So, a little more than a week after its launch, employees were allowed to purchase iPhone 4′s for our personal use.  And I snapped one up.  The 32GB models were in low supply, so I opted for a 16GB, even though I had already filled my previous 16GB iPhone 3G model.  First impressions — I really love the iPhone 4.  The camera is fantastic, the screen is really amazing, and its speedy (which any original iPhone 3G owner can appreciate).   And iOS 4 is a great enhancement when you have the better processors.   I can attest, though, it runs like mud on an iPhone 3G.

That said, I found the attenna issue to be a real thing.  If I touch the left side near the break point, my signal diminishes.  Even with iOS 4.01 update, I still see signal go down.  Apple did discover that they had a software error that caused misrepresentation of signal, but the iOS 4.01 update didn’t resolve all the problems for me.   However, I believe that a case will fix the problem as Consumer Reports and Apple have both reported.  And so, today, I downloaded the iPhone 4 Case Program app from the App Store and selected my free case.  The shipping time shows 3 to 5 weeks to arrive (which is the only bummer), but Apple did a great job of making this program easy to use from a customer’s perspective.

To order your free case from Apple, get the app, launch it and then click the blue button.  You are asked to log into your iTunes account and then the app apparently checks the fulfillment system against your serial and/or iTunes account to see if you have a pending order.  If you have a pending order, it will display a message — otherwise, it displays a list of the available cases.  I was impressed with the selection — cases from Speck, Belkin and other vendors.  I selected my Speck case and placed the order.  The app automatically pulled my address and name information from my iTunes account and so one more tap and the order was complete.  It took only about 4 or 5 taps on screen to complete my order — which is a testament to Apple’s mentality and method of creating easy customer experiences.

That all said, I’m not sure that Apple PR or Steve Jobs handled the situation very gracefully, given the type of experience they strive to create for the customer.  But that is my personal opinion and no one can discount that Apple has made an exceptional device and people want them.  Even with the antenna problem, it is the best iPhone yet.  I can’t wait to see what is up their sleeves next.    That marks one thing off of my Apple to-buy list, but a new iMac and iPad are still on the list…  just waiting until the house comes a little further and we see how all of the finances for it works out.  We are trying to be very budget conscious right now.

I had been contemplating getting a Mac Mini to replace my aging Apple TV at home and to offer us the capability of watching NetFlix or Hulu directly on our TV.   I had found dongle cables to offer video and audio to HDMI on the last revision of Mac Mini and was just waiting primarily on our house build to get going to see how our money looked as we were finishing the project.  I have been trying to be very good about my technology purchases – since I felt like we had higher priorities.

And today, I am glad we waited.  I hope to add a new Mac Mini to our collection at home soon as our media Mac – our home base for iTunes content and photos.  I still feel like I need to wait, but my wishlist of Apple products keeps growing…  An iPad, a new iPhone 4 and now add a Mac Mini.  I also want to replace my aging iMac with a new version for video editing…

The biggest issue with the Mac Mini media “server” I see going forward is software, given today’s hardware revision.  I had blogged before (here and here) about wanting some of the iTunes capabilities brought over to iPhoto – to be able to setup a library and have all my photos automatically push up to it and to be able to pull down photos easily in iPhoto from a central library.

I’ve mentioned my friend before with the agency, and good photo management is a problem that they have in their all Mac environment.  They currently have their photos on a file share, but iPhoto is much better solution since you could add keywords and ratings and all the other metadata that iPhoto allows.  But this same need applies to the multi-Mac home.

Mac OS X Server has been incrementally growing in features and capabilities with each major release.  Its market penetration and target has largely been towards Mac heavy businesses.  It has packaged several new products in the last two releases to help Mac organizations reduce their dependence on Microsoft solutions – new products like iCal and Address Book server as well as a mail server, all of which are based heavily on standards which is great for interoperability across all client platforms.

But, with the introduction of the Mac Mini server, Apple has tilted the OS X Server offering more towards small businesses (who might not purchase a Mac Pro or X-Serve to run OS X Server).  It also could be used for some home users — could this be the first, quiet step towards the home server for Apple?   I don’t have to answer and this is purely speculation, but let me continue.

A few “What if’s”
What if, given the popularity of iTunes and the new Home Sharing feature, Apple created a network copy of iTunes – an iTunes Server.  Could that be in the future for Apple?  The home sharing feature added the automatic sync technology, and technically, this functionality already available for anyone who buys a Mac Mini, with or without OS X Server. But something that automatically runs a service instead of an application would be a great idea.  All those TV Shows and Movies you buy shouldn’t need to reside on your iMac or MacBook Pro.  Those make more sense to live on a home server.   This could be the backend media server for AppleTV.

Building on that idea, what if the iTunes Server could run Back To My Mac type services and link to the cloud allowing you to stream or pull content to your library to your iPhone, iPod or Mac over an Internet connection?  Apple’s purchase of Lala could provide such an interface for users to access and pull their content using the cloud and using their own Mac as the end storage.

