Friday, September 21, 2012

My iPhone 5 Review (Part 1)

The Wait Ends

After months of waiting, I've finally got the iPhone when it launched in Singapore on 21st September 2012.

Took me near 2 hours from queueing to getting the phone itself. Not really a long time.

Size and Weight

The first impression that I had when I first held the phone is my hand is that it's so light and slim it seems "hollow". One can even mistake it for one of those dummy prototypes showed handphone shops.

There are other light smartphones around such as the Galaxy S2 and S3. Both of these are light but because of the wider width, they don't give the same overall-lightness feeling that the iPhone 5 gives.

Maps

There are reports of several glitches in the new Apple Maps.

I tried the Fly-Over for New York. Some buildings and roads are so distorted that they look like they are in middle of a war zone.

Turn by Turn

I read some reports that the Turn by Turn was showing wrong routes and info.

I tried once yesterday over a short distance on Singapore street.
It finished with accuracy. No errors then.
I'll have to try more over a longer distance to conclude its accuracy.

User Interface

One of the main differences, which is a big improvement in this case, over the iPhone 4S is the bigger 4" screen.

It is taller, while maintaining the width. I really welcome that size proportion. I generally have a small palm and anytime wider than the width of iPhone 4S or Galaxy S2, I will find it hard to operate the phone with one hand.

With this difference in screen size, there's an impact to the app design. For those older apps that aren't designed to take the full advantage of the taller display, there will be 2 black rectangular boxes each at the top and bottom of the main app display.

But for those apps that have updated to take up the full screen estate, they just look gorgeous.

See next: My iPhone 5 Review (Part 2)

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