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3G iPhone for Europe within 6 months?

As long as Apple finds a carrier in Europe (seeing how the rumor didn't happen) I would think that is within reason.
 
3G is pretty much the only option for mobile internet in Europe, since EDGE is practically non-existent. The iPhone launched in Europe, therefore, needs to have it otherwise it's a pretty redundant product.
 
D1G1T4L said:
As long as Apple finds a carrier in Europe (seeing how the rumor didn't happen) I would think that is within reason.
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The European market is much more different than the US market. For starters you cannot find a single carrier throughout Europe, so an exclusive deal is not going to happen.

Secondly, (this is the case for Denmark) no contract may bind you for longer than 6 months.

So Apple will have to make a different strategy and come with a slightly different product too.
 
To add to the uncertainty of the situation, this is something else I have come across (cut and pasted from Tech.co.uk News):

Quote:

3G looks unlikely

There has been much speculation over whether Apple would add 3G capabilities to the Apple iPhone for the European market. It's seen as essential here.

However Steve Jobs told the Wall Street Journal yesterday (28th June 2007) that 3G chipsets "were not quite mature, in the sense that they're not low-enough power for what we were looking for. They were not integrated enough, so they took up too much physical space.

"We cared a lot about battery life and we cared a lot about physical size. Down the road, I'm sure some of those trade-offs will become more favourable towards 3G but as of now we think we made a pretty good doggone decision."

Jobs: We're sticking with Wi-Fi and EDGE

Indeed, Jobs goes on to argue that EDGE can be a match for 3G and that Wi-Fi is better for web-surfing anyway:

"You know every [AT&T] Blackberry gets its mail over EDGE. It turns out EDGE is great for mail, and it works well for maps and a whole bunch of other stuff. Where you wish you had faster speed is ... on a web browser. It's good enough, but you wish it was a little faster. That's where sandwiching EDGE with Wi-Fi really makes sense because Wi-Fi is much faster than any 3G network."

It's also extremely unlikely that Apple would deny US iPhone buyers 3G on a Friday and then offer it to us Europeans the following Monday.

Close Quote.

So where does the truth lie?
 
dalvin200 said:
really.. tech moves so quickly that in december (or whenever in Q4 apple decide to release the iphone in europe), everyone will be wondering what the heck gprs is!!
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I do hope that you are right.

However, if this is so then I sympathise with buyers in the U.S.A. who have spent a lot of money on the very latest gadget only to find that in a matter of weeks it has become very old hat and oh so yesterday!

We have all come to expect rapid technological improvements but that is a bit much in my view.

Can't help thinking that some companies hold back on the latest technology so that they can give sales a boost when they start flagging a few months down the line.
 
CD3660 said:
I do hope that you are right.

However, if this is so then I sympathise with buyers in the U.S.A. who have spent a lot of money on the very latest gadget only to find that in a matter of weeks it has become very old hat and oh so yesterday!

We have all come to expect rapid technological improvements but that is a bit much in my view.

Can't help thinking that some companies hold back on the latest technology so that they can give sales a boost when they start flagging a few months down the line.
Click to expand...

Old hat? Just because Europe gets a 3G version makes the US version useless? The European version is going to be IDENTICAL to the US version with the exception of possible 3G. Apart from faster browsing, there is nothing the European version can do better than the US version.
 
CD3660 said:
I do hope that you are right.

However, if this is so then I sympathise with buyers in the U.S.A. who have spent a lot of money on the very latest gadget only to find that in a matter of weeks it has become very old hat and oh so yesterday!

We have all come to expect rapid technological improvements but that is a bit much in my view.

Can't help thinking that some companies hold back on the latest technology so that they can give sales a boost when they start flagging a few months down the line.
Click to expand...

this is why i didn't think there would be any 3G yesterday as predicted in certain quarters. it would be a kick in the teeth to all those who had queued up for a the latest thing only to find out it was only the latest thing for 3 days. it wouldn't do anything good for present sales to announce a new iphone now. iphone is supposed to come to europe in the fourth quarter of the year and i suspect in will be right at the end of the year.
 
Pressure said:
The European market is much more different than the US market. For starters you cannot find a single carrier throughout Europe, so an exclusive deal is not going to happen.

Secondly, (this is the case for Denmark) no contract may bind you for longer than 6 months.

So Apple will have to make a different strategy and come with a slightly different product too.
Click to expand...

You can't find a single carrier for all of the USA either, nor a single protocol or frequency, but an exclusive deal happened here anyway.

