible for this, and has really curtailed my use of the camera and video features as a result. If the camera in the iPhone 4 is as good as they say, I want to be able to see what I am shooting, and early results seem to suggest it will be fine. All in all, a great compromise, and I will report back of this as I use it more.

SOUND

A really important one for me, I listen to loads of voice podcasts, and Audiobooks, and it is handy to do so without having to plug into various speaker systems, which is what I have had to do with the Nexus One for the last month.

Where the Nexus One (and the N97 I had, and the Desire, and just about all Android phones!) has just a horrible tinny, scratchy, ear annoying noise, this new iPhone is the complete opposite, its clear, loud, and has a nice tone, simply superb for podcasts, and Youtube videos, and not at all bad for music playback, or internet radio use. The other great thing about iPhone is that because Apple thought about speaker position, right on the bottom of the phone, there are these great little devices from Griffin which are so cheap you can dot them around at work, and at home, and they give a nice boost without any power considerations.

iOS4

I sometimes find it hard to see why Apple get such a hard time, how many other companies do you know that would give a huge number of potential upgrader's a brand new and vastly improved phone, just 3 days before launching a new phone?

On Monday, Apple released iOS4, which brings lots of new features to 3GS owners, and quite a few to owners of the earlier 3G models as well (in fact, its only really multitasking that Apple say is not good enough for the 3G). Now come on, the 3G came out in July 2008, and just shy of 2 year later, a lifetime in mobile phone terms, you are still getting extra features all for free.

Of course, the main point of iOS4 (the name change is to reflect that it is not just on iPhone anymore, its now on several million iPod Touch models, and iPads, albeit at version 3.2 with 4 to come in September timeframe), is to power the brand new iPhone 4. It almost feels as if Apple are saying, upgrade your old phone, sell it to your mate with an old outdated Nokia, and buy our great new iPhone :-). It seems to work, with stock being harder than ever to find this time around than any other launch.

I think iOS4 is the first ever version of the OS that I will not need to jailbreak. OK, not withstanding the moan above about the silly situation with message tones, I think the multitasking included here, along with the folders feature, will satisfy me for a while to come. iOS4 feels really nice on the iPhone 4, and so it should, this phone has the same CPU as the iPad, and is the first Apple iDevice to have 512mb RAM, more than most other phones on the market.

Coming back to iPhone, via iOS4 is a true delight, and I am starting to realise that I have been kidding myself just a little bit with my Android flirtation over the last month or so. The keyboard on FroYo is superb, but when you put it up against the sheer joy that is iPhone keyboard, it feels like a really, really poor relation, and when you consider that until FroYo (which is still a hack at the point of writing this), the stock keyboard on Android was much, much worse, there really is no comparison here.

Now, before I go on, let me say what I will miss when the Nexus One is sold (yep, more on that later, I am breaking my promise on PSC to run both together, sorry!), but am fully prepared to do so due to the overall feel of iPhone 4

Wireless Hotspot. Simply stunning on FroYo, and very, very well implemented. I would kill for this on iPhone, but will not jailbreak for it. I will simply have to make do with my Three Mi-Fi, and Billion 3G router. In some ways, brilliant though the feature was, it was often the case that your did not have the "right" SIM card in the Nexus One when you needed to use it....but I digress, I will miss this.

Widgets. I will miss this, no doubt, although in the end the only one I will truly miss is the one for BeyondPod, which was great.

Calendar on home screen. Very nice and very useful, will sorely missed, but again, no plans at all to use lockscreen info or anything like it, stock all the way for me this time.

BATTERY LIFE

Well, of course 2 days use is hardly a severe test, but it looks promising. It has been used almost non stop today, hammered it to be honest, and I always have brightness at 100%, auto brightness is for wimps, and screen off set to 2 mins. Always on wi-fi, GSM set to 2G to be fair. It has been on for 4 hours 17 mins, and standby is 14 hours, 1 min. It is at 50% right now.

RECEPTION

So, with each new iPhone, or iDevice, comes a new "issue", or "fault". Steve often times does not help, coming off rather arrogant with replies etc, but here, I will try to give an honest view of the stories about it not working when you hold it :-)

So, the new iPhone has the antenna for GPS, Bluetooth, GSM/3G and also Wi-Fi built right into the steel band, in fact it *is* the steel band, or rather, two of them, hence the notches, unusual on an Apple device, but required as you probably do not want these two antenna's making contact with each other.

Of course, when people with hot, moist hands hold the phone, these two antenna's do exactly that, and the result is a claimed reduction in signal strength.

The trouble with all of this is that all we users really have to go on, is the 5 little bars of signal on our phones, and we tend to believe what they are telling us without any question. Having only had the phone for two days, it would be foolish of me to try to call this one, all I can tell you right now is that this seems no worse, and in all probability a little better than my old 3GS was. At home, on O2, the only Micro SIM I have to try ATM, my signal on any phone is so borderline, I am not prepared to test this at all.

Today, at work, where the signal is at least 5 full bars, I was holding, touching, stroking, and even wetting my fingers and playing with this whole band, and in most cases nothing happened, sometimes I lost at most 2 bars, leaving 3, and at all times I was able to make a call to an answerphone and hear the message without any distortion that usually accompanies bad connections.

Please recall I am on 2G, a lot of the reports do quote 3G, not sure if that is relevant. All I will say for sure for now is that the Google Nexus One I have also loses a couple of bars when I pick it up, and I will fully trust Apple to resolve this if it turns out to be a real, rather than media nonsense based issue.

However there are too many videos on Youtube showing this now for it to not be some sort of issue, hopefully it will be a signal display issue, fixable by software, but I will try to keep any eye on this, and report back if I find out any more.

SUMMARY

Well, I still think it is a little early to be sure, but already I have decided two things, and I must apologise to PSC listeners here. In this weeks show, I said as my SO was buying me the iPhone due to a windfall, I would run both it, and the Nexus One for a while. Sorry, but not gonna happen, I realise than I really, really can only run one smartphone at a time, it is nothing to do with money, or anything else, I just left the Nexus One at home today, and did really miss it.

I will return to this post and update it as I get to know the iPhone 4, if you have any specific questions, can you either DM me at Twitter if we follow each other, or post @kevwright on Twitter, or email me at kevwrightATgmailDOTCOM

As good as Squarespace is, I can not find a way to get it to email me when a comment is made, anyone know?

Kev