Why buying an iPhone

I met people asking why buying iPhone?

Not everyone want iPhone. iPhone is just not for everyone.

Different people buying iPhone for different reasons. Some people likes the big screen, some people like the touch screen, some people like the user interface, some people like iPhone application. Some people buy iPhone simple because it is an iPhone.

If you break it down one by one.

Easy to use interface? Why not Nokia?

Application? Why not Android, Palm or webOS?

Touch screen? How about HTC?

Big screen? Samsung Galaxy S with super AMOLED?

Now is the 4th generation of iPhone, if you still asking why buying an iPhone, then iPhone is just not for you.

Two mistakes on today's Sin Chew Cyberworld section

今日的星洲日報新媒體有兩個嚴重的小錯誤。

1. 封面標題錯誤。

这项 Maxis 的“创举”，把马来西亚摆上了“全世界第一个于凌晨零时零分发售 iPhone 4 ”的国家。当晚的首卖会，不但邀得数百位 IT 传媒及 IT 博客出席采访报道，还找来国内的某电台及某电视台现场直播。

iPhone 在第二代開始就已經有午夜首賣的例子。 iPhone 4 在亞洲，先是新加坡與香港，接著台灣，都是在午夜首賣。在台灣電訊公司自掏腰包送 iPhone 4 保護套，這倒是創舉了。

2. DiGi 24 日發售 iPhone

... 因为 DiGi 授权是迟一天至 25 日才能正式发售 ...

DiGi 於 24 日在四十餘個分銷處開始銷售，只是沒有像 Maxis 般午夜首賣及造勢。

只是印刷版有問題，網上版的報導資訊正確。

相信是記者趕著截稿，所敷衍了事。要知道新媒體讀者，部份對科技相當熟悉，尤其是像 iPhone 4 這類的熱門新聞，讀者會特別注意。

星洲日報的新媒體版，越做越差。內容貧乏，還錯誤連連，應該要改進。

What so good about FaceTime?

I don't think FaceTime (on iPhone 4) is going to work very well in Malaysia here, on a slow internet network. Not everyone need or like FaceTime, for those who need video call, you already using Skype.

So what so greet about FaceTime? Zero configuration. The FaceTime only work over WiFi now, to activate FaceTime, first you need to call through the mobile network. Once FaceTime has been activated through booth parties, you can direct call through FaceTime without initiate with the mobile network.

With FaceTime, Apple will have their own virtual mobile network, over WiFi (or WiMax, LTE). Imagine if LTE (4G network) was included in iPhone 5, and LTE is available near you, you can make calls to your friend without going through the local mobile network.

Check the youtube video, how FaceTime works.

Maxis iPhone 4 Mid Valley Gradens collection

I just received a call from a friend. Still waiting at Mid Valley to collect his iPhone 4 from Maxis since this afternoon. My friend has watched 2 movies and still not up to his turn yet. Maxis added another 50 counters to serve the crowd, still have to wait for another few hours. Expected to collect his iPhone around 9pm tonight.

I heard that last night, there is a long queue from one floor to another floor, waiting for their iPhone 4. These are register users, for those who has not register through the Maxis website, is not your turn yet. I heard there are people queue until 5am this morning to collect the iPhone.


Check flickr photos from here and here, youtube video.

Digi Unlimited Internet 15

The cheap and fast mobile internet time has gone.

There is no more Internet Unlimited 58 package, it was replace with Internet Unlimited 68 (pay RM68 per month). This is still cheap compare with other country, there is a 3G quota for fair internet usage policy. After using the Digi Internet 3G for more than 6 months time, the service quality has drop for the pass few months. I experience line drop and slow internet connection (for the same area) for recent few months.

For casual users, Digi has Internet Unlimited 15 for 7 days access, is very cheap but the 250MB weekly quota and 384Kbps is pathetic.

Look at Singapore Starhub mobile internet prepaid plan:

* Fair usage policy of 2.2GB per day applies for the usage of any MaxMobile Prepaid data plans. StarHub reserves the right to change such usage policy without prior notice to the customers.


3 days SGD10 for 2.0Mbps access, unlimited plan came with fair usage policy of 2.2GB per day.

Starhub plan is one of the cheapest for prepaid mobile broadband. It really outshines other mobile broadband providers.

