News for Monday, 14 July 2008

The second iPhone model achieved 2 milestones within 72 hours following its official launch. Apple announced to have sold one million iPhone 3G in First week-end. Sales were collected from the 21 countries where the iPhone is already available (Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK and the US), and France will join the pool on July 17th.
During the same period of time, Apple announced that iPhone and iPod Touch owners (using the Firmware 2.0) have downloaded more than 10 million applications from the new dedicated App Store, while the offer is now over 800 applications and among them 200 as freeware.

Several readers contacted us about the so called yellowish display of the new iPhone 3G as they could read about it on the web. Hereafter is a capture showing how less “bluish” is the new iPhone 3G display: iPhone 1G on the left and iPhone 3G on the right:

So, if you play with the brightness you will see the difference, but the new display is rather more neutral color-wise than the original iPhone which was offering a blue-rich display.
The display settings of the new iPhone 3G is very similar to the one of the first production batch of iPhone 1G dedicated to the US market. The blue-rich rendering appeared wit the iPhone 1G dedicated to the EU market. So it is NOT a display problem, rather a color calibration choice made by Apple.

Hereafter is a report from Patrick

I purchased an iPhone 3G last Friday, and I already had to reboot it 5 times over the week-end as it device does not support switching from horizontal to vertical display or the other way around. After rebooting it works fine till the next waking up from a sleep mode...

A topic about this issue is receiving numerous visits on Apple discussion forum. If it affects mostly iPhone 3G, the problem also impact iPhone v1.0 which have been updated with firmware 2.0. So, the accelerometer is might not be defective, but rather a bug in the iPhone OS Firmware 2.0.
In USA, Apple will exchange devices experiencing such issues, something easy when considering the number of opened Apple Store.
Unlike the iPhone v1, the 3G model is covered by an international warranty valid in all countries where the iPhone 3G is officially available. One will have to provide couple of proofs that you obtained such device legally and from authorized resellers, as described in the
iphone_Warranty.pdf

Hereafter is a report from Segonzac.

I just got a message to purchase the "iPhone Developer Program standard", on the iTunes store.
------------------------------------------------
Thank you for applying to the iPhone Developer Program.
We have reviewed the information you submitted when you initiated your program enrollment request and we are ready to instruct you on the steps required to complete the enrollment process.
Please click here to review and agree to the Standard License Agreement. You must execute this agreement prior to completing the purchase and activation process for the iPhone Developer Program.
Once you complete and activate your purchase, your enrollment will be complete.
Thank you,
iPhone Developer Program

Things are clear, with the AppStore opened, up and running, Apple is pushing to get as much applications available as possible in order to create the same ecosystem as between the iPod and the iTunes Store. In couple of months we should know if the iPhone/AppStore will have the same success.

If the launch of the iPhone 3G has been set to July 17th in France, so about one week later than the rest of the world, Orange keeps preparing the event to make it a success:

The Orange shop located on the Champs Elysées will open at 8h00 and offer croissants and iPhone Demo to celebrate the arrival of the new iPhone model.

Intel will officially launch today its new mobile computer platform, Centrino 2. Among the new features, the important ones are:
- Support for DDR3, increasing memory bandwidth while lowering power consumption.
- Support 802.11n and Wi-Max (in option).
- New Penryn to be introduced with the Centrino 2, clocked at 2.4 and 2.8 GHz.
- Support of Displayport and HDMI.
However, only the Centrino 2 without the integrated graphic chipset X4500 HD will be available (so requiring a dedicated GPU from AMD/ATI or NVidia). So, if Apple could quickly offer a revision of the MacBook Pro based on the Centrino 2, one will have to wait further before seeing the MacBook adopting the Centrino 2 and its integrated chipset X4500 HD which is expected to offer performance levels in 2D and 3D equivalent to a dedicated entry-level GPU.