Here in the US, they decided to exclude all CDMA users, and most (if not all) rural users where AT&T has no coverage. And they're doing it for 5 years. I see no reason why they would be hesitant to exclude any particular group of subscribers in Europe. They're trying to make money, not corner the cell phone market. If that's best accomplished by going to one company in one country, they will. Bet on it. They'll pick the company or companies that will give them retail control of the phones and a piece of the rate structure. Here, they can't sell iPhones in about half the country. If they can't get a contract they want in Denmark, they won't sell them there.
 
docc said:
Old hat? Just because Europe gets a 3G version makes the US version useless?
Click to expand...

I didn't say useless, I said old hat as in not the latest accepted standard.

docc said:
Apart from faster browsing, there is nothing the European version can do better than the US version.
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You said it!

docc said:
....there is nothing the European version can do better than the US version.
Click to expand...

There isn't such a version, yet. So we are all speculating, which is half the fun of it anyway.

Don't fret, I'm sure your iPhone will continue to be regarded as the latest thing for a while yet.

Chill out. ;)
 
docc said:
Old hat? Just because Europe gets a 3G version makes the US version useless? The European version is going to be IDENTICAL to the US version with the exception of possible 3G. Apart from faster browsing, there is nothing the European version can do better than the US version.
Click to expand...

here in europe we no longer travel by car or public transportation; we simply dematerialise and reappear at our at chosen destination. this is achieved through the transportation element of our mobile phones. we simply will not accept a mobile phone without this feature. if the iphone is to sell at all here it must have this feature (along with mms). i, therefore, firmly predict that our iphone will not be identical to yours.
 
I sort of find mms useless, but that is because I only ever send photos over bluetooth to phones, or by email to people that I am not physically near to. I know that I will be losing Bluetooth if I move to an iPhone, but I find that the people I would send mms messages to don't have mms set up on their phones, and they end up just going on their pcs to see pictures.
 
Apple has previously announced the iPhone would ship in Europe in Q4. This isn't news. And since Europe only has 3G, it will have to be a 3G phone. My guess is the US will get this same phone in January.
 
Chupa Chupa said:
Apple has previously announced the iPhone would ship in Europe in Q4. This isn't news. And since Europe only has 3G, it will have to be a 3G phone. My guess is the US will get this same phone in January.
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we have 2G too.
 
Iphone in the uk would need both 3G or MMS. without these features it will fail,

SMS and MMS are the 2 major selling points of phones in this country, a phone that is tricky to text on fails. people like taking pictures and sending them to each other,

Vodaphone as recently altered its pricing structure for data to a flat rate of £7.99 a month for 150Mb of data. and then £1 a day after that allowance is used.

3G is the future of phones in this country any smartphone without 3G simply will not cut it. however Pay as you go is also massive in this country aswell with most of the people in this country using it. Contract are great but more and more people are migrating to pay as you go

will be interesting to see how this goes down
 
steviem said:
....I find that the people I would send mms messages to don't have mms set up on their phones, and they end up just going on their pcs to see pictures.
Click to expand...

I too find MMS fairly useless for the very same reason. However, in my case I doubt that many people who aren't set up for it would bother to go online to get the picture, in which case it is a complete waste of time.

Incidentally, I hadn't appreciated that the iPhone does not have bluetooth technology which means that it would not link with the built in hands-free system in my car. Bah! :mad:

I had assumed that it would be part of the package as I don't know of any top of the range phones over here that don't have it.
 
gazzzmoly said:
Iphone in the uk would need both 3G or MMS. without these features it will fail,

SMS and MMS are the 2 major selling points of phones in this country, a phone that is tricky to text on fails. people like taking pictures and sending them to each other,

Vodaphone as recently altered its pricing structure for data to a flat rate of £7.99 a month for 150Mb of data. and then £1 a day after that allowance is used.

3G is the future of phones in this country any smartphone without 3G simply will not cut it. however Pay as you go is also massive in this country aswell with most of the people in this country using it. Contract are great but more and more people are migrating to pay as you go

will be interesting to see how this goes down
Click to expand...

you know, no-one has ever sent me an mms. i think it ought to a feature of the iphone but i wonder how popular it actually is.

i agree with you about pay as you go. after ten years (on the same tariff!!) i have been on pay as you go for the past year. it suits me down to the ground right now.
 
Chupa Chupa said:
Apple has previously announced the iPhone would ship in Europe in Q4. This isn't news. And since Europe only has 3G, it will have to be a 3G phone. My guess is the US will get this same phone in January.
Click to expand...

Of course Apple is going to sell iPhones in Europe, and of course it will be 3G.

I'm sure you're a pretty smart guy and know a lot about the European cell phone market. But I suspect that Steve Jobs is a pretty smart guy too, and for the things he doesn't know about selling cell phones in Europe, I'll bet that he asks someone who does.

Maybe he'll ask you...:)
 
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