Tuesday, September 25 - October 1, 2012
REAL PEOPLE. REAL STORIES
Is iPhone 5 worth buying? After months of speculation and leaks, Apple finally lifted the veils off the iPhone 5 at a press event held at the Buena Center of the Arts, San Francisco California, on September 12th. The new iPhone is thinner, lighter, faster and sexier than its predecessor the iPhone 4 S. With the iPhone 5, Apple swallowed its words by bumping up the screen size to 4 inches. If you may recall, the late Steve Jobs once proclaimed that no one wanted a big screen on a phone. He said these words at an earlier iPhone launch event. I guess, Steve must be turning in his grave, seeing as his people decided to go against his wish by introducing a bigger iPhone. The competition has been
churning out bigger and bigger phones with sizes going all the way to 5.4 inches in the case of the Samsung Galaxy Note. The reception of the iPhone 5 has been mixed, with pundits declaring the new phone as ‘reactionary’ rather than ‘revolutionary’. The iPhone 5 has not broken any new ground in the smart phone space. None of the new features/ functions, save for IOS, are new and groundbreaking. All the new features and technologies already exist in rival devices from Samsung, Nokia, Motorola and HTC. Design/aesthetics Apple played it safe with the new iPhone. Rather than create something totally new,
they modified the design of the iPhone 4 slightly. Looking at the iPhone 5 from the sides, you would be hard-pressed to tell the difference from its older sibling. Apart from the bigger 4-inch screen, the new iPhone is slightly taller than its predecessor but maintains the same width and thickness. I am glad Apple dropped the glass back opting for an all-metal frame. I would never feel comfortable knowing that my device had 2 glass surfaces. So what has changed? For starters, the iPhone 5 is powered by Apple’s new A6 processor, which Apple claims is twice as fast as the iPhone 4GS. Apple was not very forthcoming with the actual processor speed. Apple has finally placed a 4G LTE chip I the iPhone. This should call for celebration as most rival smartphones have had this feature for over a year. iPhone will now enjoy the
superfast internet speeds. Other new features include IOS 6, a 4-inch screen, a new charging port, which Apple cleverly named ‘Lightening’. As fancy as that sounds, the new port will set you back by $30 for an adopter. The competition The iPhone 5 comes hot on the heels of Samsung’s new offerings namely the Galaxy Note 2 and Galaxy S 3, Motorola’s Droid Razor M and HTC’s One-X, Nokia’s Lumia 920, all of which represent the strongest offerings from the rival Android and Windows Phone 8 camps respectively. These are very strong contenders in terms of performance and value. We shall wait to see how the new iPhone fares in the face of this formidable competition. Only time and sales figures will give a clear picture of how well the iPhone 5 will be received.
Looking at it from the sides, you would be hardpressed to tell the difference from its older sibling
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