Apart from the Bluetooth/SMS forwarding/copy-paste deficiencies of the iPhone, disk use has been one of the major contenders in the iPhone’s list of cons. The question is, why has Apple disabled disk use this time round? All of the iPods, excepting the iPod touch, can make use of the extra disk space to carry files along. Why not allow the iPhone and iPod touch duo to carry some spare files? 

While we will definitely not know the real reason for the exclusion of the multi-touch lineup from the disk use party, we can only speculate. For one, why use disk mode when you can transfer stuff wirelessly over Wi-Fi? Just because it was there on previous devices doesn’t mean Apple has to carry on the legacy of enabling disk use by cable. Wi-Fi is now widespread enough, what with every notebook shipping with a Wi-Fi chip these days. Of course, Apple did not make any of those Wi-Fi apps in the App Store themselves, but they didn’t block the dozens of them from popping up in the store either (which, as we already know, they can totally and arbitrarily do). For more on iPhone file managers, check out our “Battle of the iPhone file managers” shootout.

The next one is the question of flash storage. As you must be knowing, flash storage has limited write cycles (OK, so maybe that isn’t exactly common knowledge—allow the poor guy to show off every once in a while, will you?). So allowing people to unnecessarily burn through those write cycles would simply reduce the life of the device and cause hardships for both the customer as well as Apple. There’s already a lot of writing going on with regard to games, applications, and syncing movies, so it is best to conserve as many write cycles as possible. Users will generally transfer small files over Wi-Fi, leaving out those huge files on a standalone flash drive. 

The third problem is one of storage capacity. With the iPhone and iPod touch, the storage capacity has been reduced from what we have previously known in the iPod classic. And it is expensive. So allowing users to store huge files on the iPhone or iPod touch would mean that we are wasting valuable space when we could actually be storing files that are accessible from within the iPhone OS. Most of the time, the users don’t know what is best for them and this has been an ongoing policy when it comes to Apple and its iApps. 

However, if you wholeheartedly disagree with all that was said above and were willing me to just shut up already, there’s DiskAid. It’s a third party application that allows you to transfer files to and from your iPhone or iPod Touch. In my tests, it worked perfectly and required no setup at all. The USB cable provides for a fast transfer. Of course, these files are not available while working on the iPhone and can only be accessed by a computer with the USB cable connected (and DiskAid installed). The interface is tasteless and boring and, at least on the Mac, it looks totally out of place. The application works on a Mac as well as a PC (.NET required), and does not need any jailbreak.  

So, that being said, what’s your take on iPhone disk usage? Would you rather have Apple allowed mounting your iPhone in the Finder or is the current way of using File Managers over Wi-Fi a better, more efficient way of managing files on the iPhone (not that I want to skew your decision but vote for the latter, vote for the latter)?