It would seem that the iPhone is one of those inventions whose creators could spend a lifetime tweaking, enhancing, polishing, and improving while never changing its appearance or purpose. Yes, the new iPhone 3G S is physically identical to last year’s model. Place them side-by-side and no one can tell the difference, but turn it on and the improvements are significant. It’s faster, offers more memory, is more secure, more accessible, can perform real photography, includes a portable video editing solution, and thanks to a new fingerprint-resistant screen, never loses its glossy gleam. With these enhancements, coupled with all the new features included in the iPhone OS 3.0 software, it remains the best cellphone experience I’ve ever had.

 

 

Speed And Storage

 

Armed with a faster processor and more RAM, Apple claims that this new iPhone can perform twice as fast as last year’s model. At first use it’s hard to notice. Speed wasn’t exactly an issue with the previous iPhone and simply flicking through menu screens or surfing the web is unlikely to deliver a noticeable difference. I didn’t see it myself until I placed the two phones side-by-side for comparison. Yes, surfing the web is faster, but the impressive leap is in graphics-intensive applications such as MIM, which displays CT Scans, and Molecules which renders 3D models of biological molecules. You can now move through rendered slices of the human body with absolute ease and even the most complex molecular models, ones that choked on the previous iPhone, now load quickly.

This increase in performance will expand the limits for Apps and it will be fascinating to see developers respond with more sophisticated video games and scientific applications. As when Apple first introduced the addition of Apps, only time will show us just how this new feature will offer value.

The iPhone 3G introduces new storage sizes, doubling the choice from 8 GB and 16 GB to 16 GB and 32 GB. Even Apple was taken aback by the willingness of users to download hundreds of Apps as well as the increased demand for video content. This is one area where Apple is behind the curve as 32 GB is barely enough for many and the pressure will remain constant for Apple to expand the iPhone’s storage capacity.

Battery Life

Apple hasn’t given the iPhone a better battery so much as found ways to improve the phone’s performance when using Wi-Fi access, playing music, or watching video. It’s in these areas mainly where the phone tends to last longer. A heavy Wi-Fi user myself, I found the iPhone 3G to last me only two thirds of the day (I usually have to charge it again around 4 or 5 pm), but the iPhone 3G S manages to last right through nightfall and into the morning (thanks to standby power).

Fingerprint-Resistant Screen

The new iPhone has a screen coated with an oleophobic film, giving it a slightly slippery feel that makes it difficult for the surface to collect the natural skin oils that come off of our fingers. After a week of using the iPhone 3G S I’m astonished with the way the screen retains its glossy gleam. The clarity of the glass, dreamlike in its imperviousness, is hypnotic. Here is a feature I expect every touchscreen device manufacturer to copy and use.

3 Megapixel Camera

One of the embarrassing components with the two previous iPhone models has been the camera. Not only did it offer poor quality, but it seemed incapable of taking a picture in focus. Now with the iPhone 3G S, Apple has finally given us a proper photography solution with a three megapixel camera and an auto focus lens supported by auto exposure, brightness, and contrast. Pictures are clear, vibrant and, for the first time, worth printing.

 

An interesting omission with the camera is a zoom feature. A digital zoom, even a 2x one is after all, a software issue and since the iPhone 3G S can now perform twice as fast, it’s surprising to find none included. Apple suggests that when their team looks at the list of features to include in their devices, there are inevitable trade-offs and concessions to be made. Some features are left off in order to include others.

If this is the case with their “Tap To Focus” feature than I think they made the right move. As you line up the camera to take a shot, a rectangular reticule appears in the middle of the screen indicating the focal point. By simply tapping on different parts of the image you can change the camera’s focus, from an object in the foreground to the background or even a subject in the middle.

Most people tend to use their zoom mode to achieve this goal anyway. Rather than zoom in to bring your main interest into focus (and lose all the surrounding details) you can simply tap on it in the screen and give it the clarity you seek.

Video Camcorder

If there’s a wow factor to the 3G S it’s the camcorder which shoots VGA-quality video, but at thirty frames per second. The resulting clips are crisp, vibrant, and capable of capturing fast action. In their original state they play reasonably well on a 17” display, but once you send them as an attachment with an e-mail or MMS message, the compression is heavy enough to reduce the clip down to playable on mobile screens only. You can record video in both landscape or portrait mode, although landscape is best for playback on televisions and computer screens.

The video editing system is surprisingly easy and powerful. Based on the same concept as Apple’s Cut, Copy, and Paste feature included in the OS 3.0 update, you use a simple timeline along the top of the clip. Tap your finger on the very beginning or the very end of the timeline to drag a selector forwards or backwards, trimming off seconds or minutes from the end points.

To allow better editing control, when you place your finger along the timeline, it will zoom in, dividing the clip up into more and more seconds. At any time you can drag a playback bar to explore the section you’ve selected and continue to adjust the beginning and end points. Once you have the section you want, tap the trim icon to create an edited copy that you can then be shared through e-mail, MMS, YouTube, MobileMe, or onto your computer through USB. Very simple and quite a bit of fun to use.

