iPhone 4S - Tech Specs and Features

[klugey1]

LTE is not 4G, LTE is a working towards 4G specification, LTE-A is a 4G candidate. ITU say for a standard to be 4G it has to deliver 1Gbps speeds.

Here is the link to the article you should read before making erroneous claims:
Newsroom • Press Release

The ITU may have taken notice of this extensive and erroneous usage as the governing body has reconsidered its previous definition. A press release from its December meeting reveals that the International Telecommunications Union has made the following changes and now expands the term 4G as follows:

Following a detailed evaluation against stringent technical and operational criteria, ITU has determined that “LTE-Advanced” and “WirelessMAN-Advanced” should be accorded the official designation of IMT-Advanced. As the most advanced technologies currently defined for global wireless mobile broadband communications, IMT-Advanced is considered as “4G”, although it is recognized that this term, while undefined, may also be applied to the forerunners of these technologies, LTE and WiMax, and to other evolved 3G technologies providing a substantial level of improvement in performance and capabilities with respect to the initial third generation systems now deployed. The detailed specifications of the IMT-Advanced technologies will be provided in a new ITU-R Recommendation expected in early 2012.

In other words, all that public bickering over which carrier really has 4G (previous answer: zero) was all for naught. Based on the new guideline, commercially deployed LTE (Verizon), WiMax (Sprint) and HSPA+ (T-Mobile) can all call themselves "4G."

[Switch72nd]

mod edit: do not insult other members iPhones do exponentially better that any individual Android or WP7 phone, and the 4s is no different

No offense, but the iPhone is not exponentially better then any individual Android phone. The iPhone 4 was outclassed before it was even released and the 4s looks like it will be outclassed before its released either, and the phones that outclassed them were Android phones. I will agree that iPhones are exponentially better then any WP7 phone.

[Simon]

No offense, but the iPhone is not exponentially better then any individual Android phone. The iPhone 4 was outclassed before it was even released and the 4s looks like it will be outclassed before its released either, and the phones that outclassed them were Android phones. I will agree that iPhones are exponentially better then any WP7 phone.

iOS outclasses Android IMO. Especially in ease of use. I have a Galaxy S2 and a iPhone 4. The Galaxy S2 is by far the superior phone and I'd say still beats the 4S in most categories. However I still use my iPhone 4 as my main phone because it runs iOS. Software trumps hardware IMO. If I could put iOS on a Galaxy S2 then I would have the perfect phone

[klugey1]

Simon,
Try this out. Now my iPhone 4JB is a Galaxy Sii.

[NegativeBeef]

iOS outclasses Android IMO.

That's only if you jailbreak though. The default iOS is absolute garbage.

[klugey1]

I have a DroidX running the APEX Gingerbread ROM which rocks, and I have an HTC Droid Incredible running The Nils Business GingerSense 3.0 rom (which is also a GB-based Sense-type rom) and I'm running the a variety of Themes on my iPhone 4JB. I have to say that I keep coming back to the iPhone. Since I now have some cool widgets on the iPhone (Scrolling FB and Themes HTC Clock with weather), the only things really missing are the native Swype Keyboard and being able to go directly to Google Navigation. You iPhone Fanboys, if you haven't ever used Swype (and gotten used to it) then you really do not know what you are missing. It totally rocks.

Also, I realize there are other great Mapping Navigation apps available now on the iPhone (TomTom, MapQuest, etc...), but having it native like Android does is just not the same. I also don't want to pay $40 - $50 for the TomTom which I hear is practically native, because my Big Boat Caddi has Nav built in, so not a big issue for me.

If you can wait for the 5, it would probably be well worth your money. If you have a 4 or 3GS then just jailbreak it and have some fun with what you've got. It is very easy now, and it has been found by the Federal Courts to be completely legal. Someone else coined the term that in the iPhone 4S the "S" stands for 'Stupid', and I love this. Apple should really have hired some better & faster engineers to get the iPhone 5 out after 18 months. I am heavily involved with Qualcomm here in San Diego (makers of the CDMA chip that goes in the Verizon version of the iPhone), and the Apple folks have very large egos (making them a bit difficult to work with). I think their Egos have gotten in the way of their Engineering.

[prgeno]

LTE is not 4G, LTE is a working towards 4G specification, LTE-A is a 4G candidate. ITU say for a standard to be 4G it has to deliver 1Gbps speeds.

Actually the ITU says 1Gbps in local scenarios and 100Mbps in wide area (i.e. cellular) applications. 4G is a meaningless term.

Variants of both LTE and WiMax have been put forth to standards bodies as 4G technologies. As is the case in almost any standards committee process, the debate will rage for years. In the mean time users like us will be enjoying the 4G, forth generation, real world deployments long before any standard's committee gets their act together, which will happen right about the time when it will become a moot point as 5th generation technologies start to become publicized.

Keep making excuses for why Apple chose to lag behind the leaders if you wish, but you'll have to come up with another one as this one doesn't hold water.

[Simon]

That's only if you jailbreak though. The default iOS is absolute garbage.

