Tag Archives: apple

(Head)Phoning It In

iPhone

Oh Apple. How I love and hate you simultaneously. Your iPhone is a thing of beauty. Sublime. Utterly life changing. But your accessories leave me thirsty for more, like some post-Survivor participant thirsts for their sixteenth minute of fame.

We all know the ear buds suck. No big surprise. I want to talk about how Apple knows they suck, made an equally maddening improvement that sucks even more so. And just as you’re about to play the boiling mad consumer when you return them, they soothe your pain with treacle and excellent customer service.

Yes. I bought the $90 In-Ear buds that may or may not work for iPhones and they were glorious. The sound was so rich I could hear the lead singer from Underworld fart during one track, I swear. But soon after the cons started.

Logically, headphones with a microphone suggests they made these buds for the iPhone, since voice recording isn’t all that much of a big need (or a huge selling app) on an iPod Touch. So I’m assuming it’s primarily made for the iPhone but on the iPhone, the volume controls don’t work – they only work correctly for the iPods. So why add a microphone if it’s an iPod accessory? Maddening.

Secondly, as I paid for them, the woman pointed out that I have 3 weeks to return them for a full refund. Not a store credit, or exchange. Full. Refund. Uh oh. Not a good sign but at least she pointed that out verbally and on the bill.

Another con is that the wire used for the buds have a habit of transmitting any vibration directly into your inner ear. So any footstep, any brush up against the wires, any silent burp, telegraphs to your ear bones like a tin cup and yarn telephone. It’s utterly distracting from the rich, beautiful music.

And finally, I don’t have the ears that keep the buds in place. I tried all three sizes but found I was reinserting them every block or so. I plucked my ear hairs, cleaned the wax out and yet still no grip. They constantly slipped out, reducing the aural impact.

I took them back last night to a very crowded Apple store, where they’ve banished the long wait for the cash by having floating remote cash points on the back pocket of the hip, young(ish) things that man the isles (tiny voice: Brilliant!). After a short exchange with the most popular and sexy Panda Bear that works there…

Panda Bear: (flashing his pay point machine) Paying with credit card?
Me: Returning, actually.
PB: Really? Didn’t like them?
Me: My greasy Italian ears can’t keep them in my ear holes.
PB: You said it, not me.

…I got to the counter and was out of the store with not an ounce of hassle. In fact there was only one question asked:

Clerk: Can I ask why are you returning them?
Me: (Offering my list of complaints, said nicely and with a smile).
Clerk: I am sorry to hear that these didn’t work for you.

Yeah. She took ownership of the problem. I was so shocked by that one sentence that I told her at the end of the transaction that her service was excellent. It was like getting a good night blow job when you only expected a kiss. I didn’t add that part.

Unfortunately when I got home, the 3rd party brand I bought were such utter shite I tore them from my head and cursed the day this nameless company was created. The jack wasn’t sitting correctly in the iPhone, producing a crackling noise, the microphone produced such poor quality playback over the phone that I sounded like I was in an empty bucket at the back end of a concert hall while trying to removing chicken feathers from my throat. The buds themselves leaked so much noise SharkBoy was holding his own ears. Yeah that bad.

I’ll recount my second return later. Wish me luck!

Canada Doesn’t Deserve the iPhone

iPhone, Tech

What? I hear you say.

I’m dead serious. If the two main sites that report on iPhone news, applications and gadgets are to be the harbinger of the coming of the iPhone in the Great White North, then we can expect the news to be mis-informed and at least 24 hours too late.

Lets start with iPhoneworld.ca: other than the debilitating ads that clog it’s loading, or the mystery meat navigation, it’s fairly good. But slow on the reporting. Hackint0sh, TUAW and Gizmodo trump this site by hours (in some cases days). Let’s face it, the only thing this site will be good for is when Rogers announces the arrival of the phone and then it will wonder what to talk about next. But what made me cancel my RSS feed to it was their utterly lame attempt to get Rogers and Apple to shake hands: The “Great” Canadian iPhone Petition (quotes mine).

Very noble! That will make Rogers stand up and say “Hey! There are some disgruntle customers out there! We should do something about it!” I’ll stop with the sarcasm from here on in, you get my drift. But here’s the thing that made me pass morning tea through my nose:

We, the undersigned, pledge our support to Rogers Communications Inc., that we would support the launch of the iPhone in Canada.

Whiskey? Tango? Foxtrot? They want us to support a company that is going to monopolize this product with high connection costs? Uh… for how long? Forever? I’ll be honest, when (if?) Rogers brings the iPhone to Canada I’ll buy into their plan only because it’s the only kid on the block. As soon as someone else comes along: Sayonara! Pledging support to a company blindly is a bit too creepy for me. Sign me out. Expected signatures: 100,000. Since inception (March 28th): 790. Good luck with that.

And then there’s iPhoneinCanada.ca. Arguably a better site with product/accessory reviews but with the same amount of slow loading ads. Again, nothing really new here that hasn’t been scooped from the other Apple/iPhone sites, other than cases you can’t get in Canada unless you order them online. Worrisome were the reviews and links to “All-you-can-eat” download sites that I am pretty sure are hosting unlicensed media. Regardless, I hung out on the forums for a couple weeks and was really starting to get a sense of community until one of the moderators started to wildly recommend Ziphone blindly to all who would ask what was the best way to jailbreak, unlock, activate your phone.

Obviously he wasn’t doing his homework.

I mean, sure it works. But what is it doing to your iPhone?

When I asked if he had researched what exactly Ziphone does, he accused me of being biased towards a particular software. His final word on the matter was that the forum was there to offer many different solutions to unlocking your phone and that readers would have to make their own decisions.

So I decided that I wanted to be a part of something more informed and based on solid opinion, and I deleted that RSS feed too.

So I’m hoping that any Canadian who has an iPhone or is going to purchase one, has a little more sense to blindly trust these sites. My advice: Google deeper.