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Memory capacity on iPhone is "disappointing" - reviewer

Another enthusiastic review of an iPhone by an iPod enthusiast still manages to reveal some disappointments, as NewsWeek's Steve Levy gets nostalgic about his previous 30 G disk storage. But yes, he likes it.

Levy, a known iPod nut (author of The Perfect Thing) hasn't spoiled his friendship with Apple boss Steve Jobs. He writes that he got the review sample two weeks ago while on his travels:

"During my travels and airport delays, I was able to keep up with my e-mail, negotiate my way around the downtown, get tips on the city from an old friend whose number I don’t normally have handy, check the weather conditions in New York and D.C., monitor baseball scores and blogs, listen to an early Neil Young concert and amuse myself with silly YouTube videos and an episode of "Weeds," all on a single charge before the battery ran down," his summary raves enthusiastically.

But after getting even more excited about how easy it was to use, his has a bone to pick with Steve Jobs, who has called it "the best iPod we ever made" - and, as Levy notes, it certainly isn't for the gymnasium treadmill user.

"Heavy music users accustomed to 30 or 80 gigabytes of storage will be unhappy at the limited capacity of the iPhone," Levy goes on. "Of the 8 gigs on my iPhone, I now have 669 songs, one three-hour movie, three half-hour television episodes, 361 photos, and a bit of "other," meaning e-mail and contacts. It’s almost full."

The battery, Levy reports, is better than expected. "One day I purposely ran the battery down; the iPhone winked out after 14 hours, including six hours of talking, Web-browsing, music-listening and the viewing of that episode of 'Weeds.' " - but he recommends charging every night, all the same.