# A day with an iPhone 4s



## ritvij (Feb 20, 2012)

This is my first attempt at a review. Please don't be harsh....

People have reviewed iPhone 4s extensively! The internet is full of professional as well as personal user reviews... But most of the reviewers have penned their thoughts after using it for a considerable period of time. I had an opportunity to spend a day with this exotic product, courtesy to one of my friend’s ignorance about its usage which gave me a chance for interface with it and thereafter an irresistible temptation to express my views in black and white. I have used apple products in past from an iPod touch to an iPhone 4 and when my friend asked me  to activate his phone and sync his contacts I had a chance to use the 4s which I longed for!

*i.imgur.com/N4WGf.jpg

*"the array of apple devices at my disposal"
Left to Right: My iPod, Bro's iphone 3gs, Bro's iPhone 4*

To begin with the build quality of the handset, the iPhone 4s is not exactly the same as the iPhone 4. Apple has slightly changed the design of the 4S, by changing to a dual-band aerial design, making sure it doesn't encounter an embarrassing repeat of antenna-gate we had to endure with the iPhone 4. It is thicker than most slim phones but it fits superbly in hand! Obviously the current trend is for slimmer phones but what's the point of buying so slim phones that they cannot be kept into a tight jeans pocket without having nightmares about breaking them. The 4s feels solid and is considered small by some in terms of its 3.5" screen but it fits snugly in your hand without tending to slip! The screen is brilliant in terms of display quality and sunlight legibility is great if you set the brightness levels accordingly.    
My friend was earlier using a nokia n900 and I was to transfer the contacts from it to the 4s. It sounds a pretty mundane task but for the non-geeks who just know two ways: Bluetooth or cut copy paste-sim swap; this task is no less than attending a complete Bieber concert!

*i.imgur.com/zEn0P.jpg

*"His iPhone 4s.."*

Powering the phone on... A grey screen with iPhone written on it greets you and you need to activate it via cellular network or over the air via Wi-Fi. After the usual continue, yes, allow and I accept the license agreements you get to enjoy the phone.

If you have used an iOS device before then you will immediately feel at home with this device, if not, even then too the learning curve is not that steep. The UI remains largely the same but you get a new notification bar similar to android with the iOS 5 update! It shows the weather and all your notifications from social networks to missed calls. One can simple swipe the missed called notification on the lock screen and call the number without having to unlock the phone.
To transfer the contacts i combined all vcf files to one vcf file and sent it as an attachment to the mail account synced in iPhone. Once i received the mail just a simple tap imported all contacts from it.
Coming to the camera, it is a significant improvement over the camera of the iPhone 4. The 8 MP clicker is awesome for the day shots and the powerful led flash ensures that your night shots are even better. It shoots video at 30fps in full HD and has got a plethora of editing options available which get even more when you turn towards the app store. The front facing camera can still be used for video calls only over face time with other apple users, a disappointment, from a nearly perfect device. Some shots which I took were stunning with every detail being visible which apple claims to be coz of the introduction of a fifth lens in the optics!
The 4s shows no lag of whatsoever kind even on running multiple apps in background nor did the iPhone 4, but the 4s beats the iPhone 4 by a margin when it comes to gaming. I downloaded infinity blade II to test the grunt this phone provides and quite frankly, apple has hit the mark now! The dual core proccy handles the load times efficiently. With the new gpu under its belly, the 4s can display all the latest games in their full glory! Modern combat 3 utilizes fully the presence of the second core and the new gpu. After playing it for an hour on both the 4s and 4, one gets to feel the difference! 
Many people (my friend included) go on and on about the demerits of apple's closed system policy and the lack of Bluetooth transfers. It is correct to say that if one buys a device for 50k he should be given complete control over its features, but apple knows that if something happens to the device even because of user's fault the company is the first to get the blame! The Bluetooth worked flawlessly with my BH-503.
Siri, Apple’s voice recognition service rocks big time! I had a great hour playing about with it and it easily picked up four out my every five commands. My friend came over to pick up the device and he was dazzled by it. Now who needs touchscreens when you can send texts without typing a single letter. Of course, there is scope of improvement. Apple still has to perfect Siri for the Indian buyers as it has some problem recognizing accents but undoubtedly Siri is by far the best voice recognition service on a mobile phone.
I couldn’t test the battery life and iCloud service in this short span of time but according to other sources it manages to last for two days with moderate usage and 3g and Wi-Fi turned on throughout. I drained it to about 50% from fully charged status in the 13 hours it was with me.
On a closing note, the iPhone 4s is a fabulous device. It offers nothing extra special over the iPhone 4 but it is the best product apple has ever produced. Samsung Galaxy SII is powerful, agreed; but apple’s touch experience is still a benchmark in the industry. Like it or hate it, the 4s is one of the best phones in the market right now. The major gripe is the pricing. For 44500 for the 16GB and around 50000 for the 32GB, it is a rich man’s toy. One can build a pretty powerful pc in that amount but for real connoisseurs it is a worthy purchase. Apple sure demands a premium but delivers richer user experience than others. So if you have money to burn, go ahead buy the iPhone 4s and be the center of attention amongst your friends. Else, if you are looking for pure performance with little or no attention to UI go for the SII.

