These days, getting a fancy new iPhone 3GS (or even the cheaper iPhone 3G model) might even beat Santa delivering a new Mac under your Christmas tree -- especially if the fat man in the red suit was generous enough to include the required 2-year contract with AT&T, complete with $30 per month unlimited 3G data.

So with the hard part over -- actually waiting for and receiving the iPhone! -- what’s next?

5 Things To Do First With Your New Toy

1. Fork over your Christmas cash for a MobileMe subscription
If you already own a Mac, the best way to unlock the true magic of the iPhone is to pony up another $99 to Apple for a 1-year MobileMe subscription (or $149 for the Family Pack, if you have up to 5 others in your household who can benefit from it). Now you’ll be able to keep the information on you iPhone, iPod touch, Mac or PC in perfect sync, with no cables required. And if you ever lose your precious new baby, help will be on the way at Me.com, thanks to the Find My iPhone feature of MobileMe. That alone is worth the price of admission for the forgetful among us.

2. Purchase & apply a screen protector -- even with a case
Some iPhone users prefer bulky cases to hide their new friend away from prying eyes and to keep scratches at bay. Others go “au natural” -- after all, the iPhone is so sleek and sexy, why bulk it up with cases? Regardless, a static cling screen protector is a wise (and inexpensive) investment to prevent your new friend from accumulating scratches, and even to help ward off smudges, dust and dirt. Our preference is the Power Support Anti-Glare Film Set ($14.95) which works with both the iPhone 3GS and 3G. (If glossy is your thing, they also sell a version that way, too.)

3. Call (or SMS/Twitter/Facebook, et al) your friends and make them jealous
Sure, there are millions of iPhones around the world now, but it’s not like everyone has them (yet). We hereby give you permission to be smug -- just for today -- and spread the word by whatever method you prefer. Just remember, be nice: Your friends will likely do the same to you down the road, which can be particularly painful if and when a new model comes out next year and you can’t upgrade (without paying a bundle) because you’ll still under contract.

4. iPhone, meet iTunes
There’s always a chance that even a brand-new iPhone won’t be carrying the latest firmware, so it’s worth connecting to iTunes at this early stage and clicking the “Check for Update” button, just to be safe. More often than not, iPhone firmware updates bring nifty new features and almost always make your new device more secure. That said, if you intend to possibly jailbreak your new baby in order to make it do new tricks not blessed by Apple, you might want to do some homework before hitting that update button, just to make sure. (If you don’t know what “jailbreak” means, then you probably don’t have any use for it.)

5. Make it yours
Open some of the Apple-provided apps on your iPhone and start customizing them. The Weather app, for instance, defaults to Cupertino, California (home of Apple’s corporate headquarters), which is of no use to you if you live on the east coast. It’s also worth checking your time zone settings, to make sure they’re set to your nearest city. If you have a YouTube account, sign into it in the YouTube app so you can access your favorites as well as your uploaded videos. You’d be surprised how many new iPhone users don’t bother to visit the Settings on their device, and then wonder why certain things don’t work the way they want them to.

Of course, there is plenty more to do with your new iPhone, so you may want to cheat and take a peek at our “First 25 Things You Need To Do” for the iPod while you’re at it, since many of those also apply to your new device as well. And without further ado, let’s head to the App Store and start downloading some cool new stuff!

10 Apps To Install First

Amazon Mobile (Free)
If you’re an Amazon.com junkie like we are, you will go absolutely gaga for Amazon Mobile, which brings most of the web buying experience direct to your handset. You’ll have full access to your shopping cart, wish lists, payment & shipping options, order history, 1-Click settings and even Prime membership benefits. It’s the ultimate tool for impulse buyers, complete with all of the same product images, reviews and pricing information from the website. And you’ll save money, too, by having the ability to do quick price comparisons while standing in a retail store. After all, retail is for suckers!

BeejiveIM with Push ($6.99 for a limited time)
If you are even an occasional user of instant messaging services from AOL, Yahoo, MSN or others, do yourself a favor and spend the money on a first-rate IM app for your new iPhone. We prefer BeejiveIM, which covers all the bases including group chats, SMS out, landscape mode, saving chat logs via e-mail and a lot of customization. It connects with all of the major services (including Facebook and MySpace) and includes push notifications so you can receive IM messages even when the app is closed.

