Eager buyers line up for iPhone 3G

— -- Here we go again.

But there were reports of software problems that appeared when the phones were activated. A spokesman for AT&T, the exclusive carrier for the iPhone in the U.S., said there was a global problem with Apple's iTunes software that prevented the phones from being fully activated in-store, as had been planned.

Instead, employees are telling buyers to go home and perform the last step by connecting their phones to their own computers, spokesman Michael Coe said.

"It's ironic," said Kelly Croy, a Ohio middle school teacher who picked up his new iPhone on Friday. "I was waiting on line to get my iPhone last year, and this year I'm still waiting — but at home."

Croy said he was "very surprised and disappointed Apple didn't anticipate this."

Lines extended around the block Friday morning at Apple's 5th Avenue store in Manhattan. Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster counted 540 people on line, slightly below the throngs who queued up at the same location to purchase the first iPhones last year.

"It does feel like there's less buzz," Munster said.

But as the day wore on and customers waited to have their phones activated, lines in some locations grew longer than during last year's iPhone launch. Customers were waiting in line for five hours at he Apple Store at the Los Angeles Grove shopping center, for example; customers were waiting up to six hours at the Century City Los Angeles Apple Store.

AT&T said late Friday that most of its stores were sold out of the iPhone and that the supply will be replenished in the coming days.

Apple has sold 6 million first-generation iPhones since the launch slightly more than a year ago. The new version is cheaper — $199, from an original $599 — and accesses the Internet faster over partner AT&T's speedier, third-generation network.