Features..		9.0	
Performance		8.5	
Build quality		9.5	
Value for Money	           6.0
Overall			8.25


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## iSLaND (Feb 27, 2012)

Nice reveiw.
Though I'd never buy an apple.

Android is the future.


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## pramudit (Feb 27, 2012)

congo dude.....


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## Krow (Feb 28, 2012)

Good job.


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## ritvij (Mar 6, 2012)

thanks guys.. but as for android being the future i doubt it.. my biggest question why does android need humongous hardware to run smoothly whereas iOS runs perfectly on at least 3 generation of phones...??


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## pramudit (Mar 6, 2012)

iphone is optimized since it run on a single platform whereas android run on vareity of devices so it is not that much optimized...


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## ritvij (Mar 6, 2012)

ok.. but it still lags and with the advent of every version, it requires another hardware upgrade.. i say you buy any android high end tablet, for instance, for a huge sum of money and you get no guarantee that the future versions of android would run smoothly on it.. whats the point?? i dont mean to start an iOS vs Android discussion but still, the apple can guarantee that its devices will support iOS 6 ( i am saying it on the basis of iPhone 3gs and my iPod 3g) but android can't...


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## Anorion (Mar 6, 2012)

apple phones travel back in time from the future, everyone else makes a range of 6-12 devices, apple makes one - this gives them a tremendous advantage in terms of component sourcing and pricing, which is why their phones are the best
if you can imagine a parallel universe where market forces were drastically different apple would be the only company coming out with the exact same device

but then again, there was this encounter with my barber, where he looked at the 3GS and asked me the capacity of the memory card. I told him it had none. Then he asked me how to transfer videos and songs onto the device, I told him you have to do it by buying it from an online store. He blanked out there, clearly thinking I had got an inferior device. Then he asked me how much it cost, I told him 19900... he then looked at me as if I got cheated and told me "we get this in out town for Rs. 8000". 
the iPhone is not for these kind of people obviously

then there is the other end of teh spectrum, people who pick up the devices and have no clue what to do with em. A friend of mine got a free iPod 4 from a colleague who was using it as a camera and thought the device was useless. Another friend picked up the iPad 2 4 days after it launched and refuses to buy a single premium app till date - uses only the freebs
sucks

if you get comfortable with the entire ecosystem, iPhones offer an incredible amount of value at what is actually dirt cheap prices.