Cheap Gas! (Free)
This one is a no-brainer in today’s economy: Download the free Cheap Gas! app and find the cheapest gas prices near you, courtesy of GasBuddy.com. ’Nuff said.

Delivery Status touch ($2.99)
If you do a lot of online purchasing or just like to keep close tabs on where packages you’re sending or receiving are at any given time, you’ll love Delivery Status touch. The app supports more than 25 services including UPS, FedEx, USPS and DHL, as well as orders from Amazon, Apple, Adobe and Google Checkout. You can easily add new shipments directly from the app, from a Dashboard app on your Mac, or even a bookmarklet in your favorite browser (including Mobile Safari). You’ll wonder how you ever lived without it.

Facebook (Free)
OK, we know you were going to download this first anyway, so we might as well include it! While it’s not quite the complete Facebook experience you’ll get on the website, in many ways it’s superior (the lack of Facebook apps is a godsend!). The only major thing missing from the current version is the ability to receive push notifications, but that’s coming in a future update.

Gorillacam (Free)
Apple’s own built-in Camera app is fine, but the free Gorillacam adds so many little niceties that you’ll wish you could just remove the Camera app altogether. In addition to a self-timer and time-lapse, you can turn on “Press Anywhere” in order to make the entire screen a trigger for taking your pictures, and even take multiple shots, one after another, for as long as you like. Seriously, just download it.

NotifyMe (Free or $3.99 paid version)
Take it from us, the longer you have your iPhone, the more you’ll start to wonder how you ever lived without it. Particularly for the more forgetful among us, NotifyMe is a great app for jogging your memory with to-dos and reminders via push notifications. If you don’t believe us, download the free version (which has a 20-second nag screen on every startup and only allows 3 reminders at a time) and see if it doesn’t change your life. You can even add new reminders from any web browser and they’ll sync to the iPhone app.

Shazam (Free or $2.99 Encore or RED versions)
This is probably the app that is most-used to impress non-iPhone owners and make them lust to own one. Never again will you have to hear a song playing and wonder who performs it or what the song is called: Simply open Shazam, press “Tag Now” and let your iPhone collect a short sample, send it to Shazam’s servers and report back with the track information, just like magic. You can even listen to samples or buy tracks right from the iTunes Store.

Twitterrific (Free or $4.99 Premium version)
There are a lot of great Twitter apps available in the App Store, but one of the earliest and still one of our favorites is Twitterrific. Search for and follow new Twitter users, see either your personal timeline or the public one, manage multiple accounts and retweet, shorten URLs and even post photos with ease. The free version features unobtrusive ads that the $4.99 Premium version removes.

Zenbe Lists ($2.99)
Perfect for grocery shopping, Christmas gift buying or even your own personal wish list of things you see at the store, Zenbe Lists one-ups most of the other “to-do list” apps in the App Store by also syncing to a free web-based service. Enter your lists from a web browser via keyboard, then check them off on the iPhone as you shop and sync the results back to the web with a click.

Be sure to take a peek at our list of “10 Apps To Install First” for the iPod while you’re add it -- they all apply to the iPhone as well!

Now that you’re loaded up with applications, here is some how-to wisdom thrown down from MacLife.com mountain that will have you looking like an iPhone pro in no time at all.

10 How-Tos You Should Know

1. Conference calls in style
Many new iPhone users don’t realize that their device is capable of connecting them with more than one person at a time. In fact, you can merge up to five calls! Start by calling the first person. Once connected, tap “Add Call” and make the second call; the first call is put on hold. Tap “Merge Calls” and now you’re on with two friends at once! You can repeat the process to add more callers as necessary. To speak privately with any one caller, tap “Conference” and then tap “Private” next to that caller. To resume the conference, tap “Merge Calls.” You can even add an incoming call by tapping “Hold Call + Answer” and then tapping “Merge Calls.”