The iPhone 4 launch event at Malaysia

I would say that the iPhone 4 launch event is another successful marketing campaign from Apple. Is already 3rd year after the first iPhone released, the 4th version of iPhone launch still catching attention for most people. Not just in Malaysia, in Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan which launch iPhone 4 earlier.

For iPhone lover, you might not want to miss the iPhone 4 launch event at Malaysia. Maxis has a mid-night iPhone 4 launching event on this Friday morning (Thursday night) at Mid Valley. I am not sure it is open to the public or not, you can register from the Maxis website, you can choose to join their day time event.

DiGi has a roadshow at 1Utama shopping mall started from today (23rd September) till Sunday (24th September). There is a DiGi iPhone 4 Carnival at Quill 9, Petaling Jaya, near Sin Chew Jit-Po HQ and PJ Section 14, on 25-26 September 10am-10pm.

Price and package. Maxis rate is here. Digi says as low as RM58 per month, detail pricing will be announced 6pm today. There is a leak iPhone 4 pricing from DiGi here.

This will gave you some ideas on how the 2 telcos going to charge you. The iPhone 4 16G version is RM2290, 32G RM2690 (RM400 more). DiGi has $200 rebate on the phone, and other rebate on the iPhone package, depends on the package you choose. Maxis rebate direct on the phone, so iPhone 4 from Maxis will be cheaper. The iPhone 4 prices from Maxis is depends on the package as well. You might need to compare the package content for Maxis and DiGi to make up your last decision, eg. the free call time and internet data quota.

There are some people saying that getting iPhone 4 from Singapore is much cheaper (SGD888 without contract). But I look at the price above, is worth getting the iPhone 4 and package in Malaysia.

Latest surprise could come at last minutes, just check their website for the latest announcement.

Foursquare and twitter

Normally I access Foursquare through iPhone application, but today I just access to the Foursquare web page.

Foursquare

It gives me the twitter feel. Foursquare is a location base community website, heavily depends on location. If you do not have GPS-like mobile devices, Foursquare is useless. Where twitter, you are writing micro-blog, nothing much to do with the location.

Twitter

The way they present it just similar. There are some similarities for both websites. I simply name one, the tips in Foursquare is just tweets.

Jobs says Please leave us alone

Read the post here.

A Long Island University students, Chelsea Kate Issacs has an assignment to write about her university to buy iPads for all incoming students. She write to Apple to get some feedbacks, but no responds from Apple.

Her friend suggested that may be she can drop an email to Steve Jobs. She did, and Steve Jobs did reply.

"Our goals do not include helping you get a good grade."

After exchange for a few emails, Jobs say:

"Please leave us alone."

I am nor sure why Apple PR not response in the first place, may the Apple PR should just reply, "Please leave us alone."

Issacs, they can't help you, just write there, "unable to get an official response from Apple." will do.

Malaysia Radio Station on iPhone

Browse through the iPhone App Store few days back and found 2 Malaysia radio broadcast station application.

FM 98.8

MY FM 101.8

For those who are in Malaysia, just turn on the radio will do. For those who working or staying outside of Malaysia by still miss the radio broadcast Malaysia, these 2 application are just nice.

MY FM application seems to have better connection quality and more radio station to choose.

iPhone 4 start selling at Taiwan on Friday

iPhone 4 start selling at Taiwan today, available on all 3 Taiwan mobile telco, may be I should say yesterday night.

Chunghwa Telecom has an midnight event for the launching of iPhone 4. You can take a look at the pictures here.

Pictures and news for Fareastone(遠傳), on youtube, other news here and here.

I heard that only first batch of 45 thousand iPhones allocated for Taiwan, but pre-orders are over 200k.

When is Malaysia's turn?

The Malaysia Day is a holiday

Today is Malaysia Day, it is a holiday. In 1963 16th of September, Sabah, Sarawak (and Singapore) join Malaya and form Malaysia.

(Singapore separated from Malaysia since 1965)

There are people arguing, should National Day be the 31 August Merdeka Day or the 16 September when east and west Malaysia united together.

