7:21 AM
Tes
The iPhone 5 was the
most anticipated Apple handset launch since the iPhone 4. The 4S offered only
an incremental, albeit antenna-fixing, upgrade, and the fifth-gen iPhone
arrives just as many 4 users’ 24-month contract comes up for renewal.
However, in that time
we’ve seen a seismic shift, with competing smartphones offering quality and
desirability to match and even surpass the iPhone.
But wait a goddamn
minute. Statistics don’t lie (usually) and, just as we were putting pen to
paper, Apple announced that pre-orders for the iPhone 5 hit two million in 24
hours, spanking its previous record of one million in a day for the iPhone 4
and ensuring that many won’t see their new precious until October.
So, with it clearly
hooking the gagging mouths of many, how does it perform as ‘the latest iPhone’
and, crucially, how does it match up against the superphone stars of today?
iPhone 5: Build
Let’s start with the
chassis because, let’s face it, that’s the only distinct visible change to
differentiate it from its two previous family members. Grasp the frame in your
hand and the first thing you’ll notice is the weight; it’s the lightest iPhone
ever.
By a long way. At 112g,
it’s 20% daintier than the iPhone 4S, 16% less butch than the Samsung Galaxy S3
and 14% lighter than the HTC One X. Reducing the SIM to weency, or ‘nano’, size
has helped, minutely, as has making the shell out of anodised aluminium.
The brace of glass
strips adorning the top and bottom of the rear give both the black/slate and
white/silver models a premium feel but are actually employed to allow an
uninterrupted phone signal. No-one wants another antennagate.
Despite Keynote claims,
the 7.6mm-deep iPhone 5 isn’t the thinnest smartphone in the world – the Huawei
Ascend P1 S, Oppo Finder and ZTE Athena are all sub 7mm – but when the depth is
combined with the weight, it feels sufficiently waif-like in the hand.
And we’re not convinced
that’s for the good. Of course we want our mobile tech to be light and lithe,
but what we’ve loved about previous iGenerations is the weighty, industrial
feel, the security of feeling something solid in your pocket (no jokes) and
knowing that, if it takes a knock, it’s not going to shatter into a billion
plastic pieces.
Don’t get us wrong, it’s
a miracle how Apple has shed so much excess podge and millions of people will
love the lightweight design, but we preferred the more robust, weapon-like
nature of the 4S. A case of Marmite-y opinion, perhaps.
iPhone 5: Features
The four-inch screen,
which we’ll come onto in detail shortly, is Apple’s belated nod to the industry
trend for bigger displays, and means the iPhone 5 now stands a proud 123.8mm
tall – width remains the same at 58.6mm.
The extra screen
real-estate is welcome, though smaller-handed iPhone users might struggle to
reach the standby button with a forefinger while holding it in a natural
position. They might even have to stretch for the extra top row of apps. Just
hold it a different way, perhaps.
Because various
components have been reduced in size, the headphone socket has been moved to
the bottom of the device, which comes with its pros and cons. On the plus side,
your phone usually goes in your pocket nose first, which means the headphone
cable has a clear run out to your ears.
On the downside, the
jutting jack interferes with your hand when holding it ‘upright’. Not all apps
will use the gyroscope to flip the screen 180-degrees, either, so you’ll have
to get used to that.
The bottom-hugging
stereo speakers have also been given a boost, the better to annoy old people on
the bus as you rattle out Skream’s latest. Do your own iPhone 4S to iPhone 5
sound comparison and you’ll realise the sound is unquestionably fuller and
deeper.
Then there’s the
Lightening connector. In our testing, we didn’t find it any quicker for transferring
content over a cable but we do prefer the new connector in terms of it being a)
smaller and b) reversible.
At the time of writing,
the Lightening-to-30-pin adapter wasn’t available – it sure ain’t in the box,
and it’ll cost £25 on release – so we haven’t experienced how it will cope with
existing docks and accessories but it’s safe to say, things could look ugly.
There are add-ons that
simply won’t work with it, either – TomTom’s iPhone car kit, for example. It’s
made us realise how many USB-to-30-pin cables we’ve amassed over the years and
how, now, they’re all redundant, apart from servicing the new iPad and
nostalgic clear outs.
iPhone 5: Screen
So, onto the screen;
it’s still lovely and Retina; it now boasts 326ppi and a resolution of 1136x640;
it’s equally as bright and slightly richer in colour. There’s space for a whole
extra row of apps – woop! – and tasks can still be performed with one hand.
The main benefit is that
you can just see more. Web pages are longer, movies are wider, though many we
found from iTunes and YouTube still have to be stretched or cropped to fill the
screen, the photo viewing area is bigger (just) and Apple’s own, optimised apps
make good use of the extra space.
