What's up with the perspective on this image? Take a look at the bottom right corner of the phone...



I think Gruber said it best. This news is bigger than all mobile/wireless news announced at CES put together. Which is kind of depressing.

This is clearly the new iPhone chassis that has been making the blog rounds over the past week.

Wow, some pretty stupid questions from the press, that were obviously not going to be answered (how many units are they gong to ship). Surprised no one asked if this phone also supports GSM/UTMS in addition to CDMA. Turns out it doesn't. Or if it comes with any (few dozen) Verizon apps pre-loaded - zing!

The mobile hotspot app is Verizon's - that's one feature ATT doesn't offer. The phone is non-exclusive so it may very well appear on Sprint next. Perhaps by the time the new iteration is announced in the summer. That would make T-Mo the only one of the 4 major US carriers not to get any love.

But don't you pay for mobile hotspot on their other phones? It bugs me when a feature like that gets included on one phone and not on the others. Again, we're paying for the data, why not let us use it how we want? They didn't talk plan prices at all, did they? I assume it's the same plans available to their other phones, other than the hotspot feature.


I know T-Mobile is the red-headed stepchild, and no I don't think it's essential that they be on that carrier too, but they might as well. It doesn't hurt, and it wouldn't require as big a change as this revision. Prior to today, Android's primary competitive advantage was its presence on all major carriers. The iPhone is, of course, on the biggest two, but there are still subscribers to be had.

Still, this is a pretty big deal. I'll be interested to see how everything plays out, how many AT&T users jump ship, how Android fares on Verizon now, etc. I think Verizon is a much bigger network in my area, and I get a number of people asking me the "when?" question.

I think they'll get a pretty big rush of users, but I think it'll also take a while to tell. For one thing, there's a great many Verizon users who already bought their Android phones because they didn't know the iPhone was coming (yeah, there were rumors, but the WSJ has been rumoring this day for the last two years it seems).

They didn't mention, but engadget did say it's $20 for other phones. Yes, it's a total rip-off. It's paying for nothing. What they're saying is that they're not really giving you the bandwidth you're paying for when you grab the initial plan. Or at least they don't expect you to use the bandwidth they claim is available. They advertise "unlimited" but it's not. Then I'm sure if you used 3 or 4GB consistently every month they'd soon cap you lower or kick you off.

Why don't consumer watchdogs and other groups stop this fraudulent advertising practice?

In Canada we've been seeing false advertising about mobile pricing for two decades.

The issue with T-Mo is that the iPhone's chipset doesn't support its frequency. They'd need to change over to what is it now, 5 bands total?

I know what the issue is, but that's why I said I can't imagine it would be as difficult as making a CDMA version of the phone. Wouldn't they be able to simply change the frequencies they work on? Unless it requires an antenna redesign like the CDMA version also needed. Whatever, it's not a big deal that they aren't on the 4th-place carrier. If they add Sprint that's all they really need


Amen to all that. Actually, this practice irritates me less when you're on an "unlimited" plan (of course, it's never "unlimited," but whatever). It's when they limit you to 2GB, make you pay for the hotspot, and don't even increase your bandwidth. That's the absolute worst. It's a blatant "yes, you get 2GB, but don't you DARE use that!" Ugh, I hate all these carriers.

That's why I'll be on T-Mobile with my Nexus One until the phont crumbles into dust. Somehow when Froyo was released on the N1, I got the hotspot feature for free and it's never been turned off! I use it regularly enough that I need it now, and not regularly enough that I'm willing to pay a ridiculous $20/month for it.

It's a photograph of a poster on a wall, taken from an angle. So you're seeing a proper photograph which has then been perspective-warped by the angle of the photographer taking the picture of the poster.

Well, anyone with an iPhone can run an app to do the hotspot thing, though it's only available to jailbroken devices.

I thought it was Verizon's sleeker more racing-forward iPhone.

Looks like the CDMA iPhone isn't going to work with every iPhone 4 case, due to the change in the mute switch.

For now, I'm sticking with AT&T. Verizon doesn't service where my parents live, and I currently share a family plan with them to keep monthly costs down. I've also never been hit with roaming charges while in the US, but I've heard this is still possible on Verizon when out in the middle of nowhere. I'm hoping enough people will leave AT&T to make the network run a little better, as I've noticed data congestion issues here in southern California.

Hopefully this will lead to some good price competition (though I doubt it will), and once LTE rolls out, the ability to switch carriers without switching phones.

New cases from China will probably be available in three to four hours from now.

Verizon hasn't announced yet what the mobile hotspot pricing will be for the new iPhone. Most likely, it will be the same as for Android phones. If it's cheaper, there will be a scream from all their Android people, followed by a run on the web sites that talk about how to jailbreak and install custom ROMs.

Frankly, it's not really all that big a deal. Since I originally got an iPhone in 2007, I've done business trips where I never actually needed my laptop. I just do everything from the phone. The exceptions to that rule, ironically enough, would require negligible bandwidth -- most notably, synchronizing git repositories if I'm working on something at the time. That's noise compared to catching up with the New York Times in the morning, even on the phone.

I believe ARS is reporting that the hotspot feature is part of the $30 unlimited monthly data plan.

You mean it's not a big deal for you specifically. As I've already stated, I use the wireless hotspot on my phone quite often, for work and for fun.

