iPhone 4 Review : Messaging

Flexible Usability

The Apple iPhone 4 follows its predecessors in offering a large amount of messaging options, and that number has been swelled since the introduction of iOS4.
The keyboard – both landscape and portrait – is eerily accurate, and if you've never tried it before you'll be dumbfounded at how quickly you get used to smashing out messages as fast as possible.
The main method of interaction is through email, and Apple now lets you have multiple Exchange accounts on the iPhone as well as Gmail, YMail... in fact all kinds of webmail is supported.
And getting involved with these is as simple as pie – for our Yahoo account, it was simply a matter of username and password and we were away – slightly disconcerting privacy-wise but a dream to set up.
Google Mail can be done in the same way, or you can channel it through the Exchange route if you want to sync the contacts or calendar - Google has a good explainer on how to do it.
Corporate Exchange is a little trickier, as it requires you to know the settings and domain name and mail address – you might be better throwing the phone and a couple of beer tokens at your company's friendly IT guy if you're struggling.

However, the push email works a treat and the iPhone 4's new iOS 4 offers unified inboxes – so you can get all your email in one place without having to jump in and out of separate accounts.
The email interface on the iPhone 4 is a dream too – simply swipe from the right hand side of the message you want to erase and a little delete button appears as if by magic.
You can also easily select multiple messages to erase at once by pressing edit – you can also move the emails to a separate folder using this method too.
Another new feature is emails are now grouped together – you know the situation: you're having a five person conversation and before you know it there are 33 emails in your inbox all entitled 'Is spin class for only women?'.
Now they're all under one roof – simply click in to the subject email and you can see the debate in all its glory.
MMS was nicely set up in the way we've come to expect from Apple, with the option to send a picture or video directly from the item, or by hitting the small camera icon in the MMS message to choose a photo or video.

Strangely, if creating a message using the MMS editor, we could only attach a video or picture, yet MMS supports contact cards as well as sound recordings too.
While both of these functions allow you to create an MMS from the actual item, if you want to combine audio and a contact card you won't be able to in the current MMS editor.

Text messaging is laid out in Apple's favourite 'conversation' balloons, with easy interactivity with your chats and message lists.

The other option to contact your friends with is that old staple: instant messaging. The advent of the newer versions of the Apple OS mean push notifications and background running make much more sense on this new iteration, and the likes of Windows Live Messenger now finally appearing on the scene mean IM is a very easy way of chatting to your friends.

If we had one gripe, it's that Apple hasn't taken a leaf out of RIM's book and allowed the inbox API to be opened up. Imagine being able to see not only emails, but text messages, Facebook messages, Twitter mentions... all in one easy to reach place.
Come on Apple; let's see that in the next update, shall we?

iPhone 4 Review : Calling, FaceTime and Contact

Apple iPhone More Features

The Apple iPhone 4 is still meant to be a phone first and foremost, no matter how many applications you put on there or how much the internet experience is optimised.
Previous iPhone incarnations have struggled somewhat to offer the best telephony experience, so has Apple failed to deliver a decent calling experience again?
The answer is no and sort of... no in the fact that the call quality and stability has been jolly improved, but only sort of because the iPhone 4 has some very worrying coverage issues we'll come onto.

We mentioned the noise cancelling microphones earlier, and these really do work nicely. We wandered all through London and we were able to hear our friends in all kinds of places easily, so the earpiece is nice and clear.
The friends we were chatting too also reported a very clear and non-call-dropping experience as well - we purposely didn't tell them we were using the iPhone 4, and those that had prior iPhone use were genuinely surprised.
The speaker is also nice and clear too - the distortion we've heard on other phones wasn't present even at the loudest points - in short, perfectly usable as a conferencing device.
However, there's a major issue brewing here: the iPhone 4 loses signal if you hold it in your left hand.
Yes, we know, it sounds odd, but bear with us, there's a reason for this. Apple has been fairly ingenious in the design of the iPhone 4, and in getting it so thin, it placed the antenna, Bluetooth, GPS and other radio receivers on the stainless steel band running around the edge.
But it appears contact with the palm on the bottom left corner, the most natural place to hold the phone for many, results in bars falling quickly - see the video we shot as proof.
We were initially unconcerned, as we've seen the issue before on the iPhone 3GS, and calls didn't drop out no matter where we held the phone or how few bars we had.
But when running a speed diagnostics test using SpeedTest.net, things were very different: the average speed at 3G is around 500Kbps. With the iPhone 4 in the left hand this dropped to just under 10Kbps on the EDGE network.
If you use the Bumper, the shorting doesn't happen and there's no signal loss - on the contrary, things are very good on the signal and data front.
Apple has responded by simply telling users not to hold the phone this way – so it seems there's no fix on the horizon.
However, we'll be honest: while you shouldn't have to put up with such a major flaw in a mobile phone, it's not as much of a big deal as you'd think, and we couldn't make it drop calls even when the palm was heavily pressed on
It is very wrong that you can only either browse the internet using your right hand or holding the phone a little differently.
It's not a deal breaker if you're thinking of getting the iPhone 4 – but it is very annoying and does border on the ridiculous for a company that prides itself on such intense quality control.
FaceTime
Onto brighter things now, and Apple's odd choice to bring back video call with the new iPhone 4.
Basically, it's the same principle us Brits have been messing around with for nearly a decade - see your friends in real time while you walk around, and they can see you in turn.