Non-optimised apps are
letterboxed, which doesn’t feel right. Hopefully we’ll see a raft of updates
soon. Both iTunes and the App Store have also had visual upgrades and look
clean when you’re browsing, searching and splurging micropayments.
If you’re a long-time
iPhone owner, you might find the elongation strange at first but you’ll soon
wonder how you coped before, as going back to a 4S feels like watching your old
portable bedroom TV. However, if you’ve had an extensive play with the Samsung
S3, HTC One X or Nokia Lumia 900, you still might find it too titchy – it’s
noticeably smaller, and that could be a sticking point for potential buyers.
So why didn’t Apple just
make the screen even bigger? One theory in this reviewer’s mind is the impact
of another device screen size before Christmas. If the iPad Mini was to launch,
then it’d need to sit in a gap between the 9.7-inch iPad and 4-inch iPhone 5.
Launching a phone with a huge 5-inch-plus screen could tread on the toes of
what might be around the corner. Just a thought…
iPhone 5: Performance
Everything feels
slightly slicker when navigating the phone. Apps appear to load quicker, video
feels a touch smoother, video and image processing is definitely faster.
With the improved A6
processor now powering the visuals, our finger points straight at it, but it’s
with new apps that we’ll really see the power of the chip take hold. Real
Racing 3 (or any other A6-optimised game) wasn’t available when penning this
review, so we’ll have to wait for developers to do their thing before
witnessing any major power increase.
iPhone 5: Camera
The rear iSight camera
remains impressive, taking great pictures in bright conditions. There’s a
bigger virtual camera capture button and video stabilisation seems to have
improved.
It now detects faces and
auto-focuses in video and allows you to capture stills while taking video. The
video-compression algorithm has also improved, reducing the file-size of
footage without any discernible reduction in quality, and making for friendlier
email attachments.
Low-light image capture
improvement was also discussed in the Keynote but we still experienced a fair
bit of grain in our testing. The major improvement is with the front camera,
which has been upgraded to 720p video, making FaceTime and Skype chats much
clearer. Still shots are captured at 1.2MP, so not exactly archive-worthy.
The new Panorama mode is
intuitive and produces great results. It doesn’t capture in landscape
orientation, which feels counter-intuitive, but the speed at which it processes
and pops out a pretty, panoramic shot is impressive.
Though, even with the
wider screen, you still have to zoom right in to see what you’ve captured. And
while competing phones have had this feature for a while, if anything’s going
to be the new Instagram over the coming months, this is it.
iPhone 5: iOS 6
The iPhone 5 comes with
iOS 6 as standard. But, at this point it’s difficult to see where the unique
differences are between it running on an iPhone 4S and iPhone 5. You can read
our in-depth iOS 6 review but everything we’ve seen works on both.
Flyover, turn-by-turn
navigation, Passbook, PhotoStream sharing, FaceTime over cellular, VIP
Mailboxes, Facebook integration, Do Not Disturb, improved Siri, pre-determined
text replies to phone calls, the list goes on.
Conceivably, this could
deter iPhone 4S owners from upgrading, though if app developers take advantage
of the upgraded processor and screen and launch more iPhone 5-specific content,
their arms could be twisted. Not that the pre-sales figures suggest Apple has
much to worry about...
iPhone 5: Maps
Apple Maps will divide
opinion. Even with some nice features the search functionality seems hit and
miss in terms of finding London locations. It displays more road names than
place names and colour-coded roads have gone, so navigating to a specific point
via pinch and zoom is trickier.
Then again, the 3D
mapping, map rotation and Flyover features are all great. Maybe we’ll get used
to it but, as it stands, we prefer the old Google Maps.
The extra screen length
does give turn-by-turn Maps navigation – in portrait only – an advantage over
the iPhone 4S. Obviously, you can fit more map on screen, with the direction
tab sitting at the top, leaving a decent amount of space for the road you’re on
and your surroundings.
Walking and bicycle
routes can also be plotted. Voice directions are basic but clear, though it
doesn’t seem to utilise its traffic feature to route you around black spots to
your destination. It’s not bad for a free service.
iPhone 5: Passbook
Passbook is interesting.
Retailers and businesses will need to sign up – for free, apparently – but once
on board, you’ll be able to download flights, tickets, vouchers etc from them
and store them in a digital wallet. It’s a neat idea, and could mean users
don’t miss NFC, but as no UK outlets have signed up yet, we couldn’t test it,
though we did enjoy the slick email-to-Passbook path.
iPhone 5: 4G
Nor, regrettably, could
we test 4G. EE will be the first UK operator to offer a 4G package , which
we’re hoping will be ready to rock imminently. We’ve already seen how fast a
phone can operate on LTE (30Mbps+ on a HTC One X). Combined with the A6
processor, this should give an online speed change like no other.
