Apple Unveils Faster iPhone, Chops Price

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Apple has taken the wraps of its new, cheaper 3G iPhone to the cheers of thrilled fans and the roar of complaints from some early adopters.

An 8 gigabyte model is to sell for $199 starting July 11. A 16 gigabyte model will cost $299. They'll come in a black case with a white case optional on one model. The devices are to roll out initially in 22 countries. Apple has inked deals for wireless carriers in a total of 70 countries to carry the new iPhone.
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Now to find out how much of a price increase per month I must pay over my current iPhone.
 
theDreamer said:
Now to find out how much of a price increase per month I must pay over my current iPhone.
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On AT&T unlimited iPhone 3G data plans for consumers will be available for $30 a month, on top of voice plans starting at $39.99 a month. Unlimited 3G data for business users will be $45 a month, on top of voice.
 
If it's available for tmobile I'm all over the 8gb one.

Oh wait tmobile doesn't have 3g right? frawwwwwwwwk
 
Only difference should be you'd want the unlimited data plan if you plan to take use of 3g.

This should put some serious pressure on RIM/HTC/Palm.

Finally.
 
Any early predictions on how many early adopters are going to get sand in their ginas over this and ask, nay, demand some form of compensation? Don't kid yourself if you think it will be just a few...
 
i can't wait to get one. i live in canada and didn't want to deal with unlocking one, so this is gonna be sweet. good timing too, cus my current 5g ipod is dying a slow death. now i just have to hope that my current bell contact isn't going to cost me a ton to get out of.
 
im sorry but for my area verizon just has the best coverage, and the type of job i do, the cell phone is literally my lifeline if my radio doesn't work so i need coverage, if not i would be all over this iphone
 
Yea it will be. It's basically a smartphone and mp3 player for under $200. I hate everything apple, but I do really like my iTouch. I paid $150 for it and only now am I feeling the slightest bit jealous of these new iPhones. This looks good but I will still wait for the Android based phones. Well actually, I'm waiting for a chinese company to make a dual-sim enabled smartphone based off the Android OS. This is very viable as the difference is the iPhone and Android based phones is that there can be many different iterations of the Android based phones..

One thing Google will have to watch out for is the smartphone market being floooooooooded with $199 iPhones that are already purchased and not leaving many consumers left with money to buy another smartphone.
 
ir0nw0lf said:
Any early predictions on how many early adopters are going to get sand in their ginas over this and ask, nay, demand some form of compensation? Don't kid yourself if you think it will be just a few...
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I'm an early adopter and I'm not upset at all. This is a sidegrade, not an upgrade. 3G and GPS, at the expense of battery life and thinness. WiFi is still faster than 3G, and the 3G data plans are more expensive.

That, and I don't like the thought of having a GPS device on me all the time, serviced by the ball-less company who let the DHS set up a warrantless shop right on top of them without a sound. ;)
 
Apple is obviously gunning for smartphone market domination here, but I guess the question now is if they are deliberately doing it at the expense of the iPod Touch.

Pricing the 8GB iPhone at $200 suddenly made the touch, at least initially, very expensive. The only advantages to the touch now are if you really need higher storage capacity (the touch goes up to 32GB, double the iPhone's 16GB), or if you figure you can make up the price difference over two to three months by not being locked into an unlimited internet rate plan with AT&T.

Considering that the iPhone price drop is subsidized by cell network carriers, I doubt we'll be seeing an across the board drop in iPod Touch prices either, but we'll see.
 
Yea Serpico, I wonder what Apple will do, if anything, to try to stop the new 8g iPhone from cannibalizing iTouch sales.
 
I am mostly just wondering why 8gb of extra flash cost 100 extra dollars. Do these things allow removable flash to be added so you dont have to accept 140% markup on flash memory pricing? although I guess if you are buying an apple product youve already accepted big markup.
 
This was the upgrade I was waiting for. the battery life could be a little better, but I don't mind tossing my phone on the dock every night before bed.

$199 is a killer price for a device like this. Even a black berry pearl or curve will cost you $100+ refurbished from AT&T
 
at the $199 price point, i bet the iphone is going to be the new RAZR on my college campus....literally just about everyone you see will be using one. hell, at that price i'll probably be joining them since im in need of a new mp3 player anyway; $199 is the price of a regular ipod/zune. even if this doesnt have the same storage capacity (which i wont miss considering i filled up about 7gb on my 30gb ipod), the convenience of just having to carry one device around instead of 2 or 3 is well worth the sacrifice imo. need to start saving a bit i guess.

also, does anyone know if $199 is the price with a 2yr subscription, or if it is just a straight $199? the article doesnt mention it.
 
I sure hope these things are widely available. I have been waiting for this for over a year now to finally take the plunge.
 
