Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Can AT&T handle the iPhone?

Going to AT&T is totally a different experience from going to the apple store. Going to AT&T give you the feeling that AT&T is making guesses about how the iPhone is suppose to work and what feature have or not. For example, when I asked about whether the iPhone supports the stereo Bluetooth headset, .i.e. AD2P, their immediate answer was yes of course. So based on their answer I made the purchase from their store to find out that it is not supported yet. Also, when they were asked about their discount policy on the iPhone accessories I got many conflicting answers. One store told me that all iPhone related accessories do not qualify for corporate discount. While others told only products that are packaged with AT&T brand quality for discount.

In my overall experience dealing with AT&T, ,most of their employees are incompetent in handling advance Smart Phones and most of them do not have basic understanding of basic smart phone features. When I told one of the AT&T sales rep that I used my own SIM card instead of the one that came with the device he was very surprised that it worked and he insisted that the iPhone will not with any other SIM card other than the one that came with it. They are not aware that all SIM cards are standards and since the iPhone is locked to AT&T as long as you have an existing AT&T SIM the activation process will work without any problems. No wonder why people were having problems activating their phones.

I think it would have been a good idea for Apple to provide a full training to the AT&T sales rep in using the iPhone. In additions, Apple needs to train AT&T in general how to interact with customers. When I walk into the AT&T I feel like I am walking into a mechanic shop. Where, when I walk into the Apple store I feel I am walking into a high tech Art Museum. Totally different experience.

Monday, July 02, 2007

I love my iPhone, here are my top 5 feature requests

  1. Support for MS Exchange Push Technology. including support for Hotmail
  2. IM client support for MSN, Yahoo, Google Talk, AOL, ...etc
  3. Video recording
  4. Media transfer via Bluetooth
  5. Arabic Support in the Safari Browser.

    Thats it :)