Next, what if Apple created an iPhoto Server edition?  This could work for agencies and home users the same and allow for syncronized access to iPhoto libraries through a server.  Sure, you can share between copies of iPhoto on different Macs, but what about an iPhoto master library with home sharing type features.    Or, it could store the content in a central location and iPhoto could serve as a viewer client to the photos and movies stored on the server.    Sure, I think this is more of a longshot, but its a problem I’ve encountered with my friend who owns the agency and I’d love to have synced iPhoto across our multiple Macs at home.

Bill Keller, Executive Editor for the New York Times, is outlining a series of objectives which includes point 6:

We need to figure out the right journalistic product to deliver to mobile platforms and devices. I’m hoping we can get the newsroom more actively involved in the challenge of delivering our best journalism in the form of Times Reader, iPhone apps, WAP, or the impending Apple slate, or whatever comes after that.

This adds further fuel to rumors that Apple had reached out to publishers about an impending “new product.” If there is one thing Jobs and company understand well, it is that ever tool must have a killer application (not as in software, as in utility).  The New York Times is a pretty credible source who would most likely be high on Apple’s list of initial partners offering content for a device, if that is ultimately the “slate’s” killer application.

What is interesting to note about this video, is that it was information given during what appears to have been a confidential meeting for internal staff.  It doesn’t appear this information was ever intended for its current audience, and that may throw additional validity behind the reports.  I’m sure Keller was not worried about confidentiality and other matters when divulging the information.

Other rumors point that the device is being manufactured by FoxConn (not exactly a stretch – they manufacture a lot of Apple gear – including the iPhone) and that it is destined for a Q1 2010 launch.

My take on the matter is this:  I hope that Apple will target the device with a few unexpected uses.  Everyone expected Apple to make a phone with iPod features.  But what Apple surprised us all with is a fantastic, connected Internet device.  It has since expanded upon that initial success by offering third party applications leveraging its incredible APIs and hardware.    I hope that Apple will surprise with more than just a color screened, multitouch Kindle-killer device for replacing paper.

It has also been reported that Jobs wanted the device to be more than a potty-mate, offering more than just “surfing the Web in the bathroom.”  I can’t see offering newspapers and magazine content achieving that feat, so what could that killer feature really be?

I knew from reading, that Apple was offering screen replacement services in Apple stores across the country, so I called up the closest store in Charleston, SC.  After talking with them there, the Apple worker confirmed and told me that the best way was to make an appointment online before driving the two hours and then I’d have a definite time slot to come in for my repair.

I made my way to the Apple store in Charleston’s website and in about 2 minutes had myself registered for an appointment that evening.  I can’t tell you how incredible it was to book an appointment and know that I could just walk in a few minutes early and someone would be with me quickly.  Its better than a doctor’s office — let alone an ER.   Doctors, dentists, ophthalmologists should really all take note and offer similiar services online – its not hard.

Walking into the store around 6pm that evening, I was told to see a woman in an orange shirt.  She then asked my name and with her iPhone, looked me up and changed the slider to notify the Apple Geniuses that I had arrived for my appointment.  My name was on the board with other customers who had upcoming appointments at the Genius bar.  How ingenious, you can see what order you are in the queue…  Doctors – take note!

Shortly after, I was called up to the bar and the Genius examined my iPhone.  Not only were they knowledgeable and professional, they were also NICE and joked, seeming to have a very good time working in the store.   I know from my few days in retail that if you promote a good attitude, many customers have one back to you – kudos to them.  Also, considering I was a nervous papa whose iPhone was broken, their upbeat attitude definitely inspired hope in me too.

The Genius helped me rule out an upgrade and possible resolution after checking my account through AT&T.  We moved on to screen replacement – the price $199 – I was more than willing to pay to get it fixed.  A lot of people say its a big cost to replace the glass, but in all honesty, I’m not sure its that big of a price to pay.   A new, non-contract reduced iPhone would run upwards of $500 or $600 and a cracked screen is out of warranty-type replacement, so $199 to me seemed fair.

The Genius took the phone, disappeared into a service room and re-emerged about 15 minutes later with my working, repaired iPhone.  A nice new protective cover around it and my family and I were ready to walk out of the store.

While all this was going on, my wife and daughter were busy playing Dora in the kids area on the iMacs setup there.  Looks like we’ve found a birthday present for her…  The whole experience took less than 45 minutes, including some additional shopping.  All said, I’m extremely pleased and once again my positive impressions of Apple are completely reinforced.

Home Sharing works very similiar to the sharing features of earlier versions of iTunes, actually showing up in the same area of the iTunes interface.  Home Sharing, however, goes a step further.  By registering your iTunes with a specific iTunes Store account, other computers on your same network with the same account get access to pull music from each other – actually copying and keeping your libraries in sync.

Home Sharing also allows you to quickly and easily see what content in a shared library is missing from your library.  Once the home share is established and the list of content is populated, a drop down menu in the bottom of the app allows you to change the view to see only content missing from your library.  What’s futher, you can actually navigate the home share like your local library and limit the view to just music, movies, TV shows, etc. and then apply the ‘what’s missing’ view.

