HE CALLS himself an Apple convert and it isn't hard to see why.

He owns an iMac desktop and three iPod music players which he names iPanema, iLyena and iNara.

But 27-year-old Joel Pan was not satisfied with his collection - at least until 12.01am today. Barely past Thursday midnight, the manager became the first official Apple iPhone 3G user in Singapore.

He told my paper: 'It has been a long wait. Everyone knows that I have been waiting for it since January last year.'

SingTel, the first telecommunications company here to bring in the iPhone 3G - ahead of its competitors M1 and StarHub - said it's expecting 'tens of thousands' of potential buyers who had reserved a set at the company's iPhone website.

my paper understands from an industry source that there are at least 70,000 buyers who have made reservations, as of Sunday.

To cater to new subscribers, three new price plans - iFlexi Value, iFlexi Plus and iFlexi Premium - have been introduced.

Said to be value-for-money, the iFlexi Premium offers the iPhone 3G for free, with a subscription of $205 per month.

Mr Pan, who took half-day leave from work, began queuing up at the SingTel Comcentre at 12.30pm yesterday.

On being the first to get his hands on the much-awaited product, he said: 'Honestly speaking, I was quite disappointed when I did not see any queue in the afternoon.

'In other countries, people would have to begin queuing up three days before if they want to get their hands on an iPhone. But, of course, it is pretty exciting to be the first to own it.'

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