There are many reasons why video calling has never taken off here, and one of them is the complexity of setting it up - at least Apple has removed that hurdle here.
You can choose to video call someone from their profile in your phone, or even switch the call to FaceTime halfway through to start up a video call instead.
A simple button press flicks between the front-facing VGA camera and the rear 5MP effort, and you also get the option to move the little pane showing your own face around the screen - although you can't put it right in the centre for comedy effect.

While it's true that the audio and video quality is much improved using the iPhone 4's FaceTime application, we still can't see why this will herald the second coming of video calling.
Sure, the likes of Skype have made video chat more popular, but sitting at your PC or in your living room and looking at a larger screen just seems more natural than talking to your phone.
Plus you can currently only use FaceTime over Wi-Fi, which surely needs to change very soon, as there's no way of telling if someone is going to be available or not when you want to chat, unless you're already on a call with them.
In our tests, we were overall nonplussed by the experience. The video quality didn't seem that different from front to rear camera, and the pictures were a little grainy, which we didn't expect over Wi-Fi.
One plus point – if you have two iPhone 4s, then you can FaceTime call yourself. If you've ever wondered what the back of your hair looked like properly, this is the way to find out.
Contacts
The contacts system on the iPhone is a pretty standard affair - you've got all your friends listed in the way you'd imagine they would be, and a little column of letters on left allows you to quickly find a certain alphabetical group of buddies.
You can also easily search for your friends using the Spotlight application too, if you're a little lazy, and the whole experience works nicely.
Contact information is pretty sparse, but all the fields you need are there - IM handle is the most advanced offering you get when adding in new info.

We much prefer the simple awesomeness of the HTC Sense UI on the likes of the Desire and the Legend - the ability to sync Twitter and Facebook, see your call and messaging history and even browse their photos is an immense feature.
Still at least the iPhone 4 does things simply - apart from the fact it gets a bit too formal at times in the listing process.
If you have a friend on your SIM card or Google contact called Mr Sweatband, for instance, he would have previously been listed under 'M', but the iPhone 4 sees his last name instead and puts him under 'S'. Little thing, but annoying there's nothing you can do about it.

Thankfully you can synchronise contacts from Google or Exchange as well as searching the latter's online server if you can't find the person you're looking for straight away.
This makes the porting process from another smartphone so much easier if you're not a previous iPhone user.

iPhone 4 review : Interface part 2

Good Way of Improving

Wallpaper
Legacy iPhone users will be used to the plain old black background – so now being allowed to customise however they see fit is going to be a real treat.
There's no reason Apple hasn't allowed this so far, and it feels a little childish that this has only popped up (unless you were one of the unruly kids and jailbroke your iPhone – perfectly acceptable then).

However, being able to have it as both the lock screen image and the background is a nice touch, or to have two separate images if that's your bag.
Folders
The only other new and interesting feature to the interface is the addition of folders – if you're fed up of being forced to see row after row of icons you're going to find life just got a lot simpler.
Simply long press an icon, and rather than moving that little picture to a new place, dump it on top of another one, automatically creating a folder with the two applications in there.

You can even name it whatever you want – Apple is really letting you go nuts here.
Of course, there are older elements from previous iPhones on offer as well swiping left to access Spotlight search for instance.
This offers the chance to simply type in a search term, and Spotlight will search out messages, applications, contacts or media files containing that name.

If it can't find them then it will offer the chance to hit up the likes of Google or Wikipedia to get more information – but you can probably work out how to do that yourself.
It's not the most intuitive search – other platforms will let you perform functions like sending a message reply from the search results, but it's still jolly handy for things like finding a certain song.
Voice control is also on offer too – hold down the home button and a little blue screen pops up.