Voice Control

As a hands-free solution many smartphones today offer a feature called Voice Control which allows you to speak commands to your phone instead of using the keypad or buttons. Apple’s version of this technology is quite remarkable as it requires no training. Speech recognition, even by the best, is tricky software and most have a hard time compensating for accents, dialects, and lazy speech patterns. Most Voice Control systems require you to perform a set of commands over and over so that the handset can record and learn to match how you speak the key words differently from its built-in library. Apple’s works right out of the box, and, quite astonishing, in thirty-two different languages.

Designed to work both with the controls of the cellphone and the iPod, you can have it dial out by a person’s name by saying “Call Seamus Mobile” or by number with “Call 647-555-3339”. With the iPod activated, you have a greater range of commands such as “Play the songs of Coldplay”, “Play album Queen”, “Play playlist showtime”. You can even ask “What song is this?” and a computerized voice will answer with the artist name and song title. You can also command it to “Play more songs like this”, “Next Track”, or “Shuffle”. It confirms the choice with a tone and repeats back the phrase with its own computerize voice.

The feature is activated with the Home button. You hold it down and speak. A waveform display appears on-screen so you can see how it registers your voice. As you can’t be expected to remember all the voice commands, it displays them across the screen. I’ve tested them all and the work really well, but only if you use them as they appear on the screen. Your own variations simply cause confusion.

Voice Control works with Apple’s included wired Earphones with Remote and Mic headset, but unfortunately not any Bluetooth headsets at this time. It would seem that every iPhone generation has to have one embarrassing oversight, a hands-free solution that won’t work with Bluetooth headsets is this one’s.

Digital Compass

All of the iPhone models have had special sensors in them. An accelerometer to detect when the phone is being held in different positions, a proximity sensor to turn off the screen when its next to your face, a light sensor to adjust the screen’s brightness to match the ambient light in the room, and a GPS sensor to pinpoint its location within a few hundred feet on Google Maps. The iPhone 3G S adds one more, a digital compass sensor that can detect either true north or magnetic north and from there determine which direction it’s facing.

You can access this with a Compass App included that displays a traditional navigational compass complete with wobbly needle and map coordinates. What may seem like a novelty item has real purpose if you use this app to launch your location into Maps. Combined, the two can help you plot out directions to a chosen location with the map automatically turning to matche the direction you’re facing. How many times have you used the Maps App for directions only to discover that you’re still going in the wrong direction? In a few foreign cities, I admit I have. The digital compass sensor can also be used by third-party developers for their own ideas and so only time will tell what that will bring us.

Hardware Encryption

Both the data on your phone as well as the back-up copy synced to your computer through iTunes can be protected with advanced encryption. In addition to securing your content, it also makes it easier to use the Remote Wipe command within Find My iPhone, a handset-tracking feature added to Apple’s subscription-based MobileMe service as part of the OS 3.0 software update. Now when you send the command, instead of overwriting each piece of data to erase it, a process that can take some time to complete, the service can instead send a command to discard the encryption key and in less than a second eliminate all of its data. Considering how easy it is for an educated thief to turn Find My iPhone off on a stolen handset, this speedy wipe can make a big difference.

Accessibility

For far, far too long Apple’s iPod products have remained outside the grasp of disabled users. It’s astonishing to think that for the past eight years those who are blind, have low vision, or are deaf in one ear have not been capable of participating in the revolution started by the iPod.

Thankfully this has now changed, at least with the iPhone 3G S. It’s difficult for me to review these features, but from what I’ve seen of them they are creative, innovative, and diverse enough in options to handle a variety of needs.

Voice Over gives the iPhone the ability to read aloud with a computer voice the different options that appear on the touchscreen. Just tap a spot to have it tell you what’s there and then tap and hold to activate the icon or option.

Universal zoom increases screen magnification by 500 times and uses a three finger touch system to navigate while White on Black is a mode that reverses the screen’s colour scheme for a higher contrast and seems to do so quite intelligently.

Mono audio performs a rather simple, but helpful task, sending both stereo channels into one earbud for those with hearing in only one ear. These features, along with Voice Control, help take advantage of the iPhone’s intuitive simplicity to include a whole new demographic, one that can help Apple better explore the iPhone concept as a whole. Now we just need them on the iPod Touch.

Several years ago Apple helped launch a fitness product for the iPod nano called Nike+iPod that allowed the device to track a runner through an added sensor in their shoe. Despite the popularity of the product, it’s as if Apple has forgotten it with its latest devices. Now with the iPhone 3G S it’s picked the trail up again.

Third Generation, Same Great Genes 

While every change and enhancement given to the iPhone 3G S is for the positive and represents a better iPhone than what we’ve seen before, the truth is that these specific features are only one third of what makes Apple’s “Third Generation” iPhone. The rest, a collection of more than one hundred changes, are found within the iPhone OS 3.0 Software update which I’ve reviewed in-depth here. It’s only with these two combined that we have a significant move leap forward.

What this means is that for new users, the iPhone 3G S remains one of the top smartphones on the market, delivering an experience that other manufacturers have yet to match, but for those who purchased the iPhone 3G last year, who have been given the OS 3.0 update for free, the change is only incremental and you’re better off waiting until the next upgrade to spend your money again.

For Apple the iPhone is clearly an obsession and even as I write this you can bet their engineers are chewing through the possibilities, looking for ways to make the same phone do more if not do things better. Give them another year and they will delight us again.