Apple Inc.'s iPhone is a "beautiful and breakthrough" mobile device that lives up to the hype and will inspire lust in technology shoppers.

That's the word yesterday from reviewers for the Wall Street Journal, New York Times and USA Today, who each praised the software and design of Apple's melded mobile phone and iPod media player. They said the product's strengths outweighed problems, such as spotty network service and a price of as much as $600.

"Despite some flaws and feature omissions, the iPhone is, on balance, a beautiful and breakthrough handheld computer," said Walt Mossberg, technology columnist for the Wall Street Journal. "Its clever finger-touch interface, which dispenses with a stylus and most buttons, works well, though it sometimes adds steps to common functions."

The nod from technology reviewers will help Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs meet his goal of selling 10 million iPhones in 2008, giving the company a 1 percent share of the mobile-phone market. The gadget will be Apple's third major business, along with the Macintosh computer and iPod, whose combined sales more than tripled in five years to almost $20 billion in 2006.

"If the device lives up to the hype, then that will be a pretty big positive because the hype has been quite large," said Andy Hargreaves, an analyst at Pacific Crest Securities in Portland, Ore.

AT&T SERVICE

Mossberg, USA Today's Edward Baig and David Pogue, a columnist for the New York Times, all said one of the iPhones main drawbacks is its exclusive tie to AT&T Inc., which delivers inconsistent coverage. AT&T's network ranked either last or second-to-last in 19 out of 20 major cities in providing a signal, Pogue said, citing a Consumer Reports survey.

AT&T, which has a multiyear license to distribute the phone in the U.S., requires iPhone buyers to sign up for a two-year service plan. Prices for the plans will range from $60 to $220 a month, AT&T said yesterday.

The iPhone relies on AT&T's Edge service, a network that delivers slow speeds compared with the fastest so-called third-generation, or 3G, data networks. While the Edge network failed to match the broadband data speeds home users may be accustomed to, Baig said, the iPhone is still a "glitzy wunderkind worth lusting for."

"Apple has delivered a prodigy — a slender fashion phone, a slick iPod and an Internet experience unlike any before it on a mobile handset," Baig wrote.

'FORGIVE ITS FOIBLES'

Pogue concurred, though he took Apple to task for failing to include chat software. He also said many users would prefer tapping out messages on Research In Motion Ltd.'s BlackBerry rather than on the iPhone's touch-screen keyboard.

"Even in version 1.0, the iPhone is still the most sophisticated, outlook-changing piece of electronics to come along in years," Pogue wrote. "It does so many things so well, and so pleasurably, that you tend to forgive its foibles."

Apple will begin selling the iPhone on Friday at 6 p.m. in each U.S. time zone through its 162 stores. AT&T will offer the device through 1,800 company-owned stores.