The idea is saying things like 'Play Album Immersion' or 'Dial Marc's Mum' will do such a thing – in reality, it was useless.
We swear it's worse at working out what we're trying to say than the iPhone 3GS – so many times it decided to dial a random number instead of playing a song.
But the schizophrenic robot voice control aside, iPhone 4 interface is simply immense – from the super-smooth and responsive swiping to the instant opening of applications and animations, the reasons so many people like the iPhone is evident under the touch.
It doesn't have the instant zip of the Desire or Samsung Galaxy S, but that's more to do with the animated transitions than any kind of judder.
We're still gutted that elements like widgets aren't present – you don't hang a picture of a fridge in your kitchen to keep your milk cold, so why should you have to open an icon to access information from an application?

iPhone 4 review : Interface part 1

Good Way of Improving


When Steve Jobs releases a new phone, it always comes with an updated firmware too - and the iPhone 4 is no different. The new iPhone OS has been dubbed iOS 4 now, seeing as it's being used on the iPad too, and it's bringing a lot of upgrades that people have been hankering for for years.
But we'll quickly run through the high points of the iPhone for the uninitiated: the same iPhone home screen is offered, where it's a simple grid of icons to select applications.

If you want to re-order these, simply long press on any one, and they all start to wobble around, allowing you to flick them in whichever order you like or if you want you can delete them by pressing the X.
You can't delete the pre-loaded applications though: for instance, nobody cares about Stocks, but you have to have it there. We'd love to know if anyone has ever created a decent portfolio based on the fact they had to stare at the Stocks icon all the time and finally cracked.

Most applications, like Settings and Contacts, take you to a menu-based system, with list options to tap and drill down to further things you can interact with. All very simple really.
But this is one of the key places the iPhone has always excelled - little animated transitions make things look so cool when they flick around under the finger, and it really makes people that try the phone for the first time think it's awesome.
iPhones of old have often struggled to keep up with these animations - talk of 400MHz processors should tell you why. But this is an ARM Cortex-A8 Apple A4 1GHz processor running things here: we're sure Apple is underclocking this to save on battery life, but it doesn't matter - each change is seamless and that's what we want.
And of course, Apple's simple way of navigation is still present - simply tap the home button at any point and you're back to the familiar home screen. Simples, as a certain member of the mongoose family may or may not say.
Multitasking
The main change with the iPhone 4 is the fact multi-tasking is now on offer, something that has put Apple behind the smartphone competition for many years.
Want to listen to Spotify and browse on Safari? Nope, not possible previously - but now it is, and that's what we call a Good Thing.
Of course, Apple being the gleaming machine it is, we couldn't have simple multi-tasking like on other platforms - Jobs has apparently 'solved' things with this cunning new method.

We mean cunning in an ironic, Tony Robinson-way, because essentially all that has happened is Apple has decided to control this element as well: only certain applications which have been verified to not eat all your battery and then kill your pets (well, the first one) will be allowed to run in the background, rather than all and any third party applications.
This is slightly annoying when you have things like social networking options that you want to be able to leave and come back to, and see all the updates without waiting.

But overall: Apple's way of multitasking is the right way - you simply double tap the home button, and a little row of icons at the bottom of the screen pops up, with the most recent application opened on the left.
You can scroll along to choose the running application you want and go right back in where you were before. This means an open email you're writing, a web page, video, or something like a third party internet radio.
Scrolling to the left of the icon dock again will offer two more options - music control with basic commands, and the chance to lock the orientation - handy if you need to keep twisting the phone when watching video for some reason.
Switching between the applications spins the chosen application into view in a very pleasing fashion, indicative of the way Apple does things with the iPhone.

iPhone 4 review : Retina Display

Big Features on iPhone 4

Another big feature of the Apple iPhone 4 is the new high resolution display - Steve Jobs has decided the best name for this is a 'Retina Display' by dearth of the fact it's meant to be so high-res that it's actually more than the eye can cope with. Read more about what we think of that.

But the main point is the screen is so packed with pixels - we're talking 326 pixels per inch, and a 960x640 display, making it ridiculously high resolution for a phone with a 3.5-inch display.
This beats the Nexus One, iPad and pretty much every other phone on the market at the moment - it's immense and we can't really do it justice by describing it; essentially you have to see it to believe it.
The idea is that the days of pixellated images are over - now it's all smooth and sleek lines for everything.
This claim is certainly shown when looking at a web page on maximum zoom; sure, the old iPhone 3GS' effort looked a little ragged, but we accepted it because of the high zoom level and the fact that, well, we didn't care.

But when you see things like that on the Retina Display, things just change completely. It's crisp and pure the whole way in, and while we're not saying that it's the most necessary thing out there, it's really cool and adds an element of wow-factor.
It's not just the smoothness that impresses either; it's the contrast ratios and overall image processing that comes to the fore when you see the iPhone 4's Retina Display for the first time.
Video looks simply sublime on the 3.5-inch screen, and while it's not an OLED (rather a TFT LCD with IPS backplane switching - here's a dull link to an explainer if you're into that kind of thing... and we sadly are) it still looks every bit as good as the display on the HTC Desire.

