The iPhone has been the shining light at the end of this dark tunnel- providing me with just enough of my formerly-illuminated life to keep going in the face of adversity. I’ve pretty much been using it for all my email, most of my web access, and the center of the universe when it comes to address book/contact/calendar data. And quite capably so, in fact. I’ve become pretty adept at the touchscreen keyboard- going well beyond my old WPM count on a Crackberry or Treo – and honestly the Edge speed doesn’t suck terribly when I’m away from a hotspot.

The few things I really really miss that there’s really no presest subsitute for:

• All my Quicken data (don’t have a copy of PC Quicken to use it with- manually balancing my accounts is sucking heavily)
• OmniFocus beta (OMFG the lack my tasklist is painful right now- I’ve lists and lists of stuff that I probably should be doing but am currently blissfully unaware of)
• iTunes (my audio/video library is on a 2TB Mac-formatted RAID – shit outta luck for now)

The OmniFocus/tasklist deficiency is pretty tough to deal with- the iPhone syncs everything else from my Mac (addresses/phones, calendar items) but for some reason ignored the tasklist/to-do list features. Consequently, I’ve been using the beta of OmniFocus to manage my whopping big to-do lists, and damn- I feel out of touch without that data right now. Again- as OmniFocus is a Mac-only beta (which rocks the haus, I might add), there’s no PC equivalent I can lean on for the time being.

On a good note, however- my new MacBook Pro was ordered less than 24 hours after my old one was deemed dead and officially shitcanned, so I’m holding out hope that CDW knows how to rush an order in less than a month (have to go thru them for corporate orders, alas). Another week or two of this PC/Windows shiznit and I might unexpectedly go postal.

A few shortcomings are already surfacing, of course- but nothing I’d call a deal-breaker (just worth looking at in future software updates):

• No cut-and-paste between applications (use this constantly)
• No synching of iCal ‘To Do’ items for tasklist management (huge!)
• Safari is OK for most apps, but I’ve had it crash a few times on me (most annoyingly when entering a first attempt at this very post into the Movable Type web admin front end).
• It’s very difficult to get back to the iPod controls when you’re out and about doing other things, like say surfing with Safari. You’re stuck with play/pause and ‘next track’ from the handy iPhone headset
• As many have already complained about, the iPhone headset jack is recessed, so I can’t use my many options for better headphones with the iPhone yet (unless I buy a bulky adapter from Belkin). Yes, you can shave plastic of existing plugs to get them to fit, but why should this be necessary? I really want to use my Shure in-ears, but can’t.

All being said, though- these are nothing worth dropping the iPhone for- it’s a very beautiful and well-thought-out device and I’ll gladly use it for some time. As most of my complaints are rumored to be addressed in forthcoming software updates I’m not really worried yet, but wanted to show a balanced opinion instead of just the obvious gushing (which I could do all day, if given the chance).

Verdict- it’s a great little device, and I’m rather impressed with AT&T’s service to boot.

The touch interface is very well done, and adjusting to flicking/pinching/scrubbing didn’t take much, if any time to adjust. I think the email integration is my favorite part, it’s almost seamless to work with. I also really find Safari on iPhone very comfortable to use.

As a phone, no complaints yet. Clear sound and good signal, with excellent in-call UI that gives the whole experience that fine Apple polish. I may find some warts to complain about yet (lack of cut/paste the likeliest candidate), but for now I’m a happy camper.

Methinks this seems a bit fishy. Not only does the image at the original blog post look strangely Photoshopped, but if I recall correctly, iPhones are locked down under security tighter than the White House right now. My friends at Cingular IT are only getting their first opportunity to see one behind closed doors next week, yet this shot appears to be in public, at an event of some sort. Add the fact that 4 and 8 gigs of memory in an iPhone is barely enough for a decent mp3 library, let alone a bunch of video, I’ve got to claim extreme skepticism.

Although I think this sounds like a sweet field use for an iPhone, my bullshit meter is reaching it’s maximum right now. I’d love to be proven wrong, though.