I’m writing this post on my first ever iPhone—the 4S. I’m not an Apple fanboy by any stretch. In fact, iPhone is the only iProduct I currently use and I despise Apple’s fanboys. (Yes, I have encountered many of them.) But the truth is, the iPhone is an insanely useful device. Not only is there so much that you can do with it, all of it feels so natural and easy to use.
Grows on you
I downloaded the Google app which synced all my contacts from my previous BlackBerry. Doing that enabled instantaneous email push notifications automatically. I was concerned that by switching from BlackBerry to iPhone, I would lose the reliability of BlackBerry’s email notifications. So I was pleasantly surprised when I accidentally setup email notifications and saw that it worked just fine!
Too usable
Now I get all my mail on the iPhone. Not only that, but because of the beautiful screen and the intuitive keyboard and interface, I can reply to emails and manage my inbox right from the iPhone. Whereas with the BlackBerry, I’d only look at the incoming mail then wait until I’m on my PC to do the actual work.
Anti-aliasing finally makes sense!
The retina display is nothing short of revolutionary. I’ve hated font anti-aliasing and Microsoft’s ClearType because, on normal monitors, I could always see the little blemishes and artifacts around anti-aliased fonts. That’s why I have ClearType disabled on Windows 7. But because of the insanely high pixel density of iPhone’s retina display, fonts of all shapes and sizes render beautifully! Some people complain the iPhone display is too small, but what’s the point of a bigger display if it’s gonna have fewer pixels? I would like a bigger iPhone display too, but not at the cost of clarity.
Precious stone
And I like that I don’t have to worry about scratching the screen (or any part of the iPhone, for that matter), thanks to the iPhone’s scratch resistant surface, which totally protects the device. I know because my brother is a nasty gadget abuser. His previous BlackBerry looked completely beat up—you’d not even expect it to power up. He’s had his iPhone 4 for a few months now and it is still in pristine condition. In fact, I have yet to see an iPhone 4 that looked anything but “like new”.
This phone is just beautiful to look at. It looks more like a precious jewel, which was mined and carved out of nature, than a pretentious high tech gadget.
Reads my mind
I love how well Apple uses technology to create a natural and intuitive experience for the user. Another marvel of the iPhone is its keyboard. This thing is just brilliant and effortless to use. You don’t have to think about it—just type away and everything comes out correct. It somehow detects when I mean to say “it’s” and when I mean “its”. I don’t know how it does it, but it just works! It definitely beats the keyboards I’ve used on BlackBerries. And in iOS 5, you can add auto-text shortcuts to speed up typing even further.
Might makes right
Because the iPhone is so practically awesome, it’s very popular. And because it’s popular, everything comes out on the iPhone first—and most of the time it only comes out on the iPhone! For example, I just bought this car accessory, which turns the iPhone into a futuristic (yet, relatively affordable) headunit. Such a solution isn’t available for any other smartphone. The huge ecosystem for the iPhone makes it feasible for entrepreneurs to innovate with nichey apps and accessories.
PC is for the heavy lifting
When I first got my BlackBerry a year or so ago, I wrote a blog post about how BlackBerry liberated me from email addiction. I could finally get my email on the go. The iPhone has taken this even further. With the iPhone, I can do real web browsing, use the Reddit or Wikipedia apps, moderate comments and write blog posts using the WordPress app, read my RSS and twitter streams, and probably do more stuff that I have yet to discover. Of course, you can try to do these very things with other mobile devices, but with the iPhone, it feels right. Now my trusty ThinkPad is reserved for serious work sessions only.
But I don’t know for how long I’ll keep using Windows. The iPhone experience has really tempted me to try a Mac. And after a post like this, I’m afraid I may have accidentally inducted myself into Apple fanboydom…