We might argue that the 800:1 contrast ratio, while stunning, isn't better than an OLED version, which has the advantage of no backlight so the blacks will always be that little bit purer.
We also think that perhaps the colour reproduction isn't as saturated - but given that some people claim that OLED screens are a little too colour heavy, this may not be a bad thing.
Overall - Retina Display is a great thing, although not necessarily better than WVGA OLED screens we see in a lot of high end phones these days; but we can only hope that it's a trend that's followed by more manufacturers in the future.

Facts u need to know about iphone 4

Here's my thought about Iphone 4

find out whether i think the iPhone 4 is the best phone in the world.

Apple's launch of the iPhone 4 has seen the greatest excitement for a new phone ever - and with HD video recording, a super high-res screen and ridiculously slim dimensions, it's not hard to see why.

But things are a little different now - not only was the iPhone 3GS something of a non-update to the iPhone range, but there are finally decent alternatives in the smartphone market, with the HTC Desire and Samsung Galaxy S leading the Android fight right to Apple's door.

You can check out iPhone 4 video review:

Add to that the first major leak of an Apple product a couple of months before launch, and suddenly the iPhone 4 has a lot to do to impress.

At least Apple has unleashed the big guns for this effort - before we get into the headline specs, the design itself is a massive talking point on its own.

Jobs' chats on stage to unveil a new iPhone might have got a little repetitive (best this, magical that etc) but this is the first time since the first iPhone way back in January 2007 that we've seen a variation on the standard iPhone design.

Gone is the traditional curved back and plastic exterior with slightly chunky dimensions; in is a chassis that's only 9.3mm thin at its thickest point and a new stainless steel and glass industrial design.

If you're an iPhone fan, there's a good chance you won't like the look of the iPhone the first time you pick it up - it's the same weight as the iPhone 3GS at 137g, but it's a lot smaller, with dimensions of 115.2mm x58.6 mm x 9.3mm, so it feels like a much weightier and compact model.

The edges are stainless steel, apparently forged by winged unicorns in an iceberg (or something) to be 10 times stronger than 'normal' steel.

The front and back of the phone are made of glass, which has also been treated to be a lot stronger than the normal variety we're used to seeing through and drinking out of.

This claim holds up - not only did we feel the need to drop the phone onto the floor a few times to test, someone nameless of the TechRadar team also knocked it out (an admittedly low level) window onto concrete - and not a scratch.

If you're the protective type, then you can buy an official 'Bumper' for the iPhone 4, which encases it in a small ring of rubber, if you haven't bought the handset only for its slim lines.

The chassis shape isn't the only different thing with the iPhone 4 - the whole ethos has been tweaked. For instance, no longer is there a slightly plasticky rocker switch to control volume on the left-hand side, as it's now two discrete metal buttons with '+' and '-' written on.

The volume silencer rocker switch is above too, but that has also undergone the uber-metallic treatment.

The top of the phone still holds the headphone jack, and the power/lock key. However, the 3.5mm port is now flush to the chassis, and the power button feels much nicer to hit than before.

There's also a separate microphone for noise cancelling next to this as well - we imagine a few people will be pushing paperclips in there before they realise that it's not for the SIM card slot.

The right-hand side of the chassis is still blank - no camera button sadly, which would have been nice given the extra effort Apple has clearly put into overhauling the photography system.

Still, sleek is clearly still 'in' at the Cupertino HQ, and we can't say we blame the designers when you look at the lines.

Actually, that's not true - the micro-SIM slot is hidden away here, rather than on the top. It's the same pokey key thing/slot system as before, but this time the SIM card is much smaller - Apple says to make more room for stuff inside, we say it's just to shake things up a little bit. Either way, we bet micro-SIMs become the norm before very long in all phones.

The bottom of the phone has the familiar Apple connector for charging and connecting and docking etc, and is flanked by another more microphone-y looking microphone slot and the speaker.

The front still has that one iconic button, which is much nicer to press in the new chassis, it has to be said.

Overall, the design might not impress some people the first time they pick up the phone - a number of people we showed the phone to grimaced a little bit the first time they handled it.

It's a sharp and weighty-feeling phone, make no mistake - and it doesn't sit as comfortably in the hand as well as other iPhones of the past have.

But it feels premium, and at up to £600, it had better - that's a lot to pay when you consider you could get a 42-inch 1080p LCD for £200 less these days.

In the box

At least Apple has remained consistent when it comes to the packaging - apart from a new graphic on the front to make the new iPhone 4 look more mysterious, there's not a lot different to the older iPhones.

So that means: a simple Apple USB cable, a three-pin plug adaptor and some headphones. The latter is the same old set from the year before: hands free and a function button on the cord, but slightly poor quality compared to a range of other buds on the market.

Oh, you also get that little tool for removing the micro-SIM card as well - but Apple should just save itself some money and stick a paperclip in there, as 99.99% of people will lose that little thing, panic, then improvise anyway. Well, i have. Twice.