Steve Jobs had the kind of weekend that Hollywood moguls can only dream about.

From 6 p.m. on Friday through the end of the day on Sunday, about a half million Apple iPhones were sold, two analysts have estimated.

Gene Munster of Piper Jaffray calculated that 500,000 phones were sold. Trip Chowdhry, an analyst with Global Equities Research, put the tally a little higher, at 525,000 phones.

The blog TechCrunch notes that with iPhones priced at $500 to $600 "that's around $250 to $300 million in cash changing hands."

By comparison, the other big hit this weekend was Ratatouille, the animation movie that sold $47.2 million in tickets. And, of course, that movie was a debut from Jobs' other founding company, Pixar.

Most of AT&T's 1,800 stores were sold out of iPhones by Saturday, according to several reports. AT&T, the only wireless service provider for the iPhone, declined to comment on sales numbers or on the availability of the phones, according to the Los Angeles Times.

There were reports of buyers having difficulties activating their new phones.  The problems affected about 2 percent of iPhone buyers, the Wall Street Journal said, citing a person familiar with the situation.