Discussion on:

How TechRepublic cracked open the iPhone 3G

Bill,

As a design engineer, I can tell you that all products go through a retool through their product lifecycle.

Sometimes it's because the tools have worn down, sometimes it's to correct errors, sometimes it's because newer technology has come along, and sometimes it's a cost reduction exercise.

Most people get suspcious when the company sells products at an apparent loss, this is a typical feature of japanese business techniques in the mid to late eighties, but that is just to gain market share and because the company can later retool to reduce production and assembly costs, and when they maintain the RRP then their margin will cover the apparent losses in the early sales.

All in all I think the iPhone was possibly pushed to market without being 100% of the design vision, but it was close enough and the powerful Apple hype machine was going, heading towards a set launch date that the poor engineers had to meet or else (kudos to Johnathon Ive and co - how's the 110V DC07 going?).

All in all, I don't think there was any conspiriacy, just a whole lot of hype over the corrected version and a new mini-launch.

This time world wide, well done for remembering UK this time.

(p.s. I'm still on a SE K750i, it plays MP3s, and allows me to receive emails and make phone calls. No intention to trade in just yet!)

Seemed a bit off the topic when the clip spent more that half the time on waiting in line and switching
stores. I appreciated the clear view of the I Phone parts, but I would have liked getting a graphic
overlay of the parts for visual recognition. Perhaps that can be an add on video. THanks for showing
the simplicity of it. Good work!

how hard would it be to replace the memory board I have the 3g 8gb and I want to buy a 16gb memory board is that possible? Does it require soldering?
Thanks. Great Work Guys!