Apple’s 3.5″ tablet costs $749
Apparently, Apple’s 3.5 inch tablet with 3G and phone capability (what Apple calls their “iPhone”) with 16 or 32 MB storage costs $649 or $749. These devices are nice, but it’s against my principles to pay that kind of profit margin for a device like this.
If I was in the market for a phone and data service contract that subsidized it, I’d wait for the next model. This timing just doesn’t seem right.
Categories: Apple
Yes, but their 3.5 inch tablet with WiFi (what Apple calls their “ipod Touch”) can sometimes be found for as little as $189. It does everything the iPhone does except make calls, and with apps like Text Free, it can even do that, too. I refuse, on principle, to buy my daughter a cell phone that would force me to contribute upwards of $20 monthly to Verizon’s revenue stream for a texting plan. But the ipod Touch gives her unlimited texting, Facebook, FaceTime, Web, email, and music for nothing more than the up front cost of the device. Combine it with a MiFi device that gives us WiFi everywhere we go, and everybody’s happy.
And to think I was thrilled to have a transistor radio when I was a kid.
LF
@Leonard Flier
Good point. It’s not worth paying an additional $400 for phone capability.
This year (2011) we’ve hit a point in the US were more than 20% of homes no longer had a land line telephone in them. (Mine has not since 2003). Might we hit a point in the future where we will no longer have “phones” at all? If everyone had a 3.5 inch tablet with text and some sort of facetime and a mifi, would we need phones?