This is the month of phone hype, beyond a doubt. We’ve seen the Pre release, Nokia’s super-expensive N97 spot with LL Cool J, iPhone OS 3.0, and now the iPhone 3GS. Of the phone launches, the biggest is certainly the update iPhone, though it may have come more quietly than the world expected.

Lines outside Apple’s flagship store in NY reached several hundred, but amidst some rain, they were all shuffled under Apple’s roof making this the smallest iPhone launch yet. Still, AT&T reports hundreds of thousands of preorders for launch day, which dwarfs Palm’s Pre 50,000 first weekend statistic.

It wasn’t just scale that kept the launch quiet, though. In part, it was a lack of hangups that have plagued Apple’s past launches. Apple announced both iPhone OS 3.0 and the iPhone 3GS at WWDC this year, but the set the launch days two days apart. The staggered launch was presumably to reduce server load so that new owners weren’t trying to activate their 3GS while 20 million others were waiting for OS 3.0 downloads. It was a smart move, and it kept problems with the 3.0 release and problems with the 3GS launch (so far, at least) to a minimum.

Now the focus shifts to AT&T and how their network will handle more users hoping to see the wireless carrier make good on promises of MMS and tethering. Will MMS from iPhone users bring the sole US carrier to its knees later this summer?