Am I the only one who thinks it is a bit of a rip that NO 4.0 features are going to the original iPhone?  My phone is a little over 2 years old and now dead-ended.  One thing if that happens to a free phone, another thing for a $$$ smart phone.

The 1st gen iPhones are still functional, and better than many new “iPhone killers” from other companies.  If Apple will not keep them as current as possible, why not just jailbreak?  Will the population of dead-ended, jailbroken iPhones create a new, lower cost alternative smartphone?

trilon - 14 April 2010 10:20 PM

Am I the only one who thinks it is a bit of a rip that NO 4.0 features are going to the original iPhone?  My phone is a little over 2 years old and now dead-ended.  One thing if that happens to a free phone, another thing for a $$$ smart phone.

Apple has offered iPhone owners two years of free OS upgrades from time of purchase. That’s about the best you’ll find in the market. Some of the Android handsets coming to market today will not support even one major upgrade of the OS. I’m surprised you find Apple’s two-year upgrade commitment unsatisfactory.

The hardware in the original iPhone won’t support the iPhone OS 4.0 features. If Apple is to continue to innovate and provide new features in a timely way, decisions of this kind need to be made.

My original iPhone is now used as an iPod touch-style device. Just because your original iPhone won’t support iPhone OS 4.0’s new features doesn’t mean AT&T will stop providing service. However, 3G speeds are worth the upgrade. The 3GS offers outstanding performance and the next generation iPhone should be even more compelling from a user’s point of view.

Agree with the points, I have no expectations of getting upgrades on any conventional cell phone. Since they cost nothing with a contract, I realize they are disposable and just hope they hold together as long as the contract. When the contract is up you get a new phone, basically for nothing. I saw the first gen iPhone as more that a phone, with expectations of an upgradeable platform given the price and that it was from a computer company. 

I am in the SW biz and agree that there is a time to cut off the old stuff to move on.

But In this case it just feels like forced obsolescence. I find it hard to believe that _none_ of the 4.0 features would work. OK, HW can’t hack multitask, but no folders?  I would cut Apple some slack if they were struggling and could not afford the dev & QA, but they can.

Prior SW upgrades added features and supported the 2nd and 3rd gen unique HW (GPS, video).  The 1st gen was not dead-ended then, it just did not support the HW-specific features.  (And even then, some of the omissions seemed arbitrary.  Why no MMS on 1st gen?)

So I guess I have to reset my assumptions. The iPhone _is_ disposable like other phones.  So when the 4th gen comes out, like conventional phones, I hope there will be an affordable re-up trade-in program too.

I don’t think the word “disposable” is quite fair.  Your device isn’t being deactivated, nor is it going to lose any functions.  You’re just not getting anything new.  I held onto my Treo 650 for four years and only got very minor, under-the-hood updates for the first two years.  I haven’t seen a competitor’s OS or device that has been so lovingly supported over the long term as the iPhone ecosystem.  If someone can show me something that’s been done better, I’d love to see it.

I had a Samsung for 3 years. Not a single software update. And it cost more than my iPhone. Was glad to recycle it (to Cell Phones for Soldiers).

Now I will be glad to recycle my iPhone 3G for a 4th Gen iPhone come June.

Apple set the precedent way back when 2G owners were denied A2DP due to “hardware issues”, then petty things like the battery percentage gauge on non-3GSes, I gave my 2G the 3GS’ % gauge with a simple .plist edit.

It also has stereo bluetooth as well, plus the battery is as good as it ever was (as it should be as it’s barely 2 years old).

Those who jailbreak will probably get OS4 if they want it, we’ve already seen videos of 2Gs and 3Gs running OS 4.0 beta.

It’s unfortunate that original 2G iPhone owners won’t be able to run iPhone OS 4. In fact, iPhone 3G has the same processor and memory as the original 2G iPhone and it *will* be partially supported. The cutoff point is more of an arbitrary marketing decision than a technical one.

Apple has basically decided to go with a support cycle that keeps your OS up-to-date through the duration of your contract. After that it’s time to either get a new phone or live with the last supported version. Most people will probably be OK with that, because whatever new hotness comes out this summer will make their existing iPhones look old and tired anyway. They’ll upgrade as soon as their contract is up for renewal. I know I will, anyway.