The big news here, IMO, is the support for Exchange ActiveSync and WPA2 Enterprise/802.1X. Combined with the group-based remote administration they list on http://www.apple.com/iphone/enterprise/integration.html , it really makes it difficult to consider other options when purchasing for an enterprise. The direct integration with Exchange without any specialized servers (I'm looking at you, RIM) makes it a pretty compelling package.
 
bpizzle1 said:
at the $199 price point, i bet the iphone is going to be the new RAZR on my college campus....literally just about everyone you see will be using one. hell, at that price i'll probably be joining them since im in need of a new mp3 player anyway; $199 is the price of a regular ipod/zune. even if this doesnt have the same storage capacity (which i wont miss considering i filled up about 7gb on my 30gb ipod), the convenience of just having to carry one device around instead of 2 or 3 is well worth the sacrifice imo. need to start saving a bit i guess.

also, does anyone know if $199 is the price with a 2yr subscription, or if it is just a straight $199? the article doesnt mention it.
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The $199 price is undoubtedly the price with a 2-year subscription.
 
Since you can buy it at an Apple store it looks like you can just buy one and then unlock it when you get home (assuming they are hacked early on).
 
It's a heck of a price for a phone that can do what it does.

I however, agree with the other poster who said it is more of a sidegrade than anything. I have the original version (purchased a refurb for $249) and honestly don't mind not having 3G if it means $10 more per month for the data plan. I can find wifi access most of the time so the limited amount of time I do spend browsing over edge is not worth the extra money for the data plan. Plus, no one knows whether or not this phone will be unlockable or not (I'm betting it will but you never know). If not, then the current users really haven't lost anything as they will be able to sell their jailbroken/unlocked version to T-Mobile users who can't use the new 3G as they are one of like 3 carriers in the world that use their particular 3G format. Call me crazy too, but I'm not sure an all plastic back is an upgrade over the current aluminum back just in terms of aesthetics. I do understand why they did that (metal +3G antenna bad) but I like the looks of the current phone the best. I still may upgrade at some point, but am perfectly happy with my current phone.
 
acfoltzer said:
The direct integration with Exchange without any specialized servers (I'm looking at you, RIM) makes it a pretty compelling package.
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Not having to deal with the extra cost or the slight chance of outages (hey, it's already happened twice this year) are big pluses.
 
Serpico said:
Not having to deal with the extra cost or the slight chance of outages (hey, it's already happened twice this year) are big pluses.
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I also can't help but observe that the interface with Exchange on the iPhone looks to be about 8 years ahead of the Windows Mobile interface. Visual, draggable calendar items? Yes, please! I think this is Apple's first significant move toward the enterprise market in a very long time.
 
ir0nw0lf said:
Any early predictions on how many early adopters are going to get sand in their ginas over this and ask, nay, demand some form of compensation? Don't kid yourself if you think it will be just a few...
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Why should early adopters get any compensation? No one forced them to spend their money on early versions of the iphone. They paid to be the first ones to use the phones, which they did. Sounds like sour grapes to me.
 
Here's a suggestion how about apple drops ATT and opens the phone to all services cause there is no way in hell I would join up for ATT cell service. There phone will always be limited by that carrier.
 
Great news. I can't wait for these to come out in Canada latter this year.

I hope the $199 price is to purchase out right, even if it is $299 without a contract I will be buying it. I don't use mobile internet, and free legal Wifi is absolutely everywhere.

I like my current $10/month unlimited minutes contract I have now. Thank goodness for negotiation. :D
 
Booo. All the Apple zealots in the world will dress up in black turtlenecks and jeans in a nod to "the Steve" before going out to line up in front of the apple store and cry like they've got back-stage passes.

Apple has gotten to the point (and good for them) that they can charge whatever the heck they want for whatever the heck they want, as long as it's in a shiny black, white or brushed aluminum casing of some kind.

Don't get me wrong, I like this device a lot, but I really think these guys suck for the way they're sucking people in with it, previous versions, and offshoots (iPod touch, which I also like). This now costs less than some iPod touches and is a phone. They do all of this (including introductory and second gen touches that cost less) in less than a year, and the press and the fans still kiss their butts. You can't possibly make that much improvement and reduce the cost of materials and manufacturing (let alone set up the new logistics) for this many things in less than a year and tell me that's why the cost has come down so quickly.

Like I say, it's an extremely cool device and a very good ui (mostly), but I won't be joining unless one's given to me. I also agree with the 3G comments above: Pretty much anywhere I'd use it, I've also got wi-fi... it's an excuse for the carriers to charge more (esp here in Canada).