Wireless spec
improvements for iPhone 5 include HSPA+, DC-HSDPA and, finally, dual-band N
Wi-Fi. When using our 5GHz home router, we experienced a better, more
consistent signal. A standard 3G signal also seemed to react quicker with our
tests putting an average of 2Mbps on download speeds. A case of the new
DC-HSDPA kicking in.
iPhone 5: Battery
In our testing,
real-world battery life doesn’t seem to have changed much since the iPhone 4S,
which could be seen as a good thing considering the iPhone 5 is a more advanced
product, but you’ll still need to charge it every night to give you enough
juice for the next day.
You can watch a couple
of films on a flight or listen to hours and hours of music on one charge, but
talking and 3G surfing take a heavier toll, and 4G connectivity could be even
more of a drain.
One very welcome
improvement are the new EarPods, which come as standard. While we think you can
get better cans for the £25 they cost as a separate purchase – check out our
Apple EarPods review – it’s great to have a better audio experience straight
out of the box.
Prices for the 16GB,
32GB and 64GB models are what we’ve come to expect from new smartphones;
expensive. The iPhone remains pricier than its competitors, both as a
standalone handset – you can get a 16GB Samsung Galaxy S3 for around £100 less
than the equivalent iPhone on Amazon – and on contract.
iPhone 5: Verdict
So, what to make of this
latest upgrade. There’s no denying that the iPhone 5 is a lovely thing, and the
best iPhone to date. It could well be Apple’s best-selling unit ever.
But a lot has changed in
a year, and the current crop of Android superphones – and the incoming Windows
Phone 8 handsets – have closed the gap. For nearly every “new” feature
announced at the Keynote, there was a Samsung, Android, Windows, Nokia, Sony or
HTC fan saying “my phone already does that.”
Apple’s competitors
never been closer in terms of quality, function and aesthetics and from your
feedback on our social networks we know how many of you are jumping ship to
phones with a bigger screen and more features.
Given that iPhone 4S
users can upgrade to iOS 6 and do just about everything the iPhone 5 can do,
and that Android users can get similarly impressive handsets for less dosh, we
reckon the smart money won’t all be going on a new iPhone this year, even if
the mass market can’t get enough of it. It’s good, very good. But it’s no
longer the best around.
Specs and Feature
Here’s a complete list of specs and features for the handset:
- 4-inch touchscreen Retina display (326 PPI) with 1136 x 640 resolution, 16:9 aspect ratio and integrated touch support
- Weight: 112g
- Size: 7.6mm
- A6 chip: twice faster than A5, 22% smaller
- Graphics: twice faster than predecessor
- 16/32/64GB memory
- 8-megapixel camera with five-element lens, backside illumination, hybrid IR filter, f/2.5 aperture, dynamic low light mode, precision lens alignment, sapphire crystal, panorama mode (28-megapixel photos), 1080p video recording, improved video stabilization, face detection, photo-taking while recording; size: 25% smaller
- A6 chip Photo features: next-gen ISP, spatial noise reduction, smart filter, better low-light performance, faster photo capture
- FaceTime HD front-facing camera with backside illumination, FaceTime over cellular, 720p video recording and face detection
- HSPA+, DC-HSPA, support
- LTE (single chip, single radio, dynamic antenna)
- LTE global support for Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, Bell, Telus, Rogers, SingTel, SmarTone, SK Telecom, KDDI, SoftBank, Deutsche Telekom, Everything Everywhere
- Wi-Fi: 802.11 a/b/g/n, 2.4GHz and 5GHz on 802.11n
- GPS with turn-by-turn directions
- Three microphones, bottom, front and back – improved speaker design: five magnet transducer, 20% smaller
- Wideband audio, Noise-cancelation ear-piece
- HD voice
- Battery life: 8 hours for 3G talk, 3G browsing or LTE browsing; 10 hours for Wi-Fi browsing and video playback, 40 hours for music playback and 225 hours standby
- New 9-pin connector called Lighting: all-digital 8-signal design, adaptive interface, improved durability, 80% smaller
- Siri support
- iOS 6
Iphone 5 release date is
September 21st and Apple Iphone 5 price will be 199$ for 16GB device, $299 for
a 32GB model and $399 for the 64GB version. You will be able to buy smartphone
in your local wireless carrier point, electronics shop and Apple stores, of
course.
