Checked out our iPhone 4 review? No? What are you waiting for? Go read it, then come back here for an extra scoop of gadget opinion. Electricpig’s editorial team serve up their thoughts on the new Apple smartphone. Do you agree?
Read the rest of our iPhone 4 review
iPhone 4 review
iPhone 4 review: New design
iPhone 4 review: Retina Display
iPhone 4 review: HD video and iMovie
iPhone 4 review: Worth the upgrade?
iPhone 4 review: Sample photos
iPhone 4 review: Live Q&A
James Holland, Electricpig.co.uk editor (Our iPhone 4 review author)
Apple haters lurk around every corner, but while others have been bitching and moaning about the iPhone 4 and its antenna issue, I’ve just got on with falling in love with mine. The screen stuns everyone who sees it. My first iPhone 4 photos are already better than any previous cameraphone, and barring a slight hiccup slicing my O2 SIM down to Micro size, it’s been smooth sailing since I pried it from that Cupertino-white packaging.
Is it the best phone ever made? I think it probably is. Not because of the specs, but because of the fit and finish, from software to hardware and all the little bits in between Apple likes to call “the experience” – they’ve included enough enhancements to silence the haters, and enough new software trickery to lure in the fanboys. It’s the perfect balance. So much so that the only criticism left is that holding it a funny way makes the signal strength dip. A bit. Good luck with that argument, I’ve been using mine normally for days, and have yet to drop a single call. Maybe you really are holding it wrong.
Ben Sillis, Electricpig.co.uk reviews editor
I can’t fault the iPhone 4 itself. Antenna issues aside, it’s the most stunning gadget I’ve ever held, and I was never taken with the fat and fingerprinty iPhone 3G/3GS shell. I genuinely think for 3.5-inch screens, the iPhone 4 has now crossed a threshold. Now, it’s only about colour and power consumption – now that you can’t see the pixels, it simply never needs to be any sharper.
But the reason I’ve not bought an iPhone up until now still persists with the iPhone 4. I’m still concerned about the lack of transparency Apple gives with approvals on its app store. I’ve noticed it less recently, but the run ins that butchered Google Latitude and Google Voice on the iPhone made me supremely uneasy. Likewise Apple’s complete readiness to throw developers under a train and boot all the bikini babe apps off iTunes, as crass as they were. Perhaps there simply haven’t been as many high profile incidents recently, since Apple’s managed to kill off innovation on its platform already. Certainly Apple needs to break out of the paradigm of individual apps only for iOS 5, and finally open the door on widgets.
Sure, you can make a pretty decent HTML5 web app these days if Apple doesn’t play ball. But the problem extends to Apple’s potential editorial censorship on the iPhone too: note the case of a Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist having his app turned away for mocking the President. I’m sorry, but Apple has no business vetting this – make an adult lock and then step away.
Until this changes I probably won’t be buying the iPhone 4 either. I’m waiting for the first Android 2.2 ROM or update to hit the Dell Streak and getting one ASAP. Still, if anything can make me overturn my principles, it’s the iPhone 4′s screen. One word sums it up better than reams of text: Damn.
Just damn.
Jennifer Allan, Electricpig.co.uk reporter
Being from the North, I view most things with a healthy dose of skepticism. That includes the iPhone 4. Mine arrives with the second batch, next week, and after spending a day with Apple fanboys on Regent Street flushed with the excitement of the next in the series of magical and revolutionary devices, plus friends and colleagues variously petting and stroking their devices in my presence, I am looking forward to it enormously. However, I am very aware that this device is far from perfect.
That’s mostly because it’s a phone which is terrible at performing what could be said is its most fundamental function: making phone calls. One friend said it was the worst phone he’d ever had, but the best “phone” he’d ever had. Those inverted commas mean a lot. A device that does not do what its name defines it as doing has been the most successful products launch Apple have ever had.
But perhaps our devices, like us, have evolved past the need for basic functions like making phone calls, just like men no longer hunting wild animals. It’s just a bit, well, primitive. Don’t you think?
Read the rest of our iPhone 4 review
iPhone 4 review
iPhone 4 review: New design
iPhone 4 review: Retina Display
iPhone 4 review: HD video and iMovie
iPhone 4 review: Worth the upgrade?
iPhone 4 review: Sample photos
iPhone 4 review: Live Q&A
