Image Source: Easily Amused Institute

What a difference a year makes.  Last year I had a 12.5 hour ordeal “ and an especially bad experience at a local AT&T store “ before successfully buying an iPhone 3G on its launch day.

Today it took just a touch over 1.5 hours to get hold of my new iPhone 3GS “ and that is including one hour and 5 minutes spent waiting for the store doors to open, and we knew in advance they wouldn ‘t open until 7:00am of course.  Once 7:00am hit, we were done, dusted, and walking out after 32 minutes.  Bravo AT&T for a much, much better experience than in 2008.

I know there is a lot of AT&T bashing just lately, some of it very justified, but credit where credit is due.  They ran a much more polished launch this year, all the way round “ from pre-ordering (which we did) to opening two hours early to service those of us who had pre-ordered, to their staff seeming much more clued up and prepared this time round.  All the staff we dealt with today were friendly and cool, and seemed to know a lot more about numbers of phones and how things would work than last year.  Thanks to all of them at the AT&T outlet at Slaughter and Brodie in Austin.

Here ‘s a quick recap of our experience this morning:

Up at around 5:15am to get ready quickly and try to get to the AT&T store a little before 6:00am “ as we knew the store would open for pre-order customers at 7:00.

Arrived at the store at around 5:55am.  Found there were only about 5 people in front of us, and only one of them was a pre-order customer.  So we were Number 2 in line.

AT&T manager and staff went up and down the short line (of around 25 people) several times before 7:00am “ offering water, explaining how the line would work with pre-order folks only getting in the store at 7:00 etc, and generally being helpful and enthusiastic.

Staff checked details / receipts for pre-order folks before 7:00am to help speed things along once 7:00 hit.

Doors opened at 7:00am sharp and the first 6 pre-order customers were allowed in the store, including us (my wife, daughter, and I).

We got the new iPhone 3GS, a new basic ($5.00) case for my wife to use with my old 3G, swapped my 3G line to the new 3GS, swapped the SIM out of my old V1 into the 3G, worked out new data and text plans within our family plan, tested the 3G and 3GS once numbers were swapped, and walked out of the store at 7:32am.

We arrived back home before 8:00am and set about moving data around and between the old V1 and 3G phones, syncing them and getting my wife set for work with the new, handed down, 3G.

Overall, a really easy, really painless, even pleasant experience “ about as different to 2008 as I could possibly imagine.

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