The Apple iPhone is claimed by many to be a breakthrough in design, miniaturisation, and elegant software. This sleek touchscreen machine is most certainly much more than just a phone. Its an iPod, a camera, an organiser, an e-mail system, a fully equipped internet browsing tool - and more!

At first glance the pricing structure might appear expensive, and, of course, it does depend on how good your current deal is, but overall I believe that the iPhone represents good value for money. I had a contract phone and a separate Blackberry just for data - OK, that was pretty inefficient and quite expensive, so a switch to iPhone will certainly save me money. How much will the savings be? Not sure yet. My business contract with O2 gives 700 minutes of call time, 10 free land line numbers, and no-charge calls to other O2 users, so I am anticipating quite big savings on my home phone bill as well.

Sure, it is a phone, but a phone that is so much easier to use! The contacts list syncs (on the left, above) with my Windows contact manager via iTunes. Touch the screen to bring full contact details of your selected name to the screen (first image on the right) - that might include home phone, mobile phone, e-mail address, web address, or location. Touch a phone number to make a call (the final image on the right hand side). Here you can switch to speakerphone if desired. Also, whilst on a call, you can go and open another program/application - maybe to check a mail, or to provide your caller with some other information stored in your phone.

iPhone Applications

The applications store is available through iTunes software. I have to say that I find that there is plenty of pretty useless stuff in there, and an endless stream of games, which hold little interest for me. You do have to search quite hard to find the decent bits of software, but fear not, they are there! Here are a few suggestions that I particularly like:

Instapaper
A definite favourite - links with a desktop version of the application which downloads from www.instapaper.com  Add a short-cut from this to your desktop browser. When you find an interesting internet article, but don't have time to read it all, click the instapaper link, and syncronise your iPhone. The article will then be available on your phone to read anytime to want (without even needing a network connection) - great for the train or tube! Even better - its free!

Free RSS
Great for keeping up with the printweek.com news feed on the move! Best to refresh before you travel, but then will display all info even in non network/3G area. In network, it will link up to the web site if required for the full version of the story. Not only printweek's RSS feed of course! - it will work with them all!! I have about seven that I regularly look at, for news, sport, and industry news.

SugarSync
This is brilliant - but its a bit more than just an iPhone app - it backs up the whole of the documents area of your PC to a "cloud". The application for the iPhone, or any laptop for that matter, simply allows you to access (via password of course) those files. Therefore I can access literally any file from my PC via my phone! Awesome! I can open the document and it can be read - you can't edit it on the phone I don't think, but you can e-mail it to a local address at that point if you do need to edit. I am only just testing this at the moment - there is a charge after a 45 day trial period.

Evernote
Another syncing application: this one allows you to make notes whilst on the move, and then sync them with you desktop - the note might be a text note or a photo with a caption comment. You might also want to note something down in Evernote on your desktop machine and then upload the "to do list" or reminders to your phone before you leave the office.

Last.fm
For music lovers, and links up with your desktop version of last.fm - its great for your "own radio station" - but does of course need network coverage to work. I find it useful around the house, where of course you can take it from room to room, connecting up to iPhone speakers where available!

London City
A tube map? Is it really necessary? I had my reservations about this one, but one of my first visits to London after installing it, and the Victoria line was out of action. Now I'm not really a tube expert, so it was really handy to check for an alternative route. The application holds the map on the iPhone, so you don't need network connection (which is handy because of course there isn't any down there!).

Plenty more to come . . .