Taking it a step forward, you are also able to automatically sync music from other home shares to your library.  Some might ask why you’d want to do that…  Take this example.  At home, we have an iMac that serves as our master library.  We try to keep everything we buy there.  The iMac syncs to our Apple TV – so we want all our content there to be able to play it for parties or while we’re around the house.  We’ve enabled the automatic sync for music to pull all content from other home shares into this library.

I have privately hoped that Apple might enable this sort of functionality to turn the Apple TV into a digital hub and add the ability to make it a “master” library for iTunes, so the home sharing technology certainly gives me hope that this may come to pass.  I like the idea of having a smaller, headless device serve as my primary library.  But, until that time, we keep the iMac running 24×7 and so that works too.  Now, what about adding Back to My Mac functionality to iTunes so that we can get our home shares from anywhere on the Internet?  I like where this could go…

After upgrading to OS 3.1 over the weekend, I found that my MMS has begun working.  I can both send and recieve picture messages on my iPhone, which is a welcomed feature.   OS 3.1 or iTunes 9 also killed the ability to change the carrier configuration file, so I am unable to setup tethering on my iPhone, which OS 3.0 allowed with the reconfigured carrier file.

Most likely, my working MMS is a result of my earlier changes, but it may be the same for many other non-hacked iPhones out there, so give it a try.   I have had the picture messaging icon exposed on my messaging application for a while, but the network would not accept any messages with pictures attached from my iPhone.  To check to see if your MMS is working, you should see a little camera on the input line of the messaging application.  I haven’t tried to send a video (alas, I’m only an iPhone 3G – not a 3GS with video).

Speaking of the tethering option, though.  The OS 3.0 tethering configuration change was not without issues.  I did noticed in dot releases of iTunes that the changes for exposing the tethering option would be lost after syncing back to iTunes.  I figured this was a way of preventing advanced users from using the tethering option when AT&T didn’t want it.   It was massively inconvenient for my configuration to change automagically when I tried to tether at my parents house and get some whiff of AT&T’s spotty service in the rural areas of South Carolina.  Oh, well, I’d love to pay – AT&T, please give us tethering.

In related news, AT&T seems to know that its 3G network can’t keep up with the iPhone (<sarcasm> really??</sarcasm>).

I’m very excited to be attending VMworld again this year and I’m looking forward to soaking up just as much as possible from the conference.  I plan on blogging about some of the sessions and topics I encounter.  Last year’s conference in Las Vegas was great and I think my company greatly benefited from the information I was able to get and bring back.  We had information months in advance about the then upcoming vSphere version and its capabilities.  For anyone who is seriously invested in ESX, its well worth the money to attend.

One thing we’ve been seriously looking at is virtual host management software — something in addition to Virtual Center and something to alert us of what is going on inside of our ESX hosts.  In a pipe dream, we’d love a product that is also cross platform, since we’ve added XenServer to our mix this year.  We’re looking for software that can do some level of network monitoring and notification about traffic from ESX hosts, that allows us to alert on a wider variety of problems in the ESX environment, but also something to help us answer questions when the arise.

I hope to spend some time in the vendor expo area looking at what solutions are available.  We have seen demos and installed evaluations from several companies, but I think we are down to two options – Hyper9 or vFoglight from Vizioncore.  Those are two very different products, but each has its own strengths.  Ideally, I think both would fit into our environment quite well and both would be useful, but I doubt we get to buy both.  Neither fits that bill, but it sounds like both are moving in that direction in the future.

The week after VMworld, a rumored Apple event may happen.  Unfortunately, the event is scheduled for 9/9/09, after I leave San Fran – darn it.   AppleInsider is rumoring the event will be iPod related – including adding point-and-shoot camera capabilites to the iPod lines.  iTunes 9 is also expected to be announced with some social networking tie-in’s.  Years past, as AppleInsider reports, the event has been held at the Yerba Buena Center – and that is just a couple blocks from the hotel in the city – oh well…

So, its an exciting week for me coming up.  I’m looking forward to the trip and to VMworld.

File this under the “why’s that happening” category…  About a week ago, I noticed that my MacBook Pro’s Time Machine stopped working.  It has been working flawlessly to an external drive hosted on my iMac at home, but I wanted something to back it up when I was on the road – for an upcoming trip where we’re likely to have lots of photos.  (My friends lost a hard drive in their Mac while traveling across the country.)

Today, I found an article in ComputerWorld which links Mozy Backup to problems in Time Machine.  On further investigation, it is my problem.  As soon as I loaded Mozy on my MacBook Pro, the Time Machine problems began.  Unfortunately, I thought I had a corrupt spare image file on the backup volume, so I purged it and tried to start over.  Unfortunately, I was unable to start over and successfully backup my Mac using Time Machine.  After a couple tries, I did get it to work, only to find the next morning that it too had reported a problem with the disk image and had failed.  So, I’m down on my Time Machine, but for anyone else seeing these problems, thought the link above might be useful.

Here is an additional link:  the Apple Support Forum discussion on the matter.