Anyone who knows me or listens to my shows, knows that I drank the Apple-flavored Kool Aid many years ago. The first Apple product I ever owned was my treasured Apple IIe that my parents bought me as a high school graduation present. Between then and now, I’ve owned literally dozens of Macintosh products from the Mac-plus and SE through to a brand new MacBook Pro 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo and my wife’s new 20″ aluminum iMac.

So it should come as no surprise that as soon as Steve Jobs announced the iPhone, I wanted one. At first, the rational side of my brain kicked in and told me not to buy one. I’ve got an iPod video, I own a smart phone (a Treo 700p that I actually like), the iPhone doesn’t have a GPS, and this is a v. 1.0 product.

But then I got a new job and Apple dropped the price, so last week, against my better judgment and against the admonitions of my wife and daughters, I bought an 8 GB iPhone.

Like teenage romance, it was like at first sight, and I was certain that I would grow to love the iPhone. Unfortunately, after a week of use, I returned it to the Apple Store and will now wait for v. 2.0. Click the ‘more’ link for my 10 reasons why (in no particular order):

1. 3G v. Edge
My Treo 700p is on the Verizon Wireless network and I have become accustomed to the speed of EVDO. I use it for email, web, Google Maps, as well as to tether my phone to my MacBook Pro for near-DSL speed without having to pay T-Mobile every time I walk into a Starbucks.

Granted, the Safari web browser on the iPhone is gorgeous and that it syncs its bookmarks with Safari on my desktop computer, but what good is an elegant browser when it takes forever for a page to load? It’s a bit like the Lamborghini I saw on the freeway in Las Vegas the other day that was stuck in the traffic jam with me. Sure, the car can sometimes be driven fast out in the boonies, but how often is that really practical?

2. Typing
I listened to all the pundits and fellow Kool-Aid drinkers who said that I would get used to Apple’s on-screen keyboard, but after a week of using it, I find that I am still about 4-5x faster using the Treo keyboard than the one on the iPhone screen. Not only that, I’ve found that the tactile experience of using an actual keyboard allows me to type on the Treo without looking at it most of the time. Try that on your iPhone!

3. 3rd Party Apps
Wasn’t it Steve Jobs at MacWorld who wowed the crowd with the pronouncement that the iPhone runs OS X? If that’s the case, then why can’t I install third party applications on my phone?

This is no trivial issue for me and is perhaps one of the most important reasons why I returned the iPhone. This is a serious problem for me. I’ve been a Palm user for many years and I’ve grown accustomed to the fact that I can find a third-party application for almost any need I have to fill on my Palm. This is, after all, supposed to be a ‘smart phone.’ Why, then, does Apple feel the need to dumb it down?

When I bought the iPhone it appeared as if I could use App Tap to install third party apps and Apple would turn a blind eye, but then came the v.1.1.1 which completely disabled the ability to install third-party apps and Apple warned that . . .

4. They Want to Brick my Phone
Yes, I understand that Apple has a contract with AT&T that forces them to enforce the one-carrier-only policy for the iPhone and that they have threatened that a future update might brick any phone that has been unlocked (v.1.1.1’s dire warning: ‘If you have modified your iPhone’s Software, applying this software update may result in your iPhone becoming permanantly inoperable.’), but why on earth would they brick a phone that runs third party apps? This only serves to make the phone more useful as a business tool.

Either Apple needs to allow the installation of third party apps or they need to release an official SDK. Failing this, I shall never purchase another iPhone.

For example, lots of people have password managers on the PIMs to keep track of all those user names, serial numbers, and other alphanumeric flotsam and jetsam that we all collect. The current iPhone solution is to store this data online for retrieval via Safari. I don’t care how secure these web sites are supposed to be, I for one am not about the store my personal data online like that!

5. I can do that with my Treo . . . only better
Other than the iPod functions of the iPhone and the visual voice mail (which really isn’t very useful to me except as a parlor trick), there isn’t a single thing that the iPhone does that I can’t do on my Treo. And most of the time, the Treo does it better.

I am so tired of hearing everyone say that they can’t sync their Treos and Blackberries with their Macs. I’ve been using Missing Sync on several Macs with various devices for years and it is simply rock solid. End of story.

And by the way, when someone emails me an mp3 or wav file (for instance a Vonage voice mail file), I can listen to it on my Treo without adding any extra software. The iPhone’s iPod can’t do that. Uh, hello? This is supposed to be the greatest iPod Apple has ever released.

6. Headphones/Microphone/Speaker
This might be the biggest deal killer of them all. When I use the Apple ear buds with the built-in microphone, the people with whom I am speaking can’t hear me; when I use the iPhone by holding it up to my ear, I can’t hear the people with whom I’m speaking (although Apple says that they fixed this in v.1.1.1). Not to mention the fact that holding an iPhone to your ear is just plain uncomfortable.

7. Crippled Bluetooth
Did you want to listen to your iPhone/iPod with your Bluetooth stereo headset? Sorry, but Apple crippled that. Sure, they can fix it with a software update any time they want. Wonder when that’s gonna be.

8. GSM Buzz / GSM Gurgle
I’m no RF engineer, but it seems clear that the iPhone emits some sort of RF energy every once in a while to communicate with local cell towers. When it does, you had better hope that the iPhone isn’t near your car stereo or your buddy’s cell phone. If it is, you’ll hear the infamous GSM buzz.

And if you’re driving around town talking on your phone, whenever the iPhone switches cell sites, the person with whom you’re speaking will think that you’ve just driven underwater because you’ll be speaking plainly, but they’ll hear a sound that is akin to speaking underwater. I call it the GSM gurgle, and it just isn’t acceptable audio quality.

9. AT&T Can’t Port my Number
Oh yeah, did I mention that I seem to have the only number in America that can’t be ported from Verizon to AT&T? Of course they both blame each other, but in the end I lose.

10. Not Enough Memory
I have an 80 GB 5.5-gen iPod. It currently has about 40 GB of songs and about 10 GB of video. Try squeezing that onto an 8 GB iPhone, especially when a 16 GB iPhone appears to be right around the corner.

There’s more. Oh yes, so much more.
At one point, this list had about 17 or 18 items on it, but I decided to whittle it down to just these 10. And yet I listen to Scott Bourne, Leo Laporte, Merlin Mann, Rob, and all the others wax poetic about their iPhones and I just don’t get it. I’ve drunk the Kool Aid and seen the promised land of milk, honey and OS X, but this product just isn’t worth all the hype and hoopla.

It’s cool, the interface is slick and clean, and the video screen is totally awesome, but the best cell phone ever made?

No.

Not yet.

In the meantime, I’ll go back to my Treo 700p and be happy.