For me it doesn't matter, as long as everyone can access to the Internet happily, that's call united.

iOS 4.1 upgrade

Finally iOS 4.1 is out last week (9 September on Asia time) and I have upgraded. I have been waiting for this, hope it may have improved in performance on iPod Touch 2G.

iOS 4.1 need iTunes 10, and too bad that iTunes 10 says it only installed on Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard or above. That means it doesn't work on my iBook G3 (v2.2) which is running Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. I have to do the upgrade on another machine.

iOS 4.1 try to solve a few problems and have some improvements like proximity problem, HDR (High Dynamic Range) photo... and security patches, my concert is the old iOS 4.0.x sluggish performance on iPhone 3G and iPod Touch 2G.

After tested for a few days on iPod Touch 2G, the sluggish problem still exist, may be not that often as before.

Another thing that I want to complain iTunes on Mac. iTunes came with few new features like iBooks, video playback... I can give up all those features, but I still need to update my iPod Touch (or iPhone) and iTunes is the only software to do it.

I expect to upgrade my iPod Touch using iTunes, be it iTunes version 9 or 10, as long as not limited to latest OS platform or latest hardware. May be iTunes should provide a lite version with limited features, since there are people complain on bloated iTunes, hope to have a slimming down iTunes.

3GS users no rush for iPhone 4 yet

If you are having an iPhone 3GS, is no rush to get an iPhone 4 yet. The reasons are just simple, I bet you still have contract with the telco which came with 3GS.
The iPhone 4 A4 cpu is using the ARM cortex A8 core cpu, which is same with the iPhone 3GS. Sure iPhone 4 may improve performance in graphic display and power management.
The iPhone 4 is only available officially in 2 Asia countries (Hong Kong and Singapore), and coming soon and available in other Asian countries, but who know when? Some telco like Singtel already sold out its iPhone 4.
No rush to get an iPhone 4 if you are using 3GS now. If you need battery life improvement, get iPhone 4. If you are iPhone die hard fan, then you must get an iPhone 4.

iPod nano came with touch interface

What do we have for this annual Apple fall event?

iTunes (10) get social network with Ping. iOS 4.1 coming soon, and iOS 4.2 in this November. iOS 4.2 will enable multi-tasking on iPad.

Let's look at iPod and Apple TV:

iPod Shuffle (4th generation) back with wheel control design. 2Gb iPod Shuffle selling at USD $49.

iPod nano 6th generation with touch interface, is compact and small like a iPod shuffle. For sure you can fit into the small pocket on jeans.

Movie playback is not mention, I suppose it was removed from this iPod nano. I don't really need a touch interface to control the menu with just a few selections, but the new iPod nano look nice with a plain touch screen and no hardware control button.

iPod Touch (4th generation) with camera. The new iPod Touch 4G came with cameras now, front and rear (back). Not surprise it has FaceTime, geo tag (through WiFi) and photo, you will have more fun with LBS application like Gowalla. The back camera is not the 5 megapixels camera on iPhone 4, lower in resolution and not sure about the picture quality.

iPod Touch came with retina and higher resolution display like the iPhone 4. It is using the A4 cpu, that means it will perform better.

Apple TV 3rd generation. I can not confirm this is 3rd or 2nd generation, because the earlier Apple TV was introduced as Apple TV take 2. Now they take two again.

It is a black color box, rather the earlier white or silver color. Smaller in size, but without internal storage for video, it playback through network streaming. I prefer it to be bigger, since it will just sit inside the living room and not for portable.

It stream Netflix (alternative choice to Google Youtube?), stream from desktop or even iPad, though wireless AirPlay (earlier call AirTunes) technology. Support up to 720p and not 1080p. Is cheaper, selling at USD $99. It is using A4 cpu too.

Conclusion

If I don't have an iPod Touch and I have no plan to buy iPhone 4, I may buy the new iPod Touch. A 8G version is good enough, if need more storage, just get an iPhone 4.

I don't really need video call, but FaceTime means you can call your friend (who have FiceTime enable device) for free (through Wifi). The new A4 cpu is a big deal, it will last a few years before Apple came out with new system.

A media (video/movie) player without internal storage is still not my choice. May be the 4th generation will be better.

Continue reading:
Apple TV: Still a hobby after all these years, by CNet.
Event picture gallery, from Mercury News
Apple announces iOS 4.1 Features, Previews 4.2 Update, by pcworld.