It's also the reason I want a WiFi-only tablet. I don't want to pay for two data plans when, for the occasional moments I'll use it, I can tether my tablet to my phone.

You could also just swap the SIM card between phone and tablet if you're on a carrier with that technology... To be fair, I don't know if that works on ATT either what with their locking and all.

You're really suggesting that?

Well, you'd be saving the battery in one of the devices.

Doesn't work. Just tried to swap my iPad and iPhone 4 SIMs. Both devices noticed the switch and showed the phone numbers (yep, the iPad has a phone number), but both complained they weren't set up for a data plan. Even after a restart, neither device allowed me to set the APN. I do know that the iPad on AT&T uses a different APN setting then the iPhone and other smartphones, so that probably has something to do with it. I could probably override this with a configuration profile, but at that point it starts to get annoying.

The new Motorola Atrix, initially AT&T only, is an interesting point in this space. You can physically plug the phone into a keyboard/video docking station, and it becomes something of a netbook. Presumably, you don't need a second data plan or other such silliness.

I definitely think it's a cool idea, and I'm sure it would do the job for most things, but there are things for which I need my netbook. First and foremost, for my work I need an ethernet port, and that seems to be something that companies are trying to get rid of...


My dismay was mainly at the inconvenience of switching your SIM card all the time. For myself, I'd have to remove the battery from my Nexus One every time I did it. Plus, at the moment it's only the iPhone/iPad duo that has the microSIM, so you'd have to have two devices that matched on that anyway.

So yes, it's a way around (that doesn't work, according to Tom), but it's not a practical one

There are simple adapters that let you use a micro SIM in a device expecting a normal SIM.

Do those adapters make it any less inconvenient to actually do the swapping? Because to enable the hotspot on my phone I press a single button on my home screen, which seems easier to me, plus I can still get calls.

On the iPhone the sim card easily ejects from the side and you don't have to turn off the phone to remove/insert.

I have about 4 of those SIM adapters - they came with my SIM cutting tool.

No, it's not "easier" to eject and swap a SIM in any case. But it is easier on the wallet if you have to pay an additional $20 a month for tethering or using your phone as a hotspot.

Anyway, it's moot if ATT has the profile set up to be iPhone (or phone) specific and doesn't allow swapping.

Currently I have two different SIM cards myself. One is voice only and the other is data only. I swap once in a while, but I don't normally carry both cards on me. Usually I have the data card and on the odd occasion I need to make a voice call I use voip. I was supposed to be using a dual SIM adapter by now, but the one I bought on eBay never showed up (got a refund).

Not really and I wasn't claiming it did. I was just pointing out that your claim that you needed to have two devices with matching SIM requirements wasn't correct.

Fair enough. Sorry I was snippy, I didn't get much sleep last night and my NAS was being annoying...

The latest rumor is that the hotspot feature will be coming to all iPhones with version 4.3 of iOS. It remains to be seen how this will play out with ATT - cost extra (like tethering) or lumped in with the base data package (like VZ)?

One thing's for sure, ATT is going to lose customers with VZ getting the iPhone. There's no reason to believe that Verizon will not push many more iPhones than ATT ever has. It's already been observed by multiple people that prior to the recent announcement, many consumers were making choices between iPhone and Verizon, not iPhone and some other phone. The runway is now clear, they can have their cake and eat it too.

This talk of iOS 4.3 left me pretty confident that we're also not going to see an untethered jailbreak for 4.2.1 on new devices. I suppose the writing's already been on the wall for over a month on that one though.

Looks like the VZ hotspot "rumors" were too good to be true - it'll cost an additional $20 per month for the privilege of being able to download UP TO 2GB.

Yes, you read that right. Up to 2GB on what you're already paying a monthly fee to supposedly receive "unlimited" data.

2GB goes by in a blink of an eye on a computer streaming or downloading video. Seems like there will still be a big market for the Jailbreak tethering applications.

I thought there was already a beta of an untethered jailbreak for 4.2.1 on the iPhone 4 ?

Where did you get the idea that Verizon lumped in their hotspot feature with any of their data plans? I was under the impression that it always cost extra on their Droid phones. The Pre is the only phone in recent memory that's had a plan on a carrier that included hotspot.

Some blog posted a comment from someone at Verizon that it was "included" - sort of like the Pre. Which would have been a big deal comparing it to the Droid contracts.

I'm sure the iPhone will outsell every Android handset by a healthy margin without it, but the feature is still a huge rip-off.

Andy, I haven't seen anything announced about an untethered Jailbreak for iPhone 4 on any blog, including the Dev Team's. I suspect it will never be released and instead they're waiting for 4.3 which may be the last 4.x update.

I had seen this:

http://blog.iphone-dev.org/redsn0w

...and not read it carefully enough. I see now it is only for people with a copy of 4.2b3 available and with SHSH blobs stored for 4.2b3

Random vaguely-related thought:

I just got a Google ChomeOS laptop in the mail and was playing with it yesterday. It has a built-in Verizon 3G modem, for which they offer an unusual pricing plan. You can use 100MB per day for free, for the next two years anyway. If you want more data, you can pay by the month or they offer a $10 per day all-you-can-eat plan (which nicely undercuts overpriced hotel WiFi rates).

That pricing plan is intriguing. For the odd times that I might want to tether my laptop to my smartphone, 100MB would be more than sufficient for my needs. Wouldn't it be nice if Verizon offered such a plan?