Apple's iPhone 4 and iOS4 Features

There iPhone 4 is much more than just a step for Apple; it is their best yet. When the iPhone first made the scene in 2007, Apple fans just knew it would be a hit. The fans stuck around, even through all the bad press to show the world that the Apple iPhone was the best. Now, with their newest arrival, the iPhone 4 along with the iOS4, Apple has taken the “cannot do” attitude and turned it into a “can do” attitude.

Display
The display is probably the most interesting thing about the new iPhone 4. It is called a Retina display and it allegedly has a resolution so high that the human eye cannot see any pixels. However, it is wiser to not that this Retina display only works when the iPhone 4 is held at least 18 inches from the eyes; otherwise the pixels can be seen, according to a Doctor who commented at PCWorld.com.

However, the display is beautiful nonetheless. The display size is 3.5 inches diagonal widescreen with a 960-pixel by 640-pixel resolution. The part that makes it a Retina display is that there are 336 pixels per inch, which is, according to Apple, four times as many pixels as in earlier models, such as the iPhone 3GS. Additionally, an oleophobic coating on the glass makes it almost smudge proof.

Power & Connectivity
The power making everything happen for the iPhone 4 is double that of the iPhone 3GS at 512 RAM. Additionally, it uses the exact processor the iPad does, so that means iPhone 4 is using an A4 processor which is known to clock at least 1Ghz.

As for its wireless connectivity, the iPhone 4 is plagued by an exclusive AT&*T contract, of which is known for its weak signal strength and too many dead zones when it comes to 3G signal, despite having the fastest download speeds in the country. However, this iPhone does offer support for Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR, IEEE 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi, GSM/EDGE and HSDPA support. These bands offer talk time of up to seven hours on a 3G signal and 14 hours on a 2G signal in addition to 300 hours of standby time, six hours 3G Internet time, 10 hours on Wi-Fi Internet time, 10 hours of video and 40 hours of audio.

Multitasking
The first thing to note about the iPhone 4 and its upgraded iOS is its multitasking features. While Apple comes to this part of the game quite late, it is better than not being there at all. Multitasking is a part of smartphone life and anyone who owns a smartphone without multitasking will tell you that having it to use is necessary these days. In addition, the iPhone 4 now allows more than one application to run at a time. This means that users no longer need to close out one in favor of launching another.

While this may be a time saver and long awaited feature, it only works with some of the applications-the ones Apple has allowed to run. These include the Pandora media player, VoIP, GPS, some forms of messaging and downloading. Additionally, for those apps the user has left open in favor of using another, when he switches back to the app, it will start in the same place where he stopped using it.

Video
This is another long awaited feature of the new and improved iPhone 4 and its iOS. Whereas in the past video chat was allegedly never going to happen, iOS4 made it happen. While Skype is still disallowed to run on the iPhone, another video chat application called FaceTime. Additionally, the iPhone 4 supports video up to 720p at 30 fps and up to 1024 pixels by 768 pixels using the Dock Connector to a VGA Adapter as well. As for the camera, there is two of them. One for the video and the other takes 5 megapixel photos using a LED flash, autofocus and Geotagging support.

Overall
The biggest drawback to the iPhone 4 is the newly discovered antenna problem. If the user holds the iPhone from the bottom left hand corner, it will lose signal. The solution? Apply for the free case program in which Apple will send the iPhone owner a free casing so that the user never completes the circus, thus shorting out the signal. Users can apply at Apple’s website. Alternatively, simply do not hold the iPhone in the “death grip,” as it is known. Otherwise, the iPhone 4 has made some decent improvements over earlier models and is worth a look for those who have never owned one before.