While the rest of the world drools/is decidedly lukewarm over the recently-announced Apple iPad, I’ve found myself wanting more and more, the Apple iPhone. Now that it’s gone through three generations, with each new generation adding more features and power to the devilishly beautiful device, and now that it’s backed up by more than 140,000 apps, and now that it has a sizeable market share that threatens Nokia and RIM, meaning better support, and well… you get the point.

I’ve been a bit of a journeyman over the years in the world of mobile phones, going from a Nokia 3210, then a Nokia 3310, then a Motorola clamshell design whose model number I can’t remember. After that came a Sony Ericsson, the Samsung E600, and finally the Nokia E51.

While the E51 is an excellent phone and one I would heartily recommend to anyone, I feel it’s time for me to go ahead and try an Apple product that’s responsible for my communication (all past experiences with Apple products have been solely for the purpose of hearing music).

I have a strong feeling I’m going to love it. Aside from the sweet design of the user interface, the rock solid iPhone OS, and its beguiling shine and chrome, it’s currently one of the most powerful smartphones currently out there. And who doesn’t love the feeling of having a powerful tiger, dressed up in a very nice package, all in their pants? Yes that’s right, no one.

I am aware of the caveats: poor battery life, exorbitant data transfer charges, and a few more. But some of these are manageable, most are avoidable with careful usage, and some I’m willing to undergo as necessary pains, because the device is that beautiful.

And I haven’t even started talking about jailbreaking it yet.