So I finally plated the 3G iPhone in gold...

Qtip42

[H]is Modness
Joined
Mar 16, 2000
Messages
6,726
Let me start by saying it's a prototype. I have a feeling there's going to be some reception issues with a plated case but maybe some of you can help where I'm not an expert.

iphone3g-1.jpg


Since the 3G housing is plastic that means I can laser engrave holes, squares, whatever into the housing before plating it. A very cool customization at the least. If I were to laser cut the area above the antenna, I'd imagine it might help...the only thing I wouldn't know is what shapes would be better to cut (holes, squares, or even a huge rectangle). It'd have to be something that looks good. I could just laser cut a grid of holes into the housing then plate it but I'm not sure if that'll help anything. So reception experts please speak on this (if there is any here).
 
That's very snazzy.

Have you sold anything before to any celebrities or any one we might know?
 
how about you lasercut an apple logo over the antennas, and put a white back-lit plastic insert in there?
 
Apple would probably have a fit if I used their logo. The original logo is painted on unlike the old generation which was a separate metal piece.

I've done a few celeb things but I'm not sure if my products are mainstream enough for them to see it. Would be fun to design some money-is-no-object stuff but that's a rare thing.
 
Sucks it's going to crack in a matter of minutes of the user having it.

I just got my 4th iPhone 3G from Apple today, all have had cracks, and 2 of them have had dead pixels, and this one has a horrendously hard to move silent button. So I'm probably going for #5 here soon.

The QA on these phones is horrendous, and not to mention they're always out of stock of the service phones even, so I've had to wait anywhere from 2 days to 8 days for a replacement phone to come in stock.
 
Sucks it's going to crack in a matter of minutes of the user having it.

I just got my 4th iPhone 3G from Apple today, all have had cracks, and 2 of them have had dead pixels, and this one has a horrendously hard to move silent button. So I'm probably going for #5 here soon.

The QA on these phones is horrendous, and not to mention they're always out of stock of the service phones even, so I've had to wait anywhere from 2 days to 8 days for a replacement phone to come in stock.

Good lord dude. I beat my iphone up and don't have a single crack in it, nor do I have any dead pixels (don't think I've ever seen either, actually). I wonder if there are specific bad iPhone batches out there, because having that happen to you four times in a row really sucks.
 
qtip - That is pretty amazing. Like you said, reception is probably going to be really bad with it. Have you considered making a section of the backing plastic like they did with the 1st gen iPhone or current iPod Touch?
 
Probably won't be making anything out of plastic for it. Like I was saying, the laser can cut anything out...I can make a pattern of random heart cutouts over most of the surface so it opens up area for better reception. I'm not sure if one design is better than another though. I'll try a few things out in the coming weeks.

Cracks are not a problem for this. There is so much copper on the part the housing weighs more than the stock phone itself. :D
 
How much would you charge for such a thing? Reception on my Ipod touch is a non-issue.
 
The touch is entirely different than the 3g iphone...Touch parts are cheap and easy to do (cept the front bezel requires a lot of stripping if you want that also). The iphone 3g is plastic and it's not a decent platable grade either so it takes a lot of babysitting at the tanks to make sure everything is right. Literally this first one cost me an arm, a leg, and a kidney. The plating is also incredibly thick which isn't my preference but that's the way it had to be.
 
Good lord dude. I beat my iphone up and don't have a single crack in it, nor do I have any dead pixels (don't think I've ever seen either, actually). I wonder if there are specific bad iPhone batches out there, because having that happen to you four times in a row really sucks.

I'm that guy that baby's his electronics, and even my friends have cracks on their iPhone's, and of course Apple replaced them all without issue and actually asked us specific questions during the replacement process at the Genius bar on how we handle our phones and what sort of cases we use if any, etc..

I don't use a case, my GF has a case now, and I actually just ordered the Black Incase Slider case for my 3G (sold out at the Apple Store since the day it came out).

My first iPhone (first-gen that is) only had the 'glue bubble under screen' issue, and they replaced that when I showed it to them of course, without question as they knew this was an issue.

Now the guys at the Apple Store in Bellevue know me by name, don't even bother to have me make Genius Bar appt's and even gave me pizza fro their break room when I was there for 9 hours on launch day over the phone with AT&T when they activated my 3G to my mom's phone number on the family plan instead of my number, which nullified my upgrade pricing and left my mom's phone innoperable until it was all sorted out later that day at an actual AT&T store that Apple's Manager went to with me to figure this all out for.

At least they gave me a free case and a free dock for all of this, but seriously. I'll be on my 5th phone shortly here. I do not handle my phone unrealistically and clean it frequently and carefully (just wiping, no liquid), and it's always charging in my car while it's connected to the HU via dock connector for audio, and well...

I had to deal with the fact that Apple dropped FW charging support with the 3G so I had to buy a USB charger/dock-passthrough car charger for 30$ to fix it up and pretty much hack away at the center console of my car and hide wiring underneath my cup holders to make it look OEM still...

And I've had pretty much all of the software issue's this phone is known for, which include dissapearing itunes libraries (on the phone), horrible keyboard input lag, crashing app store apps, frequent calls failed/dropped despite 4-5 bars of signal 'strength' (vs signal 'quality'), and neither of the software updates have fixed this for me in full.

Apple really messed up with 2.0.x as far as I'm concerned, 1.1.4 was totally solid.

And even if Apple fixes these software issues with 2.1 or (heaven forbid) an even later update (omg..), that still doesn't fix the fact that this cracking casing isn't ridiculous. It reminds me of the white macbooks with their staining/cracking keyboards, and apple admitted that the plastic mix was faulty/messed-up and replaced that portion of the machine for anyone that brought it in or sent it in; of course every person I know with a white macbook had this issue and I had to tell them how to go in and get it fixed, Apple didn't exactly advertise it of course..