Facebook Places, Gowalla and Foursquare

What is the next big thing? Location base service and application is one of those, like Gowalla, or the newly announced Facebook Places.

Gowalla is a location base community website. When I first heard of Gowalla is when I meet DC about 2 months ago. DC show me the Gowalla iPhone application. What Gowalla do is, when you come to a new spot (or new places), you take a picture of it, put some comment, check in, the website will record that you have been here before.

This type of location base application is not new, there are dozens (or may be hundreds) or similar application available. But LBS application on iPhone is new, LBS on Facebook is new.

Foursquare is like Gowalla, you can check-in a place with foursquare, find your friends nearby. Foursquare came with something call tips, the idea is not new, but how they do it is good.

Tips gave you some ideas what you can do nearby. A good example is restaurant tips, gave you some ideas what to eat for meal. Tips are share by the community, you can drop your tips at check-in point.

Both Gowalla and Foursquare not just community, they make community into a game as well, a live game. You collect points and badge by check-in new place or spot. LBS technology has become more matured with online map service and more GPS mobile smart phones like iPhone. Gowalla and Foursquare are just the beginning, I am expecting more LBS application and games in the future.

Apple special event September 2010

Just another one more day to Apple special (music?) event 2010.

MacRumors predicted that new iPod nano will be released, it will be a square like rather than the existing candy bar iPod nano.

I Like the iPod nano 3rd generation form factor, but apple change the iPod nano to candy bar for the 4th and 5th generation. Refer how to identifying iPod models.

The 6th generation nano may be it will be a touch screen nano, smaller in size but still retain the original 30-pin I/O connector.

There are rumors expecting revamp Apple TV and new iPod Touch with camera.

Sony Ericsson PC Suite tested with M600i

Website support and software version

I am going to test the Sony Ericsson PC Suite with a Sony Ericsson M600i phone, the mobile PC Suite is used to synchronize mobile phone system and data, can be used to update the phone software. SE M600i is a touch screen PDA phone, released in year 2006 Q1. M600i system run Symbian OS 9.1 + UIQ 3, it is compatible with P990, but different with P910. P910 use UIQ 2.0, M600i use UIQ 3.0.

I downloaded SE PC Suite version 6 from Sony Ericsson support website.The previous version I used is version 1.3. That means Sony Ericsson still continue to develop and improve their mobile desktop software, but the PC Suite just available on Windows and not Mac OS or linux platform.

There are two ways to connect the phone with SE PC Suite, by bluetooth or usb cable. For data synchronization use bluetooth or usb cable. To update the mobile phone firmware need usb cable. Is important to check the phone is supported by the Windows system, simply connect the phone by plugging in the usb port will do. For my case here, the Windows system doesn’t recognized the M600i.

This could be a Windows problem, but I don’t find much problem with Nokia phone and Nokia PC Suite.

Installation

According to SE support website (and some other forum) the driver already included in the SE PC Suite. There is a usb driver software for all SE phone, available for download from here. If you just need to update the mobile phone software, you can try this.

Sony Ericsson PC Suite 6 looks much different from earlier version.

I have downloaded the SE PC Suite version 6, is much smaller, about 18Mb (compare with version 1.3, close to 60Mb). The installation (and uninstallation) process is much faster. Unfortunately SE PC Suite v6 doesn’t support M600i, I have to go back to SE support website, choose M600i phone, download version 1.6 which suggested by the website.

The SE PC Suite v1.6 fail to recognized M600i through usb, may be I have already mess up my Windows driver. I have used PC Suite 1.3 to synchronize with SE M600i before, it works. I have tried v1.3 this time, but I am still having USB connection problem. Even bluetooth connection can not be established.

If everything going just fine, congratulation. If anything go wrong, I need to uninstalled the existing software before I re-install a newer software. Uninstall the software (for v1.3 and v1.6) is troublesome, it can not be done from Control Panel - Add/Remove software. I must remove the software by re-install it again. I must use the same installation file that I used earlier. I have tried to use version 1.3.33 to remove version 1.3.11, it doesn’t work.

Problem to pair with phone using bluetooth
display show paired even I have deleted from the phone.

