iPhone 4 reviewed: It’s Black Gold!

The long awaited and much anticipated Apple iPhone 4 arrives in Canada today and if you thought the iPhone 3GS was an innovation, Apple’s 4th generation device with their new energy efficient and  their own powerful A4 chip,  is way beyond that. After test-driving it for a few days it exceeded my expectations, incorporating slick new features available today that were once only as realistic as you had seen them in the movies.

FaceTime Video Calling

Definitely Apple’s marquis feature, FaceTime, is bringing video calling to the masses. While video calling is not a new, its execution is an its implementation couldn’t be any easier. You connect your call, hit the FaceTime button, (making sure it’s enabled in your settings) and you’re in business. Or alternately, click on a Contact in your phone book, hit the FaceTime button and voila! A movable thumbnail of you appears on the screen so you tell what your caller is seeing. No fuss, no muss and works like a charm. It’s free and addictive! And it even specifies a FaceTime call in your call history, so you can reconnect even faster!

Now currently, FaceTime connectivity is limited to other iPhone 4 users running over a Wi-Fi network, but it’s surely a start. And since it’s been developed using open standards, Apple hopes it will be adopted an open industry standard, resulting in more devices and more carriers getting on-board allowing seamless use over 3G, as we see with voice calls and text messaging.

Front & Back Cameras

What’s tres-cool is that during a FaceTime call, with just a little toggle you can engage iPhone 4’s built-in rear camera so your caller can quickly see hear and speak to what’s in front of you. The front camera is VGA, but the rear camera features, auto-focus, featuring tap-to-focus so you can focus anywhere in the viewer and a macro lens with 5x digital zoom. It has a 5-mega-pixel sensor that features backside illumination serving up surprisingly great images in dimly lit situations. And this camera is fast, unlike the 3GS where you have a slight latency once you hit the photo button.  It also shoots high-definition 720P video at 30 frames per second, making it a pleasure to watch and easily uploadable. And finally, we get a built-in and extremely bright LED-flash, so you can capture those moments almost anywhere.

Retina Display

And while the pictures look great on photo paper, they’re also astounding on the iPhone 4’s screen. While still 3.5”, the new Retina display has 4 times the resolution of the current model. It also features a 960×640 viewing area with an 800:1 contrast ratio – colours are amazingly vibrant and blacks are deep. Text is even crispier so when zooming in on fonts, all the jaggies are gone.  That’s because the 326 pixels per inch density is more than the 300 the eye can discern.

It incorporated the same IPS (In Plane Switching) technology as used in the iPad so allowing you to clearly view the image without colours washing out  as far off as 178 degrees. It’s especially great when video calling and playing games. Overall, the 3GS display is nice, but it’s no comparison to the iPhone 4. With the Retina display I can clearly read the screen even holding it away from my face without glasses – and that says a lot. It also makes it more palatable to read books with iBooks (free app from app store) even on a smaller screen.

Built Tough Glass and Steel

The iPhone 4 is sleek and slim only 9.3mm thick despite having a larger battery and almost 40% more talk time. And it’s far from fragile, it’s built tough. Both the front and back are made with chemically treated aluminosilicate glass, like those found in helicopters – 30 times tougher than plastic and more scratch resistant. Supporting the glass is a band of custom machined forged stainless steel that enhances the unit’s structural integrity and doubles as the unit’s antennas.

It’s tough, really!  I tried twisting the body and unlike the plastic of the 3GS it has no give. Now I didn’t throw the unit against a wall or throw it under a train, but knocking it from a desk to a wooden floor a few times didn’t harm it a bit.

No AntennaGate

Of course it’s hard to talk about the iPhone 4 without talking about antenna and reception issues. I did try the bumper, which everyone will be able to get free-of-charge, but I didn’t make a bit of difference.  I made numerous local and long distance calls over 3 days on the Telus network without voice degradation or a dropped call, whether I held the phone covering the sacred spots or whether I applied the so-called death-grip.  The same held true for when using Wi-Fi and FaceTime. I did however, notice the signal bar dropping slightly as I gripped turning my fingers red, but it never cratered the call, not even once. So for now, as far as I’m concerned, for me, it’s not an issue.

Other Features

iPhone 4 introduces a whole host of other features and too many to cover here – but I will say I certainly enjoyed playing  Eliminate: Gun Range by ngmoco and N.O.V.A (Near Orbit Vanguard Alliance) by Gameloft on the new device.  Both first person shooter games have been updated and enhanced. The Retina display brings out the sharpness of the colours and smoothness of the imagery and the addition of the new 3-axis gyro to iPhone 4 to compliment the accelerometer makes you feel like you’re there holding the gun. What an experience!

iOS4

iPhone 4 ships with iOS4 adding over 100 new features to the operating system. The 2 that I welcome the most are Multitasking, the ability to have multiple applications running at the same time and Folders, which helps me organize my hundred of apps I have scattered across various pages.

(iOS4 not unique to the iPhone 4, it’s also a free download for iPhone 3G, 3GS and late model iPod Touch models)

The Bottom Line

I’ve been overly impressed with iPhone 4. I like its design, shape, its robustness and innovations like FaceTime, the dual cameras and that insanely sharp Retina display.

As Jed Clampett from the Beverly Hillbillies gleefully called oil “Black Gold”, when he struck it rich, you too can feel like Jed with  iPhone 4. And for now the white model  is elusive, so you can only get it in black. With that said, at this time, there’s very little that I can find that’s missing. If I have to dig deep think I would have liked to see is an optical zoom, perhaps a memory slot and while I know there’s no room, a tripod mount. And that’s really minimal compared to what iPhone delivers.

All the major carriers in Canada – Telus, Rogers, Bell, and Fido will carry the iPhone with announced pricing by Rogers, Bell and Fido of $159 (16GB) & $269 (32GB).

Without a contract, you can purchase the iPhone unlocked from your local Canadian Apple Store or Apple Canada on-line for $659 (16GB) and $779 (32GB) respectively.  From Rogers they will be $649 and $749. Why pay that much for a phone when the contract price is so heavily subsidized?

If you are in the market for a smartphone, I’d highly recommend iPhone 4. If you have an iPhone 3GS you need to check your upgrade eligibility options with your carrier to see whether you qualify for discounts and weigh the benefits of the extra features you would get. Either way, you can’t lose.

Greg Gazin is the Real Canadian Gadget Guy.

Follow me on Twitter @gadgetgreg

Tags: apple, canada, gadgetguy gadget guy, iphone, iPhone 4, iPhone4, unlocked