Too bad this is the only phone I actually enjoy using despite all of it's flaws... all of my other phones have been worse for actual usage because they were crippled verizon phones..

Ugh.
 
Geezus man, and yet you still keep using it. That's absolutely astonishing. And while my own personal experience with an Apple Store manager almost made me want to smash his face into the defective 20" iMac I was returning, I have to say it seems your experience is quite different. ;)
 
They've done everything in their power to keep me happy, and I'm actually friends with a few of the guys there now, we just BS when we're there and we even exchanged aim/cell info ffs.

So it's been quite an experience. I would give anything for the solid-ness of the first phone's 1.1.4 FW, and aluminum backing, but with the speed and gps and flush-headphone jack of the 3G.

Now *that* would be a product worthy of paying a premium for.
 
I was pretty envious of the GPS on the 3G iphone, but for $75 plus shipping you will be able to get a nice GPS on the old gen iphone.. it's a small module which connects to the bottom.. they are being mass produced right now.. should be available in sept.

http://www.orangegadgets.com/products.html
 
I was pretty envious of the GPS on the 3G iphone, but for $75 plus shipping you will be able to get a nice GPS on the old gen iphone.. it's a small module which connects to the bottom.. they are being mass produced right now.. should be available in sept.

http://www.orangegadgets.com/products.html

but that won't interface with google maps or likely have any sort of integration from any of the other app-store apps that use it...
 
I think it does work with google maps.. but not sure about other apps. obviously the ideal scenario is to have the 3G iphone for people wanting the gps to integrate seamlessly into apps, etc.. but for those of us on the old iphone it's better than no gps. :)

edit: hrm... I think I take that back.. lol. their landing page clearly shows google maps on the device, but the demo shown here seems to indicate a 3rd party map pack and the software running on the iphone does not look like google maps... oh well.. still and all, I want a GPS and I have the old phone, so this will be better than nothing. :p
 
I'm that guy that baby's his electronics, and even my friends have cracks on their iPhone's, and of course Apple replaced them all without issue and actually asked us specific questions during the replacement process at the Genius bar on how we handle our phones and what sort of cases we use if any, etc..

I don't use a case, my GF has a case now, and I actually just ordered the Black Incase Slider case for my 3G (sold out at the Apple Store since the day it came out).

My first iPhone (first-gen that is) only had the 'glue bubble under screen' issue, and they replaced that when I showed it to them of course, without question as they knew this was an issue.

Now the guys at the Apple Store in Bellevue know me by name, don't even bother to have me make Genius Bar appt's and even gave me pizza fro their break room when I was there for 9 hours on launch day over the phone with AT&T when they activated my 3G to my mom's phone number on the family plan instead of my number, which nullified my upgrade pricing and left my mom's phone innoperable until it was all sorted out later that day at an actual AT&T store that Apple's Manager went to with me to figure this all out for.

At least they gave me a free case and a free dock for all of this, but seriously. I'll be on my 5th phone shortly here. I do not handle my phone unrealistically and clean it frequently and carefully (just wiping, no liquid), and it's always charging in my car while it's connected to the HU via dock connector for audio, and well...

I had to deal with the fact that Apple dropped FW charging support with the 3G so I had to buy a USB charger/dock-passthrough car charger for 30$ to fix it up and pretty much hack away at the center console of my car and hide wiring underneath my cup holders to make it look OEM still...

And I've had pretty much all of the software issue's this phone is known for, which include dissapearing itunes libraries (on the phone), horrible keyboard input lag, crashing app store apps, frequent calls failed/dropped despite 4-5 bars of signal 'strength' (vs signal 'quality'), and neither of the software updates have fixed this for me in full.

Apple really messed up with 2.0.x as far as I'm concerned, 1.1.4 was totally solid.

And even if Apple fixes these software issues with 2.1 or (heaven forbid) an even later update (omg..), that still doesn't fix the fact that this cracking casing isn't ridiculous. It reminds me of the white macbooks with their staining/cracking keyboards, and apple admitted that the plastic mix was faulty/messed-up and replaced that portion of the machine for anyone that brought it in or sent it in; of course every person I know with a white macbook had this issue and I had to tell them how to go in and get it fixed, Apple didn't exactly advertise it of course..

Too bad this is the only phone I actually enjoy using despite all of it's flaws... all of my other phones have been worse for actual usage because they were crippled verizon phones..

Ugh.

Wowza. About the only thing I share your experience with is the 2.0 software. 1.4.4 was much faster, more stable, and more responsive in comparison. Either way, yeah, I'm the guy that doesn't deliberately baby his electronics and my stuff has been in excellent shape. No cracks, no bubbles or dead pixels in the display, nothing.

I hear similar stories from Joe Average re: his iMac and Macbook and again I'm thinking wtf. I've gone through titanium and aluminum Powerbook G4s, a Powermac G4, a Macbook Pro, and a 24" iMac, and the only issue I've had in those six years of Mac ownership is a bad stick of Mushkin RAM I put in my G4. Otherwise absolutely zero issues with internal or external workmanship and build quality. Meanwhile he's telling stories about multiple problems he's had with several Macbooks and 20" iMacs. Its really weird when I hear stories like that considering my own experiences. There are obviously quality control issues out there but apparently I have yet to see them firsthand.
 
My poor thread got hijacked :D kidding.

Yes it can be plated in anything...Copper, chrome, black nickel, 24kt yellow gold, white gold, rose gold, and platinum. The finish can be flat, brushed, or polished. Once we get a metal to stick to the plastic, it's the same old method of plating. The problem is getting something to stick to the terrible plastic Apple uses.
 
Back
Top