After some handwringing and discussion, the iPhone came home with us on Saturday afternoon. I’ve had one full day to live with it–enough time to form that blissful first opinion, and here it is.

First of all, the buying experience associated with buying an iPhone is exhilarating. The overwhelming media blitz for this thing makes buying one feel more like buying a Lexus than a wireless phone. As I stood in line with three other people buying them, we were gazed upon by other Apple Store patrons. It was frankly a little unnerving. Also, each phone is packaged deliberately differently than the iPods, and is even given to you to take home in a specially designed cardboard “bag” with black ribbon drawstrings. Carrying it through the mall I realized just how different it would be using the iPhone: anyone under the age of 30 was peering down at it surreptitiously as I passed.

I: Activation

Despite the horror stories circulating after the release on the 29th, my iPhone activation took about 5 minutes including the “paperwork” and sync. The iTunes-based setup worked without a hitch, and I noticed that mine had even shipped with a full battery. I dropped a few albums on it and got ready to poke around a bit.

II: First details

The device itself is stunning. The iPhone is more diminutive than even its PR suggests, and it’s thinner than my 30 GB iPod 5G. It feels good in the hand, it at times a little awkward to hold. The screen is razor sharp and exceptionally bright, and displayed photos with startling sharpness. In the first ten minutes out of the box I was speeding through the UI with ease, zooming photos with the “pinch” for the amusement of my wife.

III: Wifi trials

Let’s start by admitting that EDGE is pathetic. Its download speeds approach dialup for most tasks, and are bearable really only for email. I’d hate to be forced to use the Google Maps app with anything other than pure wifi, which was my first struggle. I had a fair amount of difficulty getting the iPhone to see my Belkin 54G wireless router, and after three resets apiece I decided to walk down the street to see if iPhone could see my local coffee shop’s wifi. Inexplicably my router appeared as I rounded the stairs on our second floor, 30 feet from the router I’d previously been practically on top of. I’m still not certain what finally made the iPhone see my router, but it’s been seeing wireless networks all weekend now and joining them without complaint. Oh well. Being outside gave me a chance to sample call quality and the iPod feature.

IV: iPod and calls

As I bopped down to the coffee shop, I flipped through some albums in the iPod. Every aspect of the UI is gorgeous, even the plain vanilla (read: non-Cover Flow) list views. Menus float and glide as if real world objects, and there’s no detectable lag between finger gestures and the virtual controls. I settled on some Bjork to listen to, and seconds into the first track my wife called. The iPod seamlessly trimmed the volume down to zero, paused my music and asked me whether I wanted to take the call; being ever the UX developer I couldn’t resist a quick chuckle at the perfection that incoming call had triggered. In quick succession this tiny little gadget had made about five right decisions about my user experience. I accepted the call and was very pleased with the audio quality, especially over the included headset. I poked around the internet a bit over wifi, and was very pleased with Safari’s speed and responsiveness. Every mobile browser I’ve ever used has some quirks, but other than the lack of Flash support Safari doesn’t really have any. After a while you stop throwing websites at it expecting it to break or truncate your sites, a la Opera Mobile or the PSP browser. Soon, you’re just surfing and taking it for granted. Mission accomplished, Apple. Time for some email.

V: Email

When you sync iPhone for the first time, it attempts to copy your email accounts from Apple Mail. You’ll find that when you click (tap?) mail for the first time that it’s ready to go as long as there are working accounts on your Mac. Over wifi speed was excellent. There are a lot of complaints about the Mail app on iPhone, from the ordering of messages (new on top, and no you can’t change it) to the way it supports Gmail. None of those things bothered me as much as not being able to use the mail app in landscape mode like Safari. I’m hoping this works in future versions. Replying to mail is a breeze, and once you get used to the admittedly awkward keyboard you find you can tap out an email response with four or five complete (correctly spelled) sentences in about two minutes.

At the end of day one, I had sent an email browsed the web and even shot a picture or two. The camera is better than average, but still just a wireless phone camera lacking a few things–see number 1 here. I had yet to delve into some of the meatier apps like Google maps or the calendar. All that would happen on day two…

TO BE CONTINUED…