So, on a quasi-impulse purchase, I decided to pick myself up an iPhone. Between actually getting my hands on one for an extended period of time and news of their fixes in 2.0.2, that was the impetus I needed to buy one, and Rogers’ promotional plans ending this month were what pushed me to buy one, like, now.

So, what do I think?

Nothing short of fantastic.

Full of nifty features, easy to use, easy to type with (I’m writing this post on it now), and certainly easy on the eyes, the iPhone is about everything I was expecting, and more. Lots of really cool programs are available, either free or dirt cheap, and it’s an easy device to personalize, giving you the feeling that even though you’re now one of the thousands that own one, it’s one all your own.

The only thing I’m disappointed in is the lack of push e-mail functionality out-of-box. It’s nice that they at least give a selectable interval to check for new mail, but I don’t really want my phone wasting battery life on constantly polling my POP server for updates. It seems kinda silly to me, but it’s definitely something the BlackBerry does quite well in comparison. Hopefully this gets resolved in a future firmware update, lest I be forced to set up an Exchange server at home. Be damned if I’m paying $99/year for functionality that my BB gave me at no charge, other than a data plan.

All in all, a great choice for a phone for those that want a really good, media-centred phone to take the place of two or three devices that they’d otherwise be carrying around.

The camera’s the best I’ve had on a phone personally this far, too. It ain’t no N95, granted, but it certainly gets the job done. See affixed photos.

All in all, you get a killer audio/video player, great browser, and some really handy social networking functions (twitter, wordpress, and IM clients are readily available), and everything is quick and simple. I won’t waste too much time with any more details, as they’ll simply be a rehash of hundreds of other websites out there. Just take my word for it, it’s a great investment.

-jb