While I initially debated upgrading my iPhone to the 3G model, I have since decided that it's just not worth it, for several reasons.

First, the new iPhone plans from AT&T now suck in comparison to the first gen iPhone plans. The voice plans remain the same from what I can see, but the data plan is now $10 more and does not include the 200 text messages like the old one did, so in order to get the "same plan" for the 3G iPhone, you'll be paying $15 extra a month. It may not seem like that much, but over the course of your 2 year contract, it adds up and even cancels out the cheaper price for the phone itself.

A second reason is that despite what others want to say, the battery life on the 3G model is noticeably worse than that with the original. The 3G drains the battery faster than does the EDGE network. Walt Mossberg has already reviewed it and said he barely got 4.5 hours out of it.

A third one is features. The 3G really only adds 2 new features. The first of course is the 3G network, and the 2nd is GPS. Yes the 3G network is faster than the EDGE network, but speed isn't everything. And GPS, on a phone, I could take it or leave it, especially since I would really only see it as useful for maybe driving, but i already have a car GPS system. Keep in mind that all the other features like the app store, etc are part of the 2.0 firmware which still will work just fine on the original models.

So while the 3G iPhone doesn't suck by any means, in fact it looks great, especially for someone who doesn't have an iPhone to begin with, for someone like me however; the new iPhone 3G doesn't pack enough of a punch to make me toss my current iPhone for the new model. Maybe in the future with newer iPhone models, but for now, I will be sticking with my current iPhone.

Tags: opinion, iphone, apple

If I had to give one reason why I don't completely wipe out Windows on my desktop, I would have to say that reason is games. I am a gamer and there are still several PC games I enjoy playing.

These games are made for Windows and can't natively be run under Linux. WINE, which just released version 1.0 of its software to run Windows applications under Linux does a pretty good job at running many PC games, sadly though, it is not a full substitute for running the game on the Windows operating system. I know me personally have had mixed success with running games with WINE. Sometimes I get it working perfectly, other times it takes a little bit of work to configure to get it to even work, and there are other times where I can't get a game to work at all.

The real reason for this is that developers won't make games for Linux. It's not just a matter of making a different installer, its about programming for a different set of graphics libraries, and programming the game to run natively under a completely different system. And despite my wishes that more developers would choose to release Linux versions of their games, I can't say I don't understand their reasoning. Game companies are in the market to make money, like any business. To make more money, it only makes sense for them to make their games for the greater user base, which in this case, is Windows. Like it or not, Windows is still the operating system with the most market share, and it only makes sense for developers to target Windows for their games. Windows may be slowly declining in market share percentage, but its still at the top, and the logical platform for PC games.

Mac OS X has recently grown noticeably in computers sold and some game companies, like EA have taken notice and are starting to develop more for the OS X platform. This goes to show that if a platform becomes more noticeable in the spotlight, it could very well start being developed for.

The argument could always be placed "well game companies should make a version of the game for Linux, so us users aren't left out in the cold". And I think of that argument too, and wish that some developers would take the plunge and start developing for Linux. Some companies have. Unreal Tournament 2003 came with a Linux installer and ran natively, Penny Arcade's game also came with a Linux version. I would love to see big-name games come to Linux, I think that Linux is a great platform and would definitely pay for a game that would run natively on Linux. But again, until more market jumps on the Linux bandwagon, its not realistically profitable for game companies to use Linux as a platform.

There are a lot of pretty good games that do run natively on Linux, but not many of them are the big name titles that you see everyone talking about. To make an example, I've been playing Crysis, the first person shooter from EA and Crytek. This game is a good game with amazing graphics and some pretty good gameplay. It currently can only run on Windows XP and Windows Vista. Its support under WINE is shoddy, and even if you could get it working under WINE, the graphical aspects of it that make it what it is would be lost because WINE can't run it natively.

I'm honestly not trying to bash Wine, I love it and it does a great job with the majority of applications and games, but for those games it doesn't run or just half-runs, there really is no alternative to Windows at the moment. We can only hope Wine improves and/or developers take more notice to Linux. If I can get most of my games to run under Linux, I would be love to be able to wipe Windows off my desktop and just go with a pure Linux system.

What do you think?

Tags: opinion, opensource, tech, linux