iPhone dilemma

Buried in my AT&T subscription page (why make it easy to find such a thing?) is the information that my 2 year AT&T contract expires on 7/11/2010.

I wrote in the past about issues with iPhone OS 3.0 on my iPhone 3G and it has been really bad since then. Apple seems to have designed iPhone OS 3.0 for the iPhone 3GS and they have done nothing to help those that didn't upgrade to the 3GS. I never upgraded to the 3GS because of their poor upgrade policy and my 3G iPhone has made me miserable.

There's plenty of news out about Apple's upcoming iPhone 4 release this summer. The big question to me is whether it will be on the AT&T network only, or if Verizon will be added either this summer or a bit later in the fall. Re-upping with AT&T for another 2 years doesn't excite me, especially with their poor network and all the dropped calls during my 45 minute commute on the Mass Turnpike. The news on Verizon support changes daily, but today's news is depressing. So it seems i'll be faced with the choice of iPhone 4 with AT&T OR some other phone on Verizon (current best alternative appears to be the HTC Incredible).

Will the Apple fan leave Apple in disgust of AT&T and Apple's own support of the iPhone? Are the alternatives any better with Verizon restricting features on their network and with the poor desktop integration other vendors have? Stay tuned.

iPad Charging Issues

Really, I don't go looking for these things, but I found another issue with the iPad recently. This looks like some kind of hardware flaw. There are documented stories out there on the net about the iPad being plugged into a USB source and not charging and sure enough I hit that issue. Evidently Apple knows about this problem too and they mention this problem:

“When charging, make sure you’re using the 10W USB power adapter that came with iPad (fastest) or the USB port on a recent Mac.”
They also say that USB hubs may not work:

"iPad may not charge when connected to the USB port on an older Mac, a PC, a keyboard, or to a USB hub.”

I don't know about you, but I have 8 USB things plugged into the MacPro that I was trying to charge the iPad on. Some just aren't a good fit for a hub (USB TV Tuner). If Apple made a device that can't work on a USB Hub well then they made a serious design mistake.

Meanwhile I found a use for the iPad. My wife found it can do Sodoku and the games on it are reasonable. So she's been clocking hours on that. I'm not sure of the economics of a $800 Sodoku device, but at lest its getting used...