iPhone 3G S: first impressions on buying, smudges and what's in the box

pre-ordered mine online. my girlfriend waited to long, so the shipping for hers was going to be too late. so, i went to the local apple store at 6:45am. the line wasn't too bad and they had actually opened the doors at 6. walked out the door with activated phone about 45 mins after getting in line. mine showed up around 12:30 courtesy of FedEx and was activated in just minutes. very easy process overall. we both had the 3G before this.

3G S is great, though i wish they kept the old style of writing on the back - now it's silver and looks crappy. also, the included headphones have a really cheap looking plug - different than all the previous iphone/ipod headphones.

Hey can't find the battery indicator switch to percentage. I did go under settings and then under general then under usage and I did not find it there. Running 3.0 software.

So activating took under 10 minutes from plugging in. I read that the trick to activating was resetting the phone. I did it, and came right back. I hope everyone has the same luck! I love it!

Mine is at home waiting for me to get off of work! Thanks for the review.

SO far, I like my 3G S a lot. I got mine at 10am via UPS, and have been waiting since then for activation to complete. The message I got on an iTunes screen (after filling out my account info) was that it could be up to a 48 hour wait!
The screen on my phone says " Waiting for activation - this may take some time".

So I turned on VoiceControl in the system preferences and now I cant scroll....so when I go back to turn it off, I cant actually scroll down the general system pane to turn it off...uh oh, do I have to restore the phone back to the original preferences?

The Marimba and Tri-Tone sounds are different. More shrill? Anyone else notice this?

I love the better camera and video phone; however, the camera "froze" on me (shutter wouldn't open). I had to restart the iPhone in order for it to work.

Regarding the discounted pricing for existing 3G iPhone users:

My understanding from AT&T is that generally, persons who purchased the 3G at launch (July 2008) have to wait the normal period of time (approximately 18 months) before they qualify for subsidized pricing on a new iPhone. This is, evidently, their standard rule regarding discounts, and applies to many other cell phone carriers, not just AT&T. This rule also applies to persons having a Premier account (which typically includes an employer-related discount). So, most will be upgrade-eligible around December 2009.

Some persons who purchased at launch have a shorter wait because their monthly bill is higher, generally over $100. They may be eligible as soon as 12 months after their last phone upgrade, which would make them eligible now. In order to accommodate users who would become eligible in the next three months, AT&T recently decided to cut short the waiting period and make those users eligible now. This only applies to iPhone, and ONLY for those users who would have been upgrade-eligible in the next three months (i.e., those paying higher monthly bills):

http://www.att.com/gen/press-room?pid=13745

So, most 3G users will not be eligible for the subsidized pricing until at least December. As has been stated many times elsewhere, the "exception" made last year for original version iPhone users getting the subsidized price on the 3G was solely based on the lack of subsidy on the original iPhone. Since those users had no subsidy to begin with, there was no loss to AT&T to allow them to upgrade immediately. In all likelihood, if those users had wanted to go with a different phone altogether, they probably still would have qualified for subsidized pricing. That is not the case for 3G owners; we still have a portion of the subsidy left to pay, so AT&T has no incentive to offer us any special deals.

Ok, here's a question. If I buy my wife a new Iphone 3GS and set it up with her number, can we then switch sims so I can use the 3GS and she can use my 3G?