72 Hours with iPhone 6

While I’m the CTO of the Zatz household, my wife Melissa is also capable of making tech purchasing decisions… and living with the consequences.

After years with Blackberry, I’ve truly become an Apple fan girl. For the less tech savvy, such as myself, I find Apple products quite intuitive, making for a fun and effective user friendly experience. When I gave up an iPad and iPad Mini to try the more economical Kindle Fire HDX, I was ultimately frustrated with its quirky operating system and lack of software polish. From what I can tell, these issues continue and I’m betting Dave will imminently return his recently purchased Fire. (Dave disputes this but he hates it when I’m right!). Like many others, my motto is “why fix what isn’t broke”? Apple has figured out a way to make technology easy, enjoyable, and super sexy looking.

As soon as the 4.7″ iPhone 6 was released Dave encouraged me to upgrade from my 4″ 5s. I use my smartphone for the majority of my web surfing and Internet needs. I actually use it more than my laptop — thanks to apps like Scanner Pro and eFax, I can even handle many work-related tasks on my phone. Dave and I also travel frequently and I’d rather not tote multiple devices. I want one gadget that will serve as my phone, my Kindle, and my web browser. As such, Dave believed I would enjoy the larger screen from my “all in one” device. I wasn’t easily convinced that we needed to spend $750 on a new phone when my 5s, although lacking in storage space, was seemingly meeting all my needs. Dave prefers I sport the newest product because it usually means a better or more efficient experience. I eventually gave in to his encouragement and I’ve been using he iPhone 6 for a few days now. I cannot say I’m in love just yet but I’m definitely interested.

I will leave the more credible tech reviews to Dave and other experts, but here are a few of my initial thoughts.

Pros:

• I’m loving the screen size. I’m appreciating the “enhanced” readable space and I look forward to using the Kindle App for a longer period of time when we go on vacation in a few weeks.
• Although I have not tried Apple Pay yet, I do like the related notifications from our linked credit card.

Cons:

• I’m noticing an increase in typos/auto correct and wonder if my tiny fingers are confused by the larger keys. It has been frustrating and I’m finding myself spending too much time deleting/making corrections. I hope it’s just a matter of getting use to the slightly larger “keyboard”.
• Thankfully my car is Bluetooth equipped because I’m not enjoying holding the phone… as a phone. I hope to get used to this as well. Holding the phone during a telephone conversation has been awkward.

When we learned UPS had dropped off my new phone, Dave messaged me “wait until I get home and I can help you”. Geesh, he needs to have more faith, after all I’ve been his apprentice for twelve years! One of the things I love about Apple is how simple they make things including a very easy activation and migration process. But I must give some of that credit to Chairman Zatz as well. He has trained me well.