Stand back, this one is going to be big.

Google's made a big splash on the scene with the announcement of its Android-powered T-Mobile G1 (formerly known at the HTC Dream), which will cost $179 -- a fraction of the venerable iPhone -- and hit shelves Oct. 22. On first glance, it doesn't look that ground-breaking -- but, it "a touch-screen interface, a QWERTY keyboard, Wi-Fi, 3G, GPS, a music player, and support for third-party applications."

Meanwhile, shares in Apple are falling, and some analysts are worried the perennial growth-leader in gadgets and laptops might be hitting a significant bump in the road.

Who will win the phone wars? And, more importantly for me, when will someone release one for Verizon so I don't have to switch cell carriers??

More in full coverage of the T-Mobile G1:

How does the gPhone stack up against its venerable 3G Apple competitor?

What does Google's Android-powered OS look like in action?

Does the G1 already have shortcomings?

Podcasters break down the T-Mobile offering.

What's the genesis of the gPhone?

Labels: Apple, cnet, Google, gphone, iPhone 3g, t-mobile g1

We've all laughed at the commercials. Giggled at cuteness of Justin Long. Begrudgingly admitted that Mac had the leg up on PC as a marketing tool.

But no more. Microsoft is biting back, and it's biting back hard. Redmond is launching a new ad campaign aimed not at disparaging its competitor's products, like Apple does, but at reminding people that, while Apple's white branding and spokespeople are alluring, they are still the little fish in a great big pond.

By thanking its current Vista customers -- who number in the hundreds of millions, going on licences alone -- for giving their business to what is clearly the best OS in the wild right now, Microsoft will quietly bully its way to the front of consumers' minds once again, where it belongs.

You see, the commercials are right -- you're either a Mac person or a PC person (and by PC, I, like Apple, mean Microsoft), and I am a fairly outspoken PC person. I have purposely ignored the iPod, the iPhone and the candy-colored bubbles Apple calls computers. I love my Zune and my Dell as much as I love my right-click button.

I hope Microsoft continues to wake up from its marketing stupor and bites the head off Mac, forcing it into a gadget-only niche market reserved for GPS devices and cellphone manufacturers.

Never tickle a sleeping dragon, lest the dragon remind you why it's a dragon in the first place.

Labels: Apple, iPhone 3g, iPod, Mac, Microsoft, PC, Zune

With tomorrow's highly anticipated release of the iPhone 3G, that well-reviewed sleek sequel of Apple's ingenious smartphone will as surely fly off the shelves as I will skip it. Not that it isn't enticing -- the web at your command, always being connected, one step shy of a wire in your brain -- but I'm waiting to spend my cash on a Microsoft version.

'Gasp!' you cry, 'but surely every tech blogger must be an open-source-loving, Redmond-hating nonconformist!'

Nah. Not that I really have a strong opinion either way -- if it works, why break it? -- but, I just haven't had the horrifically overblown problems with my Microsoft toys that others report:

My Vista has never crashed. My Zune is 1,000x better than an iPod, if only because I don't have to suffer those stupid white headphone wires. My original Xbox (which I camped out overnight in the freezing cold to buy) still works, and my Xbox 360 -- complete with HD-DVD player -- is bar-none the best game system I've ever bought.

So yes, I like Microsoft more than Apple. There I said it. Though the Mac/PC commercials are pretty funny.

But, if you are one of the many technogeeks -- and there are many -- already camped outside the flagship Apple Store in Times Square, waiting anxiously on lawn chairs or the hot pavement for your new Apple iPhone 3G, good luck! Snap a pic with your 1st-gen model and send it to me :)

Labels: iPhone 3g, iPod, Microsoft, Reviews, XBox, Zune