2. Edit your iPhone 3GS camera videos
No fooling! The iPhone OS includes basic functions for trimming a video to remove unwanted portions at the head or tail, and with iPhone OS 3.1 or later, you now have the option to save the trimmed video as a new file as well. You can even do sophisticated iMovie-style editing with multiple clips, transitions and even titles by downloading ReelDirector ($7.99) from the App Store.



3. Delete a block of text
Thanks to the copy & paste powers introduced with iPhone OS 3.0, you no longer have to sit and tap-tap-tap to remove a block of text from your favorite app. Tap and hold the Select / Select All pop-up, select the text you want to get rid of, hit the delete button just once and say goodbye to that offending text, just like that.

4. Fine-tune your Spotlight search results
Another iPhone OS 3.0 introduction was the ability to tap the Home button from your main screen to get to the Spotlight search page (or tap the Home button twice from any other page). If you find yourself mostly searching for only certain kinds of files, you can fine-tune what Spotlight seeks out by going to Settings > General > Home > Search Results. Uncheck the options you don’t need and even drag the ones that are most important to you to the top of the screen so they’ll pop up first.



5. Share multiple photos via e-mail
The ability to instantly e-mail a photo to friends or family members might seem magical enough, but did you know that you can also send multiple photos in an e-mail? You can use the Share option to send up to five images at once, but the real sleight of hand comes courtesy of the copy & paste feature. Select more than five photos, press Copy and then jump into the Mail client and paste the images. Just be careful you don’t overload your e-mail service -- the Mail app will refuse to send messages larger than 10 MB at a time.

6. Turn on Find My iPhone before losing your device
MobileMe users, be advised: Apple’s great new Find My iPhone feature is turned off by default on your device. So before you go losing your handset out in the wild, pay a visit to Settings > Mail, Contacts & Calendars > Your MobileMe account and turn on the Find My iPhone option. Oh, and be sure your Push Notifications are turned on while you’re in Settings, m’kay?



7. Pass a note (or three) to your iPhone
We scratch our head wondering why it took Apple so long, but you can finally sync notes in your desktop Mail program with the Notes app on the iPhone. Select your device from the sidebar in iTunes, go to the Info tab and then click “Sync Notes” to enable the feature. Do a sync and then sit back and feel good about having learned a new trick.

8. Redemption is at hand
Thanks to iPhone OS 3.0, you can finally do something with those iTunes Gift Cards, Gift Certificates or promo codes when you’re not close to a computer. From either the iTunes app or the App Store app, tap your way to the More tab, enter the code and press Redeem to load up your account with downloadable cash.



9. Don’t come home to an enormous data bill from AT&T
Soon after the original iPhone was released in 2007, reports started to pop up that international travelers were being socked with enormous bills for voice & data services racked up overseas. Do you really think that $30 per month data plan will cover you while using the Skype app in Russia while talking to friends back home? We didn’t think so. AT&T’s international roaming rates for many countries are just short of legal thievery, so do the smart thing and head to Settings > General > Network and turn Data Roaming to Off. Now when you travel outside of AT&T’s service area, your iPhone won’t transmit any data over the cellular network, but you can still access the Internet via Wi-Fi. Better yet, explore jailbreaking your iPhone and using unlocking software, which will allow you to save a small fortune by buying a local SIM card in the country you’re visiting.

10. Help! Something went wrong!
Yeah, we sound like a broken record, but if a rogue app goes haywire or other problems crop up, restarting your device should clear things up. Press and hold the Sleep/Wake button until the red slider appears, then slide your finger across the slider to turn the phone off. Let things settle for a moment or two, then press and hold the Sleep/Wake button again until the Apple logo appears. For more severe calamities, try resetting the iPhone by pressing and holding the Sleep/Wake button and the Home button at the same time for at least ten seconds until the Apple logo appears. If you’re just stuck in an app and need to force quit, press and hold the Sleep/Wake button for a few seconds until a red slider appears, then press and hold the Home button until the application quits.

And that’s all the time we have for now, folks! You’ll soon discover that the iPhone opens up a whole new amazing world to its users, so enjoy your first Christmas Day with your new friend and here’s to many happy months & years to come!