It’s only been few days since I got my iPhone 4S and started using iOS 5. Yes, I am one of those guys who decided to wait until iOS 5 is released not as beta before using it. As a long time Apple user, I have mixed opinions about this new version. iOS 5, iPhone 4S and Siri : since this review is about three products, let’s get started by the most anticipated mobile operating device on earth :
iOS 5
Notification Center
This is one of the best feature in iOS 5 that makes using iPhone a lot more comfortable. I have tried Blackberry and Android devices in the past and I must say that before iOS 5, they handled notification somewhat more usable than Apple’s way. That, of course, with iOS 5, is no longer the case. For notification, now we have banner, which displays notification on top of the screen, does not disturb our work, will disappear automatically after few seconds). The ability to choose between alert (our iOS 4 notification style) or banner for every app gives me the flexibility to sort out my priority, and work without being distracted all the time.
My only concern is the default setting of this new feature. Since most users need to set their own preferences, this will make Apple’s “just works” no longer true. Yes it’s not difficult to change those settings, but novice users or iPhone first-timers might find it confusing at first.
Customizable alert tones
Yes, I know that the majority of you already do this loooong ago from your jailbroken devices. But for me, who choose to keep my phone away from jailbreaking, this is a good news. Now I can FINALLY change my text tone into my custom collection. Two thumbs up for Apple !
iCloud
This goes without saying, is one of the most anticipated feature of iOS 5. However, since I already do my cloud computing on my Apple devices since long ago, iCloud is not going to change my habit that easily. I have used Gmail and Google Calendar for few years and feel comfortable about it. They are synced well with my iDevices and I will keep them synced, despite now Apple offers me.com email and their own cloud calendar. For Contacts, again, I also have my contacts synced with Gmail Contacts via a third party app called SyncInABlink and so far it work very smooth. But since I can actually sync my contacts with both Gmail Contacts and iCloud Contacts, I guess I will do both. For iCloud backup, I have tried it and successfully backup my app data. But somehow I can not find any way to use that backup data for restoring process. Or maybe it will appear next time I buy a new iPhone? Photo Stream sounds cool at first, but I turned it off after two days of usage and discovered that there is no way to delete individual photos in my cloud. The only way to delete our cloud photo is by reset button in iCloud website, and it will erase all our cloud photos. Now this is what I call bad cloud experience !
iMessage
Love this ! Though Yahoo Messenger and WhatsApp is usually enough for me, a messenger that will connect all iOS users is a great addition. In no time, me and my wife stop using all other messengers and only use iMessage instead. Took me few seconds to realize the difference between iMessage and operator-based text message, the blue vs green send button.
Overall Performance
While some people reported battery problem after upgrading to iOS 5, I do not have any problem with my iPhone battery. Maybe because I keep my notifications at minimum, my old habit since the previous iPhone. While iOS 5 works perfectly great in iPhone 4S, my greatest disappointment from iOS 5 is that my iPad (1st gen) and my iPod touch (4th gen) become noticeably slower after upgrade.
iPhone 4S
Yes, I finally can own an iPhone from the first day of availability. While some people posted their disappointment because this year’s iPhone is not iPhone 5, to me iPhone 4S is still an excellent product. The new A5 processor is certainly living up to my expectation, giving a lot smoother gaming and responsive daily usage. The availability of 64GB model can finally handles my movie contents.
4S camera is a lot better now. Not sure is it because of the increased megapixel, or they actually put better technology there. Photo quality is very acceptable, making me confident enough to use iPhone as my everyday camera.
Siri
The personal assistant is finally here. While a lot of Australians reported that Siri has problem understanding Australian accent, my experience with Siri has been reasonably good so far. Tried talk to her to play music, check my calendar, adding new calendar entry, adding new reminder, and setting my alarm. It’s quite sad that Siri can only help us with businesses in the US, at least for now. That certainly limits her helpfulness to a significant degree. Hope Apple will integrate Australian database in her capability soon.
Apple’s decision on Siri default settings is highly questionable. As one of the most anticipated feature in their new product, how can they set Siri as disabled by default (I need to struggle for few minutes before I realized that I need to enable in the setting app). After enabling Siri, then I realized that Siri can be activated when my phone is in locked mode, allowing people to access my calendar and make phone calls without a passcode. Then I realized that I can turn this off in the setting. So, Siri is off by default (which supposed to be active), but can be called without passcode by initial setting (which supposed to be off), bad choices Apple !
After some successful initial testing with Siri, I tried to actually use it in real usage. Then I realized that it’s not that practical in real use. When I speak a bit soft, she tends to misunderstand me. When I speak loud, I got some weird reaction from people around. Then I concluded that when I am outside, it is more practical to use “the normal way” instead of telling Siri to do something. When I’m at home (and have plenty of time), I also have no actual need to use Siri.
Well, the technology is not new. Apple’s implementation is not bad. Maybe it’s us, the user community, that is not yet ready for such change in interaction behavior with our phones.