If you’re one of those early adopters who bought the 8GB iPhone when it first came out, you may have been feeling a little wronged over the past 24 hours. Yesterday, just 2 months after the initial launch of the product, Apple announced a $200 price cut off of the $599, 8GB iPhone. This announcement was met with different responses by those wanting an iPhone, basically depending on whether or not they already owned one or not.

In response to “hundreds” of emails, today Steve Jobs published an open letter on the Apple website stating that they “need to do a better job taking care of our early iPhone customers” and offered a $100 Apple store credit to anyone that had already purchased an iPhone, but not before reminding us that technology is a bumpy road …

Amidst announcements of a number of new iPod products and product upgrades, Apple made a surprising move today by cutting the price of its iPhone, likely much to the dismay of early adopters. Apple is now selling the larger 8GB version of its iPhone for $399 which is down $200 from the original $599 price only a couple months after the products initial launch.

Apple also said it is going to discontinue the 4GB model of the iPhone altogether, now selling it at $299 until the supplies run out.

The guys over at HackTheiPhone have come out with another one, with this hack changing the iPhone so that you can use it with your old AT&T/Cingular SIM card from a different phone. This allows you to use the voice services of the iPhone without having to start a new contract.

So, to take advantage of this hack you’ll need an iPhone, another phone with an AT&T SIM card that you can use and enough time to follow the 19 step process to make your old SIM card work with your new iPhone. Note that this process does look a little easier than the iPhone ringtone hack as there appears to be about four fewer steps involved.

via CellPhoneBeat

It looks like some folks have found a way to add custom ringtones to your iPhone by following some steps and using a couple programs called jailbreak and iPhoneInterface. Currently the steps only work for those that are using Intel Mac’s but from the description it probably won’t be long until someone makes an interface to broaden the reach.

The instructions are listed over at HackiPhone and involves a lengthy 23 step process. The steps involve backing up and restoring your iPhone from iTunes and they have a few warnings before you start that stating that this process could totally brick your iPhone if it doesn’t work out. (They are considerate hackers.) Once your done you must also be sure you added all the ringtones you wanted or you’ll need to follow all the steps again to add more.

If you want custom ringtones for …

Jon Johanson has been a fairly well known hacker of consumer electronics gadgets for years, and has now claimed that he has found a way to activate a new Apple iPhone without signing up through AT&T’s service. Using the iPhone without AT&T’s two year plan is not allowed by the agreement made with Apple and AT&T since the company is the exclusive carrier for the iPhone.

According to Johanson’s blog post entitled “iPhone Independence Day”, the hack will activate the phone to enable the iPod functionality and WiFi, but it doesn’t have any phone capabilities. This is good for someone that uses the iPhone outside the U.S. where the voice service wouldn’t be available anyway.

In response, AT&T spokesman Mark Siegel said “Any other use of the device is not authorized and we can’t …

According to a recent report from Rheinische Post, Apple has just signed a deal with Deutsche Telekom T-Mobile to make Germany the next stop for an iPhone launch on November 1 of this year. The report is a preview to an alleged announcement planned for tomorrow where T-Mobile will be unveiled as the exclusive provider of the iPhone for Germany, selling the famed gadget for about 450 euros ($612).

While no sources of the news were cited and no comments from the involved parties were made this isn’t really set in stone but we’ll be watching tomorrow for an official word.

Source: Reuters

A preliminary analysis from iSuppli states that they estimate the iPhone from Apple has over a 50 percent gross margin which all comes back to Apple since they do not allow carriers to subsidize or discount the phones.

“With a 50 percent gross margin, Apple is setting itself up for aggressive price declines going forward,” said Jagdish Rebello with iSuppli.

According to iSuppli, the total expense to manufacture the 8GB iPhone is estimated to be about $280, leaving $319 in profit $599 price tag. The firm did not have an actual iPhone device available to them to take apart, so this estimate was made from the knowledge and experience with similar parts from other products.

The firm estimated that the cost for the flash memory was the most expensive component of both the 4GB and the 8GB iPhones, which …

Apple added some iPhone pages to their website today after Steve Jobs’ keynote speech was completed. Now that the dust has settled a little bit, here are some additional detailed specs to go along with the iPhone release information we posted earlier today.

The new Apple iPhone has a 3.5 inch Multi-touch screen with a resolution of 320 x 480 at 160 ppi. The Multi-touch screen works by finger touch, not a stylus and can track multiple fingers moving on and across the screen to perform tasks such as resizing an image. It has a 2.0 megapixel built-in camera and a battery that allows 5 hours of talking, watching videos or browsing the web, and up to 16 hours of listening to music.

The service will be provided by Cingular with Quad-Band (850, 900, 1800, 1900) GSM, EDGE, Bluetooth and WiFi. …