I dunno, maybe I'm just annoyed that idiots snuck spy-shots of banners at the wwdc site last week and made a big wow over it, and those banners made peoples' eyes all sparkly. ;)
 
sulfur_lad said:
You can't possibly make that much improvement and reduce the cost of materials and manufacturing (let alone set up the new logistics) for this many things in less than a year and tell me that's why the cost has come down so quickly.
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When the iPhone launched it returned the highest profit margins of any device that Apple sold, possibly second to the higher capacity iPods but I don't have the figures for that. We are talking about 100%-120% net profit after manufacturing and distribution. The margins are likely higher since a full year has passed and components have continued to get cheaper.

That said, the price reduction really has to do with Apple finally allowing cell partners to subsidize the iPhone price, like they normally do with all of their other cell phones. Now you actually have to sign up for an AT&T contract at the time of purchase instead of at home, meaning that AT&T is definitely subsidizing the phone since point-of-sale signup reduces the chances that the iPhone will be unlocked to use on another network.

I am guessing that Apple didn't initially want this because they didn't want the iPhone's price to undercut the iPod's. Things are different now that the iPhone is the trojan horse for the OS X Touch platform, and now Apple wants to get that platform and its applications in the hands of as many people as possible. This will be at the expense of the iPod and the iPod Touch, no question. The iPod Touch is now more expensive and only has the advantage of higher storage capacity and a lower price after a few months if you take the iPhone cell subscription costs into account. An 8GB nano costs as much as an 8GB iPhone, that's definitely going to eat into some sales.

Now that pushing mobile applications and OS X Touch as a platform is a priority, it makes sense that Apple will actually allow price subsidizing to eat away at their iPod business. I guess the tradeoff is worth it for them, as growth in iPod sales has flatlined for the last two years, while there is still tons of room for growth left for them in handsets.
 
Well the thing with the pricing was that Apple produced the phones cheap. Like around $200- 250. Yup when the suckers were paying $600 for their iPhones, Apple was still caking off them. Then you bring the incredible demand for them which gives Apple the greenlight to manufacture more or build more factories. Lastly throw in a little concept called, economies of scale, and its very, very easy to see how Apple was able to offer such a low price for these new iPhones. Now the big thing about this is that Apple actually did so. They didn't have to, but they did it. But its no suprise how but rather that they did it.

links
http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/07/02/that-599-iphone-costs-220-to-make/
 
theDreamer said:
On AT&T unlimited iPhone 3G data plans for consumers will be available for $30 a month, on top of voice plans starting at $39.99 a month. Unlimited 3G data for business users will be $45 a month, on top of voice.
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Sorry- can't complete with my HTC Mogul pack though... Still kicks its ass in features, PLUS has a real keyboard.

I don't even pay $45/month for my Sprint phone with unlimited data/text and voice (not unlimited voice but I never go over- can't remember what it is). And that's with phone insurance...
 
I have an AT&T Tilt with a 8GB MicroSD.

Can someone please tell me what new features the Iphone has compared to my Tilt?? Feature-wise, I don't even see the Iphone as new so to speak.
 
VidMan said:
I have an AT&T Tilt with a 8GB MicroSD.

Can someone please tell me what new features the Iphone has compared to my Tilt?? Feature-wise, I don't even see the Iphone as new so to speak.
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just google it, engadget has info on it
 
alexheinz said:
just google it, engadget has info on it
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Im sorry if I confused you, I meant to be sarcastic. My point was that the new IPhone is advertising "new" features like it's a godlike occurence while my Tilt has had all these features for close to a year now. Apple may develop unique products but they get people to buy them by messing with their minds. Heck, people would buy poo if it was Apple-branded.:eek:
 
so they decreased the price by $200 and put on an extra $10 per month for 24 months (extra $240) on the data plan. does not really seem the price dropped much.

the real question is how much it is going to cost without a contract.
 
zainali said:
so they decreased the price by $200 and put on an extra $10 per month for 24 months (extra $240) on the data plan. does not really seem the price dropped much.
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How is a $200 price drop not seeming like much? You have to take into consideration the MASSIVE speed difference between EDGE and 3G. I know Europe is laughing at us considering they have had 3g for over 4 years, and while 3g isn't new, its newer to American's and for us the price increase for some would be worth it to have this massive increase in speed. Just my 2 cents.

And seriously are we really still talking about compensation for early adopters?

I just bought a 2007 Honda Civic and am just PISSED they came out with a 2008 and I want to trade mine in straight for the '08...and I want it now!..../off sarcasm
 
Palliser said:
I just bought a 2007 Honda Civic and am just PISSED they came out with a 2008 and I want to trade mine in straight for the '08...and I want it now!..../off sarcasm
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Yea but the difference there is no real difference between those two year models ;)
 
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