Weeks before the official launch of iPhone 5, I was telling to myself: “AT&T is going to make me wait the entire 3-4 week delivery time”.
And that’s because back in the day, I stood in line and bought an AT&T locked, iPhone 3G. I had a very serious love-hate relationship with the device. It dropped nearly every call I was on at least once. Finally in October of 2007, I remember being on the phone with a writing partner trying to discuss a couple stories we were writing. In a 20 minute time span, my iPhone dropped the call 11 times. I was sitting at my desk and had a 3-bar signal. My writing partner was on a land line.
I had to ask myself – as a veteran product reviewer – would I put up with that kind of behavior from any other device? The answer was a clear and unequivocated no. I put the word out that I was selling the device. It sold in less than 10 minutes.
We left AT&T; and I got into Android devices at that point, and were happy for a while. The iPhone experience is so compelling, however, that I eventually ended up buying an unlocked iPhone 4S and put it on the T-Mobile network and have lived there for the past year or so. The device and the smartphone experience it brings is just that good.
My wife is due for a phone upgrade on T-Mo; and my daughter and I have unlocked iPhones. I did the math and decided that I could literally cut my cell bill in half by moving back to AT&T. I priced my unlocked iPhones for resale by Gazelle and found out I could part with both unlocked devices for the cost of 2 AT&T locked iPhone 5’s, so effectively, I get three brand new iPhones for the price of one.
I ordered them on 22-Sep-12, the day AFTER they were released in the US. I was quoted a delivery time of 3-4 weeks. And yes, I had to wait a lot.
Based on what I’ve heard about FoxConn quality issues, strikes and the complexity of the device to manufacture, I can only conclude that the rumors we’ve heard are true. I was told by the salesman at my local AT&T store that other, single orders of 16GB iPhones placed AFTER mine have beaten their delivery estimates and have been activated. But not mine.