I can not find an easy solution when I encounter problems with the SE PC Suite, I have tried version 6, 1.6 and 1.3, it doesn’t work with SE M600i, for both bluetooth and USB connection. May be is easier for other non Symbian phone.

Backup and synchronization

If paring or USB connection with the phone has no problem, the backup and synchronization is just easy. SE PC Suite doesn’t have its own PIM management, it can sync to Microsoft Outlook. I don’t really want to go through the detail here. The backup and restore don’t have much problem.

Firmware update

It need an external program call Sony Ericsson Update Service, if it was not installed, it can be downloaded separately with from website. The program doesn’t backup the data, I need to backup the phone before I update the firmware. Otherwise the update program doesn’t gave me much problem.

Conclusion:

Sony Ericsson did improved their PC Suite from time to time, but SE does not have an unified PC Suite to support all their phones, which will be quite troublesome for the users. As usual the PC Suite is available on Windows only. The installation and configuration (mainly the driver support) should be improved as well.

IBM zEnterprise System event KL 2010

IBM introduce the new zEnterprise System. The seminar event take place at Shangri-la Hotel, Kuala Lumpur. The event started at 10am, I arrive there at 9.15am, the IBM people are already there. They are early and well prepared.

Opening:

Introduction by Hemanth Kalikiri, IBM Malaysia 

Introducing the zEnterprise 196 (z196), up to 96 cores, good choice for data center.

Introducing The New Enterprise System

 Greg Lotko, from IBM USA

Spend 3 years on development, running Linux and other OS. ZBX, blade center extension, with IBM Power7 blades.

60 percent improve in performance and 30 percent cost down.

It has RAID memory, for redundancy, like RAID HD storage.

Advantage with the New Enterprise System

 Juergen Roser, from IBM Germany

About the software. SPSS, Tivoli, C/C++ compiler, Lotus Sametime, Websphere, Java, DB2 version 9 and 10 (10 still in beta).

The system is 80 times faster (for specific queries).

Next 2 presentation:

Another 2 presentation by Greg and Juergen. I will skip these 2. The conclusion is IBM zEnterprise system is good for the enterprise solution.

Information Infrastructure

Freddy Lee, IBM ASEAN

Freddy started with a story how IBM fall in love with DS8000. Freddy talks on storage performance with mix of SSD, fiber channel and Sata. Some comparison with IBM and EMC storage products.

Services for zEnterprise:

Wong Choong Cheok, IBM Malaysia

Wong talks on IBM service on zEnterprise. IBM can manage the server for you.

Lunch:

Is just a half day event, have a good lunch before leaving.

The event is well organized, informative. Good marketing session during the breaks, you can sit down and chat with the others. I notice financial sectors especially banks use a lot of the IBM products.

Oracle Exadata webcast seminar 2010

I attended the Oracle Exadata webcase seminar. It is an online seminar, live. Oracle is using Cisco software call webex (version 6.5) to perform the webcast. I works on Snow Leopard too.

Exadata is a high performance hardware storage from Oracle. It was not mention here, Oracle Exadata power by Oracle Linux.

Exadata hardware

Take a look, who is using Oracle Exadata? Including mobile operators like China Mobile, SK mobile (the largest mobile operator in Korea).

Sure it is expensive, I don't now sure how much it cost. Talk to the Oracle people.

Oracle host a lot of online webcast event. Webcast save users a lot of time, but you don't meet the people face to face, less interactive.

Oracle Sun sue Google for Android Java license issues

With Oracle support Sun can sue Google over Android Java license issue. Android use Java technology, but they build a Dalvik VM on top of the Java (refer to Google Android software stack).

Sun in not into the business to sue other company for money, you can refer to Sun Jonathan Schwartz's blog post. Oracle do it a different way. You may say Oracle sue Google for Java license issue on Android platform.

Google has the money to pay Sun for Java license, Google also support open source (Java is open source), but Google try to avoid some issues may came with Java open source license. At the end Android is open source for most of the smartphone manufacturers out there. Google should have paid Sun earlier which may avoid all these issues.

Continue reading:

Java founder James Gosling blog.
Oracle sues Google over Android and Java
[Android被告侵權] 當年昇陽沒告 為何是甲骨文卯上了Google？