Droids... just been waiting and waiting for the market to kick up and start being active


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## ritvij (Mar 6, 2012)

nicely written..
same case happened with me too.. looking at my blackberry my barber said "chinese hai na, mere paas b hai"..
but if people are ignorant then why blame the company?
i love the closed app ecosystem. It guarantees me a peace of mind. I have never seen iOS users infected with a virus.. maybe in rare cases but i have seen many android users getting a virus in disguise of an app...
bluetooth transfer problems- well i have my own theory as why they do not provide it but i cant be sure.. 

apple demands a premium but offers twice as much...


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## red dragon (Mar 6, 2012)

ritvij said:


> apple demands a premium but offers twice as much...



+100 to that.


Sent from Galaxy S2


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## ritvij (May 11, 2012)

@red dragon-  offtopic: can you do a review of your macbooks??


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## amjath (May 11, 2012)

Congrats and good review 



> Value for Money	 6.0



Good one but i expect 7.5 for the after sales service


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## ritvij (May 11, 2012)

actually i was plannin to give it a 9/10 for VFM but it was only if you are ambani or a true apple fanboy..
but for 44k one can assemble a great machine so gave it 6.0..


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## red dragon (May 11, 2012)

ritvij said:


> @red dragon-  offtopic: can you do a review of your macbooks??


There is nothing much to review actually,the MBP is 2 years old and the MBA is the 2011 model.
Will try to write something about the new 27 iMac instead this weekend.
After 3 years,now I have a desktop again!


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## mrintech (May 11, 2012)

Nice review

But, Build quality 9.5? I will give it 6

P.S. Try dropping it and s2, you will know....


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## theserpent (May 12, 2012)

Nice review
The thing is android is open source.So what android should do is make different os's depending on hardware.
Say plain android is smooth.then samsung/htc/sony customize it add crap etc and make it slowed by about 35%.
So if they start selling plain android maybe with some customization it will be smooth.
BTW custom roms are smooth


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## ritvij (May 12, 2012)

mrintech said:


> Nice review
> 
> But, Build quality 9.5? I will give it 6
> 
> P.S. Try dropping it and s2, you will know....



mate the build quality depends upon the in hand feel of the device and its sturdiness when you hold it..
agreed if you drop it it will shatter into pieces but it looks classic..

@serpent16- +10000
IMHO too, android should limit what version should run on what hardware. like ICS on tablets  and smart phones with superior hardware, they must not update it on phones that can't handle that..
BTW, i am currently working on an article titled Battle of the OSes.. i know it will start WWIII here....


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## samudragupta (May 16, 2012)

nice review mate.... co coincidently i had a similar discussion with my office colleague today... he is using an office provided iphone 3gs and said that he is looking to get a new android phone for himself.. i asked him why not an iphone 4s since he is already using 3gs and must be satisfied with the performance... he said that android is the future!! he was right however i gave him some instances that i came across my friends using anfroid handsets at work....
1) 2 of my friends htc and samsung motherboard died and now they have to pay a bomb to replace it since its just outside warranty
2) another s2 user had software issues and mic issues and had it sent to repairs in the 10th month.
3) 2 of my friends are using a iphone 4 and 4s respectively and none had any issues since 2 yrs and 1 yr. 
what i mean to say is that apples though cost a bomb have very less failure rate. 
i personally am using an ipod 3rd gen since 2 yrs and am proud owner, no issues what so ever... on the other hand android just keeps launching new versions which dont even have a specific launch date and are not meant for all manufacturers.....
my old school symbian was the best!! RIP symbian


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## aroraanant (Jun 14, 2012)

Many of my friends have 4S, I am playing with iphone including 3G,4 and 4S from a long time and really I am impressed with the quality which apple gives.


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## Cabeceira (Sep 9, 2016)

nice. detailed review. I love androids


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## RON28 (Sep 9, 2016)

Cabeceira said:


> nice. detailed review. I love androids



whatever you're smoking, stop it.


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## anirbandd (Sep 10, 2016)

Cabeceira said:


> nice. detailed review. I love androids





RON28 said:


> whatever you're smoking, stop it.


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