The iPhone Experience

Activating

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As everyone knows, I�ve transitioned to Windows Vista Ultimate x64 for my primary desktop system. With its support for huge amounts of RAM, added security and reliability, I have been nothing but happy with the experience. The games I happen to play work fine in Vista, my 5.5G iPod works well, and even my dual HDTV tuner card works. The iPhone? No.

Turns out, it�s not an issue with iTunes 7.3. That part of the setup is working fine. The problem is that the iPhone is recognized separately from an iPod. Windows Vista sees it as a digital camera. You need to install Apple Mobile Device Support (built-into iTunes 7.3) which installs USBAAPL.SYS for the following devices:

iPhone ="Apple Mobile Device USB Driver"

iBoot ="Apple Recovery (iBoot) USB Driver"

iDFU ="Apple Recovery (DFU) USB Driver"

Apple hasn�t said anything about x64 support, but since the iPod is supported in x64, I imagine that we will eventually see 64-bit driver support for the iPhone. For what it was worth, I was on hold with AppleCare on Sunday for 55 minutes to confirm that there was no workaround for the x64 limitation.

A Second Stumble

I run Windows XP SP2 on my laptop for exactly these reasons. Even then, it was clear that Apple�s compatibility testing for Windows was a second thought. I run Windows Vista x64 for security reasons. On my Windows XP SP2 machine, I have DEP enabled for all applications.

This was an exercise in futility. Each time I�d try to sync my iPhone, I�d get a DEP alert and the application would crash. First it was AppleMobileDeviceHelper, then AppleMobileBackup, then MDCrashReportTool, then YahooSync� Only after providing exemptions for this software did things actually work. What this means, though, is that Apple�s iPhone driver isn�t adhering to today�s standard coding conventions.

Thunderbirds are Go

Despite what has been said about AT&T and iTunes activation, I had little trouble getting my iPhone up and running. For me, it was as simple as the Quicktime video had promised. With my AT&T and iTunes account information in hand, and it took me less than 3 minutes from start to finish.