Have to disagree with you there. I'd still take stock iOS over Android any day.

[mikeydooodie]

im gonna make a point I've seen no one make on any blog/website/forum

why would apple change the hardware design when last year at this time everyone was raving about it and ppl still are? now they just changed the guts and put an iPad 2's guts in the iPhone 4. its a win win. next year they are gonna have an iPhone 5 with the 4s guts(just like the 4 had the 3gs guts but added FaceTime) and then the iPhone 5s is gonna be the one you want to get bc that will have updated guts in the new design, with that being said i lost my iPhone 4 a month ago and never got a replacement so I'm gonna go buy a 4s the day it comes out lol. been using a blackberry for now and i wanna throw it against the wall

ill explain the iPhone/android thing how i explain it to my friends to you people

iphone=mercedes
android=nissan

if you don't understand what i mean ill explain it

[nillam1]

This is my question too. If they AT LEAST doubled the memory to 1GB, I may consider upgrading from the 16gb 4 to the 32gb 4s, but if the memory is still at 512MB, I will probably pass.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think ram is hardware like on a PC, when I updated my 3GS with iOS 5 beta it showed my 3GS had 1 GB ram. The ram allotment is in the software/iOS, not hardware.

[one1]

[Anthony Bouchard]

That's only if you jailbreak though. The default iOS is absolute garbage.

I'd say that the default iOS outplays Android. CNET reports on Android malware probably once a week. I like to know at least that Apple is on the case, carefully speculating which Apps are let into the App Store.

There's also the user interface. iOS beings realistic kinetic inertia to every point of the device. Android doesn't seem to compete with that. Apple also makes better touch screens than all of the Android device makers combined.

So there's my opinion.

But I will agree that jailbreaking makes the competition even more fierce.

[NegativeBeef]

You know, every time I'm on a vendor-neutral forum I always see more people supporting android over iOS. It's only on this (and other apple) forums does android seem like the worst thing in the world. Hmmm......

[kfb388]

if i buy a sprint iphone 4s and a unlock comes out can i thin use it with tmobile

[Anthony Bouchard]

if i buy a sprint iphone 4s and a unlock comes out can i thin use it with tmobile

Yes, IF the unlock works.

[mectech]

Not much regret here, i am still in love with with the iphone 4 design, with the new inside all iphone 5 need is a bigger screen.
I still think the iphone leading by far.

[GnatGoSplat]

You know, every time I'm on a vendor-neutral forum I always see more people supporting android over iOS. It's only on this (and other apple) forums does android seem like the worst thing in the world. Hmmm......

I'm very happy with my JB'd iPhone 4, but if I couldn't JB it and had to use vanilla iOS 4.3, I would have preferred Android.
Actually, Windows Phone 7 apps look way nicer than their iOS and Android equivalents.

[thomaspeter]

I wanted 4GLTE to replace my HTC Thunderbolt. Apple can suck it now. How can they give AT&T a version that goes up to 14.4 mbps and Verizon one that is in the kbps?? "AT&T, your iPhone is 13x faster on our network" .What a joke.

you should try the new iphone once, I bet you wont go back. AT&T will do good with the new iphone I know. They must be aware of the requirement of the users of the iphone so they ll manage it i hope. But agian i ll advise you to try for once atleast.

[DaveHavok]

Yes, IF the unlock works.

Also, you'll have the following problems:
- No 3G Data Speeds
- You'll have to wait for someone to hack the security authentication behind Facetime again
- You'll most likely have to wait for someone to hack the security authentication behind Siri (which I'm pretty sure they'll be putting in)
- You'll have to wait for an unlock


All this for $600 I've been with Tmobile for 12 years and have both a 2G/3G iPhone and I'm sick of both them and the slow speeds, discontinued support, and lack of new apps.

I would jump over to Sprint but I'm pissed over the fact that it appears that it's not able to Talk and Surf. I guess I'll just hold back until Nov and see what the reports are from people, but seriously, this long of a wait and they couldn't get systems or use the correct hardware to allow for Talk and Surf on all networks.

[Anthony Bouchard]

Also, you'll have the following problems:
- No 3G Data Speeds
- You'll have to wait for someone to hack the security authentication behind Facetime again
- You'll most likely have to wait for someone to hack the security authentication behind Siri (which I'm pretty sure they'll be putting in)
- You'll have to wait for an unlock


All this for $600 I've been with Tmobile for 12 years and have both a 2G/3G iPhone and I'm sick of both them and the slow speeds, discontinued support, and lack of new apps.

I would jump over to Sprint but I'm pissed over the fact that it appears that it's not able to Talk and Surf. I guess I'll just hold back until Nov and see what the reports are from people, but seriously, this long of a wait and they couldn't get systems or use the correct hardware to allow for Talk and Surf on all networks.

Actually based on hat original post you quoted me on, I released an article today explaining that the iPhone 4S is unlocked for GSM only. You won't be able to move around CDMA/GSM very easily.

Personally, I'm going with AT&T.